Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 1
REDUPLICATION IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE
A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS
Student: Phan Lien Yen Phi
Class: 4B08, Contrastive Analysis
Instructor: Bui Nguyen Khanh
HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF EDUCATION
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
HO CHI MINH CITY, DECEMBER 31, 2011
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 2
ABSTRACT
Reduplication is phonologically described as reduplicated segments
(sequences of consonants or vowels) or reduplicated prosodic units (syllables or
moras) (Nadarajan, n.d.). In morphology, "reduplication is the repetition of a syllable,
a morpheme or a word” (Nguyen, 2004). Reduplication is one of the ways to create
new words, so it exists in many languages, especially in Vietnamese, it helps to
make our mother tongue melodious not only in literature but in everyday speech as
well. How about in English? Reduplication rarely occurs in English and is primarily
used in words that reflect sounds or noises such as “click clack” (Thompson, 1965,
as cited in Tang, 2007). In this paper, I would like to examine the forms and functions
of reduplication in English and Vietnamese through a contrastive view and then,
some useful implications for teaching reduplication and how to translate them from
Vietnamese into English and vice versa will be discussed.
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 3
REDUPLICATION IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE
A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS
Reduplication in English
Forms
According to Nguyen (2004), we should distinguish reduplication from
compound words because reduplication also consists of two parts, but otherwise in
most cases [it] fails to satisfy the definition of a compound word1. Some of them
contain only one free morpheme, the other constituents being a variation of this. In
other cases, both constituents are jocular pseudo-morphemes, meaningless and
fanciful sound clusters which never occur elsewhere. Nguyen (2004) states that it is
a very mixed group which consists of three subgroups: reduplicative compounds
proper, ablaut combinations, and rhyme combinations.
1.
Reduplicative compounds proper (also called exact reduplication): contains
usual free forms, onomatopoeic stems and pseudo-morphemes.
 None-imitative words may be used in reduplication and possess a ironical
ring, but they are not numerous and occur only in colloquial speech such as
pretty-pretty (affectedly pretty), goody-goody (sentimentally and affectedly
good), never-never (an ellipsis of a phrase never-never system which means “a
hire-purchase system in which the consumer may never be able to become the
owner of the thing purchased”).
1
compound word: A combination of two or more words which functions as a single word.
Compound words are written either as a single word (e.g. headache), as hyphenated words (e.g. selfgovernment), or as two words (e.g. police station).
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 4
 Onomatopoeic repetition exists but it is not very extensive, for example:
hush-hush (secret), murmur (to speak or say very quietly), pooh-pooh (to
express contempt).
 In some exact reduplication, the constituents are pseudo-morphemes
which do not occur elsewhere, like in blah-blah (nonsense, idle talk). People
often say blah, blah, blah when they do not want to repeat what somebody has
said or written. Some nursery words, such as: quack-quack (duck), Pops-Pops
(father), bye-bye, choo-choo (a train), night-night, no-no, pee-pee, poo-poo…
also belong to this type.
2.
Ablaut combinations: are twin forms consisting of one basic morpheme
(usually the second), sometimes a pseudo-morpheme which is repeated in the
other constituent with a different vowel. In ablaut reduplications, the first vowel is
almost always a high vowel and the reduplicated ablaut variant of the vowel is a
low one (Wikipedia). There are two typical changes: /ɪ/ – /æ/, such as chit-chat
(gossip), dilly-dally (loiter), knick-knack (small articles of ornament), riff-raff (the
mob), shilly-shally (hesitate), zigzag (a line or pattern that looks like a series of
letters W’s), pitter-patter (a quick light knocking sound)…, and /ɪ/ – /ɔ/, such as
ding-dong (said of the sound of the bell), ping-pong (table-tennis), singsong
(monotonous voice), tiptop (first-rate), criss-cross (to move or exist in a pattern of
lines crossing something or each other)…
3.
Rhyme combinations: are twin forms consisting of two elements (most
often two pseudo-morphemes) which are joined to rhyme. Some typical examples
for this subgroup are: razzle-dazzle (noticeable activity or very colorful
appearance intended to attract attention), lovey-dovey (darling), harum-scarum
(disorganized), helter-skelter (in disordered haste), hoity-toity (snobbish), hurry-
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 5
scurry (great hurry), hurdy-gurdy (a small organ), namby-pamby (weakly
sentimental), willy-nilly (compulsorily)…
Another way to classify the forms of reduplication is shown in the research of
Nadarajan (n.d). It is illustrated by the table below:
Group
Full reduplication:
Partial reduplication: reduplication of only a part
the exact repetition
of a word
of a sound or word
Vowel
Onset
Rhyming words:
alternation
alternation:
rhyme –
‘h-C’ / ‘C-w’1
diminutive suffix2
- chit chat
- handy dandy
- boogie woogie
- quack quack
- criss cross
- hurly burly
- lovey dovey
- leaving-leaving3
- see saw
- bow wow
Subgroup
Examples - murmur
- teeny weeny
Functions
In terms of functions, most linguists agree that English reduplications are
either colloquial, slang or nursery words and markedly expressive and emotional (the
1
Onset alternation occur when the consonant (C) change in ‘h-C’ or ‘C-w’ alternation. The
root word would have the meaning while the reduplicant would lack any explicit meaning.
2
As for rhyme with diminutive suffixes, the words tend to lack independent meanings, but
take on a new meaning when combined. These words are often found in nursery rhymes and
children’s story books.
3
Full reduplication would be used to provide emphasis as indicated in “Are you leaving-
leaving now?”, i.e. “Are you ‘really’ leaving (for good) or merely stepping out for a minute” (Ghomeshi
et al, 2004, as cited in Nadarajan, n.d.)
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 6
emotion is not expressed in the constituents but suggested by the whole pattern)
(Nguyen, 2004). Reduplications depend on sound-symbolism so much that their
phonetic make-up plays the most important role in their functioning. In ablaut
combinations, both groups (/ɪ/ – /æ/ and /ɪ/ – /ɔ/) are based on sound symbolism
expressing polarity, they symbolize to and fro rhythm (criss-cross), or suggest
hesitation (shilly-shally), and the semantically predominant group are the words
meaning idle talk, such as bibble-babble, chit-chat, clitter-clatter, etc. In the third
subgroup (rhyme combinations), the semantically predominant group are the words
denoting disorder, trickery, teasing names for persons, and some playful nursery
words.
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 7
Reduplication in Vietnamese
Forms
While it is not productive in English, reduplication is found abundantly in
Vietnamese. However, the definition of “từ láy” in Vietnamese is a little bit different
from this in English. According to Mai, Vu, & Hoang (1997), in Vietnamese,
reduplicative words are phonetically repeated (called “điệp”), but they still have some
different feature (called “đối”), for example đỏ đắn has the same onset consonant but
different rhymes. In “người người”, “nhà nhà”, “ngành ngành”, they are only repeated
the entire word without any differences, therefore, they are reduplicative forms of
word, not the reduplicative words. Vietnamese reduplicative words can be divided
into three groups based on the number of syllables they contain: two-syllable (bisyllabic) reduplicative words (e.g. xanh xanh, khe khẽ, ngơ ngác…), three-syllable
(tri-syllabic) reduplicative words (e.g. sạch sành sanh, khít khìn khít…), and foursyllable reduplicative words (e.g. lúng ta lúng túng, trùng trùng điệp điệp…). Among
them, the bi-syllabic is the most important group because they make up more than
98% amount of Vietnamese reduplicative words (Le, Nguyen, & Roussanaly, n.d.).
Therefore, in this paper, I would like to take a long, hard look at bi-syllabic
reduplicative words in Vietnamese. In this group, we have two types of reduplication:
full reduplication and partial reduplication. (Mai et al, 1997)
1.
Full reduplication: consists of the reduplicative words whose phonetic
feature is not identical. They are divided into 3 sub classes:
 Full reduplication with alternate stress: contains two identical elements in
which one is pronounced in a stronger or longer way: cào cào, ba ba, rề rề, lăm
lăm, khăng khăng, lù lù, lâng lâng, đùng đùng, hây hây, đăm đăm…
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 8
 Full reduplication with alternate tone: bằng tone (ngang, huyền) precedes
trắc tone (hỏi, sắc, ngã nặng) based on the following rule:
Bằng
Trắc
1. Ngang
Hỏi
Sắc
2. Huyền
Ngã
Nặng
E.g.: (1) đo đỏ, ra rả, thoang thoảng, lay láy, đau đáu, phơi phới…
(2) sừng sững, lững thững, nhè nhẹ, ngờ ngợ, vành vạnh…
There are some exeptions, such as cỏn con, dửng dưng, mảy may…
 Full reduplication with alternate final consonant due to the so-called “quy
luật dị hóa”: m – p (e.g. ăm ắp, cầm cập, chiêm chiếp…), n – t (e.g. chan chát,
sồn sột, ngùn ngụt…), ng – c (e.g. phưng phức, khang khác, rừng rực…), nh –
ch (e.g. anh ách, phanh phách, rinh rích…)
2.
Partial reduplication: includes the reduplicative words in which either initial
consonant or rhyme is repeated. There are 2 sub classes:
 Initial reduplication with alternate rhyme: bập bềnh, đẹp đẽ, ngơ ngác, say
sưa, vồ vập, hấp háy, bồng bềnh, xơ xác, lung linh… We should pay attention
to the main vowel alternation rule in some reduplicative words:
u – i:
cũ kĩ, xù xì, tủm tỉm, mũm mĩm…
ô – ê:
ngô nghê, hổn hển, xồ xề…
o – e:
vò ve, khò khè, nhỏ nhẻ…
i – a:
rỉ rả, xí xóa, hí hoáy…
u – ă:
tung tăng, vùng vằng, thủng thẳng…
u – ơ:
ngu ngơ, khù khờ, cũn cỡn…
ô – a:
hốc hác, ngột ngạt, mộc mạc…
ê – a:
nghêu ngao, rề rà, xuề xòa…
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 9
 Rhyme reduplication with alternate initial consonant: bâng khuâng, bơ vơ,
càu nhàu, thao láo, hấp tấp, lảng vảng, lúng túng, thình lình, lưa thưa, lơ thơ…
Functions
Reduplication in Vietnamese has multiple semantic functions (Nguyen, T.C.,
1999; Nguyen, T.G., 2003, as cited in Tang, 2007) in comparison with English
reduplication which is primarily used in words that reflect sounds or noises
(Thompson, 1965, as cited in Tang, 2007). When a verb is repeated, this
reduplication indicates movement, for example when we reduplicate the verb gật
[đầu] (to nod [one’s head]), we have gật gật đầu to indicate a repetitive nodding
motion. For an adjective reduplication, it can imply a lesser degree of quality, such
as xinh (pretty) while xinh xinh (kind of/ less pretty), or the color of xanh xanh is
lighter than that of xanh. Some certain nouns can be reduplicated to indicate
reoccurrence or multiple instances, like ngày ngày (day day) implies many days or all
days (Nguyen, T.C., 1999; Nguyen, T.G., 2003, as cited in Tang, 2007). In terms of
semantic effects of intensifying or attenuating the meaning of the root word, below
are some examples of full reduplication in Vietnamese:
Reduplication Table
simple
meaning
form
redup. form
meaning
semantic effect
ầm
noisy
ầm ầm
rumble, roar
intensifying
ào
impetuous
ào ào
roar, thunderously
intensifying
bầu
rounded
bầu bầu
roundish
attenuative
bời
be disordered
bời bời
be in disorder
no change
chan
pour broth
chan chan
abundant, plentiful
opaque
chênh chênh
oblique, tilted, slant
no change
stare for a long
time
chong chong
staring for a long time
continuous
chuồn move stealthily
chuồn chuồn
dragon-fly
opaque
dần
dầu dầu
gradually
continuous
chênh be tilted, slanting
chong
beat
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 10
gạch
underline
gạch gạch
shade with parallel lines
?
ha
hurrah
ha ha
aha
intensifying
hầm
stew
hầm hầm
angry
intensifying/opaque
hây
rosy, ruddy
hây hây
rosy, ruddy
no change
hăng
very enthusiastic
hăng hăng
enthusiastic
attenuative
hay
good
hay hay
rather good
attenuative
hề
clown
hề hề
grin broadly
?
hồng
rosy
hồng hồng
slightly rosy
attenuative
hơi
a little
hơi hơi
a little bit
attenuative
hung
reddish
hung hung
slightly reddish
attenuative
keng
clang
keng keng
clang
no change
khè
snore
khè khè
snoring
no change
lầm
make a mistake
lầm lầm
look angry
opaque
lần
time
lần lần
gradually
continuous
lắm
very
lắm lắm
very much
intensifying
lăm
five
lăm lăm
keep ready
opaque
lảng
sneak away
lảng lảng
sneak off
attenuative
lờ
ignore
lờ đờ
dull
opaque
đầm
pond
đầm đầm
be in bad mood
opaque
đâu
where
đâu đâu
everywhere
intensifying
đăm
right side
đăm đăm
look fixely
opaque
đằng
direction
đằng đằng
inflamed with
opaque
nao
which, where
nao nao
with emotion, touched
opaque
ngày
day
ngày ngày
day by day
continuous
nhầu
rumpled
nhầu nhầu
rush in a pack
opaque
nhao
be in a stir
nhao nhao
to get in general uproar
?
nhẹ
light
nhẹ nhẹ
very light
intensifying
nhè
snivel
nhè nhè
snivelling
continuous
nhèo
flabby
nhèo nhèo
very flabby
intensifying
nhiều a lot of
nhiều nhiều
a little bit more
attenuative
nhông wander
nhông nhông
wander
no change
stentorian
opaque
oang
loud and powerful oang oang
phạch flop
phạch phạch
flipflop
continuous
phềnh swell
phềnh phềnh
swell
no change
phơ
snowy
phơ phơ
slightly snowy
attenuative
quen
familiar
quen quen
somewhat acquainted with attenuative
rầm
loud
rầm rầm
uproarious
rành
have a knowledge
rành rành
plain, obvious, undeniable ?
intensifying
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 11
rào
rivulet
rào rào
cascading noise
opaque
sè
stingly
sè sè
very low
?
song
but, however
song song
at the same time
opaque
tanh
fishy
tanh tanh
somewhat fishy
attenuative
tà
decline
tà tà
decline obliquely
attenuative
tàng
old
tàng tàng
rather old
attenuative
tênh
very
tênh tênh
like a feather
intensifying
thanh slim
thanh thanh
rather slim
attenuative
thẹn
ashamed
thẹn thẹn
a little ashamed
attenuative
thinh
(làm thinh) be
quiet
thinh thinh
broad
opaque
thình
bang
thình thình
loudly
intensifying
thiu
snooze
thiu thiu
snooze
no change
thôi
stop
thôi thôi
enough
opaque
thòm
tomtom beat
thòm thòm
continous roll of tomtom
continuous
thường often
thường thường often
continuous
thớt
chopping board
thớt thớt
lip-service
opaque
tom
collect, gather
tom tom
noise of drum
continuous
tòm
plop
tòm tòm
plopping
continuous
trắng
white
trắng trắng
slightly white
attenuative
trừng
stare at
trừng trừng
wide open
intensifying
trùng
coincide
trùng trùng
numberless
attenuative
ù
buzz
ùù
rumble
continuous
ủi
shoo
ủi ủi
shoo
no change
vân
veined
vân vân
etc . . .
opaque
xa
far
xa xa
in the distance
attenuative
xăm
written oracle,
body tattooing
xăm xăm
straight and in a hurry
intensifying
xanh
green, blue
xanh xanh
bluish, greenish
attenuative
xinh
pretty
xinh xinh
rather pretty
attenuative
xổng
escape
xổng xổng
unimpeded
?
xơi
eat
xơi xơi
many, much
opaque
xờm
hang down
xờm xờm
really hang down
intensifying
xương xương
bony, thinnish
attenuative
chề chề
heavy, grave
opaque
dàu dàu
withered, gloomy
opaque
him him
unable to open wide
opaque
khư khư
hold tight
opaque
xương bone
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 12
lâng lâng
relieving
opaque
thênh thênh
spacious
opaque
nhâu nhâu
crowd
opaque
nhong nhong
tintinnabulation
opaque
Note. The data is originally compiled by Jeanne Tieu, retrieved from
http://vietnamese-grammar.group.shef.ac.uk/grammar_en.php?ID=11
In addition, reduplicative words are very onomatopoeic (such as ầm ầm, ào
ào, rì rào…) and figurative (chót vót, thăm thẳm, cheo leo…), so they are often used
in literature as a literary device and everyday speech.
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 13
TEACHING IMPLICATION
After examining the similarities and differences in forms and functions of
reduplication in English and Vietnamese, I would like to draw out some teaching
implications concerning English and Vietnamese reduplication.
First of all, reduplication is a very interesting linguistic phenomenon, so it
more or less has influence on language acquisition and learning. Especially,
Vietnamese has many, many reduplicative words that can cause difficulty in
translating them into English and vice versa. Therefore, being aware of the forms
and functions of reduplication in English and Vietnamese may help teachers and
students overcome these problems. To do that, teacher should give students some
possible ways to translate Vietnamese reduplicative words into English, such as
adding a proper adverb to an adjective (xinh xinh can be translated to quite pretty, đo
đỏ can be slightly red…), or using synonyms or hyponyms to indicate the degree of
quality (đo đỏ can be reddish, xanh xanh can be bluish…), etc.
Secondly, this phenomenon can sometimes arouse students’ interest, so
teachers can use it to design warm-up or review activities like find out as much as
possible reduplication in nursery words (bye-bye, no-no, night-night, choo-choo,
quack-quack, pops-pops…) in 3 minutes, or match the reduplicative words with their
meaning.
One more thing is that knowing reduplication in English and Vietnamese may
help students create positive transfer from L1 (Vietnamese) to L2 (English). The
students can understand and distinguish the differences between the two languages
and develop their linguistic competencies in both languages.
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 14
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, reduplication is an interesting phenomenon that exists in many
languages, especially in Vietnamese, it makes our mother tongue harmonious
because it is used not only as a literary device but also in everyday conversations.
This paper aims to point out the similarities and differences in forms and functions of
reduplication in English and Vietnamese. Through the literature review, we see that
Vietnamese reduplicative words are much more than English in quantity and there
are a lot of differences between Vietnamese and English reduplications in terms of
forms and functions. Some teaching implications are also discussed in this paper. I
hope that the information here will be helpful.
Reduplication in English and Vietnamese 15
REFERENCES
Le, H.P, Nguyen, T.M.H., & Roussanaly, A. (n.d.). Finite-state description of
Vietnamese reduplication. Retrieved December 19, 2011, from
http://www.loria.fr/~lehong/pubs/ALR-709.pdf
Lexical reduplication. (n.d.). In Online grammar. Retrieved December 29, 2011, from
http://vietnamese-grammar.group.shef.ac.uk/grammar_en.php?ID=11
Mai, N.C., Vu, D.N., & Hoang, T.P. (1997). Co so ngon ngu hoc va tieng Viet. Hanoi:
Education Publishing House.
Nadarajan, S. (n.d.). A cross-linguistic study of reduplication. Retrieved Demcember
14, 2011, from
http://w3.coh.arizona.edu/AWP/AWP13/AWP13%5BNadarajan%5D.pdf
Nguyen, H.L. (2004). An outline of morphology. Ho Chi Minh City: University of
Education Press.
Reduplication.(n.d.). In Wikipedia. Retrieved December 10, 2011, from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduplication
Tang, M.G. (2007). Cross-linguistic analysis of Vietnamese and English with
implications for Vietnamese language acquisition and maintenance in the
United States. Journal of Southeast Asian American education &
advancement, 2. Retrieved Demcember 19, 2011, from
http://jsaaea.coehd.utsa.edu/index.php/JSAAEA/article/view/13/8