What is a more-form-for-more-content metonymy?

What is a more-form-for-more-content metonymy?

Definition
	A conventional metonymy in which some sort of increase in the amount of form in an utterance, such as vowel lengthening, repetition, or reduplication, is used to stand for some augmentation of the meaning of the utterance.

Examples

Here are some examples in English:

He ran and ran.

Note:
The repetition of the verb stands for an increase in the time or distance the person ran.
He's sm-a-a-a-ll.

Note:
The vowel lengthening stands for extreme smallness.

Adapted from:

Lakoff, G. and Johnson 1980

Generic
	A more-form-for-more-content metonymy is a kind of
	Conventional metonymies in English

Source
	Lakoff, G. and Johnson 1980

Context for this page:

Concept module: more-form-for-more-content metonymy
In modular book: Metonymies in English, by Eugene E. Loos (general editor), Susan Anderson (editor), Dwight H. Day, Jr. (editor), Paul C. Jordan (editor), and J. Douglas Wingate (editor)
In bookshelf: Lexicon

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library, Version 4.0, published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 1999. [Ordering information.]

Page content last modified: 2 July 1998