Phonology of Disyllabic Ideophonic Suffix in Hong Kong Cantonese

An ideophone is "a vivid representation of an idea in sound" (Doke 1935). In Hong Kong Cantonese, an ideophone is typically comprised of a disyllabic ideophonic suffix (DIS) and a root, such as hung4 (red) bok1bok1. The present study aims to explore phonological characteristics of DISs in Hong Kong Cantonese in the following four aspects, with 138 collected examples of ideophones in current use. (1) Reduplicative patterns of DISs are demonstrated. Rules of phonetic changes that make full reduplication evolves into different kinds of partial reduplication are discussed, from which some obsolete full reduplication forms are deduced. (2) Syllables of DISs that violate Cantonese phonotactics are presented with DISs' tone and phoneme preferences. (3) Sound symbolism of DISs is explored. It is found that the concept of size and the commendatory or derogatory sense are connected with the acoustic frequency. (4) In addition, based on the phonological characteristics of DISs concluded in the above sections, the grammaticalization process of DISs is discussed.