Unecessary repetition of meaning

[Elbonio]

I am struggling to remeber the term which is used to describe when an unnecessary repetition of words results in stating the same thing twice

eg

"john repeatedly iterated his opinion on the matter"

you either say repeatedly or iterated, you don't need both

but what is it called when this is done?

[HCaulfield]

redundancy?

[Tdol]

How about tautology

[Elbonio]

tautology is deliberate, i'm talking about accidental use


there is a grammatical term for it but I cannot for the life of me think what it is... it's not anywhere in the glossary i've looked already.

[Red5]

In that case I would agree with H Caulfield.

See: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=redundancy

[Elbonio]

thanks for your help guys but that's not it

im sure there is a specific technical term for it

don't make me get in touch with my old english teacher! It was he who told me about it some 5 years ago. It's driving me nuts trying to remember what it was.

[Marylin]

thanks for your help guys but that's not it

im sure there is a specific technical term for it

don't make me get in touch with my old english teacher! It was he who told me about it some 5 years ago. It's driving me nuts trying to remember what it was.

don't make me get in touch with my old english teacher!

We would hate that!

how about a pleonasm?

[Elbonio]

Yes!

that's it!

Thanks so much.

I can now sleep at night.




May I suggest this is added to the glossary?

[Red5]

how about a pleonasm?

Superb! Thanks again Marylin!

May I suggest this is added to the glossary?

You certainly can. I'll see what we can do and we'll notify you in this thread when it's up.

[Tdol]

I'll put it up, but they're the same, pretty much, an ironically interesting example of redundancy in terminology:
http://www.fun-with-words.com/redund...#What_Pleonasm