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Diminutive
A diminutive is a word obtained by modifying a root word to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment, and sometimes to belittle something or someone. A ( abbreviated ) is a word-formation device used to express such meanings. A is a diminutive form with two diminutive suffixes rather than one. Purpose Diminutives are often employed as nicknames and pet names when speaking to small children and when expressing extreme tenderness and intimacy to an adult. The opposite of the diminutive form is the augmentative. In some contexts, diminutives are also employed in a pejorative sense to denote that someone or something is weak or childish. For example, one of the last Western Roman emperors was Romulus Augustus, but his name was diminutivized to "Romulus Augustulus" to express his powerlessness. Formation In many languages, diminutives are word forms that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
List Of Diminutives By Language
The following is a list of diminutives by language. Indo-European languages Germanic languages English English has a great variety of historical diminutives adopted from other languages but many of these are lexicalized. Productive diminutives are infrequent to nonexistent in Standard English in comparison with many other languages. =Native English endings that could be seen as diminutives= *-k/ -ock/-uck: bollock, bullock, buttock, fetlock, hillock, mattock (OE ''mattuc''), mullock, pillock, stalk, whelk, yolk *-n/ -en/-on (accusative or feminine): chicken, kitten, maiden * -le (frequentative -l): puddle, sparkle * -s: Becks, Betts, Wills *-sie/-sies/-sy ( babytalk assimilative or from ''patrici-'' of Patsy): bitsy, footsie (1930), halfsies, onesies, popsy (1860), teensy-weensy, tootsie (1854), twosies, Betsy, Patsy, Robsy * -o (American nicknaming, later Commonwealth): bucko, daddio, garbo, kiddo, smoko, wacko, Jacko, Ricko, * -er/-ers/ -ster ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Augmentative
An augmentative (abbreviated ) is a morphological form of a word which expresses greater intensity, often in size but also in other attributes. It is the opposite of a diminutive. Overaugmenting something often makes it grotesque and so in some languages, augmentatives are used primarily for comical effect or as pejoratives. Many languages have augmentatives for nouns, and some have augmentatives for verbs. Germanic languages English In modern English, augmentatives can be created with the prefixes: *’’over-’’: e.g., ’’overlord’’ and ’’overqualified’’. *’’grand-’’: e.g., ’’grandmaster’’ and ’’grandparent’’. *’’super-’’: e.g., ’’supermarket’’ and ’’superpower’’. *’’mega-’’: e.g., ’’megastore’’ and ’’megastar’’. *’’arch-’’: e.g., ’’archrival’’ and ’’archangel’’. Since the early 1990s, the prefix ’’über-’’ or ’’uber-’’ has also frequentl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Affect (linguistics)
In linguistics, affect is an attitude or emotion that a speaker brings to an utterance. Affects such as sarcasm, contempt, dismissal, distaste, disgust, disbelief, exasperation, boredom, anger, joy, respect or disrespect, sympathy, pity, gratitude, wonder, admiration, humility, and awe are frequently conveyed through paralinguistic mechanisms such as intonation (linguistics), intonation, facial expression, and gesture, and thus require recourse to punctuation or emoticons when reduced to writing, but there are grammatical and lexical expressions of affect as well, such as pejorative and approbative or laudative expressions or inflections, adversative forms, honorifics (linguistics), honorific and deferential language, interrogatives and tag questions, and some types of evidentiality. Lexical affect Lexical choices may Framing (social sciences), frame a speaker's affect, such as ''slender'' (positive affect) vs. ''scrawny'' (negative affect), ''thrifty'' (positive) vs. ''stingy'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reduplication
In linguistics, reduplication is a Morphology (linguistics), morphological process in which the Root (linguistics), root or Stem (linguistics), stem of a word, part of that, or the whole word is repeated exactly or with a slight change. The classic observation on the semantics of reduplication is Edward Sapir, Edward Sapir's: "Generally employed, with self-evident symbolism, to indicate such concepts as distribution, plurality, repetition, customary activity, increase of size, added intensity, continuance." It is used in inflections to convey a grammatical function, such as plurality or intensification, and in Lexicon, lexical Derivation (linguistics), derivation to create new words. It is often used when a speaker adopts a tone more expressive or figurative than ordinary speech and is also often, but not exclusively, Iconicity, iconic in meaning. It is found in a wide range of languages and language groups, though its level of Productivity (linguistics), linguistic productivit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clipping (morphology)
In linguistics, clipping, also called truncation or shortening, is word formation by removing some segments of an existing word to create a diminutive word or a clipped compound. Clipping differs from abbreviation, which is based on a shortening of the written, rather than the spoken, form of an existing word or phrase. Clipping is also different from back-formation, which proceeds by (pseudo-)morpheme rather than segment, and where the new word may differ in sense and word class from its source. In English, clipping may extend to contraction, which mostly involves the elision of a vowel that is replaced by an apostrophe in writing. Creation According to Hans Marchand, clippings are not coined as words belonging to the core lexicon of a language. They typically originate as synonyms within the jargon or slang of an in-group, such as schools, army, police, and the medical profession. For example, , , and originated in school slang; and = credit) in stock-exchange slang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nicknames
A nickname, in some circumstances also known as a sobriquet, or informally a "moniker", is an informal substitute for the proper name of a person, place, or thing, used to express affection, playfulness, contempt, or a particular character trait. It is distinct from a pseudonym, stage name, or title, although the concepts can overlap. Etymology The compound word ''ekename'', meaning "additional name", was attested as early as 1303. This word was derived from the Old English word ''eac'', meaning "also", related to ''eacian'', meaning "to increase". By the 15th century, the misdivision of the syllables of the phrase "an ekename" led to its rephrasing as "a nekename". Though the spelling has changed, the meaning of the word has remained relatively stable ever since. Various language conventions English nicknames are generally represented in quotes between the bearer's first and last names (e.g., '' Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower'' and '' Daniel Lamont "Bubba" Franks''). It i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pet Name
A hypocorism ( or ; from Ancient Greek ; sometimes also ''hypocoristic''), or pet name, is a name used to show affection for a person. It may be a diminutive form of a person's name, such as '' Izzy'' for Isabel or '' Bob'' for Robert, or it may be unrelated. Origins and usage Etymologically, the term ''hypocorism'' is from Ancient Greek (), from (), meaning 'to call by endearing names'. The prefix refers in this case to creating a diminutive, something that is smaller in a tender or affectionate sense; the root originates in the Greek for 'to caress' or 'to treat with tokens of affection', and is related to the words () 'boy, youth' and () 'girl, young woman'. In linguistics, the term can be used more specifically to refer to the morphological process by which the standard form of the word is transformed into a form denoting affection, or to words resulting from this process. In English, a word is often clipped down to a closed monosyllable and then suffixed with ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
List Of Glossing Abbreviations
This article lists common abbreviations for grammatical terms that are used in linguistic interlinear glossing of oral languages in English. The list provides conventional glosses as established by standard inventories of glossing abbreviations such as the Leipzig Glossing Rules, Leipzig Glossing rules, the most widely known standard. Synonymous glosses are listed as alternatives for reference purposes. In a few cases, long and short standard forms are listed, intended for texts where that gloss is rare or uncommon. Conventions * Grammatical abbreviations are generally written in full or small caps to visually distinguish them from the translations of lexical words. For instance, capital or small-cap (frequently abbreviated to ) glosses a grammatical past-tense morpheme, while lower-case 'past' would be a literal translation of a word with that meaning. Similarly, (small) cap might be a locative suffix used in nominal inflections, prototypically indicating direction downward b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grammaticalization
Grammaticalization (also known as grammatization or grammaticization) is a linguistic process in which words change from representing objects or actions to serving grammatical functions. Grammaticalization can involve content words, such as nouns and verbs, developing into new function words that express grammatical relationships among other words in a sentence. This may happen rather than speakers deriving such new function words from (for example) existing bound, inflectional constructions. For example, the Old English verb 'to want', 'to wish' has become the Modern English auxiliary verb ''will'', which expresses intention or simply futurity. Some concepts are often grammaticalized; others, such as evidentiality, less frequently. In explaining this process, linguistics distinguishes between two types of linguistic items: * lexical items or content words, which carry specific lexical meaning * grammatical items or function words, which serve mainly to express grammatical ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Middle English
Middle English (abbreviated to ME) is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman Conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English period. Scholarly opinion varies, but the University of Valencia states the period when Middle English was spoken as being from 1150 to 1500. This stage of the development of the English language roughly coincided with the High Middle Ages, High and Late Middle Ages. Middle English saw significant changes to its vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and orthography. Writing conventions during the Middle English period varied widely. Examples of writing from this period that have survived show extensive regional variation. The more standardized Old English literary variety broke down and writing in English became fragmented and localized and was, for the most part, being improvised. By the end of the period (about 1470), and aided by the movabl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Old French
Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th [2-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it was deemed no longer make to think of the varieties spoken in Gaul as Latin. Although a precise date can't be given, there is a general consensus (see Wright 1982, 1991, Lodge 1993) that an awareness of a vernacular, distinct from Latin, emerged at the end of the eighth century.] and mid-14th centuries. Rather than a unified Dialect#Dialect or language, language, Old French was a Dialect cluster, group of Romance languages, Romance dialects, Mutual intelligibility, mutually intelligible yet Dialect continuum, diverse. These dialects came to be collectively known as the , contrasting with the , the emerging Occitano-Romance languages of Occitania, now the south of France. The mid-14th century witnessed the emergence of Middle French, the lang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wu Chinese
, region = Shanghai, Zhejiang, southern Jiangsu, parts of Anhui and Jiangxi provinces; overseas and migrant communities , ethnicity = Wu , speakers = million , date = 2021 , ref = e27 , familycolor = Sino-Tibetan , fam2 = Sinitic , dialects = Varieties , dia1 = Taihu (incl. Shanghainese) , dia2 = Taizhou , dia3 = Oujiang , dia4 = Wuzhou , dia5 = Chu–Qu , dia6 = Xuanzhou , iso3 = wuu , lingua = 79-AAA-d , map = Idioma wu.png , mapcaption = , glotto = wuch1236 , glottorefname = Wu Chinese , script = Chinese characters (Latin script) , notice = IPA Wu ( zh, t=, s=, p=Wúyǔ; Wugniu and IPA: ( Shanghainese), (Suzhounese)) is a major group of Sinitic languages spoken primarily in Shanghai, Zhejiang province, and parts of Jian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
