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nicknames (was: childish pronunciation of "Christophe")

From:Adam Parrish <myth@...>
Date:Saturday, March 13, 1999, 0:37
On Fri, 12 Mar 1999, Nik Taylor wrote:

> Speaking of names, I wonder how many people here had nicknames based on > distortions of their names as children, or still retain them? Other > than common ones like shortenings, etc. I never had any (but then > again, /nIk/ doesn't lend itself to easy manipulation). My brother, > Adam, I sometimes affectionately call /&'dVm/, spelled "Adumb", or > /@'d&m(It)/ (Adamn(it)). >
The only nickname I've ever had sounds like /'&b@/ -- a distortion that (like Christophe's nickname) arose from my little sister's attempt at saying my name in her infancy. My other little sister, five years younger, also picked up this pronunciation. Currently this nickname is only used by my little sisters when they're trying to be insincerely sweet to me. :) To put more of a conlang spin on it, Doraya has a method of deriving nicknames (_toren-toren_) from regular names. This consists of reduplicating the name in the regular Doraya way, then dropping everything but the resulting reduplication and the last syllable of the root, e.g.: Laiyralan -> Analan Anlorin -> Rinlorin Martanda -> Datanda Trefen -> Fentrefen I imagine that further distortions of these might happen, leading to nicknames like _Rinno_ for _Anlorin_ or _Fenne_ for _Trefen_. Anyone else have unique or interesting ways of constructing nicknames in their conlangs? Adam -- myth@inquo.net http://www.inquo.net/~myth