When is the last time you heard someone exclaim whee, pronounced like we with the long e carried all the way through the exhale?
For that matter, is whee even a word?
Yes!
Whee is an interjection, a part of speech that expresses a heightened emotional state.
Other examples of interjections are wow, oh, and aw. When delivered in an emphatic tone with telling facial expressions and body language, the remarks bypass cultural and language barriers.
Accordingly, well before babies and toddlers can formulate words and sentences to articulate precisely how they feel, they instinctively grasp the essence of whee. With only a nudge of encouragement (“Say whee!”) from an adult or older child, they’ll readily mimic the sound of sheer joy, excitement, and freedom.
While whee-inspired moments vary by child and circumstance, they commonly entail physical, heart-pumping activities that happen outdoors: reaching new heights in a swing, hopping (or being lifted) to receive an approaching wave in the surf, jumping into a mound of fallen leaves and tossing them in the air, sledding down a snowy bank, running towards the wind with a kite, and so on.
Choruses of whees mixed with other gleeful notes—as in the happy squeals and unfettered laugher of youngsters at play—should resound in every community. We all know that children don’t thrive when they’re confined inside, and a virtual world is no substitute for real adventures.
Just as they must have nourishing food and ample sleep, children require abundant whee-evoking activities to flourish—and so do we!
Sallie W. Boyles, a.k.a. Write Lady
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