Just a Load of<i>Hibber-Gibber</i>? Making Sense of English Rhyming Compounds

Benczes, Réka

doi:10.1080/07268602.2012.705577

Cited by 20 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…A similar process can be observed in huff-puff (‘moved with every puff of wind’), which is yet again a concatenation of two meaningful – and synonymous – words. As elucidated by Benczes (2012), the rhyming feature of such expressions is neither accidental, nor without meaning or function, as it ntensifies the overall meaning of the expression. Therefore, the rhyme is used as a means of emphasis, which supports the hypothesis that synonymous compounds are coined for an emphatic effect 10…”

Section: Synonymous Compoundsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Repetitions which are not repetitions: the non-redundant nature of tautological compounds

Benczes¹

2014

English Language and Linguistics

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In English morphological literature, the term 'tautological compound' has been typically used to refer to two distinct -but closely related -phenomena: (1) compounds composed of a hyponym and a superordinate term (such as oak tree); and/or (2) compounds based upon two synonymous units (such as subject matter). Such combinations are one of the quirkiest -and least researched -phenomena of English compounding. Their oddity can be attributed to two main factors. First, as their name, 'tautological compound' implies, at face value such combinations can be considered as prime examples of the redundancy of language. Second, they do not follow normal compound-forming rules in the sense that both constituents can function as the semantic head (as opposed to 'normal' English compounds, which follow the Right-Hand Head Rule).Perhaps it is the quirkiness of tautological compounds that accounts for the fact that not much has been said about them in traditional accounts of compounding, which typically relegate them to a marginal area of the English language. However, there is more to tautological compounds than meets the eye. What the present study wishes to demonstrate is that the term 'tautological compound' is a misnomer, as such combinations are far from being tautological or redundant in their meaning. Accordingly, the article first clarifies the notion of tautological compound, and then aims to give an account of the various roles that such combinations play in language, thereby demonstrating their non-tautological and non-redundant nature -in order to assign this much-neglected category to its proper, well-deserved place within English word formation.

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Section: Synonymous Compoundsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 10 Benczes (2012) also adds that the partial reduplication of such compounds (via rhyme) reflects the repetitive and/or rhythmical character of the sounds that these expressions denote.…”

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confidence: 99%

Repetitions which are not repetitions: the non-redundant nature of tautological compounds

Benczes¹

2014

English Language and Linguistics

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“…It has been noted by a number of linguists that English has a very strong tradition of rhyming and alliterating compounds, with rhyming compounds being the most frequent type of reduplicatives (Algeo 1998: 75, Hladký 1998, Benczes 2013, Rastall 2004 ['panties']: "oversized panties") attest, they do not seem to be as common as is the case in English, especially in American English. An indication of the relative infrequency of rhyming and alliterating compounds in Hungarian can be found in Sólyom (2007), who collected and analyzed Hungarian neologisms that appeared around the turn of the millennium.…”

Section: Language Play In Rhyming and Alliterating Compoundsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recent studies, however, attribute a more significant role to rhyming and alliterating compounds in everyday language use (see for example Ladányi 2007, Sólyom 2012, Benczes 2014. For instance, Benczes (2014) claims that rhyming and alliterating patterns serve a number of important pragmatic functions in everyday Hungarian, such as signaling informality.…”

Section: Language Play In Rhyming and Alliterating Compoundsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For instance, Benczes (2014) claims that rhyming and alliterating patterns serve a number of important pragmatic functions in everyday Hungarian, such as signaling informality. In order to prove her point, Benczes cites two examples from Népszótár, a now defunct Hungarian webbased dictionary that could be freely edited by the users (www.nepszotar.hu).…”

Section: Language Play In Rhyming and Alliterating Compoundsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Language Play and Linguistic Hybridity as Current Trends in Hungarian Word-Formation

Benczes

Tóth-Czifra

2016

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Hungarian literature on word-formation typically focuses on rule-governed descriptions of regular and typologically relevant patterns. However, there are plenty of other word-formation trends that usually go unnoticed in mainstream morphological research. The present paper will focus on two such trends: 1) rhyming and alliterating compounds such as pannon puma ['Pannonian puma,' a euphemism for Hungary's economic performance, playing upon the analogy of the 'Asian tiger']; and 2) creative prefixations such as meggugliz ['to google'] and felhájpol ['to hype']. Although these are seemingly two quite different patterns, they in fact share two significant traits. On the one hand, they are demonstrations of the fact that language users make full use of the creative possibilities in language and routinely play with sounds and meanings. On the other hand, they are also indications of the influential role of English in present-day Hungarian wordformation. It seems that language users are not only aware of the possibilities that this interference can result in, but are also able to exploit these consciously. This crossing of language boundaries is becoming increasingly inevitable with the global spread of English.

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Rhyme over Reason

Benczes¹

2019

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Just a Load ofHibber-Gibber? Making Sense of English Rhyming Compounds

Cited by 20 publications

References 29 publications

Repetitions which are not repetitions: the non-redundant nature of tautological compounds

Repetitions which are not repetitions: the non-redundant nature of tautological compounds

Language Play and Linguistic Hybridity as Current Trends in Hungarian Word-Formation

Rhyme over Reason

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