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Otto Jesperson

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Tricia Calimlim
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240 views10 pages

Otto Jesperson

Uploaded by

Tricia Calimlim
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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OTTO

JESPERSEN’S
LANGUAGE
ORIGIN
HYPOTHESIS
B Y: A D R I E N N E A N D G W E N A
OTTO
JESPERSEN
OTTO
• Otto Jespersen, in full Jens Otto Harry Jespersen,

JESPERSEN
• (born on July 16, 1860, Randers, Den.-died April 30,
1943, Roskilde),

• Danish linguist and a foremost authority on English


grammar.

• He helped to revolutionize language teaching in


Europe and contributed greatly to the advancement of
phonetics, linguistic theory, and the history of English.
OTTO JESPERSEN'S
LANGUAGE ORIGIN
HYPOTHESIS
BOW-WOW
POOH-POOH THEORY
THEORY
DING-DONG THEORY
LA-LA / SING-SONG THEORY

YO-HE-YO THEORY
THEORY
BOW-
WOW
The bow-wow theory. Language began
as imitations of natural sounds -- moo,
choo-choo, crash, clang, buzz, bang,
meow. This is more technically referred
to as onomatopoeia or echoism.
THEORY
POOH-
POOH
The pooh-pooh theory. Language
began with interjections, instinctive
emotive cries such as oh! for surprise
and ouch! for pain.
THEORY
DING-
DONG
This theory maintains that speech arose
in response to the essential qualities of
objects in the environment. The original
sounds people made were supposedly in
harmony with the world around them.
THEORY
LA-LA/ SING-
SONG
The sing-song theory. Jesperson suggested that
language comes from play, laughter, cooing,
courtship, emotional mutterings, etc. He even
suggests that contrary to other theories, some
of our first words were long and musical,
rather than the short grunts many assume we
started with.
THEORY
YO-HE-YO
According to this theory,
language evolved from the
grunts, groans, and snorts
evoked by heavy physicallabor.
THANK
YOU!!!

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