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A hypocoristic (or hypocorism) is a lesser form of the given name used in more intimate situations, as a form of endearment, a pet name. Often generated as

• a contracted form of a given name, such as Tony from Anthony.
• a baby-talk form approximating the name's pronunciation, such as Bess for Elizabeth.
• a given name with a diminutive suffix; in some languages diminutive forms of names are used primarily when referring to children and the meaning can oscillate between tenderness and condescension when used for an adult.
  • -ito/-ita or -ín/-ina in Spanish, such as Juanita from Juana. Extra consonants may be interposed as in Carmelina and Carmencita from Carmen, or merged, as in Carmina.
  • a parallel construction in Portuguese, with -inho/-inha, as in Aninha from Ana and Joãozinho from João.
  • same in Italian and Italian regional languages, with -ino/-ina and -etto/etta as in Paolino/Paoletto and Paolina/Paoletta from Paolo and Paola.
  • -ĉj- and -nj- affixes (for males and females respectively) in Esperanto.
  • -chen in German.
  • -ie or -y in English, such as Vicky from Victoria.
  • -chan, -tan, or -pi in Japanese, such as Kana-chan from Kana and Aki-chan from Akihiro. Gemination (doubling) of the consonant or lengthening of the vowel before the -chan to provide two moras is common, such as Settchan from Setsuko and Hii-chan from Hiroki.
  • reduplication in various languages, such as John-John or Didi.
  • the addition of a word-final very high tone, or changed tone, in Cantonese and related dialects, sometimes in combination with the addition of the mid-toned prefix a before the name.

As evident from the above-mentioned examples, hypocoristics frequently demonstrate (indirectly) a phonological linguistic universal (or tendency) for high-pitched sounds to be used for smaller creatures and objects (here as more "cute" or less imposing names). Higher-pitched sounds are associated with smaller creatures due to the fact that smaller creatures can only make such high frequency sounds given their smaller diaphragm sizes.

The word "hypocoristic" is used as a noun or adjective in English; some other languages prefer to use the original Greek word "hypocoristicon" as a noun. The noun "hypocoristicon" seems to be rarely used in English.

[edit] See also

• Antonym: Pejorative
• Diminutive
• Nickname
• Hypocoristics for Dutch names
• Hypocoristics for Spanish namesca:Hipocorístic

es:Hipocorístico gl:Hipocorístico it:Ipocoristico pt:Hipocorístico