En réponse à julien eychenne <eychenne.j@...>:
>
> I would agree with Christophe saying that this suffix reduplication
> has
> a hypocoristic value, and is essentially found in affective words.
> Compare :
> "tonton" vs "oncle" 'uncle'
> "tata" vs "tante" 'aunt'
> "lolo" vs "lait" 'milk' (plural "lolos" means "boobs")
> "mémé" vs "grand-mère" 'grand-mother'
> "pépé" vs "grand-père" 'grand-father'
Don't forget the most important: papa and maman :)) . And I never used pépé and
mémé but papi and mami.
> And if I remember well, the famous Toto we find in every child-joke
> comes from Christophe :)
>
I thought it came from Thomas? Anyway, when she was very young, my sister
couldn't pronounce the consonant clusters of my name and I got from that the
nickname Tita, followed later by Titof (when she mastered coda consonants ;)) ).
Christophe.
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