Diminutive

A diminutive is a formation of a word used to convey a slight degree of the root meaning, smallness of the object named, intimacy, or endearment. It is the opposite of a augmentative. In some languages diminutives are formed in a regular way by adding affixes to nouns and proper names, in English the alteration of meaning is often but not essentially conveyed through smaller size. English diminutives tend to be shorter and more colloquial than the basic form of the word, diminutives formed by adding affixes in other languages are often longer and not necessarily colloquial. Diminutives are often used for affection (see nickname and hypocoristic). In many languages the meaning of diminution can be translated "tiny" or "wee" and diminutives are used a lot when speaking to small children; adult people sometimes use diminutives when they express extreme tenderness and intimacy by behaving and talking like children (for example in sexual situations). (See Apocopation).

English Usage in General

Diminutives are common in most national forms of English. Terms such as "undies" for underwear, and "movies" (short for "moving pictures") are frequently heard terms in English. (Note that analogical expressions in languages in which diminution is a regular part of the grammar would not be called diminutives.) Common diminutives are:

• -ey/-ie/-y: dearie, doggy, kitty, cookie
• -ling: duckling, gosling
• -ette: dinette, cigarette
• -let: piglet, eyelet

Australian English

Australian English is known for its use of diminutives with the "-za" suffix applied to the shortened version of a person's name, especially one ending in -(r)r- plus vowel. Thus "Barry" becomes "Bazza" and "Gary" becomes "Gazza" though this is not routinely done with all names; a possible diminutive for "Larry", which would be "Lazza" under this system, a word quite close to Lizzy (diminutive of the female name Elizabeth) and lass (meaning girl)), is very rare. There has also been a trend towards changing "Jarrod" or "Jared" to "Jazza". Female names are also shortened, such as "Sharon" becoming "Shazza". This use of diminutives is also found in British English.

Other suffixes

Other suffixes are also used, such as "-ey/-ie/-y" and "-o", thereby creating names such as Petey (formerly Peter), Dougie (Douglas), Johnny or Jono (Jonathan), and Robbie or Robbo (Robert). In Britain the title of popular soap opera Coronation Street is frequently shortened to "Corrie" or "Corro" by its fans.

Sometimes a diminutive lengthens the original word as seen in the ubiquitous American term "hottie" to denote sexually appealing (or "hot") young man or woman.

Diminutives aside from Proper Nouns

Many other words are replaced with diminutives in Australian English. Emergency-services personnel are often referred to as ambos and firies instead of "ambulance officers" and "firefighters". Similarly, medical professionals are frequently known as medicos. Well-known bodies are also subject to this process, as with the Salvation Army being known as the Salvos or McDonalds being Macca's. Garbage collectors are almost universally known as garbos.

Non-English languages with regular use of diminutive suffixes

In many languages formation of diminutives by suffixes is a regular part of grammar. All nouns, not just proper nouns can be diminuted. The world "diminutive" is used in a narrower and less vague sense here than when referring to English. The basic meaning of diminution in these languages is "smallness of the object named"; endearment, intimacy etc. is secondary and dependent on context. For example, the name of the last Roman emperor of the western part of the Roman Empire - Romulus Augustus - was diminuted to Romulus Augustulus (little Augustus) to emphasize the contrast between the grandness of the name and political insignificance of its bearer, in this case the connotation of diminution is derogatory, no endearment here.

German

German, for example, features words such as "Häuschen" (or "Häuserl" in Austrian German) for "small house", "Würstchen" for "small sausage" and "Hündchen" for "small dog". The use of diminutives is quite different between the languages and dialects. The Alemannic dialects for example use the diminutive very often.

There are two suffices that can be systematically applied in German:

• -chen, e.g. "Männchen" for little man (corresponding with English -kin, Low Saxon and Dutch -je and -tje and flamish and Low Saxon -ken)
• -lein e.g. "Männlein" for little man (corresponding with English -let, alemannic -le, -li, Bavarian and Austrian -l and Latin -culus / -cula)

Suffixation of the diminutive suffixes –chen and –lein to a finally stressed word stem causes umlaut of the stressed vowel.

There is another suffix (corresponding with English ling), that appears figuratively but that is not simply used to modify existing words:

• -ling e.g. "Lehrling" for apprentice (though literally teachlet), and "Feigling" for coward (though literally figlet/little fig)

Dutch and Low German

In Dutch and in East Frisian Low Saxon, -je, -tje, and -pje are used as a diminutive suffix (e.g. huis becomes huisje (little house); boom becomes boompje (little tree)). Some words have a slightly different suffix, even though the diminutive always ends with -je. For example, man becomes mannetje (little man).

In Flemish and in southern Low German the diminutive -ke, -ken is corresponding (Manneke, manneken for little man). Both forms are corresponding with the English diminuitive -kin, e.g. lambkin, pumpkin and the German diminutive -chen.

In northern Low German, the diminutive is rarely used, as in the North Germanic languages.

Latin

In the Latin language the diminutive is formed also by suffixes.

• -ulus, -ula, -ulum, e.g. paululus (very small) from paulus (small)
• -culus, -cula, -culum, e.g. homunculus (little man) from homo (man)
• -olus, -ola, -olum, e.g. malleolus (little hammer) from malleus (hammer)
• -ellus, -ella, -ellum, e.g. libellus (little book) from liber (book)

Similarly, the diminutive of gladius (sword) is gladiolus, a plant whose leaves look like small swords.

Italian

In Italian, the diminutive for people is usually expressed by changing masculine (usually -o) to -ino and femenine (usually -a) to -ina, whereas for inanimate objects, the pattern is -o to -etto and -a to -etta. -ello and -ella also exist, though often as the result of the italicization of words from other Romance languages. The new word is then pluralized as a word in its own right. The animate/inanimate rule is extremely loose. Examples which have made it into English are mostly culinary, like linguine (named for its resemblance to little tongues ("lingue", in Italian)), and bruschetta. The diminution is often figurative: an operetta is similar to an opera, but dealing with less serious topics. "Signorina" means "Miss", whereas "signorino" would be a pejorative belittling of a man. The augmentative also exists: -one.

Spanish

More detail at Spanish nouns.

In Spanish, -o and -a become -ito and -ita, respectively — as in "perro" (dog) and "perrito" (puppy). Sometimes, this changes the spelling slightly: a "chica" is a girl, and a "chiquita" is a little girl, for example. In other instances, the suffix "-illo" or "illa" is used. A well noun example of this is "tortilla".

Portuguese

See also Portuguese grammar.

In Portuguese, -inho and -inha are the most common diminutive endings, replacing -o and -a, respectively. Diminutives are very commonly used in informal language. Words ending in vowel generally have -zinho added, such as café and cafezinho. A "c" (but not a "ç") becomes a "qu" on some words, like "pouco" (few or a few) and "pouquinho" (very few). Popular diminutives may have different forms: e.g., "poucochinho" (very few, a very small portion). Portuguese is somehow peculiar because the diminutive endings "-inho" and "-inha" are often used not only with nouns but also with adverbs (e.g., só/sozinho, both meaning alone), adjectives (e.g., tonto/tontinho, meaning silly and, perhaps, "a bit silly") and even some other word classes, as interjections (e.g., obrigado/obrigadinho, meaning thank you,thanks) and even verb gerunds (e.g., correndo/correndinho, both meaning running, but the latter having an affective sense).

French

French diminutives usually end in -ette, such as fillette (young girl) or courgette (small marrow = zucchini) and this frequently carries over into English as well. While informal French often produces diminutive effects simply by cutting a word in half (MacDo from MacDonalds, fixs from fixations 'ski bindings'), the ending -oche is sometimes used. For example, cinoche (ciné) and MacDoche (MacDonalds).

Czech

In Czech diminutives are formed by suffixes, as in other Slavic languages. Every noun has a grammatically correct diminutive form, regardless of the sense it makes. This is sometimes used for comic effect, for example diminuting the world for "giant" to mean "little giant". Diminutives can be diminuted further by adding another diminutive suffix. E.g.: "Julie" (Julia), "Julka" (little Julia), "Julinka" (very little Julia).

Russian

Russian has a wide variety of diminutive forms for names, to the point that for non-Russian speakers it is difficult to connect a nickname to the original. Diminutive forms for nouns are usually distinguished with a -ka or -chka/shka suffix. For example, "voda" (вода, "water") becomes "vodka" (водка, "little water") and "kot" (кот, "cat") becomes "koshka" (кошка, "kitten").

Names can be somewhat more arbitrary, but still follow a loose pattern. A list of common names and their diminutive forms:

• Aleksey = Alyosha, Alyoshenka, Alyoshka, Lyoshik
• Aleksandr(a) = Sasha, Shura, Sashenka, Shurik, Sashka
• Anastasiya = Nastya, Asya, Nastenka, Nastyushka, Nastyona, Nastka
• Boris = Borya, Borenka, Boryusha, Borka
• Dmitriy = Dima, Mitya, Mitenka, Dimochka, Mityusha, Dimon, Mitka
• Ivan = Vanya, Ivanushka, Vanechka, Vanka
• Konstantin = Kostya, Kostenka, Kostik, Kostka
• Leonid = Lyonya, Lyolik, Lyonichka, Lyonka
• Mariya = Masha, Manya, Mashenka, Mashechka, Mashusha, Marusya, Mashka
• Mikhail = Misha, Mishenka, Mishanya, Mishka
• Nataliya = Natasha, Nata, Natashenka, Natusenka, Natusik, Natashka
• Nikolay = Kolya, Kolenka, Nikolasha, Kolka, Kolyan
• Sergei = Seryozha, Seryoga, Seryozhenka, Seryozhka
• Stepan = Styopa, Styopanka, Stepanchik, Styopushka, Styopka
• Svetlana = Sveta, Svetochka, Svetik, Svetyushka, Svetka
• Vladimr = Volodya, Vova, Vovochka, Volodenka, Vovka, Volodka
• Yekaterina = Katya, Katerina, Katechka, Katenka, Katyukha, Katyusha, Katka
• Yevgeny = Zhenya, Zhenechka, Zheka, Zhenka

Some names can also be modified with a -ka ending to add a further level of familiarity, but are not normally used for adults who are not family members.

Turkish

Turkish diminutive suffixes are -cik and -cegiz (-cegiz):

• ev = evcik (house)
• Mehmet = Mehmetçik

Polish

in Polish there are a lot of affixes which help create diminutive. Some of them are -cia, -unia, -enka, -lka, -pka for feminine nouns and -ciek, -uń, -eńki, -lki, -pki for masculine (and many, many others). For example:

• Frog (Żaba) = żabcia, żabusia, żabeńka, żabuleńka, żabeczka, żabunia, żabka
• Small (mały) = maleńki, malusi, malutki, malusieńki (and malusieńki is something which is even smaller than maleńki)