Lesson 7 — Grammatical Topic —  CVC Reduplication  

On this page: Inherent reduplication First element of a CVC sequence
    CVC reduplication as a process   Sound rules and reduplication
    sound pattern of CVC reduplication    

Inherent reduplication
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You've already seen a number of words that show some form of reduplication: part or all of the word is repeated or reduplicated.
ayamumu    "caterpillar" caterpillar ayamumu   
  wuluwul "lobster, crayfish"   lobster, crayfish
  pepe "older sibling"
wuluwul
  koko "father" koko  
  nono "maternal grandfather, mother's father" father paternal grandmother  
  nono "a lot, very, very much so" mama
  mama "paternal grandmother, father's mother"  
Here are a few others that follow the pattern of ayamumu:
  kopkop "toad" toad kopkop  
  muxmux "to crumble"   to wrinkle, be wrinkled
  okok "to wrinkle, be wrinkled"
okok
  ytyt "to deceive"    

CVC Reduplication as a process
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CVC is shorthand for "Consonant – Vowel – Consonant," which is by far the most common pattern of reduplication in Samala:
You can see how CVC describes the pattern of a word such as kopkop "toad."
The basic CVC sequence here is kop, which shows up reduplicated as kopkop. The word always shows up this way, so this is called "inherent reduplication."
Reduplication is also a process. You can do CVC reduplication on many words that are not inherently reduplicated. Here are a few examples, with verbs and also with nouns:
s–nowon + R > nownowon "he/she is standing, stands a lot, keeps standing" they're very crooked
  no–s–kitwon + R > noskitkitwon "it keeps coming out, a lot is coming out"
  s–iy–woyo + R > iwoywoyo "they're very crooked" iwoywoyo
  coyini + R + > coycoyini "others, the others, different ones" beach, sandy area
  s–i–tomol + R + >   itomtomol    "their canoes, their collection of canoes"
  xas + R + > xasxas "beach, sandy area"
xasxas
         
There are two points to look at here: what does does CVC reduplication mean and what happens when you reduplicate a word this way?
First, what does reduplication seem to mean?
It covers a range of meanings:
continual action: "he/she is standing" or "keeps standing"    
  repeated or prolonged action:   "it keeps coming out"    
  intensified action: "a lot is coming out," "it's very crooked"    
  plural noun: "others, the others, different ones"    
  group or collection of nouns: "canoes, a group of canoes"    
    "beach, sandy area"    
  a large number of nouns: "lots of canoes"    

The sound pattern of CVC reduplication
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Let's look at some of the examples again:
s–nowon + R > nownown "he/she is standing, stands a lot, keeps standing"
  s–iy–kitwon + R > sikitkitwon "it keeps coming out, a lot is coming out"
  coyini + R + > coycoyini "others, the others, different ones"
  s–i–tomol + R + >   itomtomol   "their canoes, their collection of canoes"
What's the pattern here?  
Repeat the first CVC sequence of the main part of the word, the part that comes after person markers.
If the word starts with two consonants — like the verbs in these examples — only the consonant that begins the first CVC sequence counts for reduplication.
For nouns, add a glottal stop at the end or glottalize the last consonant of the word.

What counts as the first element of a CVC sequence
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Some word start with a vowel: many verbs and a few nouns
The CVC pattern is so strong that any consonant that shows up in front of the initial vowel gets pulled in to serve as the first CVC consonant.
Here are examples where a person marker gets pulled in:
k–icumu + R > kickicumu "I'm pointing, I keep pointing, I point a lot" your children
  k–itaq + R > kitkitaq "I'm listening, keep hearing/listening"
  s–aqmil + R > saqsaqmil "he/she is drinking, drinks a lot, keeps drinking"
  p–itn + R + > pipitn "your children" pipitn
Here are examples where part of one of the number markers i– or iy– gets pulled in:
  k–i–alpat + R > kialalpat "we two keep running, are running and running" they two are full, really fullthey two are full, really full
  s–i-aqt + R iaqaqt "they two are full, really full"
  p–iy–lkn + R > piylylkn "you all keep sitting, are sitting a lot"
  s–iy–aqmil + R > siyaqyaqmil "they keep drinking, they drink a lot"
iaqaqt
From the second line of the Dog Girl story:
  s–iy–aquyep– + R >   iyaqyaquyep   "they scavenge"  
As you can see, this process can scramble the underlying elements of a word. A reduplicated sequence such as saqsaqmil — "he/she keeps drinking" — is no longer a straightforward combination of s– + aqmil.
If you're not familiar with the vocabulary, you might see saqsaqmil and perhaps wonder if you should look up some verb aqsaqmil. Fortunately, CVC reduplication is easier to recognize when you hear it spoken than when you see it written.
Now that you're more famililiar with them, notice that using the phonetic characters c, and makes it much easier to decode a CVC reduplication. The CVC pattern is more obvious when a noun like pipitn — "your children" — is written this way rather than as *pichpichtn.

Sound rules and CVC reduplication
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The juncture between the two CVC sequences in CVC reduplication gives rise to just about every possible combination of sounds in the Samala language.
There are several sound rules that apply to these combinations of sounds. Two of them are covered here; you'll see more over the next few lessons.
Liquids and stuck-in vowels
With the suffixes –wun and –wa you've seen how sequences of two liquids in a row are broken up with a stuck-in vowel.
With CVC reduplication, you don't have to worry about stuck-in vowels.
If CVC reduplication puts two liquids next to each other, they stay together with no change.
You've already seen a few examples of this:    
s–nowon + R > nownowon "he/she is standing, stands a lot, keeps standing"    
  s–woyo + R > woywoyo "it's very crooked"    
  p–iy–lkn + R >   piylylkn   "you all keep sitting, are sitting a lot"    
Glottalization and CVC reduplication
You've already seen that a consonant loses its glottalization when another consonant comes right after it: So far the only examples of this that you've seen result from adding the suffixes –wun and –wa. frogs
waqaqwun		 it was wet
owa
  waqaq–wun > waqaqwun "frogs"
  s–o–wa > owa "it was wet"
The same thing happens with CVC reduplication. Look at these reduplicated forms: my younger siblings
kickicis 		 
  k–icis + R + > kickicis "my younger siblings" you're holding, keep holdingpulpuli
  s–tamay + R > tamtamay "he/she keeps forgetting"
  p–uli + R > pulpuli "you're holding, keep holding"
  pon + R + > ponpon "trees, sticks, lots of wood"   birds
wicwic
  wic + R + > wicwic "birds, lots of birds"  

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