From: Rick McCallister
Message: 61915
Date: 2008-12-06
> From: G&P <G.and.P@...>So our generalization is that after polysyllables get smacked down to monosyllables, we resort to modifiers to distinguish them, as in US Southern English /iNkpIn/ vs. /streytpIn/. And so, it's smackdown to the end of time?
> Subject: RE: [tied] Negation
> To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
> Date: Saturday, December 6, 2008, 3:50 AM
> >I wonder if there is not another tendency to enlarge
> mono-syllabic words.
> >Chinese "syllables" are most often used in
> two-syllable words.
>
>
>
> In Chinese it is usually a matter of disambiguation. You
> probably know that
> there are very few possible syllables, even with the
> distinction of 4 tones
> in Mandarin (or 7 in Cantonese). For example, qiao in tone
> 3 has 14
> distinct meanings, written with 19 distinct characters.
> Yi in tone 4 has
> 38 distinct meanings. Hence the creation of repetitive
> compounds, using two
> synonyms, which together point to the meaning they share.
> The most famous
> of these has been calqued into English as a
> "look-see".
>
>
>
> Speaking more generally, I think there are so many factors
> involved that no
> generalisation about a tendency is possible. There will be
> plenty of
> examples of monosyllables being replaced by longer
> versions, but plenty of
> examples where this does not happen.
>
>
>
> Peter