Late Morning
Clear
Languages based on sound, like English, are pretty easy to denote. Whereas logographic/ideographic languages use symbols to represent objects or ideas, the symbols in languages like English represent sounds. This is convenient, as there are many more objects and ideas in the world than there are possible human mouth sounds, so we only have to memorize a handful of symbols to function.
Though linguists generally agree that the precise symbolism used in English is arbitrary (i.e. there is nothing of the letters in English meant to signify more than just sound), there are times where the symbolic representation of the word is surprisingly close to the referent of the word. A classic example of this is the word 'bed', in which the 'b' and the 'd' make up the headboard and footboard of the bed and the 'e' forms the cushioning.
This can happen in more subtle ways, too. Take the word 'through', for example. A pretty arbitrary mapping from symbols to meaning, if you ask me. But compare this to the word 'thorough', which is a mere letter difference from 'through'. If you imagine the meaning of 'through', you can picture an arrow going through an apple, a ghost passing through a body, wind blowing through branches, etc. All of these suggest some object (or continuous force) travelling beyond the permeable outside of some other object and travelling beyond to the other side. To illustrate this:
The word 'thorough' is semantically and visually more fleshed out, as though one took the word 'through' and stretched it from the first and last letter, popping an extra 'o' out. To do something thoroughly is to do it rigorously and completely. If an action is done to an object thoroughly, that object has been completely permeated, every facet acted upon; not simply a passing through. A diagrammatic representation could look as follows.
I wonder if the semantic-symbolic connection can carry further from this line of reasoning, perhaps growing in completeness with the word 'throughout'. Though there are many related words that are symbolically close to these words but would not semantically fit, like 'though' and 'trough'. The words 'thorough' and 'through' are etymologically related also, which could account for their similarity in meaning. Regardless, this is a pretty neat example of the consequence of arbitrary symbol-meaning mappings: order where there shouldn't be.
Note: I choose pretty narrow definitions of the subject words in this post. This is mostly done to illustrate my point, which is about as practical as the study of autological words. The self-reference is a bit different, though.
