INNOVATIVE BIPARTITE ADJECTIVES IN JAPANESE:
A PRELIMINARY SEMANTIC DESCRIPTION*
Kimi Akita and Keiko Murasugi
Nagoya University and Nanzan University

1.

Introduction

Japanese has recently seen the emergence of four-mora unaccented bipartite adjectives,
such as huwa-toro ‘fluffy and creamy’ and saku-uma ‘crunchy and yummy,’ in casual
discourse. They are typically derived from two mimetics or adjectives, as in (1).
(1) a.

b.

huwahuwa ‘fluffy’ [MIM] + torotoro ‘creamy’ [MIM]huwa-toro ‘fluffy and creamy’sakusaku ‘crunchy’ [MIM] + umai ‘yummy’ [Adj] saku-uma ‘crunchy and yummy’

These adjectives (henceforth “XY adjectives”) are often used alone or in attributive or
predicative constructions that describe food, fashion, or personality (Akita, 2014), as illustratedin (2).
(2)a.

moti-huwa-na
panchewy-fluffy-COP bread‘the bread that is chewy and fluffy’b.

kimo-kawa-na
kyarakutaa
disgusting-cute-COP character‘a character that is disgusting but cute’c.

huwa-toro-noomuretu
fluffy-creamy-COP omelet‘an omelet that is first fluffy and then creamy’*Part of this paper was presented at the Conference on the Language of Japanese Food at YorkUniversity, Toronto on May 5, 2018. We would like to thank the organizers and audience, especially
Kiyoko Toratani. We deeply thank the 390 youngsters in the Nagoya area, in particular Sachiko Saito,
who discussed a lot of examples of innovative wakamono kotoba with us in private and in classes. This
project was in part supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grants #15K16741 (Akita) and #17K02752(Murasugi) and Pache Research Subsidy 1-A-2 for the 2018 academic year (Murasugi).

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Kono ebi-hurai-wa
saku-uma-da.
this shrimp-fry-TOP crunchy-yummy-COP‘This fried shrimp is crunchy and (therefore) yummy.’e.

Kono sukaato metya-kawa!
this skirtvery-cute‘This skirt is very cute!’

XY adjectives may also form nominal compounds, such as huwa-toro-omuretu (fluffy-creamyomelet) ‘a fluffy and creamy omelet’ and tyoi-waru-oyazi (a.little.bit-playboy.likemiddle.aged.man) ‘a middle-aged man who is a little bit like a playboy.’
The organization of this paper is as follows. Section 2 summarizes related studies on thesemantic ranges of conventional compound predicates. Section 3 proposes a semantic
classification of XY adjectives. Section 4 compares XY adjectives with conventional
compounds, discussing what is (not) special about their semantics. Section 5 concludes thepaper.
2.

Previous Studies

Previous findings about conventional compounds help us to discuss the semantic diversityof XY adjectives. Here, we cite representative semantic classifications of adjectival and verbal
compounds in Japanese (and English).
Yumoto and Kageyama (2009) classify adjectival compounds in Japanese and English,
noting three major types of compound adjectives: modification, coordination, and argument
incorporation. Modification compounds consist of a modifying element and a head element that
follows it, as illustrated by ice-cold ‘cold as ice’ in English and musi-atui (steam-hot) ‘steaming
hot’ in Japanese. Coordination compounds, which are not very productive, consist of twosimilar (often antonymic) elements, as in bittersweet ‘bitter and sweet’ and ama-zuppai (sweetsour) ‘sweet and sour.’ Argument incorporation compounds involve a predicate that follows its
argument, as in class-conscious ‘conscious of classes’ and hara-guroi (stomach-black) ‘sly.’
Chen and Matsumoto (2018: Ch. 4) classify Japanese verbal compounds into thirteen
semantic types, as in (3) (translation ours except for (3a, b, d, e), which are cited fromMatsumoto, 2011).
(3) a.

Cause (e.g., uki-agaru (float-rise) ‘float up’)b.

Means (e.g., tataki-kowasu (hit-break) ‘break by hitting’)c.

Preliminary (e.g., wari-ireru (break-put.in) ‘break (an egg) and put (it) in’)d.

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e.

Manner (e.g., mai-otiru (dance-fall) ‘flutter down’)f.

Concomitance (e.g., sagasi-mawaru (search-go.around) ‘look around for’)g.

Figurative manner (e.g., kurui-zaku (go.mad-bloom) ‘bloom out of season’)h.

Same-event (e.g., tobi-haneru (fly-jump) ‘jump up and down’)i.

Event complementation (e.g., dasi-osimu (put.out-regret) ‘grudge’)j.

Derivative (e.g., uti-agaru (hit-rise) ‘be launched’ (< uti-ageru (hit-raise) ‘launch’))k.

Bleached V1 (e.g., uti-hurueru (hit-shiver) ‘tremble with fear’)l.

Subsidiary V2 (e.g., mi-ageru (look-raise) ‘look up’)m.

Opaque (e.g., tori-simaru (take-close) ‘supervise’)

It is worth noting that the figurative manner type (3g) and the bleached V1 type in (3k) aresimilar to modification-type adjectives in that the first element modifies (or intensifies) thesecond element. Moreover, the same-event type in (3h) is similar to coordination-typeadjectives in that the two components contribute equally to the compound meaning. The event
complementation type in (3i) shares complementation semantics with argument incorporation
adjectives.
The semantic range of XY adjectives overlaps with that of these conventional compounds.
In the following section, we will show that despite their adjectival status, XY adjectives aresimilar to verbal, rather than adjectival, compounds, and they also crucially differ from both.
3.

Semantic Classification of XY Adjectives

We collected 91 XY adjectives from 390 youngsters, most of whom were undergraduate
students in the Nagoya area, as well as from the internet (see Akita and Murasugi (inpreparation) for a full list of XY adjectives). We classify them into six according to the semantic
relation between X and Y, as in (4).
(4)

a.

Synonymy (21 types):moti-huwa ‘chewy and fluffy,’ yuru-huwa ‘loose and fluffy,’ yuru-kawa ‘looseand fluffy,’ uru-tuya ‘moist and glossy,’ gosu-rori ‘Gothic and Lolita,’ mote-kawa‘popular and cute’b.

Antonymy (13 types):
kimo-kawa ‘disgusting but cute,’ uza-kawa ‘annoying but cute,’ dasa-ike‘unfashionable but cool,’ mazu-uma ‘unappetizing (at first) but yummy’-3-

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Sequence (15 types):
huwa-toro ‘first fluffy, then creamy (of omelet),’ saku-syuwa ‘first crunchy, thenspongy,’ tun-dere ‘first cold but later lovestruck’d.

Reason (5 types):saku-uma ‘crunchy and therefore yummy,’ horo-uma ‘crumbling and therefore
yummy,’ waku-teka ‘excited and therefore shining’e.

Degree (33 types):
metya-kawa ‘very cute,’ yaba-uma ‘terrifically yummy,’ tyoi-waru ‘a little bit likea playboy,’ mazi-oko ‘really angry,’ oni-yaba ‘extremely risky’f.

Argument incorporation (4 types):
mune-kyun ‘heart-pounding,’ huk-karu ‘light-footed’Type (a) (synonymy) consists of synonymous elements that are semantically coordinatedby AND. Type (b) (antonymy) also involves coordination, but X and Y in this category are ina BUT relation. Many Type (b) items have kawa ‘cute’ as Y. Type (c) (sequence) represents asequence of events or properties. For example, huwa-toro is used for a food that ‘first feels
fluffy, and then feels creamy,’ such as an omelet that is creamy inside. Type (d) (reason) issimilar to Type (c), but it involves a causal, not a temporal, relation. For example, saku-uma
means ‘crunchy and therefore yummy,’ and not vice versa. Type (e) (degree), which isparticularly productive, represents some kind of degree. X in this type of XY adjective istypically an intensifier meaning ‘very’ or ‘extremely.’ Type (f) (argument incorporation) islimited in productivity. X in this category is an internal argument of Y.
4.

XY Adjectives vs. Conventional Compounds

In Section 2, we noted the semantic overlap between adjectival and verbal compounds inthe conventional lexicon of Japanese. In this section, we consider what is and is not special
about the semantic range of XY adjectives in comparison with that of conventional compounds.
Table 1 presents a systematic comparison of XY adjectives with conventional adjectival
and verbal compounds. Verbal compounds have many semantic types (see (3) above), and someof them appear to correspond to the three subtypes of adjectival compounds. Therefore, thetable is based on the semantic classification of verbal compounds except for the final row (i.e.,antonymy).

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Table 1. Semantic comparison of the three types of Japanese compounds
Verbal compounds Adjectival compounds XY adjectives
a. Cause ((d) reason)b. Meansc. Preliminary ((c) sequence)d. Background ((c) sequence)e. Manner
f. Concomitance  (modification)? ((e) degree)g. Figurative
mannerh. Same-event (coordination) ((a) synonymy)? (argument? ((f) argument
i. Event
complementationincorporation)
incorporation)
j. Derivativek. Bleached V1 (modification) ((e) degree)l. Subsidiary V2 
m. Opaquen. Antonymy ((b) antonymy)
As the table shows, the semantic range of conventional compound adjectives is a proper subsetof that of XY adjectives as well as of compound verbs. Moreover, all semantic types of XY
adjectives except for the antonymy type find their equivalents in conventional compound verbs.
Neither compound adjectives nor compound verbs can express “antonymic” relations.
An apparent exception is a group of taste adjectives like ama-zuppai (sweet-sour) and amakarai (sweet-salty). However, these adjectives express AND, rather than BUT, relations, suchas ‘sweet and sour’ and ‘sweet and salty.’ It appears generally true that antonyms cannot
maintain their antonymic relation in compounding. In fact, nominal compounds that consist ofantonymic elements, such as iki-kaeri (go-return) ‘to and from somewhere,’ siro-kuro (whiteblack) ‘black and white,’ and koo-haku (red-white) ‘red and white,’ also express ANDrelations. To maintain their antonymic relations, we normally need phrases, as in amaku-mo
suppai (sweet-even sour) ‘sweet but sour,’ itta-kedo kaetta (go.PST-but return.PST) ‘left but
returned,’ and siro-da-ga kuro (white-COP-but black) ‘white but black.’
One possible explanation for why XY adjectives, such as kimo-kawa ‘disgusting butcute,’ can express contrastive relations at the word level pertains to the word formation process
involved in XY adjectives. Arguably all XY adjectives involve truncation but do not necessarily
involve compounding. For example, huwa-toro ‘first fluffy, then creamy’ is formed directlyfrom two reduplicated mimetics: huwahuwa ‘fluffy’ and torotoro ‘creamy,’ not derived fromthe hypothetical mimetic compound *huwahuwa-torotoro. Similarly, guu-kawa‘overwhelmingly cute’ is a truncation of the half-fixed expression guu-no ne-mo de-nai-hodokawaii (MIM:sound.of.breath-GEN sound-even go.out-NEG-degree cute) ‘cute enough to put-5-Nanzan
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one to silence.’ Furthermore, huk-karu ‘light-footed’ is made from the set phrase huttowaakuga karui (footwork-NOM light) ‘one’s footwork is light.’ The untruncated compound*huttowaaku-garui, from which this XY adjective would be derived in a derivational analysis,
does not exist. Thus, the absence of compounding prior to truncation appears to account for thesurvival of antonymic relations in Type (b) XY adjectives. X and Y in XY adjectives do notform a totally new concept, retaining their original relationship. Crucially, this explanation canbe extended to the entire semantic network of XY adjectives. Phrasal truncation allows themto have a broad range of phrasal meanings at the word level, which make them different fromconventional adjectival compounds, as we saw in Table 1.
The present discussion reminds us of the colloquial clipping of some Japanese proverbs.
As illustrated in (5), these expressions also do not involve compounding before truncation andretain their phrasal meanings in the truncated output.1(5)a.

tor-anu
tanuki-no
kawa-zan’yoo  tora-tanu
take-NEG raccoon.dog-GEN skin-calculation‘don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched (lit. estimating the sales of theskin of the raccoon dog you’ve not caught)’b.

tana-kara botamoti  tana-bota
shelf-from botamochi‘pennies from heaven (lit. (eating) a botamochi (that fell) off the shelf)’c.

yabu-otutui-te
hebi-odasu  yabu-hebibush-ACC poke-GER snake-ACC put.out‘wake a sleeping dog (lit. poke the bushes and make a snake come out)’d.

kamo-ga negi-osyot-tekuru  kamo-negi
duck-NOM scallion-ACC shoulder-GER come‘it is all the more convenient (lit. a duck comes with scallions)’e.

tiri-mo tumor-eba
yama-tonaru  tiri-tumodust-even accumulate-if mountain-COP become‘many a little makes a mickle (lit. even a small amount of dust makes a mountain if
accumulated)’

1Acronyms (e.g., FYI ‘for your interest’) and Chinese and Sino-Japanese four-character idioms (e.g.,isseki-nityoo (1.stone-2.bird) ‘(killing) two birds with one stone’) may be considered further examplesof phrasal truncation.

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Note that in ordinary truncated compounds, which are highly productive in Japanese(Kubozono, 1995), compounding takes place first, and truncation takes place next. For
example, dezitaru ‘digital’ and kamera ‘camera’ are compounded to form the compound noundezitaru-kamera, and then it is truncated as dezi-kame. The same is true for poke-mon, whichis the shortened form of the compound noun poketto-monsutaa ‘pocket monster.’ The presumed
localization of phrasal truncation to the casual register of Japanese suggests the need of aregister-specific treatment of word formation in morphological theory.

5.

Conclusion

In this paper, we have argued that despite their morphological uniformity, XY adjectives
in colloquial Japanese are semantically diverse and have both regular and unique semantic
properties. Our next steps will include a theoretical analysis of this output-oriented word
formation, which we expect to also account for some formal characteristics of XY adjectives,
such as the irreversibility of X and Y (e.g., ?huwa-moti (fluffy-chewy), *uma-saku (yummycrunchy)).

References
Akita, K. (2014) “Register-specific Morphophonological Constructions in Japanese.” Berkeley
Linguistics Society 38, 3-18.
Akita, K. and K. Murasugi (in preparation) “Innovative Bipartite Adjectives in Japanese Food
Descriptions and Beyond.”
Chen, Y. and Y. Matsumoto (2018) Nihongo Goi-teki Hukugoo-doosi-no Imi-to Taikei:
Konsutorakusyon-keitairon-to Hureemu-imiron (The Semantics and Organization of Japanese
Lexical Compound Verbs: Construction Morphology and Frame Semantics). Hituzi Syobo,Tokyo.
Kubozono, H. (1995) Go-keisei-to Inritu-koozoo (Word Formation and Prosodic Structure). Kurosio
Publishers, Tokyo.
Matsumoto, Y. (2011) “Compound Verbs in Japanese: Types and Constraints.” Paper presented at theResearch Centre for Japanese Language and Linguistics, University of Oxford, 2 November.
Yumoto, Y. and T. Kageyama (2009) “Meisi-o Hukumu Hukugoo-keiyoosi (Compound Adjectives
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