Echo word

Abstract: IN THE Indian Antiquary 14 (1885), 79-81, S. M. Natesa Sastri Pandit published an English translation of a Tamil folk-tale which is built around a word-play. Linguistic work in South Indian has provided me with versions of this tale in three separate Dravidian languages, Kota, Coorg, and Toda, and the material now at hand is sufficient for a presentation of the motif employed in these stories and an analysis of the stories themselves. The motif I shall call the " Echo-word motif," borrowing the term "echo-word" from a discussion of certain noun-formations found in many, if not most, of the languages of India, Indo-Aryan, Dravidian, and Munda, a discussion which was published in the Circulars of the Linguistic Society of India in 1928. The term did not originate there, but its origin is relatively unimportant and need not be traced further in this connexion. Such echo-words are well-known for the major Indo-Aryan vernaculars, e. g. in Hindi jal-ul, hath-uth, in Bengali jal-tal, hat-tat, in Gujarati hath-bath, in Marathi dzal-bil, ghoda-bida. Prof. S. K. Chatterji, ib. 3 (14 May, 1928), pp. 7-8, states that the function of the formations is to express " [the thing denoted by the basic noun] and things similar to or associated with that," in much the same terms that he had used previously in Origin and Development of the Bengali Language (Calcutta University Press, 1926), p. 176. In the Dravidian languages such formations are also well-known as a feature of the vernaculars, e. g. Tamil tannir-kinnir, Telugu gurramu-girramu, Kannada kudure-gidure. Since they are vernacular forms and found rarely, if at all, in the literatures of the literary languages, they have been almost totally neglected in the grammars. Work on the Toda, Kota, and Coorg languages has enabled me to state the method of formation and the functions of these words in an exact form. For Toda the formation is as follows.

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to enquire into the various meanings of redu-plication as a linguistic operation, and not as a merely stylistic or expres-sive device. The theoretical frame is Antoine Culioli's ‘enonciative' lin-guistics (notion and located occurrence, notional domain and boundary); context and intersubjectivity are taken into account as much as possible. The first section deals with total reduplication, within the nominal, verbal and adjectival category: it shows that reduplication on an occurrence modifies the relation between the reduplicated term and the term syntacti-cally associated to it by denying the occurrence any specific stable value. It thus modifies the scheme of individuation of the notion (its actualization into an occurrence). The second section, dealing with partial reduplication or echo constructions, whether formed with a v- substitution to the initial consonant or with other forms of alliteration, shows that it modifies the notion itself by de-centring it, and reshapes it by taking into account vari-ous forms of heterogeneity, particularly the conflicting viewpoints of speaker and hearer.

Abstract: cyninges Ðegn, guma gilphlæden, gidda gemyndig, sē Ðe ealfela ealdgesegena worn gemunde —word ōÐer fand sōÐe gebunden— secg eft ongan sīÐ Bēowulfes snyttrum styrian, ond on spēd wrecan spel gerāde, wordum wrixlan; wēlhwylc gecwæÐ, Ðæt hē fram Sigemunde(s) secgan … (Beowulf, ll. 867b–875) GRENDEL is overcome. The warriors who urged their horses along the trail of bloody tracks are returning to Heorot. A poet-warrior sings, adding the name of Grendel's conqueror to the roll of Germanic heroes. The author of Beowulf gives a brief but precious account of the principles of his poetry. One word finds the other, rightly bound, and there is a varying with words. The inevitable alliteration of Old English poetry, as in the second line above, is obviously the most conspicuous way in which one word found the other, rightly bound. Likewise, varying in words aptly describes the principle underlying the “Kenning” or epic epithet. This principle of style consists in the repetition of words or phrases to round out a full poetic picture by presenting an idea from varying points of view. Examples are cyninges Ðegn, guma gilphlæden, and secg, all of which refer to the poet-warrior in the quoted passage.