ABSTRACT
Expressives in Nepali constitute a word class with conspicuous and pronounced sound symbolic properties. As parts of speech, expressives exhibit roughly the same syntactic valence as adverbs and predicate adjectives, and they fulfil functions similar to those parts of speech. Despite their phonaesthetic and sometimes onomatopoeic character, Nepali expressives do not have vague senses, but instead convey precise meanings and evoke highly specific images. The Nepali language is richly endowed with onomatopoeia, and onomatopoeic parts of speech that convey acoustic imagery might be nouns or verbs. A number of Nepali expressives are reduplicated or rhyming forms. A smaller and perhaps even more fascinating subset of expressives exhibits neither gemination nor evince reduplication or rhyme. As parts of speech, Nepali expressives are distinguished from simple adverbs, which in Nepali may have meanings which are not necessarily so simply expressed in English.
