I want to understand what does it exactly mean when people use this form
Ex:
Gele gele
Ata ata
Gide gide
Yata yata

 

Unfortunately there's no easy way to translate this form, as you'll see it can be used in a couple of different ways, but I'll try my best.

1. As/By/if (yürüye yürüye gitti)
2. Gele gele böyle mi gelir? (Is this the best that could come of this?)

 

There is also düşe kalka. It literally means falling and getting up and actually means to do something with difficulty. As an example:

Düşe kalka geçtiğimiz sarp, keçi yolları...
The steep footpaths that we have passed with difficulty...

 

Hi,

This structure of repeated words has different uses such as:

-idiomatic use :
Güle güle kullan!
Bula bula bunu mu buldun?

- ikileme ( for emphasis):
Kapı kapı dolaştık.
Çocuklar uslu uslu oturuyorlar.

- Adverbial function:
Koşa koşa geldi.

 

Furthermore:
Idiomatic usage is actually giving the verb a sense of "while/as" so actually it's identical to the adverbial function semantically, the trouble is conveying this in translation forces us to classify it differently.

"yürüye yürüye gitti" (He went by walking)
"gele gele böyle mi gelir?" (As it comes/As it could be, is this what it came as?)

Nouns however are far more complicated as there are many many (see what I did there) usages, to add to Gemmenita:
Her yan ağaç ağaç. (Every side is tree-tree, Trees everywhere)
yavaş yavaş kalktı. (He got up slowly, as you can see nouns and noun-like words(adverbs, adjectives etc.) when duplicated do not take "-e")
Gözü mosmor olmuş. (His eyes were purple(as in he had a black eye) This exemplifies perhaps one of the most odd features of Turkish, intensity of certain words can be furthered by duplicating the first syllable and by adding a seemingly arbitrary consonant. If there is a pattern to it I am unaware, sorry.)

 

Hello.

Gele gele - belittling phrase which denotes discontent - Gele gele bu zar mı geldi ? - And this is the outcome of the dice roll ?
Ata ata- He went but he went throwing all the way. Continuity in action.
Gide gide - He went to the spot all as a result of his incessant travelling. Continuity again !
Yata yata- He passed his courses minus any studying

 

Yes, that's one other form of 'ikileme' which can be made either by repeating exactly the same word (= the question of Ramisadeh hence I made only this form of 'ikileme' in my list) or by adding a different sound or word (the example of Ahmet : mosmor and also one more: bembeyaz) or by using two words of the same family: ses seda, akil fikir.

Ramisadeh, and also here I would like just to add that this 'repeated words' structure is not used only with repeated root of verbs but with repeated nouns and adjectives too as you see in all the above examples...