An onomatopoeia...

Being a mix of my curiosity and need for a little writing project I'm working on, there's this question I'm having: What's the onomatopoeia (I really like how there's no shortened way to say that word) for the sound a penguin makes? It would be cool too if any of you knew such onomatopoeia in japanese}

and also, it just hits me, how to pronounce onomatopoeia in english? (second language) I never heard anyone saying it, and google translator insists it's onomato-poe-ya while I'm almost sure it's onomato-pee-ya

edited 25th May '12 9:49:47 PM by ElectricBoogaloo

I think penguins make a noise similar to "quack".

And you're right, it's pronounced onomato-pee-ya.

I think it's funny that we've officially classified "onomato" as a single syllable

I figured it didn't need to be broken down into syllables since the question was just about how "poeia" is pronounced.

Though, that means I probably didn't need "onomato" there in the first place.

edited 4th Jun '12 1:12:02 PM by Malph

It's not pronounced that way. Onomatopoeia is Ancient Greece which doesn't support oe = one sound like Latin (e.g. subpoena) or Germanic languages. You pronounce it the same way as poem or poetic.