Semantic grammar of Hindi: A study in reduplication By Anvita Abbi (review)

BOOK NOTICES 487 tics (1957), raises questions about interference and principles of borrowing. In the first section, K deals with kinds and conditions ofborrowing, and discusses methodological questions based on Haugen's 'Analysis of linguistic borrowing' (Lg. 26.210-31, 1950). Here K addresses the problems of borrowing from a foreign language and from a second language, drawing an essential distinction between the two ('direct' and 'hybrid' borrowings). In his second section, he focuses on the phonological-phonetic integration of loanwords, including orthography. Here current English borrowings in Hungarian medical terminology are analysed phonologically. In the next section, nw^hological issues are discussed, with examples from English and Hungarian, but also from Russian—and, to a lesser extent, from Polish. In the concluding section, K identifies what he calls a 'terminus technicus': here he follows the characterization ofA. I. Moiseev (? jazykovoj prirode termina', Moscow, 1970). In the same section, he analyses current English borrowings into Hungarian medical language in terms of mt^hology and semantics. A short bibliography closes the volume; but K has omitted a glossary of some four hundred medical terms which were originally a part of his dissertation. Since K's area is very specialized, and since the language with which he deals is spoken by few western scholars, an English language summary would have greatly enhanced the usefulness of this volume. [Marianna D. Birnbaum, UCLA.] Semantic grammar of Hindi: A study in reduplication. By Anvita Abbi. (Series in Indian languages and linguistics , 10.) New Delhi: Bahri, 1980. Pp. xii, 159. Rs. 55.00. Abbi's revision of her 1974 Cornell dissertation examines an inadequately described area of Hindi grammar, namely reduplication. It has long been recognized that this process is associated with several different semantic functions in Hindi, e.g. the notions of distribution and iteration. But the richness of the Hindi reduplicative system, involving many different parts of speech—and expressing different or even contradictory meanings—has hitherto not been treated. The topic is an important one, well worth an extended examination. SGH essentially consists offour chapters and a like number of appendices. Chap. 1 provides a brief inventory of Hindi reduplicative expressions , and summarizes the ways they have been characterized in the past. It also presents an introduction to A's theoretical model—i.e. that proposed by Wallace Tiafe in his Meaning and structure oflanguage. Chaps. 2, 3, and 4 contain extended discussions ofthe reduplication ofadverbs , adjectives, and nouns respectively. The appendices consist of a brief discussion of the derivation of causative verbs, plus illustrative lists of what A refers to as 'partial reduplications ', 'mimic words', and 'echo words'. Five distinct types of reduplication are distinguished here: complete reduplication (e.g. laRke laRke, dhire dhire), partial reduplication (kam käj, idhar udhar), echo words (khänä vänä), mimic words (bhin bhin, cip cip), and reduplication with an infix (rätörät). Further distinctions can be made within each type: the part of speech being reduplicated, the formal characteristics ofthe reduplicating form (whether bearing perfective or imperfective aspectual suffixes , whether marked for number-gender concord , etc.), the derivational history of the reduplicating form—and, most importantly, the semantic function served by the reduplication. The major portion of SGH treats complete reduplication , with phenomena of other types illustrated in the appendices. A finds a well-developed system governing the occurrence and formal characteristics of reduplication . In the case of adverbial phrases alone, she describes six different meanings: simultaneity (e.g. vo calte-calte gir para 'He fell down while he was walking'), duration (vo pan becte-becte buddhä ho gaya 'He became old selling betels [all his life]'), the non-occurrence of an event in spite of the likelihood of its occurrence (durghatnä hote-hote bac gai 'The accident was about to take place but was averted), continuity (calte-calte uske pävö mê chäle par gaye 'His feet were blistered from continuous walking'), iteration (ek hi sajävat dekh-dekh kar mäi üb gayâ ? am bored from seeing the same decoration [again and again']), and intensification (yah citthl abhi-abhi aï hai 'This letter has comejust now. ') With adjectival phrases, one must add the semantic features of distribution (mere p...