Peter's point about the attractiveness/ugliness of a word as a function of its meaning is interesting. Can language be pure music with "meaning" only in the rhythm and tone? "Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe" for example. Linguists among us probably could help with the question.
I find Swahili is musical because of its syllabic alliterative rhythm: kidogo kijiji;
samaki, nyama na ndizi;
ziwa Manyara na Momella;
wakubwa wadudu; bomba la maji .
A non-Swahili speaker can hear the song without knowing the meaning (that one phrase means "huge bugs," for example). On the other hand, could "death" sound appealing, or at least neutral, spoken by a beautiful woman (or man) in some context?
I'm off to luxuriate in my mzuri sana mchumba.
Kwa heri.
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