Re: THEORY: Reduplication

Tom Wier wrote:


>> In a message dated 05/20/2002 05.51.08 PM, Jeffrey@HENNING.COM writes:
>>
>> >I've been wondering what I should do with reduplication.  I've been
afraid
>> >that it sounds to speakers of Western European languages rather childish
>> >and pidgin-like.
>
>Missed the original post to this...
I can't find it either-- but as to Indonesian:  reduplication with "2" leads
to some minor graphic problems--

anak2 'children' is fine.  anak2an 'doll' is fine, but pluralized would
probably be written out-- anak-anakan2 rather than anak2an2.  In older
works, a hyphen was used-- anak2-an; I'm not sure what current usage is.
(Actually I suspect a repetitious form like "anak-anakan anak-anakan" would
simply be avoided if at all possible.)

with a circumfix:  ke-anak2-an 'childish', or keanak2an; memperanak2an
'treat like a child'--it is understood that the prefix is not reduplicated.

jadi 'become; finished' -- men-jadi2 'to increase', men-jadi2-kan 'to make
worse'

With some difficulty I found a reduplicated verb form with nasal
substitution:

kobar 'to flare up'-- the dict. writes "me-ng-...2-kan" implying
mengobar-ngobarkan 'to stir up, arouse';  but I suspect there could be cases
where the second member doesn't have the nasal, so a form like
**mengobar-kobarkan might be possible.

ObConlang:  In Kash, in those cases where the initial cons. has changed, the
second member does not change-- a possible ex. pila 'think' pila-pila 'think
over, ponder, consider' : ambila 'thought, ability to reason', ambila-pila
'reconsideration'.

Redupl. in Kash generally has a limiting/specifying function.   With many
adjectives, a meaning 'a little/sort of...' vs. 'really....' would depend on
context and tone of voice.