Reduplication

[Matthew Dryer]

Walman, a Papuan language, is similar to what Östen says about Russian.  
While the diminutive most typically conveys both small size and 
endearment, it can also be used only to express endearment or only to 
express small size.

Matthew

On 3/3/13 10:41 PM, Östen Dahl wrote:
> I am not sure if Paul's claim about the non-existence of diminutive constructions that refer only to small size implies that no diminutive could ever be used referring only to size, but at least in Russian there are diminutives that seem fairly free of evaluative or expressive meaning. For instance, "stol-ik" does not seem to mean anything but "small table":
> http://ru.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%B8%D0%BA
>
> - östen
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Discussion List for ALT [mailto:LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG] On Behalf Of Paul Hopper
> Sent: den 3 mars 2013 22:14
> To: LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG
> Subject: Re: Reduplication
>
> Dear Alex, David and All,
>
> Thanks, Alex, for sharing this most interesting article. I notice that in fact even in the examples you cite, smallness is not present as an undiluted feature of reduplication--"distribution" or "fragmentation" is also involved, and sometimes also collectivity and plurality, which is (and you point this out also) characteristic of the meaning of reduplication in other Austronesian languages. You note a kind of paradox
> here: "distribution" is expansive, but diminution is contractive:
>
> "On touche ici du doigt un paradoxe de la réduplication nominale. D'un côté, l'effet d'éclatement suggère une croissance en étendue, comme si fragmenter une entité revenait à la multiplier, à la distribuer sur un grand nombre d'occurrences – d'où les valeurs plurielles et collectives.
> Mais par ailleurs, ce même processus de fragmentation revient à représenter la notion N sous une forme réduite, comme s'il s'agissait, cette fois-ci, de la diviser – d'où les valeurs diminutives attestées en mwotlap, comme dans d'autres langues austronésiennes." (from Alex François' article)
>
> I'm not convinced that we have examples of a diminutive construction that refers only to small size, but my confidence is wavering a little.
>
> - Paul
>
>
>
>> hello,
>>
>> Reduplication is common in Austronesian languages, with a variety of
>> meanings.
>> One of these meanings (albeit a rare one, and non-productive) is
>> diminutive.
>>
>> e.g. West Tarangan (Maluku, Indonesia):   *seldi* 'shrimp' =>
>> *sel**sel**di*'small shrimp'   (Nivens 1993: 384)
>>
>>         Manam (Oceanic, PNG):  *moata* 'snake'  =>  *moata-moata* 'worm'
>> (Lichtenberk 1983: 611)
>>
>>         Mwotlap (Oceanic, Vanuatu):  *Ä“y* 'lobster'  =>  *Ä“y**Ä“y*
>> 'shrimp'
>> (François 2004: 181)
>>                             *qol* 'surgeonfish, larger variety'  =>
>> *qolqol*'surgeonfish, smaller variety'
>>
>> I mentioned these examples in my discussion of reduplication and its
>> polysemy in the language Mwotlap.
>> Reduplication is there only fully productive for verbs and adjectives;
>> for nouns, it is a process of lexical derivation, which only affects
>> some lexemes.
>> Its semantics include (on nouns) diminutive, qualitative, plural, and
>> (on
>> verbs) pluractional, distributive, intensive, atelic, intensional,
>> infinitive, etc.  I tentatively proposed the notion of "fragmentation"
>> as a way to capture reduplication's core underlying meaning in this
>> language.
>>
>> François, Alexandre. 2004. La réduplication en mwotlap : les
>> paradoxes du
>> fractionnement<http://alex.francois.free.fr/data/AlexFrancois_2004_Reduplication_Mwotlap.pdf>.
>> In Elizabeth Zeitoun (ed.), *Les langues
>> austronésiennes<http://fdl.univ-lemans.fr/fr/liste-des-numeros/n23_24.html>.
>> *Special issue of *Faits de langues* n°24: 177-195.
>>
>> Incidentally, Mwotlap does not use reduplication for hypocoristic
>> functions.  The diminutive meaning is thus here "pure", i.e. not
>> contaminated by any affective meaning such as expressivity, endearment
>> or familiarity  — a situation Paul suggested should be “difficult,
>> perhaps impossible” to find.
>>
>> best,
>> Alex
>>
>> ********
>>
>> 2013/3/3 Anvita Abbi<anvitaabbi at gmail.com>
>>
>>> Dear Scott,
>>> Base reduplication for diminutives or for approximation of taste and
>>> color adjectives is common in most of the Indo-Aryan languages , e.g.
>>> *hari '*green'* *but *hari hari *'greenish' or *karwa *'bitter' but
>>> *karwa karwa *'somewhat bitter' in Hindi.
>>> Munda languages such as Kharia also have similar structures, e.g.
>>> *goej*  'dead' but *goej goej* 'dead-like'.
>>> Kurux, a North Dravidian language shares the structure with Hindi
>>> because of contact with IA languages.
>>> Austroasiatic languages such as Khasi is very rich in expressive
>>> morphology to indicate diminutive meaning but the non reduplicated
>>> part can not be considered a base as it has no meaning of its own.
>>> For details see *Reduplication in South Asian languages. An areal,
>>> typological and historical study *(1991) by Anvita Abbi.. Allied
>>> Publishers.
>>> Anvita
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 10:02 AM, Scott T. Shell<ay2493 at wayne.edu>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hello all,
>>>>
>>>> I'm looking for languages that reduplicate base forms to create
>>>> diminutives.
>>>>
>>>> An example from Bamyili Creole:
>>>>
>>>> bragbrag        'froggy'          pəpəp         'puppy'
>>>> daŋgidaŋgi      'donkey'          daldal        'dollie'
>>>>
>>>> Can anyone else help add to this list? It is important that the
>>>> reduplication process carries no grammatical information. Also, I
>>>> must point out that I am not looking for partial base reduplication.
>>>> It must be the entire base.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> Scott T. Shell
>>>> Graduate Student, Wayne State University
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Prof. Anvita Abbi
>>> Centre for Linguistics
>>> School of Language, Literature and Culture Studies Jawaharlal Nehru
>>> University New Delhi 110067 www.andamanese.net
>>> President: Linguistic Society of India
>>> URL:
>>> http://www.jnu.ac.in/FacultyStaff/ShowProfile.asp?SendUserName=anvita
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>> --
>> Alex François
>> LACITO-CNRS<http://lacito.vjf.cnrs.fr/index_en.htm>, France;
>> Australian National
>> University<http://chl.anu.edu.au/disciplines/linguistics/index.php>,
>> Canberra
>> http://alex.francois.free.fr
>>
>
> --
> Paul J. Hopper,
> Paul Mellon Distinguished Professor of Humanities Emeritus, Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, Tel. 412-683-1109, Fax 412-268-7989.
>
> Adjunct Professor of Linguistics,
> Department of Linguistics,
> University of Pittsburgh.
>
> Senior External Fellow,
> School of Linguistics and Literature,
> Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS), Freiburg i.Br., Germany