 | This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Iteration mark" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(September 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
.jpg)
Iteration marks are characters or punctuation marks that represent a duplicated character or word.
InChinese,𠄠 orU+16FE3 𖿣OLD CHINESE ITERATION MARK (usually appearing as〻, equivalent to the modern ideograph二) or々 is used in casual writing to represent a doubled character. However, it is not used in formal writing anymore, and it rarely appeared in printed matter. In a tabulated table or list, vertical repetition can be represented by aditto mark (〃).
Iteration marks have been occasionally used for more than two thousand years inChina. The example image shows an inscription inbronze script, a variety of formal writing dating to theZhou dynasty, that ends with"子𠄠孫𠄠寶用", where the small𠄠 ("two") is used as iteration marks in the phrase"子子孫孫寶用" ("descendants to use and to treasure").
InFilipino,Indonesian, andMalay, words that are repeated can be shortened with the use of numeral "2". For example, the Malaykata-kata ("words", from singlekata) can be shortened tokata2, andjalan-jalan ("to walk around", from singlejalan) can be shortened tojalan2. The usage of "2" can be also replaced with superscript "2" (e.g.kata2 forkata2). The sign may also be used for reduplicated compound words with slight sound changes, for examplehingar2 forhingar-bingar ("commotion"). Suffixes may be added after "2", for example in the wordkebarat2an ("Western in nature", from the basic wordbarat ("West") with the prefixke- and suffix-an).[1]
The use of this mark dates back to the time when these languages were written withArabic script, specifically theJawi orPegon varieties. Using the Arabic numeral٢, words such asرام رام (rama-rama, butterfly) can be shortened toرام٢. The use of Arabic numeral٢ was also adapted to severalBrahmi derived scripts of the Malay archipelago, notablyJavanese,[2]Sundanese,[2]Lontara,[3] and Makassaran.[4] As theLatin alphabet was introduced to the region, the Western-style Arabic numeral "2" came to be use for Latin-based orthography.
The use of "2" as an iteration mark was official in Indonesia up to 1972, as part of theRepublican Spelling System. Its usage was discouraged when theEnhanced Indonesian Spelling System was adopted, and even though it is commonly found in handwriting, old signage or text messages, it is considered to be inappropriate for formal writing and documents.[1]
Japanese has various iteration marks for its threewriting systems, namelykanji,hiragana, andkatakana, but only the kanji iteration mark (々) is commonly used today.[citation needed]
InJapanese, iteration marks calledodoriji (踊り字, "dancing mark"),kasaneji (重ね字),kurikaeshikigō (繰り返し記号), orhanpukukigō (反復記号, "repetition symbols") are used to represent a duplicated character representing the samemorpheme. For example,hitobito, "people", is usually written人々, using the kanji for人 with an iteration mark,々, rather than人人, using the same kanji twice. The use of two kanji in place of an iteration mark is allowed, and in simple cases may be used due to being easier to write.
In contrast, whilehibi (日々, "daily, day after day") is written with the iteration mark, as the morpheme is duplicated,hinichi (日日, "number of days, date") is written with the character duplicated, because it represents different morphemes (hi andnichi). Further, whilehibi can in principle be written as日日,hinichi cannot be written as日々, since that would imply repetition of the sound as well as the character. In potentially confusing examples such as this, readings can be disambiguated by writing words out in hiragana, sohinichi is often found as日にち orひにち rather than日日.
Sound changes can occur in duplication, which is not reflected in writing; examples includehito (人) andhito (人) being pronouncedhitobito (人々) (rendaku) orkoku (刻) andkoku (刻) being pronouncedkokkoku (刻々) (gemination), though this is also pronouncedkokukoku.
The formal name of the kanji repetition symbol (々) isdōnojiten (同の字点), literally "same character mark", but it is sometimes callednoma (のま) because it looks like the katakanano (ノ) andma (マ). This symbol originates from a simplified form of the character仝, a variant of "same" (同) written in thecursive script style.[5]
Although Japanese kanji iteration marks are borrowed fromChinese, the grammatical function of duplication differs, as do the conventions on the use of these characters.
While Japanese does not have a grammaticalplural formper se, some kanji can bereduplicated to indicate plurality (as a collective noun, not many individuals). This differs from Chinese, which normally repeats characters only for the purposes of adding emphasis, although there are some exceptions (e.g.,人,rén, "person";人人,rénrén, "everybody").
However, for some words duplication may alter the meaning:
Using々 instead of repeating kanji is usually the preferred form, with two restrictions:
When the reading is different, the second kanji is often simply written out to avoid confusion. Examples of such include:
The repetition mark is not used in every case where two identical characters appear side by side, but only where the repetition itself is etymologically significant—when the repetition is part of a single word. Where a character ends up appearing twice as part of a compound, it is usually written out in full:
Similarly, in certain Chinese borrowings, it is generally preferred to write out both characters, as in九九 (ku-kuChinese multiplication table) or担担麺 (tan-tan-mendan dan noodles), though in practice々 is often used.
Invertical writing, the character〻 (Unicode U+303B), a cursive derivative of𠄠 ("two", as inChinese, above), can be employed instead, although this is increasingly rare.
Kana uses different iteration marks; one for hiragana,ゝ, and one for katakana,ヽ. The hiragana iteration mark is seen in some personal names likeさゝきSasaki orおゝのŌno, and it forms part of the formal name of the car companyIsuzu (いすゞ).
Unlike the kanji iteration marks, which do not reflect sound changes, kana iteration marks closely reflect sound, and the kana iteration marks can be combined with thedakuten voicing mark to indicate that the repeated syllable should be voiced, for exampleみすゞMisuzu. If the first syllable is already voiced, for exampleじじjiji, the voiced repetition mark still needs to be used:じゞ rather thanじゝ, which would be read asjishi.
While widespread in old Japanese texts, the kana iteration marks are generally not used in modern Japanese outside proper names, though they may appear in informal handwritten texts.
In addition to the single-character iteration marks, there are also two-character-sizedrepeat marks, which are used to repeat the preceding word or phrase. They are used invertical writing only, and they are effectively obsolete in modern Japanese. The vertical kana repeat marks〱 (unvoiced) and〲 (voiced) resemble the hiragana characterku (く), giving them their name,kunojiten (くの字点). They stretch to fill the space typically occupied by two characters, but may indicate a repetition of more than two characters. For example, the duplicated phrase何とした何とした may be repeated as何とした〱. If adakuten (voiced mark) is added, it applies to the first sound of the repeated word; this is written as〲. For example,tokorodokoro could be written horizontally asところ〲; the voiced iteration mark only applies to the first soundと.
In addition to the single-character representationsU+3031 〱VERTICAL KANA REPEAT MARK andU+3032 〲VERTICAL KANA REPEAT WITH VOICED SOUND MARK,Unicode provides the half-character versionsU+3033 〳VERTICAL KANA REPEAT MARK UPPER HALF,U+3034 〴VERTICAL KANA REPEAT WITH VOICED SOUND MARK UPPER HALF andU+3035 〵VERTICAL KANA REPEAT MARK LOWER HALF, which can be stacked to render both voiced and unvoiced repeat marks:
〳 〵 | 〴 〵 |
As support for these is limited, the ordinary forward slash／ and backward slash＼ are occasionally used as substitutes.
Alternatively, multiple single-character iteration marks can be used, as intokorodokoro (ところゞゝゝ) orbakabakashii (馬鹿々々しい). This practice is also uncommon in modern writing, though it is occasionally seen in horizontal writing as a substitute for the vertical repeat mark.[dubious –discuss]
Unlike the single-kana iteration mark, if the first kana is voiced, the unvoiced version〱 alone will repeat the voiced sound.
Further, ifokurigana are present, then no iteration mark should be used, as in休み休み. This is prescribed by the Japanese Ministry of Education in its 1981 Cabinet notification prescribes, rule #6.[citation needed]
In theNuosu language,ꀕ is used to represent a doubled sound, for exampleꈀꎭꀕ,kax sha sha. It is used in all forms of writing.
InTangut manuscripts the sign𖿠 is sometimes used to represent a doubled character; this sign does not occur in printed texts. InUnicode this character isU+16FE0TANGUT ITERATION MARK, in theIdeographic Symbols and Punctuation block.
InEgyptian hieroglyphs, the signs:
|
— zp(wj) sn(wj), literally meaning "two times", repeat the previous sign or word.
InKhmer,leiktō (ៗ) as forThai,mai yamok (ๆ) andLao,ko la (ໆ) represent a repeated syllable where as it besides the word. This used to be written as numeral two (២) and the form changed over time. A repeated word could be used either, to demonstrate plurality, to emphasize or to soften the meaning of the original word.
InEnglish,Spanish,French,Italian,German,Portuguese,Czech,Polish andTurkish lists, theditto mark (″) represents a word repeated from the equivalent position in the line above it; or an evenly-spaced row of ditto marks represents any number of words repeated from above. For example:
This is common in handwriting and formerly in typewritten texts.
InUnicode, theditto mark ofWestern languages has been defined to be equivalent to theU+2033 ″DOUBLE PRIME (″).[citation needed] The separate characterU+3003 〃DITTO MARK is to be used in theCJK scripts only.[6][7][8]
The convention in Polish handwriting, Czech,Swedish, and Austrian German is to use a ditto mark on the baseline together with horizontal lines spanning the extent of the word repeated, for example:
In western mathematics, the superscript numeral originated as a notation for exponentiation.[9] Over time its meaning expanded to represent repeated function application as well, effectively making it a notation for marking iteration.[10] This sense was eventually borrowed in non mathematical text to represent repeated symbols, especially to mark repeated letters in acronyms. The superscript is occasionally left out, either colloquially or in the formal representation of the acronym, due to either typographic or stylistic concerns. Notable examples include the bus protocolI²C, and the fan-fiction hosting websiteAO3.
Media related toIteration marks at Wikimedia Commons
