Pronunciation

Onomatopeia is a fancy way to describe words that sound like what they mean. For instance, in English, bees "buzz" and cats "meow". Words for animal sounds are almost always built on how the animals actually sound to listeners. But that can be different in different languages. Since each language has its own set of sounds to work with, they hear animals based on those sounds.

For example, a rooster's crow is translated as:

• "Cockadoodle doo!" in English;
• "Kikiriki!" in Spanish; and
• "Kok-e-kok-ko!" in Japanese.

This video shows people from all over the world saying animal sounds in their language. How would you write the sounds the animals make in your language?