Form and function of reduplicated nouns in Japanese
Linus Olsson · KTH Publication Database DiVA (KTH Royal Institute of Technology) · 2015
This study investigates the form and function of reduplication in nouns in Japanese. Three main areas were investigated: meaning, morphosyntactic behavior, and register. The study was conducted with informants participating in meetings which were audio recorded. The informants were asked to describe a number of reduplicated nouns belonging to three categories: concrete nouns, abstract nouns, and nouns relating to time. A number of pseudo forms were also included to see if similar patterns could be observed in nouns that did not belong to the regular lexicon. The results were analyzed for possible patterns relating to meaning, morphosyntactic behavior, and register across the three noun categories. Primarily two patterns were observed: 1. the reduplicated forms of concrete nouns tended to have a meaning of plurality and maintain their noun status, and 2. the reduplicated forms of nouns relating to time tended to acquire a sensation of extended time and frequency, and change word class into adverbs. These patterns were not observed as strongly among the pseudo forms. In addition to these patterns, other phenomena were observed among the reduplicated nouns that could not be categorized as belonging to specific patterns and should be investigated in further studies.