echoic
pronunciation
How to pronounce echoic in British English:
UK [e'kəʊɪk]
How to pronounce echoic in American English:
US [e'koʊɪk]
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- Adjective:
- (of words) formed in imitation of a natural sound
- like or characteristic of an echo
Word Origin
- echoic (adj.)
- 1880; see echo (n.) + -ic. A word from the OED. Onomatopoeia, in addition to its awkwardness, has neither associative nor etymological application to words imitating sounds. It means word-making or word-coining and is strictly as applicable to Comte's altruisme as to cuckoo. Echoism suggests the echoing of a sound heard, and has the useful derivatives echoist, echoize, and echoic instead of onomatopoetic, which is not only unmanageable, but when applied to words like cuckoo, crack, erroneous; it is the voice of the cuckoo, the sharp sound of breaking, which are onomatopoetic or word-creating, not the echoic words which they create. [James A.H. Murray, Philological Society president's annual address, 1880]
Example
- 1. Application of pulse sound measurement technique to acoustic measurement of fiber-optic hydrophones in an echoic tank is presented .