Weird Word Ways: Reduplicative Recitations

[Ermintruder]

This type of English language mannerism, always, has subconsciously puzzled me. And it exists in other languages, too.

You do know what I mean...

Examples include:
"dilly-dally" "shilly-shally" "wishy-washy" "mumbo-jumbo" "zig-zag" "ding-dong" "hee-haw" "wiggle-waggle" hip-hop" "spit-spot"

It's a style which is more of an old-generation English. Many youngsters (sub-30yrs) would tend to have no real understanding of these. And I'm not certain myself what is going on, at all....

This is a fascinating PDF list (47pp) written by a Josel Hladkeý
http://www.phil.muni.cz/plonedata/wkaa/BSE/BSE_1998-24_Scan/BSE_24_04.pdf

And the appropriately-titled On the iconicity of Ablaut Reduplication
by JCM Cabrera.....

So prior to me doing any further cheat-research on the internet.....can anyone here give some proper insights into the absolute significance of these irregular semi-rhymed couplings?

Is it just verbal venturing, funword fooling....or something actually deeper?

 

[Krepostnoi]

I don't have much to offer beyond the half-remembered factoid that Anglophone humans greatly prefer it when the main vowel sound of the first word in the dyad is pronounced further towards the back of the mouth, and vice versa. This is why the two partners in the pair take the order they do. It also tends to hold true of longer series of sounds. Hence Rikki-Tikki-Tavi sounds acceptable to us as a name for a mongoose, while Rikki-Taki-Tivvi would sound distinctly odd. Bish-bash-bosh.

 

[James_H]

In Cantonese (and maybe in Mandarin, but I'm not sure) this is how kids talk, so they don't say 'fork', they say 'fork fork', and they don't say 'dog', they say 'dog dog' (much as English-speaking kids say 'doggy'). Adults still tend to say 'star star' instead of just 'star' or 'stars'.

 

[Coal]

This type of English language mannerism, always, has subconsciously puzzled me. And it exists in other languages, too.

You do know what I mean...

Examples include:
"dilly-dally" "shilly-shally" "wishy-washy" "mumbo-jumbo" "zig-zag" "ding-dong" "hee-haw" "wiggle-waggle" hip-hop" "spit-spot"

It's a style which is more of an old-generation English. Many youngsters (sub-30yrs) would tend to have no real understanding of these. And I'm not certain myself what is going on, at all....

This is a fascinating PDF list (47pp) written by a Josel Hladkeý
http://www.phil.muni.cz/plonedata/wkaa/BSE/BSE_1998-24_Scan/BSE_24_04.pdf

And the appropriately-titled On the iconicity of Ablaut Reduplication
by JCM Cabrera.....

So prior to me doing any further cheat-research on the internet.....can anyone here give some proper insights into the absolute significance of these irregular semi-rhymed couplings?

Is it just verbal venturing, funword fooling....or something actually deeper?

Fascinating. I wonder if it's a device that's easy to remember, in the same way Kennings were used in works (like Norse Sagas and Beowulf) as an aid to recollection (although they could get rather obscure) along with alliteration and rhyme. So it's kind of a meld of the two devices, which is both pleasing to use and easy to recall.

 

[eburacum]

Ha ha!

I was just reading a personal recollection of someone who went to see Billy Smart's Circus when they were a kid and was disappointed because the ringmaster didn't shout 'Wakey-Wakey!'

Of course that was Billy Cotton, not Billy Smart.

 

[Mythopoeika]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whip-Ma-Whop-Ma-Gate

 

[Old Master Q]

In Cantonese (and maybe in Mandarin, but I'm not sure) this is how kids talk, so they don't say 'fork', they say 'fork fork', and they don't say 'dog', they say 'dog dog' (much as English-speaking kids say 'doggy'). Adults still tend to say 'star star' instead of just 'star' or 'stars'.

I have very little (almost no) Cantonese, but I always thought 'tsing' - star was the word for a heavenly body, but basically out of context and not meaningful, whereas tsing-tsing definitely meant star up in the sky, ming-sing meant a celebrity. ...And so on; i.e. the word required contextualising?

 

[James_H]

I have very little (almost no) Cantonese, but I always thought 'tsing' - star was the word for a heavenly body, but basically out of context and not meaningful, whereas tsing-tsing definitely meant star up in the sky, ming-sing meant a celebrity. ...And so on; i.e. the word required contextualising?

Interesting! I do know that the planets are all called something-sing (e.g. Mars = 'fo sing' = 'fire star', which would support that.

 

[Yithian]

In Cantonese (and maybe in Mandarin, but I'm not sure) this is how kids talk, so they don't say 'fork', they say 'fork fork', and they don't say 'dog', they say 'dog dog' (much as English-speaking kids say 'doggy'). Adults still tend to say 'star star' instead of just 'star' or 'stars'.

The children's name for 'dog' in Korean is 'mong-mong-ee' (멍멍이), which stems from the the fact that the onomatopoeic dog sound is "mong-mong"

This results, loosely, in the literal translation being a 'woof-woofer'.

Which is adorable.