Reduplication-based idioms 1

Some English idioms are based on reduplicated pairs or sets of words. The words often rhyme - they can also be minimal pairs - and the exercises below deal with such rhyming pairs (spelt separately, together or hyphenated). Some of these words come from children's puns or nursery rhymes while others can be 'adult' words, even taboo expressions.

The words used below can be found in Wiktionary at https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_reduplications

Ex. I Write the following idioms using ordinary (orthographic) English spelling.

a. /ˈɑːdʒi ˈbɑːdʒi/ b. /breɪn dreɪn/ c. /'klæptræp/ d. /'dɪli 'dæli/ e. /'iːzi 'piːzi/ f. /'hændi 'dændi/ g. /'heərəm 'skeərəm/ h. /'hʌm,drʌm/

Ex. II Fill in the gaps in the following sentences using the phrases from Exercise I.

1. The journey was exhausting. The kids had a/an .......................... over where to stop for lunch and there were traffic jams on the motorway.
2. A good comedian should not resort to cheap ........................... like a circus clown.
3. Countries that don't pay their scientists enough usually suffer from .......................... .
4. Now that my Spanish holiday is over, I'm back to my ......................... existence.
5. I don't want you to ............................. and play computer games all night. Your maths exam is tomorrow, remember?
6. 'Young people can be so ......................... - no wonder so many of them can't hold down a job,' said Mr Grumpy.
7. The new online shop has all sorts of clever, ....................... tools for gardeners.
8. Paolo is Italian and fluent in French, and he says learning Spanish was .......................... for him.

KEY

I. a. argy-bargy, b. brain drain, c. claptrap, d. dilly-dally, e, easy peasy, f. handy dandy, g. harum-scarum h. humdrum

II. 1. argy-bargy, 2. claptrap, 3. brain drain, 4. humdrum, 5. dilly-dally, 6. harum-scarum, 7. handy dandy, 8. easy peasy