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From: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Subject: Re: Reduplication
Message-ID: <157@spar.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 3-Apr-85 06:21:31 EST
Article-I.D.: spar.157
Posted: Wed Apr  3 06:21:31 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 4-Apr-85 06:54:49 EST
References: <234@rtech.ARPA> <396@teddy.UUCP> <1345@ut-sally.UUCP> <456@terak.UUCP>
Reply-To: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Organization: Schlumberger Palo Alto Research, CA
Lines: 82
Keywords: Manios med fhefhaked Numasioi

>> > > pooh'-pooh'  A reduplication of pooh.
>Webster's 9th Collegiate (.. ) defines the prefix "re-" as ":again :anew"
>It defines duplication as "copying or repeating" (...)
>so, re + duplication = again copying
>
>which obviously means there must be three or more, right :-) !!
>(original, first copy, reduplicated (3rd+) copy)
>I guess reduplication joins the ranks of words that don't mean what they say.
>
>It is left to the connoisseur to check the dictionary meaning.
>-- 
>Suzanne Barnett

    Frequently Latin and Greek prefixes undergo semantic limitation
    or mutilation upon entering the class of living English word
    building formatives. This is quite common among prefixes:

    e/ex- In Latin, meant (from/away from/out of/out), as in `eject'
	  (throw out), `exclaim' (speak out), now it means (former)
	  as in `ex-president', `ex-wife', &c.

    meta- In Greek, meant (change into/across/among/along with/following/
    	  backwards), as in `metaphysics' (the book FOLLOWING Aristotle's
	  physics), `metathesis' (change in positions), now it means
	  (hyper-), `meta-theorem', `meta-language', if you accept all
	  those MIT-and-Hofstedter-isms.

    re-   In Latin, meant (back to the beginning/backwards/back/again),
          as in `return' (turn back to the beginning), `replace' (put back),
	  `repel' (drive back), currently believed to mean only (again),
	  in spite of all the evidence.  Some swell words: `re-enthuse',
	  `re-cocacolanize', `re-televise', `re-nice'...

    Apparently, Webster's 9th dictionary is doing little to correct such
    injustices.

    `Reduplication' goes way back, and is, as most of Latin's grammatical
    terms, a literal translation of a Greek term:

    anadiploun {ana-diplo-ein} = to reduplicate, where `ana-', which has
                many meanings, here probably means (back to the beginning).
		`diploun' means (to duplicate), as in `diploid'.

    I can only speculate at this point why the prefix (ana-) was felt
    essential by those who coined this word.

    Reduplication in the IndoEuropean languages does NOT involve
    duplication of the entire word, as in `pooh-pooh'. It is the
    duplication of the FIRST SOUND in the word, and was the standard
    method for forming the perfect tense in all IndoEuropean languages,
    as below:

		PRESENT			    PERFECT

    Greek	leipo:	(I leave)	    le-loipa	(I have left)
    Latin	pello:	(I drive out)	    pe-puli:	(I have driven out)
    Old Irish	braigim	(I fart)	    be-brag	(I have farted)

    IndoEur.	*XeYo:	(I XeY)		    *XeXoYa	(I have XeY-ed)

    Anyway, the only regular use for reduplication in Ancient Greek
    was as above -- a copy of the initial consonant of the word is
    prefixed to the beginning of the word (in Latin the phenomenon is
    restricted to a small number of irregular verbs).

    Perhaps the fact that duplication is `thrown back' to the beginning,
    rather than a total duplication, is why the inventors of this word
    felt the need for the prefix (ana-)/(re-). 

    Naturally enough, when modern linguists encountered such phenomena as 
    in Chinese:

	To'ngzhi`men do~u ga~o-gao-xi`ng-xing-de go~ngzuo`.
	comrades     all  very-very-glad-glad   work 

	(All comrades work very gladly)

    ...they called it `reduplication' of the modifier ga~o-xi'ng.

    Bekos!

-michael