0:02

Hello, hello. Welcome

0:04

back to this week's

0:06

new episode. How

0:08

are you? How was your day

0:10

so far? What are

0:12

you doing? Are you out walking? Working

0:15

out? Commuting to

0:17

work? Cleaning house? What

0:19

are you doing? Whatever it

0:22

is, thank you for letting me

0:24

accompany you. I think you

0:26

should be proud of yourself. I know

0:28

a lot of English learners who

0:31

make excuses about not finding

0:33

time to practice English, and

0:36

you made the time. You prioritized

0:39

English during the day, and

0:41

so congrats. Today, we

0:43

have a very fun topic

0:46

of conversation, or I guess

0:48

self-conversation. I'm going to be talking

0:50

to myself. Yeah,

0:53

it's going to be about

0:56

reduplications. We'll discuss 10 handy-dandy

0:59

reduplications. Now,

1:01

I know 99% of you are saying,

1:04

what in the world is

1:06

that? What in

1:08

the world is a reduplication? Well,

1:12

I just told you one. Handy-dandy.

1:15

Handy by itself means

1:18

useful or practical. In

1:21

American English, you can

1:23

add dandy for emphasis,

1:26

intensification, and

1:29

to give it a playful

1:31

and poetic effect. Handy-dandy

1:34

is a reduplication. We'll

1:37

go through some examples in a bit.

1:39

In English, you'll hear reduplications

1:41

in songs and

1:43

casual conversation. Many

1:46

times, it involves just repeating

1:48

the first word and

1:51

changing one syllable, consonant,

1:53

or vowel, like handy-dandy,

1:56

flip-flop, or chitchat.

2:00

Sometimes you'll hear the exact

2:02

same word repeated like

2:05

booboo or yo-yo. Sometimes

2:08

they rhyme, not always,

2:11

but there's always a rhythmic

2:13

sensation to them. And

2:16

I think that's why they're pretty memorable. So

2:18

if you want to add some spice

2:21

and flavor to the way you speak

2:23

in English, keep listening and stay tuned

2:25

until the very end. I

2:28

have a major tip that is going

2:30

to help most of you when making

2:32

comparisons in English. If

2:38

you would like the text for

2:40

this audio so that you can

2:42

read along and understand everything I

2:44

say, a quiz

2:47

and all of the other bonus material for episodes

2:50

151 to 200, be

2:53

sure to sign up for season four.

2:56

You can find the link for it in the

2:58

episode notes. If you

3:00

sign up to all premium content

3:03

for seasons one, two and three,

3:05

you'll get these five minute English courses

3:07

to boost your vocab and

3:10

you'll get season four at a

3:12

huge discount when checking out.

3:14

I highly recommend signing up. It's

3:17

a great way to reinforce what you

3:19

learn. So you can find those

3:21

links once again in the episode notes.

3:25

We're going to start with

3:28

rhyming reduplications. These are

3:30

so playful. So a lot

3:32

of times you're going to need to

3:34

have a playful delivery as well.

3:38

Number one, handy dandy. So

3:40

handy dandy, as I mentioned

3:43

before, means extremely useful or

3:45

practical. I would

3:47

use handy dandy to describe tools.

3:50

Kitchen appliances or

3:52

gadgets, anything that helps

3:55

you solve a problem. Imagine

3:57

You need to translate a word from.

4:00

Your language into English. You.

4:02

Might have a handy dandy app on

4:04

your phone. That can help you

4:06

do that quickly. My. Mom has

4:08

about one thousand gadgets in

4:10

her kitchen drawers. And. All

4:13

of them could be described as.

4:15

Handy. Dandy. Where. Do I

4:18

begin? So she has a gadget to

4:20

get pickles or olives out of a

4:22

jar and has a long claw so

4:24

that you don't get your fingers dirty.

4:27

And she gets so excited about

4:29

it. Oh, you want pickles? Let

4:31

me grab you my handy Deity

4:33

Pickle Poker! Help you.

4:36

Don't like appeals on your apples. Let me

4:38

get you my hand. He the any apple

4:40

peeler. Let. Me: get my hands he

4:42

the he milk for author to make them milk

4:44

on your coffee so. Me: Now.

4:47

Obviously it's not necessary to

4:49

say handy dandy and these

4:51

circumstances. As you can probably tell,

4:53

it's a little goofy. And

4:56

one hundred percent playful. Number.

4:58

Two when I first went

5:00

to Brazil back in two

5:02

thousand and sixteen. Lucas

5:05

My husband and I met in

5:07

Rio de Janeiro. Or. You

5:09

these in a two for you

5:11

Brazilians and we went to the

5:13

beach. The. Beach in Rio

5:15

is obviously great. It feels like

5:18

something from a movie. There are

5:20

beach sharks on the sand. that's

5:23

or cocktails and there are

5:25

lots of really sit people.

5:27

With. Nice hands, What caught

5:30

my attention? Being a foreigner. And

5:32

and I think being a foreigner. You're always

5:34

hyper aware of situations. And

5:37

was the itsy bitsy. Teeny

5:40

weeny bathing suits, Itsy

5:43

bitsy, teeny weeny and

5:46

eighty Betty. All mean

5:48

very small, The

5:51

bathing suits were much smaller and

5:53

more revealing than the bathing suits

5:55

I'd seen in the United States.

5:58

May. be were a bunch of peru

6:00

in the US but the

6:02

bikinis worn by beach goers on

6:04

the Copacabana were much, much

6:06

smaller than what I was wearing. Which

6:09

to be honest must have looked like

6:11

granny panties by comparison.

6:14

Granny panties is also a

6:16

reduplication. It's a funny way

6:19

to say really big panties.

6:23

Panties as like

6:25

female underwear. So granny

6:27

panties. So look at me

6:29

on the Copacabana wearing granny panties. I

6:31

had to go shopping. Personally

6:35

I use itty-bitty more

6:38

frequently than teeny-weeny

6:40

or itsy-bitsy but

6:42

you can actually use them all

6:44

in a row if you're feeling eager

6:47

to emphasize how small something

6:49

is. Oh my

6:51

gosh look at those itsy-bitsy

6:54

teeny-weeny itty-bitty little things. They're

6:56

so small. You

6:58

get the point. Now let's

7:01

do one more example with itty-bitty because

7:03

I'm gonna stick this in your head.

7:05

So last week my parents were in

7:08

North Carolina visiting and we went out

7:10

for barbecue and after

7:12

a great meal with all the

7:14

fixins, in other words

7:16

all the sides, we ordered

7:19

dessert. They had Mississippi

7:21

mud pie which is

7:23

like a chocolate cream pie with

7:25

Oreo crust and

7:28

banana pudding which is huge

7:30

in the south. So much banana

7:32

pudding. Now the problem is

7:34

these desserts came in itty- bitty

7:37

containers. They were so teeny-weeny

7:39

that I had to order

7:41

four more. Nobody wants

7:44

to share an itty-bitty dessert.

7:47

So next time you're tempted to say

7:49

very small just replace it with itty-bitty

7:53

itsy-bitsy or teeny-weeny. Alright

7:57

number three. One

7:59

of the most. In readable occasions.

8:01

Is super duper. If

8:04

you ever get bored saying

8:06

it very and English Super

8:08

Duper is a playful alternative.

8:11

The. Other day I ordered a drink from

8:13

a local coffee shop and I don't

8:15

know what they put in it, but

8:18

it was super duper sweet. I

8:20

couldn't drink it. I

8:23

could also say exceptionally

8:25

sweets, Unbelievably sweet tooth,

8:28

sweet. But it's super.

8:30

Duper sweet. Is a very

8:32

common way to say very. Let

8:35

me give one more example. You know

8:37

who Ten Jennings is. He.

8:39

Was a contestant on the show

8:41

Jeopardy a long time ago. He

8:44

won i think seventy four

8:46

games and made over two

8:48

point five million dollars. He's.

8:50

Super duper smart, So.

8:52

Smart. Is. Now the host

8:54

of Jeopardy. Super

8:57

duper. Smart. Alternatively, and

8:59

I'm giving you alternative examples here because

9:01

super duper can be kind of playful

9:03

and maybe you don't always want to

9:06

feel playful. Alternatively, I

9:08

could say he's

9:10

exceptionally intelligence, remarkably

9:12

smart, tremendously clever.

9:15

Or. Maybe exceedingly sharp is

9:17

quick to respond. His weedy.

9:19

He's smart. But yeah,

9:22

super duper. I. Like

9:24

this one. Add that to your vocab. So.

9:26

So far, I've mentioned number one:

9:28

Hand, He and he useful or

9:31

practical. Number two: itsy bitsy, teeny

9:33

weeny and eighty Betty. Which.

9:35

Mean: very small. Number.

9:37

Three granny panties, Which.

9:40

Means a large Panties are

9:43

large underwear. And

9:45

super duper. Which. Means

9:47

very very. If you

9:49

want to sound super. Duper smart. Try.

9:52

Using also exceptionally

9:55

remarkably. Or. Tremendously

9:57

as an alternative to

9:59

see. very

10:01

very. Okie dokie, let's

10:03

move on. Okie

10:05

dokie is another one. Not going

10:07

to explain that. I think you got

10:10

it. Number five, artsy

10:12

fartsy. Or as I

10:14

learned in my research, arty farty

10:16

if you're in Britain. So

10:18

we say artsy fartsy in American

10:21

English. It means connected

10:23

with or having an interest

10:25

in the arts. Now

10:28

what's interesting is how it's used.

10:31

Some people use it to

10:33

simply state that something is

10:35

very artistic. For example, what

10:38

are you doing on Saturday? I don't

10:40

know. I'm thinking about going to that

10:42

artsy fartsy street fair to do

10:44

some crafts. Do you want to come? In

10:47

this example, artsy fartsy is

10:49

not really negative. It's

10:52

just describing the artistic nature

10:54

of the event. The

10:57

event is artsy fartsy. It's

10:59

an artsy fartsy event. Why

11:03

I love language is that there

11:05

are layers. I've learned

11:07

that many native English

11:09

speakers interpret artsy fartsy

11:11

as being pretentiously artistic

11:14

in a way that others

11:16

might see as silly. So

11:19

for example, the art

11:21

gallery was full of artsy

11:23

fartsy pieces that left many

11:26

visitors scratching their heads in

11:28

confusion. So maybe

11:30

the art didn't resonate with

11:32

the public. Maybe it was too abstract. It

11:35

was too confusing. It was too

11:37

artsy. It was just too

11:39

artsy fartsy. Now

11:41

imagine you go to a fashion show

11:44

and a designer decides to make

11:46

her latest collection out

11:48

of bubble wrap. You

11:50

know bubble wrap. The stuff

11:52

you use to package breakable

11:55

items with, maybe glasses you

11:58

might pack in bubble wrap. There's

12:00

a bunch of little bubbles that are really fun to pop.

12:03

So as much as you

12:05

love bubble wrap, you just don't

12:07

understand it as a clothing choice.

12:09

It's too artsy fartsy. Nobody would

12:11

want to wear that. Well,

12:13

maybe, but it is

12:16

impractical. You can

12:18

kind of hear the judgment in these

12:20

last two examples with the

12:22

art gallery and the artsy fartsy

12:24

pieces and the fashion designer.

12:27

All of it seems a bit pretentious

12:29

and maybe a bit silly to the

12:31

public. But, you know, this

12:34

one really comes down to interpretation because

12:36

even native English speakers are

12:38

going to require context. This

12:41

leads me to fancy

12:43

schmancy. Number six. Fancy

12:46

schmancy is used to describe things

12:48

that are over the top, extravagant

12:52

or showy. If

12:54

a McLaren, a very

12:56

fancy expensive car or

12:59

Rolls-Royce drives by, you

13:01

can say, oh, wow, look

13:03

at that fancy schmancy car. If

13:06

you're in LA and you go

13:08

to Rodeo Drive, which is a

13:10

very high end shopping street with

13:13

designer products, you can

13:15

most definitely use fancy schmancy.

13:18

Look into any store and say, wow,

13:20

look at all that fancy schmancy stuff

13:22

because it is fancy schmancy. It's extravagant.

13:25

Some of it's probably showy. Maybe

13:28

it's over the top in the sense of

13:30

it being very expensive. Maybe

13:32

you can't imagine ever using

13:34

it. It's fancy

13:36

schmancy. Last example here,

13:39

speaking of LA, we have

13:41

a good friend there who is

13:43

really down to earth. And

13:46

his wife really likes fancy

13:48

things. Expensive clothes,

13:50

brand name purses. Maybe

13:53

we'd find her on Rodeo Drive. But

13:55

interestingly, they are pretty different

13:58

from one another. He likes. to

14:00

save money, she likes to spend it. You

14:02

might know a couple like this, kind of

14:04

funny. Occasionally they'd

14:07

invite us to these fancy

14:10

shmancy restaurants that cost

14:12

like a hundred dollars

14:14

per person. I mean before

14:16

you even get in. And you

14:18

probably know by now Lucas and I have

14:20

two little girls. So in

14:23

my head I'm thinking I'm not going to blow

14:25

$400 on a random meal. First of all, my

14:29

girls are not going to eat $100 worth

14:32

of food. Secondly, they're

14:34

toddlers. They're unpredictable.

14:37

At any moment, for whatever reason,

14:40

they might start screaming and ruin

14:42

this very expensive meal for everyone

14:44

else in the room. Like

14:47

why can't we just go get burgers? I'm

14:49

even cool with a sandwich, a picnic on the

14:51

beach maybe. Anyway, we

14:54

didn't always accept their invitations.

14:57

Not that I don't think it's worth going to

14:59

fancy shmancy restaurants. One of

15:01

the fanciest meals I ever had was

15:03

in Borago, I think that's how

15:05

you pronounce it, in Santiago, Chile.

15:07

It was not cheap, but boy,

15:09

it was a great experience. You

15:12

guys have to go to that restaurant if

15:14

you're ever in Santiago. Number

15:17

seven, lovey-dovey. Does

15:20

it make you feel uncomfortable when

15:23

people around you are too

15:25

lovey-dovey? On

15:27

Super Bowl Sunday, Lucas and I

15:29

went to a Super Bowl party

15:31

with our girls, and most of

15:33

the people there were couples who

15:35

were younger than us. And

15:38

as the night progressed, some of the

15:40

couples started to sit on each other's

15:42

laps. They played with each other's

15:44

hair. They were all

15:47

very lovey-dovey. So

15:49

lovey-dovey means excessively affectionate,

15:52

sentimental, or romantic. You

15:55

can even say it to your partner. Why

15:57

so lovey-dovey today? Why are you you

16:00

so affectionate. Now

16:02

couples tend to be lovey-dovey at

16:04

the beginning of a relationship. If

16:07

they kiss or are intimate in

16:09

front of other people, this is

16:11

what we call PDA, public

16:14

display of affection. Now

16:16

some people are more into

16:18

PDA than others and

16:21

obviously this can make other people in

16:24

the room feel uncomfortable. PDA

16:26

is very similar

16:28

to lovey-dovey, right? It's a public

16:30

display of affection. If

16:32

you're too lovey-dovey, someone's gonna say

16:35

get a room. Alright, that's

16:37

it for the rhyming reduplications.

16:40

If you had fun with these and

16:42

want to look up more, I recommend heebie-jeebies,

16:45

nitty-gritty, and easy peasy.

16:48

Let's go over some that

16:51

don't rhyme. These are called

16:53

ablout reduplications or partial reduplications.

16:56

I believe if there's a linguist out there

16:58

and wants to correct me, please

17:01

do. Alright, number eight, chit

17:04

chat. So chit chat is

17:07

a very casual, playful

17:09

conversation. It's not

17:11

usually deep, it's not philosophical,

17:14

it's casual. A teacher might

17:17

tell you in a classroom,

17:19

shh, why yet? There's

17:21

too much chit chat happening in the back

17:23

of the room. Too much

17:26

casual conversation, in other words.

17:29

Occasionally, when I meet up with my friends,

17:31

Lucas will ask what we talked about.

17:34

I think he pretends not to be interested

17:36

in gossip, but he's sort of curious. And

17:40

I'll respond, oh you know, it was just

17:42

chit chat. In other

17:44

words, oh it was just casual conversation,

17:47

which obviously leads to more questions. So

17:50

chit chat, as you can hear,

17:53

it's normally used as a noun,

17:55

but occasionally you might hear it as

17:58

a verb. stood

18:00

outside the coffee shop and chit-chatted

18:02

about the weather. You

18:05

may be wondering what the difference is

18:07

between chit-chat and chat. Chit-chat,

18:09

the emphasis is really that

18:11

the conversation is right. Number

18:14

9 Mishmash. A mishmash

18:17

is a mixture of unlike

18:19

things. Last week, my

18:22

family went on a comedy bus

18:24

tour of Asheville and

18:26

during it, the comedian played a

18:29

mishmash of music. She'd

18:32

play something really upbeat and

18:34

modern and then she'd flash back

18:36

to the past, playing Elvis,

18:39

for example. Now it was

18:41

a huge mishmash of music and

18:44

it set the mood because

18:46

her script was a

18:48

huge mishmash of history

18:51

and jokes. Sometimes she

18:53

had the audience practically crying so the

18:56

music tied into that. Other times people

18:58

were laughing. We laughed a lot. Anyways,

19:01

it was a huge mishmash of

19:03

music, a huge mishmash of stories

19:06

and I use the word

19:09

mishmash all the time. Today for

19:11

lunch, I had a mishmash of

19:13

leftovers. Leftover tacos,

19:16

a piece of pizza and an apple. It

19:19

was a mishmash of food. I know

19:21

it sounds gross. Judge me. Number

19:25

10. This is the last one

19:28

of the day and it's going

19:30

to be about exact reduplications.

19:33

Between the ages of one and two and

19:35

a half, the baby or I

19:37

guess a toddler by the time they're two and a half really

19:41

starts speaking. At

19:43

first they babble. They say

19:45

a bunch of stuff that doesn't really

19:47

make sense and a lot

19:49

of times there's a repetition of syllables. American

19:52

parents are really thrilled

19:55

when they hear mama or

19:58

mom or dada. for

20:01

dad. And there are a

20:03

lot of words in baby

20:05

English, I guess, like

20:08

this. A boo-boo is anything

20:11

that hurts, like when

20:13

you get cut, if you have

20:15

a burn, a bruise, kids

20:17

would say, oh, you have a boo-boo. Kids

20:20

also say pee-pee, wee-wee, poo-poo, doo-doo, when

20:22

they have to go to the bathroom.

20:25

When they cry, an adult might come to

20:28

them and say, they're there. Don't

20:30

cry. You're going to be okay.

20:34

Occasionally, adults use exact reduplications

20:37

with other adults. Every

20:39

time we eat out with my parents, Lucas

20:41

and my dad fight to pay the bill.

20:43

And I'm like, can we stop

20:45

this game? Let's just go 50-50. Like,

20:48

let's divide the check-in to, let's

20:50

go 50-50. I also

20:53

think that as a teacher, our relationship

20:56

should be 50-50. I

20:59

make the content, you listen to it,

21:01

you learn with it, and hopefully you

21:03

use what you learn. Half

21:05

me, half you, 50% me, 50% you, 50-50. In the episode

21:08

notes for today, I'll provide a

21:17

link to handy-dandy English

21:19

resources for you to

21:21

keep studying, as

21:23

well as the bonus material links

21:26

for season four and all premium

21:28

content. Check those out. And

21:31

let's go through the ones we just

21:33

did so that you

21:35

will have them in your mind. We went through

21:38

artsy-fartsy. So something

21:40

that is very connected with or

21:42

having interest in the arts.

21:45

Fancy-schmancy, which

21:47

means extravagant or showy.

21:51

Lovey-dovey, which means

21:54

displaying excessive affection.

21:57

Chit-chat, which means very casual

22:00

conversation, mishmash,

22:03

which means a mixture of unlike

22:05

things, and then 50-50. One

22:09

person does 50%, the other person does 50%. Let's

22:14

talk about the one big tip I

22:16

have. Reduplications

22:18

are about emphasis and

22:21

intensification. A lot of

22:24

times we want to emphasize a comparative

22:27

form, such as bigger

22:30

or better. My

22:32

brother is bigger than me. How

22:35

would I intensify this? I

22:37

would say he's much bigger

22:39

than me. What

22:42

if I want to be even more dramatic?

22:45

I hear a lot of non-native English

22:47

speakers saying things like, very

22:49

much bigger than me. But

22:52

we wouldn't say that. We actually

22:54

repeat much. He's

22:57

much, much bigger than me. Ken

23:00

Jennings is much, much smarter

23:03

than me. Remember

23:05

those bikinis on the Copacabana? They

23:07

were much, much smaller than what

23:10

I was wearing. I

23:12

know it's tempting to get creative here, but

23:14

it sounds unnatural. I

23:17

keep repeating much with more emphasis.

23:22

Do you have reduplications in your

23:24

native language? I want you

23:26

to think about it, and please let me

23:28

know on Instagram. I'm truly

23:30

curious if this linguistic

23:33

phenomenon exists everywhere. Write

23:36

to me at American English

23:38

Podcast. Have a good one. Bye-bye.

23:42

Thank you for listening to this

23:44

episode of the American English Podcast.

23:46

Remember, it's my goal here to

23:49

not only help you improve your

23:51

listening comprehension, but to show

23:53

you how to speak like someone from the States.

23:56

If you want to receive the

23:58

full transcript for this episode, or

24:00

you'd like to speak just want

24:02

to support this podcast, make sure

24:04

to sign up to premium content

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on americanenglishpodcast.com. Thanks and

24:08

hope to see you soon.