Himalayan Linguistics

This paper presents a comprehensive analysis of reduplication in Khiamniungan, a Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Northeast India and parts of Myanmar. Reduplication in Khiamniungan is common across worrd classes. The study identifies and categorizes four primary reduplicative strategies: (1) echo formations, where partial reduplication creates semantically modified words; (2) compounding reduplication, in which morphologically independent stems combine to form new lexical items; (3) full reduplication, used for emphasis, pluralization, quantification, and manner marking; and (4) expressive reduplication, which encodes sensory and onomatopoeic meanings. The paper highlights the syntactic and semantic functions of reduplicated forms, illustrating their role in quantification, habitual aspect marking, imperative constructions, and intensification. While complete reduplication is pervasive across word classes, partial reduplication and echo formations are comparatively less common but still attested. Additionally, Khiamniungan exhibits a robust system of expressive reduplication that encodes sensory perception, aligning with patterns observed in other Tibeto-Burman languages. This study contributes to the broader understanding of reduplication in the Patkaian (Northern Naga) linguistic subgroup and sheds light on typological features relevant to Tibeto-Burman languages as a whole.