Laughter is one of the most universal human expressions. It is an emotional reflection that transcends cultures, languages and situations, but, when transferred to the world of written messagesit is not at all easy to faithfully and adequately represent their sound. In this context, the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) explained what is the right way to “write” laughter in texts, and it’s not the way everyone believes.
For many, the traditional “hahaha” It is enough to express hilarity in messages and social networks; However, the RAE emphasizes that this form is not entirely appropriate from a legal point of view. grammatical. The interest of the RAE for onomatopoeia because it’s not a coincidence. These expressions have evolved over time to adapt to daily use and new forms of communication. In the digital age, where much of our interactions are through written messages, onomatopoeia is essential for conveying emotions and reactions that would otherwise require gestures or tone of voice.
This is the right way to laugh in writing according to the RAE
According to the RAE, the correct representation of laughter in Spanish must be “ha, ha, ha”, with commas inserted between each “ha”. This proposition is based on several linguistic arguments. First, it avoids creating a compound word, as happens when you write “hahaha” in a continuous block.
According to Spanish stress rules, “jajaja” would be a simple word that should have an accent, since its stress would fall on the penultimate syllable. Using commas to separate the elements, they are presented as individual expressionswhich eliminates the need to apply stress rules for compound words.
In addition, the RAE emphasizes that the writing “ha, ha, ha” more faithfully reflects the real sound of laughter in Spanish, maintaining the use of the letter “j”, characteristic of our language to express this type of sound . This approach also seeks to adapt to universal nature of onomatopoeiawhose aim is to represent as faithfully as possible the sounds to which they refer.
There’s more to the RAE explanation than “hahaha.” The institution also indicated that variants such as “hehehe”, “jojojo” or “jijiji” They must follow the same pattern. So the correct thing would be to write “heh, heh, heh” for ironic or mocking laughter, “ho, ho, ho” for deeper or sarcastic laughter, and “hee, hee, hee” for suppressed laughter or nervous. laugh. This approach allows each type of laughter to have its own appropriate representation, thus enriching Spanish’s ability to convey emotional nuances in written conversations.
Another important clarification concerns the use of “hahaha”a common representation of laughter in English. In this language, the “h” has an aspirated sound, which makes it suitable for conveying the sound of laughter. However, in Spanish, the “h” is silent and has no phonetic equivalent, making this expression incorrect for our language. Although “hahaha” has become popular on social media and chats due to the influence of English, it is not considered appropriate in standard Spanish.
Although the RAE insists on separating the elements of laughter with commas, there are cases where it allows letters to be joined to form a word. This occurs when laughter functions as a noun, as in the expression “He said between laughing and hahaha”. In these cases, “jajajás” has an accent because it becomes an acute word ending in “s”, respecting the spelling rules of Spanish.
Another acceptable example would be “A lot of jijijí and little work”where “jijijí” acts as a noun and is written with an accent in the last syllable, following the rules for accenting acute words.
In short, the Royal Spanish Academy has taken an important step in proposing a correct way to write laughter in Spanish. Although the traditional “hahaha” is still widely used, adopting “ha, ha, ha” with interspersed commas provides a more accurate and respectful representation of grammar rules. In addition, this standard makes it possible to nuance the different types of laughter depending on the context, thus enriching written communication.
Examples of onomatopoeia
Onomatopoeias are expressions that imitate natural sounds and which are frequently used in written language to recreate auditory situations.
For example, when we want to represent the sound of a drop of water falling, we use the onomatopoeia “plic, plic”. Similarly, to describe the sound of an explosion, “boom” is used. In addition to nature sounds, onomatopoeia also imitates the noises that animals make: the cat’s meow This is expressed as “meow”. Finally, there are also onomatopoeia that reflect human sounds: “achís” is the onomatopoeia used to represent a sneeze.
