In how far does the なん〜かん〜 pattern generalize?

Question

In phrases such as なんだかんだ and なんでもかんでも, there seems to be an underlying pattern なん〜かん〜, creating a 'this and that' kind of nuance. Cursory googling reveals that なんでかんで seems to exist, as well as なんかかんか, but it doesn't seem to work for なん+counter. When does this work, and when is this ungrammatical?

Answer 1

It doesn’t seem to go very far.

I think it must still make sense when replaced with 何か. What seems important here is that it refers to various things without specifying what they are, just like 何か refers to something without specifying what it is. なん followed by a counter, on the other hand, is an interrogative that asks about some information.

The following list must be reasonably exhaustive, except for local variations.

• なんだかんだ
• なんやかんや
• なんやらかんやら
• なんたらかんたら
• なんちゃらかんちゃら
• なんとかかんとか
• なんでもかんでも
• なんもかんも (a variation of 何もかも)
• なんかかんか (not so common)

I have never heard anyone say なんでかんで in my life, and I would be puzzled at what it might mean if I did. Search results suggest it is used only in certain Northern dialects. It sounds very strange to me precisely because I would take the なんで part as asking "why" or "by what means". My best-effort attempt would be to understand it as meaning the same as なんだかんだで, which seems wrong anyway.