Compounding in english word building

Word
compounding (word composition) is a universal way of deriving new
words. It is also one of the most ancient, productive and active
types of word-formation in English. About 1/3 of all derived words in
modern E. are compounds.

Word
compounding – is a kind of word-formation based on combining 2
immediate constituents ( компонент) where each is a
derivational base: noun + noun – raincoat; adj +adj – darkblue;
adj + noun – bluebell; verb + prep – make-up; obj. group –
forget-me-not.

The
roof can be joined directly or by the connective from the point of
view of meaning they are motivated, part. and non-motivated.

The
meaning of mot. is understood directly from the meaning of its
components (apple tree)

In
part. mot. the meaning of one root is either wickeaned or lost
(chatterbox).

In
non-mot. the meaning is either lost of ………………. by the new
orig. meaning (buttercup – лютик).

From
the point of view the form comp. present an intr. study. They may
have solid hyphenated or separate spelling. It is not always easy to
differentiate compound words from word-combination. There are some
criteria of differentiation: 1. Compounds unlike combinations posses
one stress. 2. They have a sem …………………. (new meaning
differs from their components meaning). 3. They are usually written
as one word.

Compounds
undergo derivation when der. affixation added to them (typewrite +
er, blue-eye +ed).

Compound
verbs are derived from nouns (to baby-sit).

Shortening
– when spelling is simplified (night – nite). The tendency is
proper to all styles: clipping, abbreviation, blending.

Clipping
– is a reduction of a word to one or 2 syllables: professor –
prof, middle – mid.

Abbreviation
– is the way of building new words out of initial letters: NATO,
TV.

Blending
– is a compounding by means of produced words: fog +smoke — smog

15. Abbreviation.

Shortening
is a comparatively
new way of word-building, which has achieved a high degree of
productivity nowadays, especially in American English.

Shortenings
are produced in two different ways:

1. To
   make a new word from a syllable of the original word. The word may
   lose its beginning (phone –
   from telephone, fence – from defence)
   , it’s ending (hols
   – for holidays, vac – for vacation, props – for properties, ad
   – from advertisement)
   or both the beginning and the ending (flu
   – from influenza, fridge – from refrigerator).

2. To
   make
   a new word from the initial letters of a word group: a) If the
   abbreviated written form tends itself to be read as though it were
   an ordinary English word and sounds like an English word, it will be
   read like one. The words thus formed are called acronyms,U.N.O.
   [‘ju:neu]
   from the
   United Nations Organisation, NATO —
   the
   North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, SALT—Strategic
   Arms Limitation Talks.

b)
The other subgroup consists of initial abbreviation with the
alphabetical reading retained, i.e. pronounced as a series of
letters.
B.B.C. from
the British
Broadcasting Corporation, M.P. from
Member
of Parliament. This
type is called initial shortenings. They are found not only among
formal words, such as the ones above, but also among colloquialisms
and slang. So, g.
f. is
a shortened word made from the compound girl-friend.

Both
types of shortenings are characteristic of informal speech in general
and of uncultivated speech particularly. Here are some more examples
of informal shortenings: Movie
(from
moving-picture),
gent (from
gentleman),
specs (from
spectacles),
exhibish (from
exhibition),
posish (from position),
Billery (Bill+Hillery).

1. Sound
   Imitation (onomatopoeia — [onemaete’pie]).

Such
words are made by
imitating different kinds of sounds that may be produced by animals,
birds, insects, human beings and inanimate objects.

It
is of some interest that sounds produced by the same kind of animal
are frequently represented by quite different sound groups in
different languages. For instance, English dogs bark
(cf.
the
R. лаять).
The English cock cries cock-a-doodle-doo
(cf.
the R. ку—ка—ре—ку).
Semantically,
according to the source of sound, onomatopoeic words fall into a few
very definite groups. Many verbs denote sounds produced by human
beings in the process of communication or in expressing their
feelings: babble,
chatter, giggle, grunt, grumble, murmur, mutter, titter, whine,
whisper and
many more. Then there are sounds produced by animals, birds and
insects, e.g. buzz,
cackle, croak, crow, hiss, honk, howl, moo, mew, neigh, purr, roar
and
others. Some birds are named after the sound they make, these are the
crow, the cuckoo, the whippoor-will and
a few others. Besides the verbs imitating the sound of water such as
bubble
or
splash,
there
are others imitating the noise of metallic things: clink,
tinkle, or
forceful motion: clash,
crash, whack, whip, whisk, etc.

1. Reduplication.

In
reduplication
new
words are made by doubling a stem, either without any phonetic
changes as in bye-bye
(coll,
for good-bye)
or
with a variation of the root-vowel or consonant as in
ping-pong, chit-chat (this
second type is called gradational
reduplication). Stylistically
speaking, most words made by reduplication represent informal groups:
colloquialisms and slang. E. g. walkie-talkie
(«a
portable radio»), riff-raff
(«the
worthless or disreputable element of society»; «the dregs
of society»), chi-chi
(sl.
for chic
as
in a chi-chi
girl).

1. Back
   formation.

The
earliest examples of this type of word-building are the verb to
beg that
was made from the French borrowing beggar,
to burgle from
burglar,
to cobble from
cobbler.
In
all these cases the verb was made from the noun by subtracting what
was mistakenly associated with the English suffix -er.
So,
in the case of the verbs to
beg, to burgle, to cobble the
process was reversed: instead of a noun made from a verb by
affixation (as in
painter from
to
paint), a
verb was produced from a noun by subtraction. That is why this type
of word-building received the name of back-formation
or
reversion.

Later
examples of back-formation are to butle
from
butler,
to baby-sit from
baby-sitter,
to force-land from
forced
landing, to blood-transfuse from
blood-transfuing.

1. Sound
   interchange.Sound
   interchange may be defined as an opposition in which words or word
   forms are differentiated due to an alternation in the phonemic
   composition of the root. The change may affect the root vowel, as in
   food
   n
   :
   : feed
   v;
   or root consonant as in speak
   v
   :
   : speech
   n;
   or both, as for instance in life
   n
   :
   : live
   v.
   It may also be combined with affixation: strong
   a
   :
   : strength
   n;
   or with affixation and shift of stress as in ‘democrat
   :
   :
   de’mocracy.

The
type is not productive. No new words are formed in this way, yet
sound interchange still stays in the language serving to distinguish
one long-established word from another. Synchronically, it
differentiated parts of speech, i.e. it may signal the non-identity
of words belonging to different parts of speech: full
a
:
: fill
v;
food
n
:
: feed
v;
or to different lexico-grammatical sets within the same part of
speech: fall
intransitive
v :
: fell
causative
v; compare also lie
:
: lay,
sit :
: set,
rise :
: raise.

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A compound is a word composed of more than one free morpheme.^[1] The English language, like many others, uses compounds frequently. English compounds may be classified in several ways, such as the word classes or the semantic relationship of their components.

History[edit]

English inherits the ability to form compounds from its parent the Proto-Indo-European language and expands on it.^[2] Close to two-thirds of the words in the Old English poem Beowulf are found to be compounds.^[3] Of all the types of word-formation in English, compounding is said to be the most productive.^[4]

Compound nouns[edit]

Most English compound nouns are noun phrases (i.e. nominal phrases) that include a noun modified by adjectives or noun adjuncts. Due to the English tendency toward conversion, the two classes are not always easily distinguished. Most English compound nouns that consist of more than two words can be constructed recursively by combining two words at a time. Combining «science» and «fiction», and then combining the resulting compound with «writer», for example, can construct the compound «science-fiction writer». Some compounds, such as salt and pepper or mother-of-pearl, cannot be constructed in this way, however.

Types of compound nouns[edit]

Native English compound[edit]

Since English is a mostly analytic language, unlike most other Germanic languages, it creates compounds by concatenating words without case markers. As in other Germanic languages, the compounds may be arbitrarily long.^[a] However, this is obscured by the fact that the written representation of long compounds always contains spaces. Short compounds may be written in three different forms, which do not correspond to different pronunciations, though:

• The spaced or open form consisting of newer combinations of usually longer words, such as «distance learning», «player piano», «ice cream».
• The hyphenated form in which two or more words are connected by a hyphen. Are often hyphenated:
  • Compounds that contain affixes: «house-build(er)» and «single-mind(ed)(ness)»,
  • Adjective–adjective compounds: «blue-green»,
  • Verb–verb compounds: «freeze-dried»,
  • Compounds that contain articles, prepositions or conjunctions: «rent-a-cop», «mother-of-pearl» and «salt-and-pepper».
• The solid or closed form in which two usually moderately short words appear together as one. Solid compounds most likely consist of short (monosyllabic) units that often have been established in the language for a long time. Examples are «housewife», «lawsuit», «wallpaper», «basketball».

Usage in the US and in the UK differs and often depends on the individual choice of the writer rather than on a hard-and-fast rule; therefore, spaced, hyphenated, and solid forms may be encountered for the same compound noun, such as the triplets place name/place-name/placename and particle board/particle-board/particleboard.

Examples by word class

Modifier	Head	Compound
noun	noun	football
adjective	noun	blackboard
verb	noun	breakwater
preposition	noun	underworld
noun	adjective	snow white
adjective	adjective	blue-green
verb	adverb	tumbledown
preposition	adjective	over-ripe
noun	verb	browbeat
adjective	verb	highlight
verb	verb	freeze-dry
preposition	verb	undercut
noun	preposition	love-in
adverb	preposition	forthwith
verb	adverb	takeout
preposition	adverb	without

Neo-classical compound[edit]

In addition to this native English compounding, there is the neo-classical type, which consists of words derived from Classical Latin, as horticulture, and those of Ancient Greek origin, such as photography, the components of which are in bound form (connected by connecting vowels, which are most often -i- and -o- in Classical Latin and Ancient Greek respectively) and cannot stand alone.^[5]

Analyzability (transparency)[edit]

In general, the meaning of a compound noun is a specialization of the meaning of its head. The modifier limits the meaning of the head. This is most obvious in descriptive compounds (known as karmadharaya compounds in the Sanskrit tradition), in which the modifier is used in an attributive or appositional manner. A blackboard is a particular kind of board, which is (generally) black, for instance.

In determinative compounds, however, the relationship is not attributive. For example, a footstool is not a particular type of stool that is like a foot. Rather, it is a stool for one’s foot or feet. (It can be used for sitting on, but that is not its primary purpose.) In a similar manner, an office manager is the manager of an office, an armchair is a chair with arms, and a raincoat is a coat against the rain. These relationships, which are expressed by prepositions in English, would be expressed by grammatical case in other languages. (Compounds of this type are known as tatpurusha in the Sanskrit tradition.)

Both of the above types of compounds are called endocentric compounds because the semantic head is contained within the compound itself—a blackboard is a type of board, for example, and a footstool is a type of stool.

However, in another common type of compound, the exocentric (known as a bahuvrihi compound in the Sanskrit tradition), the semantic head is not explicitly expressed. A redhead, for example, is not a kind of head, but is a person with red hair. Similarly, a blockhead is also not a head, but a person with a head that is as hard and unreceptive as a block (i.e. stupid). And a lionheart is not a type of heart, but a person with a heart like a lion (in its bravery, courage, fearlessness, etc.).

There is a general way to tell the two apart. In a compound «[X . Y]»:

• Can one substitute Y with a noun that is a Y, or a verb that does Y? This is an endocentric compound.
• Can one substitute Y with a noun that is with Y? This is an exocentric compound.

Exocentric compounds occur more often in adjectives than nouns. A V-8 car is a car with a V-8 engine rather than a car that is a V-8, and a twenty-five-dollar car is a car with a worth of $25, not a car that is $25. The compounds shown here are bare, but more commonly, a suffixal morpheme is added, such as -ed: a two-legged person is a person with two legs, and this is exocentric.

On the other hand, endocentric adjectives are also frequently formed, using the suffixal morphemes -ing or -er/or. A people-carrier is a clear endocentric determinative compound: it is a thing that is a carrier of people. The related adjective, car-carrying, is also endocentric: it refers to an object which is a carrying-thing (or equivalently, which does carry).

These types account for most compound nouns, but there are other, rarer types as well. Coordinative, copulative or dvandva compounds combine elements with a similar meaning, and the compound meaning may be a generalization instead of a specialization. Bosnia-Herzegovina, for example, is the combined area of Bosnia and Herzegovina, but a fighter-bomber is an aircraft that is both a fighter and a bomber. Iterative or amredita compounds repeat a single element, to express repetition or as an emphasis. Day by day and go-go are examples of this type of compound, which has more than one head.

Analyzability may be further limited by cranberry morphemes and semantic changes. For instance, the word butterfly, commonly thought to be a metathesis for flutter by, which the bugs do, is actually based on an old wives’ tale that butterflies are small witches that steal butter from window sills. Cranberry is a part translation from Low German, which is why we cannot recognize the element cran (from the Low German kraan or kroon, «crane»). The ladybird or ladybug was named after the Christian expression «our Lady, the Virgin Mary».

In the case of verb+noun compounds, the noun may be either the subject or the object of the verb. In playboy, for example, the noun is the subject of the verb (the boy plays), whereas it is the object in callgirl (someone calls the girl).

Sound patterns[edit]

Stress patterns may distinguish a compound word from a noun phrase consisting of the same component words. For example, a black board, adjective plus noun, is any board that is black, and has equal stress on both elements.^[b] The compound blackboard, on the other hand, though it may have started out historically as black board, now is stressed on only the first element, black.^[c] Thus a compound such as the White House normally has a falling intonation which a phrase such as a white house does not.^[d]

Compound modifiers[edit]

English compound modifiers are constructed in a very similar way to the compound noun. Blackboard Jungle, leftover ingredients, gunmetal sheen, and green monkey disease are only a few examples.

A compound modifier is a sequence of modifiers of a noun that function as a single unit. It consists of two or more words (adjectives, gerunds, or nouns) of which the left-hand component modifies the right-hand one, as in «the dark-green dress»: dark modifies the green that modifies dress.

Solid compound modifiers[edit]

There are some well-established permanent compound modifiers that have become solid over a longer period, especially in American usage: earsplitting, eyecatching, and downtown.

However, in British usage, these, apart from downtown, are more likely written with a hyphen: ear-splitting, eye-catching.

Other solid compound modifiers are for example:

• Numbers that are spelled out and have the suffix -fold added: «fifteenfold», «sixfold».
• Points of the compass: northwest, northwestern, northwesterly, northwestwards. In British usage, the hyphenated and open versions are more common: north-western, north-westerly, north west, north-westwards.

Hyphenated compound modifiers[edit]

Major style guides advise consulting a dictionary to determine whether a compound modifier should be hyphenated; the dictionary’s hyphenation should be followed even when the compound modifier follows a noun (that is, regardless of whether in attributive or predicative position), because they are permanent compounds^[6][7] (whereas the general rule with temporary compounds is that hyphens are omitted in the predicative position because they are used only when necessary to prevent misreading, which is usually only in the attributive position, and even there, only on a case-by-case basis).^[8][9]

Generally, a compound modifier is hyphenated if the hyphen helps the reader differentiate a compound modifier from two adjacent modifiers that modify the noun independently. Compare the following examples:

• «small appliance industry»: a small industry producing appliances
• «small-appliance industry»: an industry producing small appliances^[e]

The hyphen is unneeded when capitalization or italicization makes grouping clear:

• «old English scholar»: an old person who is English and a scholar, or an old scholar who studies English
• «Old English scholar»: a scholar of Old English.
• «De facto proceedings» (not «de-facto«)

If, however, there is no risk of ambiguities, it may be written without a hyphen: Sunday morning walk (a «walk on Sunday morning» is practically the same as a «morning walk on Sunday»).

Hyphenated compound modifiers may have been formed originally by an adjective preceding a noun, when this phrase in turn precedes another noun:

• «Round table» → «round-table discussion»
• «Blue sky» → «blue-sky law»
• «Red light» → «red-light district»
• «Four wheels» → «four-wheel drive» (historically, the singular or root is used, not the plural)

Others may have originated with a verb preceding an adjective or adverb:

• «Feel good» → «feel-good factor»
• «Buy now, pay later» → «buy-now pay-later purchase»

Yet others are created with an original verb preceding a preposition.

• «Stick on» → «stick-on label»
• «Walk on» → «walk-on part»
• «Stand by» → «stand-by fare»
• «Roll on, roll off» → «roll-on roll-off ferry»

The following compound modifiers are always hyphenated when they are not written as one word:

• An adjective preceding a noun to which —d or —ed has been added as a past-participle construction, used before a noun:
  • «loud-mouthed hooligan»
  • «middle-aged lady»
  • «rose-tinted glasses»
• A noun, adjective, or adverb preceding a present participle:
  • «an awe-inspiring personality»
  • «a long-lasting affair»
  • «a far-reaching decision»
• Numbers, whether or not spelled out, that precede a noun:^[e]
  • «seven-year itch»
  • «five-sided polygon»
  • «20th-century poem»
  • «30-piece band»
  • «tenth-storey window»
  • «a 20-year-old man» (as a compound modifier) and «the 20-year-old» (as a compound noun)—but «a man, who is 20 years old»
• A numeral with the affix -fold has a hyphen (15-fold), but when spelled out takes a solid construction (fifteenfold).
• Numbers, spelled out or not, with added -odd: sixteen-odd, 70-odd.
• Compound modifiers with high- or low-: «high-level discussion», «low-price markup».
• Colours in compounds:
  • «a dark-blue sweater»
  • «a reddish-orange dress».
• Fractions as modifiers are hyphenated: «two-thirds majority», but if numerator or denominator are already hyphenated, the fraction itself does not take a hyphen: «a thirty-three thousandth part». (Fractions used as nouns have no hyphens: «I ate two thirds of the pie.»)
• Comparatives and superlatives in compound adjectives also take hyphens:
  • «the highest-placed competitor»
  • «a shorter-term loan»
• However, a construction with most is not hyphenated:
  • «the most respected member».
• Compounds including two geographical modifiers:

• «Anglo-Indian»

But not

• «Central American», which refers to people from a specific geographical region
• «African American», as a hyphen is seen to disparage minority populations as a hyphenated ethnicity^[10]

The following compound modifiers are not normally hyphenated:

• Compound modifiers that are not hyphenated in the relevant dictionary^[6][7][9] or that are unambiguous without a hyphen.^[8]
• Where there is no risk of ambiguity:
  • «a Sunday morning walk»
• Left-hand components of a compound modifier that end in -ly and that modify right-hand components that are past participles (ending in —ed):
  • «a hotly disputed subject»
  • «a greatly improved scheme»
  • «a distantly related celebrity»
• Compound modifiers that include comparatives and superlatives with more, most, less or least:
  • «a more recent development»
  • «the most respected member»
  • «a less opportune moment»
  • «the least expected event»
• Ordinarily hyphenated compounds with intensive adverbs in front of adjectives:
  • «very much admired classicist»
  • «really well accepted proposal»

Using a group of compound nouns containing the same «head»[edit]

Special rules apply when multiple compound nouns with the same «head» are used together, often with a conjunction (and with hyphens and commas if they are needed).

• The third- and fourth-grade teachers met with the parents.
• Both full- and part-time employees will get raises this year.
• We don’t see many 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old children around here.

Compound verbs[edit]

modifier	head	examples
adverb	verb	overrate, underline, outrun
adverb	verb	downsize, upgrade
adjective	verb	whitewash, blacklist
adjective	noun	badmouth
noun	verb	browbeat, sidestep, manhandle
preposition	noun	out-Herod, outfox

A compound verb is usually composed of an adverb and a verb, although other combinations also exist. The term compound verb was first used in publication in Grattan and Gurrey’s Our Living Language (1925).

Some compound verbs are difficult to analyze morphologically because several derivations are plausible. Blacklist, for instance, might be analyzed as an adjective+verb compound, or as an adjective+noun compound that becomes a verb through zero derivation. Most compound verbs originally have the collective meaning of both components, but some of them later gain additional meanings that may supersede the original, emergent sense. Therefore, sometimes the resultant meanings are seemingly barely related to the original contributors.

Compound verbs composed of a noun and verb are comparatively rare, and the noun is generally not the direct object of the verb.

Examples of compound verbs following the pattern of indirect-object+verb include «hand wash» (e.g. «you wash it by hand» ~> «you handwash it«), and «breastfeed» (e.g. «she feeds the baby with/by/from her breast» ~> «she breastfeeds the baby«).

Examples of non-existent direct-object+verb compound verbs would be *»bread-bake» (e.g. «they bake bread» ~> *»they bread-bake«) and *»car-drive» (e.g. «they drive a car» ~> *»they car-drive«).

Note the example of a compound like «foxhunt«: although this matches the direct-object+verb pattern, it is not grammatically used in a sentence as a verb, but rather as a noun (e.g. «they’re hunting foxes tomorrow» ~> «they’re going on a foxhunt tomorrow«, but «not» *»they’re foxhunting tomorrow«).

Hyphenation[edit]

Compound verbs with single-syllable modifiers are often solid, or unhyphenated. Those with longer modifiers may originally be hyphenated, but as they became established, they became solid, e.g.

• overhang (English origin)
• counterattack (Latin origin)

There was a tendency in the 18th century to use hyphens excessively, that is, to hyphenate all previously established solid compound verbs. American English, however, has diminished the use of hyphens, while British English is more conservative.

Phrasal verbs[edit]

English syntax distinguishes between phrasal verbs and adverbial adjuncts. Consider the following sentences:

I held up my hand implies that I raised my hand.

I held up the negotiations implies that I delayed the negotiations.

I held up the bank to the highest standard implies that I demanded model behavior regarding the bank.

I held up the bank implies either (a) that I robbed the bank or (b) that I lifted upward a bank [either literally, as for a toy bank, or figuratively, as in putting a bank forward as an example of something (although usually then the sentence would end with … as an exemplar. or similar)].

Each of the foregoing sentences implies a contextually distinguishable meaning of the word, «up,» but the fourth sentence may differ syntactically, depending on whether it intends meaning (a) or (b). Specifically, the first three sentences render held up as a phrasal verb that expresses an idiomatic, figurative, or metaphorical sense that depends on the contextual meaning of the particle, «up.» The fourth sentence, however, ambiguously renders up either as (a) a particle that complements «held,» or as (b) an adverb that modifies «held.» The ambiguity is minimized by rewording and providing more context to the sentences under discussion:

I held my hand up implies that I raised my hand.

I held the negotiations up implies that I delayed the negotiations.

I held the bank up to the highest standard implies that I expect model behavior regarding the bank.

I held the bank up upstairs implies that I robbed the upstairs bank.

I held the bank up the stairs implies that I lifted a (toy) bank along an upstairs route.

Thus, the fifth sentence renders «up» as the head word of an adverbial prepositional phrase that modifies, the verb, held. The first four sentences remain phrasal verbs.

The Oxford English Grammar (ISBN 0-19-861250-8) distinguishes seven types of phrasal verbs in English:

• intransitive phrasal verbs (e.g. give in)
• transitive phrasal verbs (e.g. find out [discover])
• monotransitive prepositional verbs (e.g. look after [care for])
• doubly transitive prepositional verbs (e.g. blame [something] on [someone])
• copular prepositional verbs. (e.g. serve as)
• monotransitive phrasal-prepositional verbs (e.g. look up to [respect])
• doubly transitive phrasal-prepositional verbs (e.g. put [something] down to [someone] [attribute to])

English has a number of other kinds of compound verb idioms. There are compound verbs with two verbs (e.g. make do). These too can take idiomatic prepositions (e.g. get rid of). There are also idiomatic combinations of verb and adjective (e.g. come true, run amok) and verb and adverb (make sure), verb and fixed noun (e.g. go ape); and these, too, may have fixed idiomatic prepositions (e.g. take place on).

Misuses of the term[edit]

«Compound verb» is often confused with:

1. «verb phrase»/»verbal phrase»—Headed by a verb, many verbal phrases are multi-word but some are one-word: a verb (which could be a compound verb).
2. «phrasal verb»—A sub-type of verb phrase, which has a particle before or after the verb, often having a more or less idiomatic meaning.
3. «complex verb»—A type of complex phrase: In linguistics, while both «compound» and «complex» contrast with «simple», they are not synonymous (simple involves a single element, compound involves multiple similar elements, complex involves multiple dissimilar elements).

See also[edit]

• Metaphor
• Phrasal verb
• Portmanteau
• Syllabic abbreviations
• Morphology

Notes[edit]

References[edit]

Bibliography[edit]

In English grammar, compounding is the process of combining two words (free morphemes) to create a new word (commonly a noun, verb, or adjective). Also called composition, it is from the Latin for «put together».

Compounds are written sometimes as one word (sunglasses), sometimes as two hyphenated words (life-threatening), and sometimes as two separate words (football stadium). Compounding is the most common type of word-formation in English.

Types of Compounds

Compounding exists in several different forms and parts of speech, including the following:

• Compound Adjective
• Compound Adverb
• Compound Noun
• Compound Tense
• Compound Verb
• Exocentric Compound
• Rhyming Compound
• Root Compound and Synthetic Compound
• Suspended Compound

Examples and Observations

• «Compounds are not limited to two words, as shown by examples such as bathroom towel-rack and community center finance committee. Indeed, the process of compounding seems unlimited in English: starting with a word like sailboat, we can easily construct the compound sailboat rigging, from which we can, in turn, create sailboat rigging design, sailboat rigging design training, sailboat rigging design training institute, and so on.»
  (Adrian Akmajian et al., «Linguistics: An Introduction to Language and Communication». MIT Press, 2001)
• «Trammell was, Hollenbeck said, ‘just a loud-mouthed backslapping small-town handshaker who’s got a job much too big for him.’”
  (Loren Ghiglione, «CBS’s Don Hollenbeck». Columbia University Press, 2008)
• Buffy: No actual witches in your witch group?
  Willow: No. Bunch of wannablessedbes. You know, nowadays every girl with a henna tattoo and a spice rack thinks she’s a sister to the dark ones.»
  (Sarah Michelle Gellar and Alyson Hannigan in «Hush.» «Buffy the Vampire Slayer», 1999)

Stress Test

«Typically a compound begins as a kind of cliché, two words that are frequently found together, as are air cargo or light colored. If the association persists, the two words often turn into a compound, sometimes with a meaning that is simply the sum of the parts (light switch), sometimes with some sort of figurative new sense (moonshine). The semantic relationships of the parts can be of all kinds: a window cleaner cleans windows, but a vacuum cleaner does not clean vacuums. We can be sure we have a compound when the primary stress moves forward; normally a modifier will be less heavily stressed than the word it modifies, but in compounds, the first element is always more heavily stressed.» (Kenneth G. Wilson, «The Columbia Guide to Standard American English». Columbia University Press, 1993)

Distinguishing Features of Compounds

«[In most compounds] the rightmost morpheme determines the category of the entire word. Thus, greenhouse is a noun because its rightmost component is a noun, spoonfeed is a verb because feed also belongs to this category, and nationwide is an adjective just as wide is…

«English orthography is not consistent in representing compounds, which are sometimes written as single words, sometimes with an intervening hyphen, and sometimes as separate words. In terms of pronunciation, however, there is an important generalization to be made. In particular, adjective-noun compounds are characterized by a more prominent stress on their first component…

«A second distinguishing feature of compounds in English is that tense and plural markers cannot typically be attached to the first element, although they can be added to the compound as a whole. (There are some exceptions, however, such as passers-by and parks supervisor.)» (William O’Grady, J. Archibald, M. Aronoff, and J. Rees-Miller, «Contemporary Linguistics: An Introduction». Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2001)

Plurals of Compounds

«Compounds generally follow the regular rule by adding the regular -s inflection to their last element. . . .

«The following two compounds are exceptional in taking the inflection on the first element:

passer-by/passers-by
listener-in/listeners-in

«A few compounds ending in -ful usually take the plural inflection on the last element, but have a less common plural with the inflection on the first element:

mouthful/mouthfuls or mouthsful
spoonful/spoonfuls or spoonsful

«Compounds ending in -in-law allow the plural either on the first element or (informally) on the last element:

sister-in-law/sisters-in-law or sister-in-laws»

(Sidney Greenbaum, «Oxford English Grammar». Oxford University Press, 1996)

Compounds in the Dictionary

«Evidently, the definition of what counts as a single dictionary entry is fluid and allows for very wide margins; any attempt at further precision is impossible because of the unlimited potential for compounding and derivation. The OED [Oxford English Dictionary] policy on compounds and derivatives is indicative of how blurred the line between a ‘headword’ and a compound or a derivative can be:

Compounds are frequently collected together in a section or group of sections at or near the end of an entry. They are followed by a quotation paragraph in which examples of each compound are presented in alphabetical order of the compound. Some major compounds are entered as headwords in their own right. . . .

Clearly, the size of the dictionary records exceeds by far the vocabulary of an individual speaker.» (Donka Minkova and Robert Stockwell, «English Words.» «The Handbook of English Linguistics», ed. by Bas Aarts and April McMahon. Blackwell, 2006)

Compounding in Shakespeare’s King Lear

«Shakespeare seized upon the inherent creative energies of English compounding and transformed them into art. Examples abound throughout his oeuvre, but «King Lear» shines an especially bright spotlight on his combinatorial craft. . . .

«First, we behold Lear’s ‘compounding’ rage. He agonizes over one daughter’s ‘sharp-toothed unkindness’ and wills the ‘fen-sucked fogs’ to foul her. After another daughter also repudiates him, Lear offers his submission to ‘hot-blooded France’ and invokes the ‘Thunder-bearer,’ ‘high-judging Jove.’ . . .

«Next, we learn of nature’s ‘compounding’ wildness. A gentleman reports that a raving Lear is out roving a desolate, storm-struck heath, where he strives ‘in his little world of man to out-scorn/The to-and-fro-conflicting wind and rain’ from which even the ‘cub-drawn bear’ and ‘belly-pinched wolf’ seek shelter. Lear is only accompanied by his loyal fool, ‘who labors to out-jest/ His heart-struck injuries.’ . . .

«Amid the forceful modifiers of ‘oak-cleaving’ and ‘all-shaking’ are the ‘thought-executing’ ‘vaunt-couriers’: lightning bolts.» (John Kelly, «Forget His Coinages, Shakespeare’s Real Genius Lies in His Noggin-Busting Compounds.» Slate, May 16, 2016)

The Lighter Side of Compounding

• «My dad didn’t read things like Playboy or National Enquirer. He was a science nerd with a crew cut, plastic pocket protectors, and a bow tie, and the only magazines at our house were Scientific American and National Geographic. I felt more connected to Karen’s loud, messy, National Enquirer—reading, Twinkie-eating, Coca-Cola-drinking, station wagon-driving, bust-enhancing household than to my polite, organized, National Geographic–reading, bean sprout, and tofu-serving, mind-improving, VW bus-driving household.» (Wendy Merrill, «Falling Into Manholes: The Memoir of a Bad/Good Girl». Penguin, 2008)
• «Hey! If any of you are looking for any last-minute gift ideas for me, I have one. I’d like Frank Shirley, my boss, right here tonight. I want him brought from his happy holiday slumber over there on Melody Lane with all the other rich people, and I want him brought right here, with a big ribbon on his head, and I want to look him straight in the eye, and I want to tell him what a cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, . . . hopeless, heartless, fat-ass, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed sack of monkey…he is! Hallelujah!… Where’s the Tylenol?» (Chevy Chase as Clark Griswold in «National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation», 1989)

Today, we are going to talk about building. But don’t worry. You won’t need to get out a hammer and nails because we are going to be building words. And what are we using to build words? Other words!

In English, we often create cool new words by mashing two or more words together. For example, we can take the word peanut and combine it with the word butter to make peanut butter. Delicious! Or we can take the word monkey and fasten it to the word wrench to make monkey wrench. Handy! Or we can add together right and angle to make a right angle. Algebraic!

Making new words is a lot of fun, so let’s keep going and learn about all the different ways we combine words together as we explore the grammatical concept of compounding.

What is compounding?

In grammar, compounding, also called composition, is when two or more words are combined together to form a new word. For example, the word underground is a combination of the words under and ground. In English, compounding is used to form words belonging to four common parts of speech: nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.

Most of the time, compounding creates a word or phrase that means something different than the meanings of the words used as “ingredients.” For example, the word bluebird refers to specific species of songbirds whereas the separate words blue bird refer to any bird with blue feathers. As another example, the adjective old school refers to supporting traditional methods or values and doesn’t refer to ancient scholarly buildings.

The different types of compounds

Typically, compounds are usually divided into three different types. Often, the way the compounds are labeled will depend on which dictionary or grammar resource that you use. It is also possible for a compound to be considered more than one type. Generally, if a specific compound doesn’t appear in a dictionary at all, the typical pattern is that it will be hyphenated.

Closed compounds (Single words)

Closed compounds are compounds that consist of two words combined together without a space in between. Some examples of closed compounds include blackboard, sweatshirt, backstroke, undercut, horseshoe, desktop, and smartphone.

Open compounds (Multiple words)

Open compounds consist of two words with a space in between them. Examples of open compounds include air conditioner, guardian angel, French toast, spray paint, and cream cheese.

Hyphenated compounds

The last type of compound is formed by connecting two or more words together using hyphens. Newer compounds and/or compounds that don’t appear in dictionaries are often written as this form of compound. Examples of hyphenated compounds include fat-free, dark-skinned, merry-go-round, two-faced, tractor-trailer, and stay-at-home.

Learn all about how to use hyphens here!

Compounds in different parts of speech

Examples of compounds can be found in four of the most commonly used parts of speech: nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.

We will briefly look at each of these different types. If you want to explore each one in more detail, we have provided an extensive guide to three of the types of compound in the links below:

• Compound nouns
• Compound verbs
• Compound adjective

Examples of compound nouns

Closed: basketball, headphones, rowboat, rainforest, toothpaste, frostbite
Open: tennis shoe, fabric softener, gym shorts, banana split, peanut butter
Hyphenated: jack-in-the-box, city-state, sister-in-law, will-o’-the-wisp

Examples of compound verbs

Closed: blackmail, blindside, overshoot, brainwash, underperform
Open: turn back, check in, mull over, play up, double down
Hyphenated: gift-wrap, baby-sit, double-check, criss-cross, cherry-pick

Examples of compound adjectives

Closed: seasick, waterproof, overpowered, downtrodden, homemade
Hyphenated: red-faced, white-collar, sun-dried, cold-blooded, last-minute

Open compound adjectives are less common and often take the form of an open compound noun being used as an adjective. For example:

• high school student, jump rope competition, hot dog bun

Often, an -ly adverb is combined with a past participle to form an adjective phrase. Depending on the grammar resource, these formations may be considered to be open compound adjectives. For example:

• overly simplified explanation, brightly lit room, barely audible sound, easily missed detail

Examples of compound adverbs

Closed: therefore, hereafter, sometimes, whenever, overnight
Open: upside down, inside out, early on, almost always, over and over
Hyphenated: topsy-turvy, in-house, self-consciously

Examples of compounding in sentences

There are lots and lots of compound words out there. We use compound words to refer to many common things, so you are likely to come across and use a ton of compound words in your everyday speech. Let’s look at just a few examples of how we typically use compound words in our sentences.

• I asked for another serving of egg rolls.
• The bowl was filled with blueberries and sunflower seeds.
• She held a block party at her beach house.
• Because he had a headache, he called a timeout during the football game.
• The major general shored up the gaps in the front line with more infantrymen.
• She double-clicked the mouse while mashing buttons on the keyboard to try to fix her desktop computer.
• My stepsister owns a workshop that makes wristwatches, timepieces, and grandfather clocks.

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Lecture 3.
Word-building: affixation, conversion, composition, abbreviation.
THE WORD-BUILDING SYSTEM OF ENGLISH
1.
Word-derivation
2.
Affixation
3.
Conversion
4.
Word-composition
5.
Shortening
6.
Blending
7.
Acronymy
8.
Sound interchange
9.
Sound imitation
10. Distinctive stress
11. Back-formation
Word-formation is a branch of Lexicology which studies the process of building new
words, derivative structures and patterns of existing words. Two principle types of wordformation are distinguished: word-derivation and word-composition. It is evident that wordformation proper can deal only with words which can be analyzed both structurally and
semantically. Simple words are closely connected with word-formation because they serve as the
foundation of derived and compound words. Therefore, words like writer, displease, sugar free,
etc. make the subject matter of study in word-formation, but words like to write, to please, atom,
free are irrelevant to it.
WORD-FORMATION
WORD-DERIVATION
AFFIXATION
WORD-COMPOSITION
CONVERSION
1. Word-derivation.
Speaking about word-derivation we deal with the derivational structure of words which
basic elementary units are derivational bases, derivational affixes and derivational patterns.
A derivational base is the part of the word which establishes connection with the lexical
unit that motivates the derivative and determines its individual lexical meaning describing the
difference between words in one and the same derivative set. For example, the individual lexical
meaning of the words singer, writer, teacher which denote active doers of the action is signaled by
the lexical meaning of the derivational bases: sing-, write-, teach-.
Structurally derivational bases fall into 3 classes:
1. Bases that coincide with morphological stems of different degrees оf complexity, i.e.,
with words functioning independently in modern English e.g., dutiful, day-dreamer. Bases are
functionally and semantically distinct from morphological stems. Functionally the morphological
stem is a part of the word which is the starting point for its forms: heart – hearts; it is the part
which presents the entire grammatical paradigm. The stem remains unchanged throughout all
word-forms; it keeps them together preserving the identity of the word. A derivational base is the
starting point for different words (heart – heartless – hearty) and its derivational potential
outlines the type and scope of existing words and new creations. Semantically the stem stands for
the whole semantic structure of the word; it represents all its lexical meanings. A base represents,
as a rule, only one meaning of the source word.
2. Bases that coincide with word-forms, e.g., unsmiling, unknown. The base is usually
represented by verbal forms: the present and the past participles.
3. Bases that coincide with word-groups of different degrees of stability, e.g., blue-eyed,
empty-handed. Bases of this class allow a rather limited range of collocability, they are most
active with derivational affixes in the class of adjectives and nouns (long-fingered, blue-eyed).
Derivational affixes are Immediate Constituents of derived words in all parts of speech.
Affixation is generally defined as the formation of words by adding derivational affixes to
different types of bases. Affixation is subdivided into suffixation and prefixation. In Modern
English suffixation is mostly characteristic of nouns and adjectives coining, while prefixation is
mostly typical of verb formation.
A derivational pattern is a regular meaningful arrangement, a structure that imposes
rigid rules on the order and the nature of the derivational base and affixes that may be brought
together to make up a word. Derivational patterns are studied with the help of distributional
analysis at different levels. Patterns are usually represented in a generalized way in terms of
conventional symbols: small letters v, n, a, d which stand for the bases coinciding with the stems
of the respective parts of speech: verbs, etc. Derivational patterns may represent derivative
structure at different levels of generalization:
- at the level of structural types. The patterns of this type are known as structural
formulas, all words may be classified into 4 classes: suffixal derivatives (friendship) n + -sf →
N, prefixal derivatives (rewrite), conversions (a cut, to parrot) v → N, compound words (musiclover).
- at the level of structural patterns. Structural patterns specify the base classes and
individual affixes thus indicating the lexical-grammatical and lexical classes of derivatives
within certain structural classes of words. The suffixes refer derivatives to specific parts of
speech and lexical subsets. V + -er = N (a semantic set of active agents, denoting both animate
and inanimate objects - reader, singer); n + -er = N (agents denoting residents or occupations Londoner, gardener). We distinguish a structural semantic derivationa1 pattern.
- at the level of structural-semantic patterns. Derivational patterns may specify semantic
features of bases and individual meaning of affixes: N + -y = A (nominal bases denoting living
beings are collocated with the suffix meaning "resemblance" - birdy, catty; but nominal bases
denoting material, parts of the body attract another meaning "considerable amount" - grassy,
leggy).
The basic ways of forming new words in word-derivation are affixation and conversion.
Affixation is the formation of a new word with the help of affixes (heartless, overdo).
Conversion is the formation of a new word by bringing a stem of this word into a different
paradigm (a fall from to fall).
2. Affixation
Affixation is generally defined as the formation of words by adding derivational affixes
to different types of bases. Affixation includes suffixation and prefixation. Distinction between
suffixal and prefixal derivates is made according to the last stage of derivation, for example,
from the point of view of derivational analysis the word unreasonable – un + (reason- + -able) is
qualified as a prefixal derivate, while the word discouragement – (dis- + -courage) + -ment is
defined as a suffixal derivative.
Suffixation is the formation of words with the help of suffixes. Suffixes usually modify
the lexical meaning of the base and transfer words to a different part of speech.
Suffixes can be classified into different types in accordance with different principles.
According to the lexico-grammatical character suffixes may be: deverbal suffixes, e.d.,
those added to the verbal base (agreement); denominal (endless); deadjectival (widen,
brightness).
According to the part of speech formed suffixes fall into several groups: noun-forming
suffixes (assistance), adjective-forming suffixes (unbearable), numeral-forming suffixes
(fourteen), verb-forming suffixes (facilitate), adverb-forming suffixes (quickly, likewise).
Semantically suffixes may be monosemantic, e.g. the suffix –ess has only one meaning
“female” – goddess, heiress; polysemantic, e.g. the suffix –hood has two meanings “condition or
quality” falsehood and “collection or group” brotherhood.
According to their generalizing denotational meaning suffixes may fall into several
groups: the agent of the action (baker, assistant); collectivity (peasantry); appurtenance
(Victorian, Chinese); diminutiveness (booklet).
Prefixation is the formation of words with the help of prefixes. Two types of prefixes can
be distinguished: 1) those not correlated with any independent word (un-, post-, dis-); 2) those
correlated with functional words (prepositions or preposition-like adverbs: out-, up-, under-).
Diachronically distinction is made between prefixes of native and foreign origin.
Prefixes can be classified according to different principles.
According to the lexico-grammatical character of the base prefixes are usually added to,
they may be: deverbal prefixes, e.d., those added to the verbal base (overdo); denominal
(unbutton); deadjectival (biannual).
According to the part of speech formed prefixes fall into several groups: noun-forming
prefixes (ex-husband), adjective-forming prefixes (unfair), verb-forming prefixes (dethrone),
adverb-forming prefixes (uphill).
Semantically prefixes may be monosemantic, e.g. the prefix –ex has only one meaning
“former” – ex-boxer; polysemantic, e.g. the prefix –dis has four meanings “not” disadvantage
and “removal of” to disbrunch.
According to their generalizing denotational meaning prefixes may fall into several
groups: negative prefixes – un, non, dis, a, in (ungrateful, nonpolitical, disloyal, amoral,
incorrect); reversative prefixes - un, de, dis (untie, decentralize, disconnect); pejorative prefixes
– mis, mal, pseudo (mispronounce, maltreat, pseudo-scientific); prefix of repetition (redo),
locative prefixes – super, sub, inter, trans (superstructure, subway, intercontinental,
transatlantic).
3. Conversion
Conversion is a process which allows us to create additional lexical terms out of those
that already exist, e.g., to saw, to spy, to snoop, to flirt. This process is not limited to one syllable
words, e.g., to bottle, to butter, nor is the process limited to the creation of verbs from nouns, e.g.,
to up the prices. Converted words are extremely colloquial: "I'll microwave the chicken", "Let's
flee our dog", "We will of course quiche and perrier you".
Conversion came into being in the early Middle English period as a result of the leveling
and further loss of endings.
In Modern English conversion is a highly-productive type of word-building. Conversion
is a specifically English type of word formation which is determined by its analytical character,
by its scarcity of inflections and abundance of mono-and-de-syllabic words in different parts of
speech. Conversion is coining new words in a different part of speech and with a different
distribution but without adding any derivative elements, so that the original and the converted
words are homonyms.
Structural Characteristics of Conversion: Mostly monosyllabic words are converted,
e.g., to horn, to box, to eye. In Modern English there is a marked tendency to convert
polysyllabic words of a complex morphological structure, e.g., to e-mail, to X-ray. Most converted
words are verbs which may be formed from different parts of speech from nouns, adjectives,
adverbs, interjections.
Nouns from verbs - a try, a go, a find, a loss
From adjectives - a daily, a periodical
From adverbs - up and down
From conjunctions - but me no buts
From interjection - to encore
Semantic Associations / Relations of Conversion:
The noun is the name of a tool or implement, the verb denotes an action performed by the
tool, e.g., to nail, to pin, to comb, to brush, to pencil;
The noun is the name of an animal, the verb denotes an action or aspect of behavior
considered typical of this animal, e.g., to monkey, to rat, to dog, to fox;
When the noun is the name of a part of a human body, the verb denotes an action
performed by it, e.g., to hand, to nose, to eye;
When the noun is the name of a profession or occupation, the verb denotes the activity
typical of it, e.g., to cook, to maid, to nurse;
When the noun is the name of a place, the verb will denote the process of occupying the
place or by putting something into it, e.g., to room, to house, to cage;
When the word is the name of a container, the verb will denote the act of putting
something within the container, e.g., to can, to pocket, to bottle;
When the word is the name of a meal, the verb means the process of taking it, e.g., to
lunch, to supper, to dine, to wine;
If an adjective is converted into a verb, the verb may have a generalized meaning "to be
in a state", e.g., to yellow;
When nouns are converted from verbs, they denote an act or a process, or the result, e.g.,
a try, a go, a find, a catch.
4. Word-composition
Compound words are words consisting of at least two stems which occur in the language
as free forms.
Most compounds in English have the primary stress on the first syllable. For example,
income tax has the primary stress on the in of income, not on the tax.
Compounds have a rather simple, regular set of properties. First, they are binary in
structure. They always consist of two or more constituent lexemes. A compound which has three
or more constituents must have them in pairs, e.g., washingmachine manufacturer consists of
washingmachine and manufacturer, while washingmachine in turn consists of washing and
machine. Compound words also usually have a head constituent. By a head constituent we mean
one which determines the syntactic properties of the whole lexeme, e.g., the compound lexeme
longboat consists of an adjective, long and a noun, boat. The compound lexeme longboat is a
noun, and it is а noun because boat is a noun, that is, boat is the head constituent of longboat.
Compound words can belong to all the major syntactic categories:
• Nouns: signpost, sunlight, bluebird, redwood, swearword, outhouse;
• Verbs: window shop, stargaze, outlive, undertake;
• Adjectives: ice-cold, hell-bent, undersized;
• Prepositions: into, onto, upon.
From the morphological point of view compound words are classified according to the
structure of immediate constituents:
• Compounds consisting of simple stems - heartache, blackbird;
• Compounds where at least one of the constituents is a derived stem -chainsmoker,
maid-servant, mill-owner, shop-assistant;
• Compounds where one of the constituents is a clipped stem - V-day, A-bomb, Xmas,
H-bag;
• Compounds where one of the constituents is a compound stem - wastes paper basket,
postmaster general.
Compounds are the commonest among nouns and adjectives. Compound verbs are few in
number, as they are mostly the result of conversion, e.g., to blackmail, to honeymoon, to
nickname, to safeguard, to whitewash. The 20th century created some more converted verbs, e.g.,
to weekend, to streamline,, to spotlight. Such converted compounds are particularly common in
colloquial speech of American English. Converted verbs can be also the result of backformation.
Among the earliest coinages are to backbite, to browbeat, to illtreat, to housekeep. The 20th
century gave more examples to hitch-hike, to proof-read, to mass-produce, to vacuumclean.
One more structural characteristic of compound words is classification of compounds
according to the type of composition. According to this principle two groups can be singled out:

words which are formed by a mere juxtaposition without any connecting elements,
e.g., classroom, schoolboy, heartbreak, sunshine;

composition with a vowel or a consonant placed between the two stems. e.g.,
salesman, handicraft.
Semantically compounds may be idiomatic and non-idiomatic. Compound words may be
motivated morphologically and in this case they are non-idiomatic. Sunshine - the meaning here
is a mere meaning of the elements of a compound word (the meaning of each component is
retained). When the compound word is not motivated morphologically, it is idiomatic. In
idiomatic compounds the meaning of each component is either lost or weakened. Idiomatic
compounds have a transferred meaning. Chatterbox - is not a box, it is a person who talks a great
deal without saying anything important; the combination is used only figuratively. The same
metaphorical character is observed in the compound slowcoach - a person who acts and thinks
slowly.
The components of compounds may have different semantic relations. From this point of
view we can roughly classify compounds into endocentric and exocentric. In endocentric
compounds the semantic centre is found within the compound and the first element determines
the other as in the words filmstar, bedroom, writing-table. Here the semantic centres are star,
room, table. These stems serve as a generic name of the object and the determinants film, bed,
writing give some specific, additional information about the objects. In exocentric compound
there is no semantic centre. It is placed outside the word and can be found only in the course of
lexical transformation, e.g., pickpocket - a person who picks pockets of other people, scarecrow an object made to look like a person that a farmer puts in a field to frighten birds.
The Criteria of Compounds
As English compounds consist of free forms, it's difficult to distinguish them from
phrases, because there are no reliable criteria for that. There exist three approaches to distinguish
compounds from corresponding phrases:
Formal unity implies the unity of spelling

solid spelling, e.g., headmaster;

with a hyphen, e.g., head-master;

with a break between two components, e.g., head master.
Different dictionaries and different authors give different spelling variants.
Phonic principal of stress
Many compounds in English have only one primary stress. All compound nouns are
stressed according to this pattern, e.g., ice-cream, ice cream. The rule doesn't hold with
adjectives. Compound adjectives are double-stressed, e.g., easy-going, new-born, sky-blue.
Stress cannot help to distinguish compounds from phrases because word stress may depend on
phrasal stress or upon the syntactic function of a compound.
Semantic unity
Semantic unity means that a compound word expresses one separate notion and phrases
express more than one notion. Notions in their turn can't be measured. That's why it is hard to
say whether one or more notions are expressed. The problem of distinguishing between
compound words and phrases is still open to discussion.
According to the type of bases that form compounds they can be of :
1.
compounds proper – they are formed by joining together bases built on the stems
or on the ford-forms with or without linking element, e.g., door-step;
2.
derivational compounds – by joining affixes to the bases built on the word-groups
or by converting the bases built on the word-groups into the other parts of speech, e.g., longlegged → (long legs) + -ed, a turnkey → (to turn key) + conversion. More examples: do-gooder,
week-ender, first-nighter, house-keeping, baby-sitting, blue-eyed blond-haired, four-storied. The
suffixes refer to both of the stems combined, but not to the final stem only. Such stems as nighter,
gooder, eyed do not exist.
Compound Neologisms
In the last two decades the role of composition in the word-building system of English has
increased. In the 60th and 70th composition was not so productive as affixation. In the 80th
composition exceeded affixation and comprised 29.5 % of the total number of neologisms in
English vocabulary. Among compound neologisms the two-component units prevail. The main
patterns of coining the two-component neologisms are Noun stem + Noun stem = Noun;
Adjective stem + Noun stem = Noun.
There appeared a tendency to coin compound nouns where:
 The first component is a proper noun, e.g., Kirlian photograph - biological field of
humans.
 The first component is a geographical place, e.g., Afro-rock.
 The two components are joined with the help of the linking vowel –o- e.g.,
bacteriophobia, suggestopedia.
 The number of derivational compounds increases. The main productive suffix to coin
such compound is the suffix -er - e.g., baby-boomer, all nighter.
 Many compound words are formed according to the pattern Participle 2 + Adv =
Adjective, e.g., laid-back, spaced-out, switched-off, tapped-out.
 The examples of verbs formed with the help of a post-positive -in -work-in, die-in,
sleep-in, write-in.
Many compounds formed by the word-building pattern Verb + postpositive are numerous
in colloquial speech or slang, e.g., bliss out, fall about/horse around, pig-out.
ATTENTION: Apart from the principle types there are some minor types of modern wordformation, i.d., shortening, blending, acronymy, sound interchange, sound imitation, distinctive
stress, back-formation, and reduplicaton.
5. Shortening
Shortening is the formation of a word by cutting off a part of the word. They can be
coined in two different ways. The first is to cut off the initial/ middle/ final part:
 Aphaeresis – initial part of the word is clipped, e.g., history-story, telephone-phone;
 Syncope – the middle part of the word is clipped, e.g., madam- ma 'am; specs
spectacles
 Apocope – the final part of the word is clipped, e.g., professor-prof, editored, vampirevamp;
 Both initial and final, e.g., influenza-flu, detective-tec.
Polysemantic words are usually clipped in one meaning only, e.g., doc and doctor have
the meaning "one who practices medicine", but doctor is also "the highest degree given by a
university to a scholar or scientist".
Among shortenings there are homonyms, so that one and the same sound and graphical
complex may represent different words, e.g., vac - vacation/vacuum, prep —
preparation/preparatory school, vet — veterinary surgeon/veteran.
6. Blending
Blending is a particular type of shortening which combines the features of both clipping
and composition, e.g., motel (motor + hotel), brunch (breakfast + lunch), smog (smoke + fog),
telethon (television + marathon), modem , (modulator + demodulator), Spanglish (Spanish +
English). There are several structural types of blends:

Initial part of the word + final part of the word, e.g., electrocute (electricity +
execute);

initial part of the word + initial part of the word, e.g., lib-lab (liberal+labour);

Initial part of the word + full word, e.g., paratroops (parachute+troops);

Full word + final part of the word, e.g., slimnastics (slim+gymnastics).
7. Acronymy
Acronyms are words formed from the initial letters of parts of a word or phrase,
commonly the names of institutions and organizations. No full stops are placed between the
letters. All acronyms are divided into two groups. The first group is composed of the acronyms
which are often pronounced as series of letters: EEC (European Economic Community), ID
(identity or identification card), UN (United Nations), VCR (videocassette recorder), FBI
(Federal Bureau of Investigation), LA (Los Angeles), TV (television), PC (personal computer),
GP (General Practitioner), ТВ (tuberculosis). The second group of acronyms is composed by the
words which are pronounced according to the rules of reading in English: UNESCO (United
Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization), AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency
Syndrome), ASH (Action on Smoking and Health). Some of these pronounceable words are
written without capital letters and therefore are no longer recognized as acronyms: laser (light
amplification by stimulated emissions of radiation), radar (radio detection and ranging).
Some abbreviations have become so common and normal as words that people do not think
of them as abbreviations any longer. They are not written in capital letters, e.g., radar (radio
detection and ranging), laser (light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation) yuppie,
gruppie, sinbads, dinkies.
Some abbreviations are only written forms but they are pronounced as full words, e.g.,
Mr, Mrs, Dr. Some abbreviations are from Latin. They are used as part of the language etc. - et
cetera, e.g., (for example) — exampli gratia, that is - id est.
Acromymy is widely used in the press, for the names of institutions, organizations,
movements, countries. It is common to colloquial speech, too. Some acronyms turned into
regular words, e.g., jeep -came from the expression general purpose car.
There are a lot of homonyms among acronyms:
MP - Member of Parliament/Military Police/Municipal Police
PC - Personal Computer/Politically correct
8. Sound-interchange
Sound-interchange is the formation of a new word due to an alteration in the phonemic
composition of its root. Sound-interchange falls into two groups: 1) vowel-interchange, e.g., food
– feed; in some cases vowel-interchange is combined with suffixation, e.g., strong – strength; 2)
consonant-interchange e.g., advice – to advise. Consonant-interchange and vowel-interchange
may be combined together, e.g., life – to live.
This type of word-formation is greatly facilitated in Modern English by the vast number
of monosyllabic words. Most words made by reduplication represent informal groups:
colloquialisms and slang, hurdy-gurdy, walkie-talkie, riff-raff, chi-chi girl. In reduplication new
words are coined by doubling a stem, either without any phonetic changes as in bye-bye or with a
variation of the root-vowel or consonant as in ping-pong, chit-chat.
9. Sound imitation or (onomatopoeia)
It is the naming of an action or a thing by more or less exact reproduction of the sound
associated with it, cf.: cock-a-do-doodle-do – ку-ка-ре-ку.
Semantically, according to the source sound, many onomatopoeic words fall into the
following definitive groups: 1) words denoting sounds produced by human beings in the process of
communication or expressing their feelings, e.g., chatter; 2) words denoting sounds produced by
animals, birds, insects, e.g., moo, buzz; 3) words imitating the sounds of water, the noise of metallic
things, movements, e.g., splash, whip, swing.
10. Distinctive stress
Distinctive stress is the formation of a word by means of the shift of the stress in the
source word, e.g., increase – increase.
11. Back-formation
Backformation is coining new words by subtracting a real or supposed suffix, as a result
of misinterpretation of the structure of the existing word. This type of word-formation is not
highly productive in Modern English and it is built on the analogy, e.g., beggar-to beg, cobbler to cobble, blood transfusion — to blood transfuse, babysitter - to baby-sit.