Disclaimer: This post was originally written in Chinese and translated into English by GPT-5.2.
As a linguistic device, the reduplication phenomenon in Modern Chinese expresses a certain meaning of “quantity”; basically, this can be said to have been a consensus in the grammatical community since Zhu Dexi (1982). Zhu Dexi held that verb reduplication indicates short time span or small amount of action; adjective reduplication all contains the notion of quantity and can be divided into two cases: in the attributive and predicative positions it expresses a slight degree, while in the adverbial and complement positions it carries an intensified or emphatic meaning.
However, as for the quantitative characteristics of Modern Chinese reduplicative forms, the academic community has not yet reached a unified consensus. Centering on Zhu Dexi’s above assertions, there are currently mainly two camps of views: the first camp holds that reduplication expresses a change in quantity, i.e., the linguistic unit before and after reduplication has quantitative characteristics of different degrees, and reduplicative forms of different word classes have different quantitative characteristics; the second camp holds that reduplication expresses the determination of quantity, i.e., compared with the linguistic unit after reduplication, the linguistic unit before reduplication does not contain quantitative meaning, or the quantitative meaning has not yet become salient—this is the commonality of the quantitative characteristics of reduplication across word classes. Representatives of these two camps include Li Yuming (1996) and Shi Yuzhi (1996), among others.
Reduplication has been one of the hot issues in Modern Chinese research over the past more than sixty years; relevant works are too numerous to enumerate, and achievements are abundant. But as far as works analyzing the quantitative expression of Modern Chinese reduplicative forms are concerned, these studies often only focus on the reduplication of certain word classes in Modern Chinese, and thus have a certain one-sidedness. Coupled with a lack of strict definitions of concepts such as Modern Chinese reduplicative forms and the category of quantity, some of the views therein are not necessarily convincing. On the basis of drawing on previous research results, this paper strictly defines concepts such as reduplicative forms and the category of quantity, and attempts to systematically and comprehensively sort out and analyze the quantitative characteristics of Modern Chinese reduplicative forms.
From a synchronic perspective, reduplication is a linguistic device with high productivity and derivationality; its basic construction can be described as: X*X→XX. Here, X is the base form, the linguistic form before reduplication; XX is the reduplicative form, the product of the base form X after one self-copying and self-overlapping. Functionally, reduplication includes word-forming reduplication and inflectional reduplication, and the corresponding reduplicative forms are word-forming reduplicative forms and inflectional reduplicative forms. Among them, the former are words, and the latter are superword forms. Formally, reduplication has the following characteristics:
① The base form X itself cannot be a reduplicative form (hypothetically X’X’). Because if the base form X = X’X’, then the reduplicative form XX = X’X’X’X’ violates the reduplication rule that the base form can only undergo one self-copying, so it does not hold. Due to the rules of Chinese syllable usage, the base form X generally does not exceed two syllables.
② The reduplicative form XX has integrity in semantic function; there is no syntactic relation between the two internal base forms X. This is the basic requirement for reduplication as a linguistic device quite different from syntactic combination. Therefore, something like “官官（相护）”, which is essentially a coordinative structure, is not a reduplicative form.
This paper holds that Modern Chinese reduplicative forms include two categories and five types: the first category is basic reduplicative forms, with AA and ABAB (A and B are both monosyllables; the same below); the second category is derived reduplicative forms, with ABB, AAB, and AABB. Many studies also include the “A不AB、A里AB” pattern and certain variant forms of VV verb reduplication (“V了V”, “V一V”, and “V了一V”) among derived reduplicative forms; this paper takes a negative stance toward this. The former obviously does not conform to the basic construction of reduplication “X*X→XX”, and its productivity is very limited, so it should not be included. As for the latter, although its semantic function is close to that of its corresponding reduplicative form VV, whether from the perspective of construction or diachronic evolution, the two can at most be treated as synonymous substitutable structures or variant forms, and it is not appropriate to directly equate the latter with the former. Liu Danqing (2012:3-5), from syntactic and dialectal perspectives, also expressed similar views.
Basic reduplicative forms, AA and ABAB, strictly conform to the basic construction of reduplication and are undoubtedly the most typical reduplicative forms. Derived reduplicative forms, ABB, AAB, and AABB, although structurally do not conform to the basic construction of reduplication and have relative independence, are high in frequency, strong in productivity, and their reduplicative meanings and patterns are closely related to basic reduplicative forms, thus they are also widely recognized by the academic community. From the perspective of diachronic language evolution, to a certain extent, derived reduplicative forms can all be regarded as the overlap of reduplicative forms AA or BB with other language components (ABB→ABB, AAB→AAB, AABB→AABB), except that most of these reduplicative forms are no longer very free and are used only as word-forming morphemes. Shao Jingmin (1990:19-26), from historical, regional, stylistic, and semantic perspectives, found that the BB in ABB reduplicative forms is undergoing varying degrees of grammaticalization, functionally similar to morphemes, such as “光秃秃”“黑沉沉”“黄橙橙”, so ABB can be analyzed as ABB. The main part of AAB reduplicative forms is a governing verb-object phrase structure, such as “拍拍手”“睡睡觉”“说说话”, which structurally can obviously be analyzed as AAB; that is, it is more appropriate for a monosyllabic verb reduplication to be accompanied by an object, such as “吃吃饭”“吃吃面条”. Shi Qin’s (2007) research also shows that AABB reduplicative forms originally derived from an overlapping form of reduplicative forms AA and BB. Later, with the lexicalization of temporary combinations of AABB, due to reanalysis and analogy, many disyllabic AB words can directly construct an AABB reduplicative form through “ABAB→AABB”. Ren Haibo’s (2001:306) investigation of a 100-million-character corpus shows that in the AABB pattern, nearly 80% of A or B are coordinative or joint in semantic structure, and they can all be regarded as generated through the overlapping form “AABB→AABB”, such as “松松散散→松松散散”. However, the historical origins of these three reduplicative forms are evidently quite complex, and we do not intend to pursue them to the end here. Of course, we also cannot forget that for derived reduplicative forms where AB has become a word, quite a number of examples are indeed difficult to regard as indirectly evolving from basic reduplicative forms, and we should admit that there is some special reduplication process that makes “AB*AB→ABB、ABB or AABB”. Especially for AABB reduplicative forms such as “许许多多”“高高兴兴”“踏踏实实”, their base forms A and B have no meaning when separated, so they can only be regarded as directly reduplicated from the disyllabic words “许多”“高兴”“踏实”.
This paper mainly studies AA (inflectional form), ABAB basic reduplicative forms, AABB derived reduplicative forms, and the special ABB reduplicative forms among noun classifiers. Since in word-forming reduplication, syllables do not express meaning, and bound morphemes do not have combinatory ability at the syntactic level, it is difficult for us to accurately study their quantitative characteristics from a synchronic perspective; therefore, this kind of reduplicative form will not be the focus of this paper. But based on the above argumentation, we presuppose that as an abstract, productive linguistic device, the quantitative function of reduplication has certain commonality and universality. That is to say, through the study of the above scope of reduplicative forms, we can basically grasp the quantitative essence and specific characteristics of reduplication.
Understanding the category of quantity cannot be separated from understanding the category of quality. In philosophy, “quantity” is opposite to “quality” and they are two different modes of thinking. “Quality” embodies a kind of synthetic thinking, mainly used to classify and judge things, actions, properties, etc., so that they can be distinguished from one another internally; “quantity” embodies a kind of analytical thinking, mainly used to describe and compare quantitative characteristics such as the size, range, and degree of “quality”, so that they can be more clearly recognized by people. For example, in the two sentences “这张纸是白的” and “这张纸白白的”, “白” is a classificatory concept, whereas “白白” is an analytical concept. A classificatory concept is used to express judgment and does not contain the speaker’s subjective attitude; therefore, “白纸” can be either “clean” or “not clean”. An analytical concept is used to describe and compare, indicating the speaker’s subjective cognition (“白白” here means “very white”); therefore, “白白的纸” cannot be “not clean”. Theoretically, “quality” itself does not contain the meaning of “quantity”, whereas “quantity” is a further analysis of the characteristics of “quality”; the two are clearly distinct and must not be confused. That is, the category of quantity is a semantic set that analytically (descriptively, comparatively) describes the quantitative characteristics of the category of quality.
Within the language system, the two categories “quality” and “quantity” also have corresponding forms of expression. As far as the category of quality is concerned, generally speaking, nouns correspond to things, verbs correspond to actions, adjectives correspond to properties, and onomatopoeia correspond to the external sounds they imitate. As for the category of quantity, numerals and classifiers, numeral-classifier phrases, adverbs expressing range and degree, morphological changes (such as the reduplication phenomenon in Modern Chinese), and specific structures expressing comparison (such as “跟……一样”“不如……” etc.)—the meanings expressed by these linguistic devices all belong to the category of quantity. In addition, it should be noted that some words in Modern Chinese, in the process of lexicalization, already include the meaning of “quantity”. Besides degree adverbs such as “最”“顶”, stative adjectives such as “雪白”“笔直”“死静” also already contain quantitative descriptions of the degree of properties such as “白”“直”“静”. As for other word classes in Modern Chinese that can be reduplicated, they usually express only “quality” and not “quantity”, such as “人、看、红”, etc.
That reduplication expresses quantity is a basic consensus in the academic community. Here we attribute the phenomenon of reduplication expressing quantity to the quantification function of reduplication. In Modern Chinese, the word classes that can serve as bases for reduplication mainly include nouns, classifiers, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and onomatopoeia, etc.; therefore, the quantification function of reduplication can also be understood from two aspects: 1) The base expresses “quality” but not “quantity”; through the quantification function of reduplication, the reduplicative form comes to have quantitative characteristics. The corresponding word classes include nouns, classifiers, verbs, qualitative adjectives, onomatopoeia, etc. This is the most basic meaning of reduplication quantifying. 2) The base generally already contains some specific quantity and almost does not accept modification by other linguistic devices expressing the category of quantity, but through the quantification function of reduplication, the quantitative characteristics of the base are strengthened and highlighted. The corresponding word classes include stative adjectives and adverbs, etc. The second type of reduplication quantifying is more pragmatic than grammatical, more often expressing the speaker’s renewed emphasis on a certain thing; not only can it only occur through basic reduplication, but the number of words that can be reduplicated is also quite limited, and it seems it can be regarded as a pragmatic variant of the first type of reduplication quantifying.
The two meanings of reduplication quantifying also indicate the dual nature of reduplication as a linguistic device: namely, it has a side that leans toward a grammatical device, and a side that leans toward a pragmatic device. From the pragmatic side, the first type of reduplication quantifying can in fact be further divided into direct quantification and indirect quantification. In reality, Modern Chinese reduplicative forms include two situations: one that focuses on expressing quantity and one that focuses on expressing situation/state; these two situations correspond respectively to direct quantification and indirect quantification. The former, for example: “人人/个个都去了”, means “everyone went”; “人人/个个” here means “each person” and does not have situationality. The latter, for example: “一车车物资”“阵阵掌声”, means “supplies one cart after another” and “applause one round after another”; “车车/阵阵” here expresses continuity and repetition; the situational meaning is prominent, but objectively, compared with the base that does not express quantity, it indirectly expresses “a large amount”. Verbs and adjectives respectively express actions and properties in meaning and more or less implicitly contain situational characteristics; although their reduplicative forms express some specific quantity, they also indirectly have the effect of highlighting their situationality, such as “看看他”’s “看看” and “眼睛大大（的）”’s “大大”, meaning “take a look” and “quite big”. The two concepts of the “quantity” of things and the “situation/state” of things have an intrinsic association, but from the perspective of quantitative analysis, reduplicative forms that focus on expressing situation/state also indirectly express quantity.
With the quantification function of reduplication made clear, below we will in turn conduct a quantitative analysis of the reduplicative forms of these word classes.
Noun reduplicative forms have two types, AA and AABB, mainly expressing multiple meanings such as “each” and generic reference. In summary, noun reduplicative forms all express “a large amount”.
All AA noun reduplications express “each”, and can often be replaced by the corresponding “每+classifier+A/synonym of A”, for example: 人人: 每个人, 事事: 每件事, 家家: 每户家庭, 处处: 每个地方, 时时: 每个时刻. The number of monosyllabic nouns that can be directly reduplicated and flexibly used is very limited, and most show traces of diachronic evolution (Shi Yuzhi 2003), but in some highly topical sentences, some monosyllabic nouns denoting location and place can also be conditionally reduplicated, such as for contrast, expressing “each”. For example:
Village after village has gongs and drums, stockade after stockade has songs and dances—what a scene of a prosperous festival.
On the night of the Lantern Festival, in the ancient city of Kaifeng, street after street is lit with colored lanterns, tree after tree with silver blossoms; in every alley and thoroughfare, the din of voices is overwhelming.
On the whole, monosyllabic nouns have weak reduplication ability; they are few in number. But the number of noun AABB reduplicative forms is extremely considerable, and their internal composition is also quite complex. Their semantic characteristics, according to the study by Wu Yin and Shao Jingmin (2001), can be divided into six types: each, generic reference, mixed, successive, spread throughout, and depiction (i.e., “situation/state”), with the basic meaning of expressing “a large amount”. The following examples all come from Wu Yin and Shao Jingmin (2001:14-15):
Each: 家家户户、字字句句、分分秒秒, etc.
Generic reference: 坛坛罐罐、针针线线、汤汤水水, etc.
Mixed: 花花草草、男男女女、是是非非, etc.
Successive: 祖祖孙孙、世世代代、生生世世, etc.
Spread throughout: 上上下下、里里外外、方方面面, etc.
Depiction: 风风火火、星星点点、婆婆妈妈, etc.
In terms of nature, classifiers that can be reduplicated include three types: nominal classifiers, temporal classifiers, and verbal classifiers. All three subtypes of classifiers can be reduplicated in the forms AA, 一AA, and 一A一A, mainly expressing “each” and “one by one”. Like noun reduplicative forms, classifier reduplicative forms also all express “a large amount”.
Classifier AA reduplicative forms have two cases: expressing “each” and expressing “one by one”. But in actual usage, temporal classifier AA reduplicative forms only express “each”, such as “天天加班”“年年如此”’s “天天”“年年”, etc. Verbal classifier AA reduplicative forms mainly express “one by one”, such as “次次”“回回”“趟趟” respectively expressing “each time”“each time (round)”“each trip”; occasionally they also express “each”, such as “阵阵掌声”’s “阵阵” expressing “one round after another”. Nominal classifier AA reduplicative forms can express both “each” and “one by one”. The former implicitly has a specific quantitative range, while the latter does not. Sometimes, the same AA form can, due to different contexts, simultaneously have the meanings of “each” and “one by one”. For example:
Each: 个个学生、张张纸、句句话, etc.
One by one: 朵朵白云、串串葡萄、盏盏明灯, etc.
A. Each: There are tens of thousands of ways to get rich; every road leads to a moderately prosperous life.
B. One by one: Today’s Hengyang has water, land, and air roads one after another connecting in all directions, laying the foundation for future economic takeoff.
When classifier AA reduplicative forms express “one by one”, their situational depiction is prominent and they can be used as predicates, for example: 掌声阵阵、白云朵朵、道路条条; when they express “each”, the reduplicative form expresses only quantity and not situation/state, and cannot be used as a predicate; for example, one does not say “学学个个”“纸张张”“话句句”, etc. Through this method, we can effectively distinguish the different quantitative characteristics within nominal classifier reduplicative forms.
The 一AA and 一A一A reduplicative forms of classifiers can often replace each other, mainly expressing “one by one”, with prominent situational meaning, and are close in meaning to “一A又一A”. For example:
Nominal classifiers: Books should be read one book at a time, homework should be done one problem at a time.
Temporal classifiers: The days are so trivial, so long; that toil repeats day after day, year after year, repeating until one becomes numb.
Verbal classifiers: Just as the government issues orders time after time to strengthen supervision, mining accidents still replay again and again.
In Modern Chinese, when combined with numerals, some monosyllabic nouns can be temporarily used as classifiers, such as “碗”“桶”“车”, etc. Such temporary classifiers can only be reduplicated by the two methods 一AA and 一A一A, for example:
Here, bowl after bowl and bucket after bucket of milk was frozen into ice blocks.
She loaded the waste soil onto the cart, and then delivered it to the garbage station cart by cart.
Finally, nominal classifier 一AA and 一A一A reduplicative forms also have two special cases: 1) When the 一AA reduplicative form is used for anaphoric reference, it expresses “each”. 2) After the A in the 一A一A reduplicative form, sometimes the modified noun can be added or supplied, forming an over-four-syllable reduplicative form “一A名一A名”. For example:
They are each and every one naturally beautiful, well-educated, with suitors like clouds.
They coordinated with transportation and industry and commerce, registering one vehicle after another, increasing tax revenue by more than five million yuan.
Verb reduplicative forms mainly include three types: AA, ABAB, and AABB. The governing verb-object phrase AAB reduplicative form can be regarded as monosyllabic verb reduplication plus an object, so its quantitative characteristics are completely consistent with verb AA reduplicative forms; it can be subsumed under AA reduplication, or need not be discussed separately. Verb reduplicative forms mainly express short time span or small amount of action, or a “small quantity” in action; some verb AABB reduplicative forms, due to the structural meaning of the AABB pattern, are similar to noun AABB reduplicative forms and have the meaning of expressing “a large amount”.
Time span refers to the duration of an action or behavior, such as “一会儿”“一天”; amount of action refers to the number of repetitions of an action or behavior, such as “一次”“一遍”. Compared with the base form, the verb VV reduplicative form has the quantitative characteristics of short time span or small amount of action, and can almost always be synonymously replaced with “V一下” or “V一会儿”. Monosyllabic verb reduplication forms AA, and disyllabic verb reduplication forms ABAB. For example:
Short time span: 看看书，下下棋，聊聊天；研究研究，琢磨琢磨，收拾收拾
Small amount of action: 弯弯腰，理理发，拍拍手；指教指教，引荐引荐，打扮打扮。
It should be noted that “V一下” in fact can express both short time span (“等一下=等一会儿”) and small amount of action (“敲一下，敲两下”). When examining several hundred example sentences of verb VV reduplication, Li Shan (1993:23) once simplistically considered that “V一下” only expresses small amount of action, and that “V一会儿” can almost be replaced by “V一下”, thus drawing the conclusion: there are some verb VV reduplicative forms that purely express small amount of action, but not a single one that purely expresses short time span. This is somewhat misleading; for example, “多睡睡” can only be understood as “sleep a bit longer (for a while)”; here “睡睡” purely expresses short time span. Of course, for various reasons, the time span and amount of action of actions and behaviors can also be subjective and relative, and sometimes difficult to distinguish. For example, “聊聊天”, in different contexts, can be understood as either “chat for a while” or “chat once”; this depends on whether the speaker treats “chatting” as a durative action or a repetitive behavior. However, conceptually, the distinction between time span and amount of action objectively exists, and the difference between the two is clear.
In terms of language sense, verb VV reduplicative forms may carry meanings such as “trying”, “habitual”, and “relaxed”. But to a large extent, these meanings are still assigned or derived from specific linguistic environments, manifested in that the reduplicative forms can all be replaced by “V一下” or “V一会儿” without a change in meaning. Therefore, from the perspective of quantitative analysis, the verb VV reduplicative forms here still express short time span or small amount of action. For example:
You ask around; where on earth did that person go?
After he retired, he usually reads a bit, plays a bit of chess, and chats a bit with old friends; he’s not lonely at all.
These days he watches some movies, buys some things, packs his luggage, and is just waiting to go home.
When V is a concrete, real, short-duration verb of action/behavior, such as a short-duration bodily action verb, the verb VV reduplicative form can also be used in perfective sentences to express a concrete short-duration amount of action (Li Yufeng 2016:88-93). At this time, the verb VV reduplicative form can be replaced by “V了V” or “V了一下/一会儿”. For example:
He touched Ning Jinshan’s head, felt his hands, and patiently asked after him in every way, just like an old mother.
Verb AABB reduplicative forms are divided into two situations. One is a serial-verb form of two monosyllabic verb VV reduplications, and in expression they can often be swapped front and back, such as “走走停停/停停走走”“写写算算/算算写写”. In terms of quantity, this reduplicative form is clearly no different from verb VV reduplication, except that its situationality is more prominent. The other kind, due to the stative-adjective functional categorization and word-class shift effects possessed by the AABB pattern (Hua Yuming 2003), is completely different from verb VV reduplication. Such verb AABB reduplicative forms can often be replaced by “又A又B”, have extremely strong situational depiction, and express the continuity and repetition of actions/behaviors, having a meaning of “a large amount”, such as: 拉拉扯扯、指指点点、躲躲闪闪、修修补补、吹吹捧捧、蹦蹦跳跳. These two types of verb AABB reduplicative forms are sometimes not easy to distinguish, but the first has only verbhood, is mainly used as a predicate, and cannot be used as an adverbial; the second also has adjectival properties; besides being a predicate, it is also often used as an adverbial, and functionally is close to stative adjectives, for example:
After drinking, I and Ou Wumin swaying unsteadily returned to our poor big courtyard.
Nouns generally also cannot be used as adverbials, but when noun reduplication enters the AABB pattern, it often undergoes semantic generalization and extension and also gains adverbial function. This shows that the AABB pattern has strong structural meaning and is another reduplication form distinct from basic reduplication.
Adjective reduplicative forms mainly include AA, ABAB, and AABB, and can be used as attributives, predicates, adverbials, and complements; semantically they are all equivalent to: a degree adverb indicating a high degree such as “非常/很/挺” + the base form. Therefore, adjective reduplicative forms express a kind of “large amount” in the degree of some property. For example:
The workers’ faces were all droopy, dazed, utterly exhausted.
Xiao Qunxiu touched her face; it was scalding hot.
A model worker should not only be a model worker, but also a lively, open and forthright, ordinary young person!
Zhu Dexi (1982:27) held that compared with the base form, the degree quantity of the property expressed by adjective AA reduplication is milder in the attributive and predicative positions. But this claim has two problems: 1) The monosyllabic adjective base expresses “quality” but not “quantity”, and there is no quantitative basis for comparison between it and the reduplicative form, so the phrasing “more mild” is inaccurate. 2) That the degree quantity of adjective AA reduplication would undergo a reverse change of “large amount–small amount” due to changes in syntactic position is baffling. The following are Zhu Dexi’s examples:
He is a little fat kid, with short legs; when he walks, he totters comically.
The face is red, the eyes bright.
We believe that in example (29), “短短的腿” is clearly “very short legs”, and in example (30) it is clearly saying “the face is very red, the eyes are very bright”; adjective AA reduplication here still expresses a relatively large degree quantity of the property. Although the reduplicative form here may carry an affectionate, intimate, diminutive nuance, this is not its rational meaning. Li Jinrong (2006:145) also points out that this nuance is only a temporary pragmatic meaning produced by an “empathy” factor, mainly arising when adjective AA reduplication modifies things closely related to people. If the object modified by the reduplicative form is not intimate, this meaning will not arise either; for example, in the sentence “大大的眼睛占据了部分头和脸颊”, “大大的” clearly expresses a very large degree. Similarly, in example (26), “恹恹的、呆呆的” clearly means “very weary, very sluggish” rather than “a bit weary, a bit sluggish”, and none has a mild or diminutive meaning. Li Yuming (1996:66) once cited “圆圆（儿）的肩头”“长长（儿）的车队” as examples, arguing that the reduplicative form can be “-erized” (儿化) to prove that the degree of the reduplicative form is weakened compared with the base. But the -erization phenomenon is extremely common in adjective AA reduplication and does not show that the reduplicative form has a small-degree quantitative characteristic. For example, in Li Yuming’s examples, “长长的车队” is clearly “very long”, which is why it can “flow forward nonstop”. As for “圆圆的肩头”, although it cannot be rounder than a mathematical circle, “round” here is clearly “round” in everyday-life terms, and “圆圆” means “very round”.
Besides monosyllabic reduplicative forms, disyllabic adjective reduplicative forms include ABAB and AABB, both expressing a large degree quantity of the property. Those that can undergo ABAB reduplication are mainly stative adjectives; those that can undergo AABB reduplication are mainly qualitative adjectives. Some AB adjective bases expressing a coordinative relationship can undergo both forms of reduplication, for example: 长久长久/长长久久，白胖白胖/白白胖胖，清亮清亮/清清亮亮 (Huang Bin 2001:51). But in terms of language sense, AABB reduplication is more lexicalized and more idiomatic; it can be replaced by “又A又B”, while ABAB reduplication more often emphasizes and highlights the overall degree quantity of AB as a whole. This is also why its bases are mainly stative adjectives, such as “雪白、笔直、死静”, because stative adjectives themselves already contain a relatively large degree quantity of the property. However, this also shows that the motivation for reduplication of stative adjectives differs from bases that generally express only “quality” and not “quantity”, because it does not need reduplication to endow the base with quantitative characteristics. Shi Qin (2004:88) explains that stative adjectives have a tendency for their stative meaning to fade (for example, one can say “雪亮如银”), and therefore reduplication is needed to strengthen the semantic characteristics of the base. This is relatively convincing.
In addition, it should be noted that there is also a class of disyllabic qualitative adjectives that can often be reduplicated in the construction “让／使／叫＋某人＋ABAB”, for example:
Separated for a few days, let the two of them calm down.
Come on, put on this suit; let’s also look swaggering.
But observation shows that such ABAB reduplicative forms can generally be synonymously replaced by “AB一下/一会儿”. That is, in essence, such reduplicative forms are still disyllabic verb reduplication, and the disyllabic qualitative adjective AB is a verb-adjective dual-category word; when reduplicated it turns into a verb, and thus it should not be regarded as adjective reduplication.
Adverbs are far less capable of reduplication than adjectives, mainly with AA and ABAB. Since adverbs often already contain some specific quantity, linguistic devices generally expressing the category of quantity also cannot collocate with them; therefore, adverb reduplicative forms more often merely strengthen and highlight the quantity already present in the base. But from the speaker’s subjective perspective, such reduplicative forms can be understood as a further deepening to some extent, expressing “a large amount”. For example:
The graduation ceremony ended an era, an utterly wonderful, carefree era.
When a number is extremely large—so large that it exceeds all finite numbers—what kind of number is it?
Similar examples include: 光光、偏偏、独独、万万，相当相当、十分十分、特别特别, etc.
Zhang Yisheng (1997) systematically studied the phenomenon of adverb reduplication and pointed out that compared with the base form, the reduplicative form is semantically more salient and has a stronger tone, corroborating our view.
Onomatopoeia used for reduplication are generally disyllabic, so onomatopoeic reduplicative forms are mainly ABAB. The purpose of onomatopoeic reduplication is to reproduce the form of a sound repeated many times; the situational depiction is very prominent, but from the perspective of quantitative analysis, it has the meaning of “a large amount”. For example:
He was talking about having been cold-shouldered when he went to see someone just now, and as he spoke he chuckled.
He kept stealing glances, and in his heart it still thumped nonstop.
Liu Danqing (2009) perceptively discovered the phenomenon of reduplication of Modern Chinese content words becoming onomatopoeic. What is reduplicated are various kinds of content words, such as the “大哥” in “他大哥大哥地叫着”, but we believe that this kind of reduplicative form should still be regarded as onomatopoeic reduplication rather than content-word reduplication. Because, as Liu Danqing pointed out, the basic function of onomatopoeic reduplication is to reproduce the phonetic form of an utterance, highlighting its signifier and suppressing its signified; therefore, this paper treats it as a temporary onomatopoeia. Related examples include:
I heard that foreigner shouting “维特维特” (wait wait).
I asked Old Zhang what was going on, and he only knew to mutter “坏了坏了” over and over again.
On the basis of strictly defining concepts such as reduplicative forms and the category of quantity, this paper has systematically and comprehensively sorted out and analyzed the quantitative characteristics of Modern Chinese reduplicative forms. Different from the existing two camps of views that reduplication expresses a change in quantity and that reduplication expresses the determination of quantity, we hold that the quantitative essence of reduplication is related to its quantification function. That is, through reduplication, a base form that originally does not express quantity acquires quantitative characteristics in the reduplicative form; a base form that originally already expresses quantity has its quantitative characteristics strengthened and highlighted in the reduplicative form. That reduplication expresses the determination of quantity can be said to be the main manifestation of the quantification function of reduplication, but not all of it. The view that reduplication expresses a change in quantity sees the differences in quantitative characteristics among reduplicative forms of different word classes, but it is biased in presupposing that base forms all express quantity.
Specifically, in Modern Chinese, noun and classifier reduplicative forms express meanings such as “each” or generic reference, and have the meaning of “a large amount”; verb reduplicative forms express short time span or small amount of action, and have the meaning of “a small amount”; adjective reduplicative forms express “a large amount” in the degree of some property; adverb reduplicative forms express the strengthening and highlighting of the degree quantity of the base form, and have the meaning of “a large amount”; onomatopoeic reduplicative forms express the reproduction of sounds repeated many times, and have the meaning of “a large amount”. “A large amount” focuses more on the discrete characteristics of things, while “large/small amount” focuses more on the continuous characteristics of things, but subjectively they are all definite quantities and can be understood as meanings of “relatively many, relatively small, relatively large” quantities. In addition, it should be noted that the AABB pattern is a derived reduplicative form different from basic reduplication (AA, ABAB). Whether nouns, verbs, or adjectives, once they enter this pattern, the quantity they express is at a high value, such as “a large amount” and “a very large amount”. Of course, except for verbs, the quantities expressed by basic reduplication of other word classes are also all at a high value. This reflects the interrelatedness between basic and derived reduplicative forms.
Of course, due to limitations of space and personal energy, this paper has not provided a more detailed description of the internal compositional situations of reduplicative forms within each word class in Modern Chinese, and also lacks a diachronic discussion of word-forming reduplicative forms. In addition, since the quantitative essence of reduplication is related to its quantification function, it is still necessary for us to understand the relationship between reduplication and quantity from two aspects: first, the selection of bases by the reduplication phenomenon, and second, the syntactic performance of the reduplicative form relative to the base form. These issues are, for the time being, left unaddressed in this paper, awaiting future related research.
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