Re: Plurals via reduplication in Japanese (was Re: Adopting a plural)
| From: | Steven Williams <feurieaux@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Friday, October 8, 2004, 15:29 |
|---|
I think I remembering hearing 'samazama', which I take
to be a plural of 'sama', which means something like
'lord' (well, person of significantly higher status
than the speaker; damn Japanese sociolinguistics).
--- Tim May <butsuri@...> a écrit :
> Paul Bennett wrote at 2004-10-08 09:25:45 (-0400)
>
> > Aren't there also some small number of plural
> nouns in Japanese
> > formed by reduplication? They're fossils, but
> certainly existent,
> > or so the conversation went. I swear that not too
> long ago on this
> > very list somebody (but I fail to recall who)
> posted a short list
> > of them. I think it was actually to do with /h/ ~
> /p/ ~ /b/ and the
> > sound changes that made them what they are. The
> examples were
> > showing that the sound change only happened in
> initial (or was it
> > non-initial?) position. One example was habipabi
> or huriburi or
> > something. Damn, I wish I could remember it
> better.
> >
>
> Hito (person) > hitobito (people)
> Shima (island) > shimajima (islands)
>
> Those are the two examples I know of.
>
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