The Phonetic Evidence and its Effect on Directing Meaning According to Ibn Ya'eesh (d. 643 Hegira)

Abstract

The phonetic evidence is considered an important aspect of language for it is the art of uttering speech to clarify its pronunciation and unveil its meaning or it is "the art of affecting the addressee with all his auditory, emotional, and visual senses". It is likely that the first of what has reached us from the Arabic heritage is the book "Al-Ain" which affirmed the relationship between sound and its meaning. The ancient Arab linguists had found that there is a natural connection between the sounds and their meanings as stated by the advocates of the resemblance theory which is one of the theories of language development.