What is the term for the double consecutive use of a word with stress on one of the words to alter its severity?

Question

What is the term when a word is used consecutively twice, with intentional stress placed on the first word, as a means to alter the severity of the word's meaning?  I am not referring to a past perfect (had had) or a relative-demonstrative (that that), but to the slightly sarcastic use as demonstrated in shows like Seinfeld.
Sample sentences, with emphasis:

I know we're going out to eat, but I am only going to pick at an appetizer because I'm not hungry hungry.
Don't wear something so formal to the party; I don't think you need to be dressed dressed.

Of personal note, some of my relatives decided a few years ago to nick-name the term a "Celaine" (a combination of their names) due to their own frequent use of it.
Note: This question explicitly requests the term of art used by linguists and English scholars when discussing this phenomenon. This question is different from a similar question which requests a historical explanation for the phenomenon described by this term. None of the answers to the suggested duplicate provide the term.  The author of the similar question requests the term for the pattern in a comment, but does not receive an acceptable answer. The only mention of an acceptable term is in a comment made by the author of this question, in response to the author of the similar question, directing back to this very question.

user31341 · Accepted Answer

It is called contrastive focus reduplication in one popular analysis (Ghomeshi et al (2004)). Scholars in the same analysis also refer to it as a double-construction.  In Lee (2006), you will see the type of intonation on the first instance of the repeated word ("B accent") referred to as a case of contrastive topic. Both papers are nice reads if you're into that sort of thing.

James Waldby - jwpat7 · Answer

I suspect a specific name exists for the illustrated pattern; at the moment I don't know that name.  But there are some general terms (hypernyms of the specific term, if it exists) that may apply:
• Epizeuxis, “repetition of words in immediate succession, for vehemence or emphasis”
• Antanaclasis, “the stylistic scheme of repeating a single word or phrase, but with a different meaning each time”; also “A form of pun in which a word is repeated in two different senses”

Some additional terms that refer to repeated words appear in wikipedia's Repetition (rhetorical device) article.

What is the term for the double consecutive use of a word with stress on one of the words to alter its severity?

2 Answers

Add your own answers!

Ask a Question