Sound symbolic patterns in Pokémon move names
Shigeto Kawahara
direct link: http://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/003742
November 2017
Recent studies have shown that there are sound symbolic patterns in Pokémon names in such a way that those Pokémon characters with longer names tend to be stronger. They also found that voiced obstruents in the Pokémon characters’ names correlate with the characters’ strength parameters. Building on these observations, this short paper tests whether the same sound symbolic patterns hold in the moves (“waza or ?” in Japanese) that Pokémon characters use during their battles. The results of the current investigation show that similar patterns found the previous studies also hold in the names of Pokémon moves, further supporting the role of sound symbolic relationships in Pokémon naming patterns. More generally, the current study provides another case in which there is a non-arbitrary relationship between sounds and meanings. [This paper is in collaboration with Michinori Suzuki (ICU)].