Definition
An ideophone is a member of a set of words that
- are phonologically distinguishable from other words in a language
- are often onomatopoeic, and
- form one or more syntactic classes or subclasses, most typically adverbial.
Examples
(Hausa)
Hausa adverbs have a distinctive obstruent-vowel-obstruent pattern, as in the following:
- kaf ‘completely’
- kas ‘specklessly’
- kat ‘with a snapping sound’
Sources 1
- Schachter 1985, 21