Originally written by Liliana Boladz-Nekipelov on October 25, 2009 10:04 AM for a child it might be Jacuś.

That's the standard one, but I could also think of Jaculek, Jacusiek, Jacusieczek, Jacunio, Jacuńcio, Jacuniek, Jacunieczek, Jacusieniek, Jacusienieczek...

So much for suffix productivity...

Some of the items on the above list are 2nd-degree diminutives which ties in with what Janus said about Poles diminishing diminutives.

Liliana,

You created the "poll", right? Well, Portuguese and Spanish are filled with diminuitive forms. And they have many functions.

And I tried to create a picture of HOW they function in English. And how to identify them. That is ignored by you all, and the claim is made that "et" is the diminuitive form.

Then, we hear from Jacek that this was all about Polish. Then, we hear from a Dane about them being "productive".  What the heck is a "productive" diminuitive form anyway????????

Perhaps "occurence" and "non-occurence" is what was meant.

I say, why bother....obviously, there is no interest in knowing how they "work" in other languages;

Examples: Cafe, Cafecito, cafezinho//querida:queridinha, queridita//mama: mamacita, mãezinha....

Where on earth do you get the idea that your post was ignored? It most certainly was not (by me, anyway). Like I said, I was not talking about the diminutive form; you’re quite right that a form cannot be ‘productive’, it makes no sense to speak of forms being productive. It makes perfect sense, however, to speak of productive or non-productive suffixes in any given language (if it has suffixes at all, that is). A diminutive form is what you get when you add a diminutive suffix to a suffixable word.

And just like in any other language, suffixes come and go in English. The suffix -et is found in some diminutives, but it is not a productive suffix, in that you can’t just go around applying it to more or less any (suffixable) word and still be immediately understood. Diminutive suffixes such as -ling or -ette (for feminine diminutives especially) are more productive, in that it is possible to create new diminutive forms by adding these suffixes, though not indiscriminately: the scope of their productivity is limited to a narrower set of words. The Spanish/Portuguese suffixes listed by you are then what you’d call fully productive suffixes, in that you can use them for pretty much any word that you want to. Granted, there are preferences, where some words ‘prefer’ -illo/-illa to -(c)ito/-(c)ita; but even if you use the wrong suffix, any Spanish/Portuguese speaker will know immediately that your intention was to create a diminutive. A chãozinho, for example, would be instantly recognisable to a Portuguese-speaker as a ‘little floor’; whereas a ‘floorlet’ or a ‘floorling’, though not completely obscure, would still give an English-speaker a moment’s pause before accepting it as a completely regular word.

I most certainly did not claim that -et is THE diminutive suffix (much less form) in English; it is one of the diminutive suffixes used in English.

The thread is not all about Polish, either; it’s about any language. My reply was about Danish originally; Jacek and Liliana’s replies were logically about Polish; yours are logically about languages that you speak and work in: English, Spanish, Portuguese, etc.

Bringing up the Spanish/Portuguese suffixes -(c)ito/-(c)ita; -(z)inho/-(z)inha, etc., is perfectly valid. The only reason I did not comment on that part of your post was that I agreed with it entirely.

No, ‘occurrence’ and ‘non-occurrence’ is a different thing, relating to whether or not a form (or indeed a suffix) is found at all. Occurrence is more often linked to forms than suffixes; a ‘baret’ as a diminutive form of ‘bar’ is a non-occurring word, while ‘baronet’ as a diminutive form of ‘baron’ is an occurring word. Productivity is more commonly linked with affixes or clitics (including case endings, verb endings, etc.) and deals with whether or not it’s possible to use an affix as a flexible tool in the language, creating new but immediately comprehensible words ‘on the fly’, as it were. -ness (though nothing to do with diminutives) is a good example of a very productive suffix in English, as its scope is ever broadening—there’s even a song called Thatness and Thereness, showing that it’s possible, though perhaps not entirely meaningful, to add it to pronouns and adverbs, two usually very reluctant groups of words to be suffixed upon.

As it happens, that’s exactly what they’re is. I would love to know more about how diminutives work in languages where I don’t know that much about them, such as the Slavic ones. I only know, in a general kind of way, that they’re very heavily used and that there are a plethora of them; I know very little of the details. As I said, my reason for not commenting on your listing of the Romance ones was merely indicative that I agreed with it, not that I have no interest in it.

Originally written by Janus Jacquet on October 25, 2009 8:53 PM It makes perfect sense, however, to speak of productive or non-productive suffixes in any given language

I find it odd that you have to repeat this, Janus... It's standard terminology...

Jane, Spanish diminutive forms are nothing compared to Slavic diminutive forms, although they are common, I must agree, but they are more regular. Slavic diminutive forms are almost a way of life, a separate dialect for some people. You can create probably around 20 diminutive forms from one noun, based on the persons imagination mainly.    

Yes, the poll was absolutely not about Polish. I am interested in other languages: deminutive forms are a very interesting phenonnon worth examining by linguists.