kottke.org

...is a weblog about the liberal arts 2.0 edited by Jason Kottke since March 1998 (archives). You can read about me and kottke.org here. If you've got questions, concerns, or interesting links, send them along.

A friend of mine and

A friend of mine and I were discussing phrases like "artsy fartsy" and "hoity toity" and wondering a) if that sort of rhyming phrase had a name, and b) if there were more of them that we didn't know about. I should have known the answers were available on the Web. Words like that are called reduplicates and some of my favorites (found here, scroll down to the bottom) include dilly-dally, fuddy-duddy, higgledy piggledy, hurly-burly, and namby-pamby.

Related to reduplicates is Cockney rhyming slang, one of my favorite "features" of the English language. I'd start using it in daily conversation, but I fear that no one would know what the hell I was talking about, which, according to the explanation of what Cockney rhyming slang is, was probably the point.

By Jason Kottke    Apr 29, 2000 at 01:58 pm

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