What nuance does っち give in "暑っちぃ”？

Question

The context is "暑っちぃ.. 今日はこの暑さ.."

Is it a slang/dialect type of suffix that is added to the adjective?

Answer 1

In this particular case, I agree with Shoko's assessment that it is just bending the rules of 送り仮名 for effect, and not the suffix 〜っちい. (Maybe she will elaborate on that in a full answer.)

〜っちい as a suffix is similar to the English suffix -y or -like, but with a negative connotation. Unlike 〜っぽい, it usually isn't tacked on to whatever word you want.

Examples

• 弱っちい weakly
• 安っちい cheap-looking
• ぼろっちい shabby
• ばっちい dirty
• みみっちい stingy

Maybe I missed a few, but I think these are the only ones you are likely to encounter.

Answer 2

The nuance of "[暑]{あ}っちぃ" is "It's too hot to pronounce even an easy three-letter word あつい (so shorten or pronounce the word in a much easier way)," I think. The small hiragana っ works here to emphasize the meaning of [暑]{あつ}い.

I don't know whether 暑っちぃ is categorized as slang or dialect in Japanese language, but I'm sure that 暑っちぃ is a very casual expression. So decent adults don't use it at work or in a situation where politeness is required.

Using ち instead of つ makes the word あつい sound very informal, while small hiragana っ doesn't cause too informal nuance. Sometimes people say 「[今日]{きょう}は[本当]{ほんとう}に、あっついですね」 at work or in a formal situation on a really hot day, and it's still polite, though sounds somewhat friendly.

暑っちぃ is used a lot in informal situations. It's one of very common casual colloquial expressions. I guess that whether someone uses 暑っちぃ or 暑い depends on her/his personality or social status, not the region where s/he grew up, especially nowadays.

The small hiragana ぃ of written 暑っちぃ could express at least two ways of pronouncing, from my observation as a native Japanese speaker.

One is that the vowel i of the ち(chi) followed by small hiragana ぃ is pronounced longer than ち alone, but shorter than ちー.

Another possibility is that the ち followed by small hiragana ぃ is pronounced in a special tone or not normally/smoothly pronounced. The nuance of this kind of っちぃ depends on the way of speaking, or the characteristics of the person who says it.

Or maybe, it's possible that the author just liked small hiragana ぃ more than katakana-hiragana prolonged sound mark (長音符), ー, and used it in writing. Some people prefer to use small hiragana rather than to use the symbol ー, so.