What is word composition in english

Word-composition
(compounding)
is the formation of words by morphologically joining two or more
stems.

A
compound
word
is a word consisting of at least two stems which usually occur in the
language as free forms, e.g. university
teaching award committee member.

The
compound inherits
most of its semantic and syntactic information from its head,
i.e. the most important member of a compound word modified by the
other component.

The
structural
pattern
of English compounds

[
X Y]
y

X
= {root, word, phrase},
Y
= {root, word},
y
= grammatical properties inherited from Y

According
to the
type
of the linking element:

compounds
without
a linking element, e.g. toothache,
bedroom, sweet-heart;

compounds
with a
vowel linking element,
e.g. handicraft,
speedometer;

compounds
with a
consonant linking element,
e.g. statesperson,
craftsman;

compounds
with a
preposition linking stem,
e.g. son-in-law,
lady-in-waiting;

compounds
with a
conjunction linking stem,
e.g. bread-and-butter.

According
to the
type
of relationship
between the components

-in
coordinative
(copulative)
compounds neither of the components dominates the other, e.g.
fifty-fifty,
whisky-and-soda, driver-conductor;

-in
subordinative
(determinative)
compounds the components are neither structurally nor semantically
equal in importance but are based on the domination of one component
over the other, e.g. coffeepot,
Oxford-educated, to headhunt,
blue-eyed,
red-haired
etc.

According
to the
type
of relationship
between the components, subordinative compounds are classified into:

-syntactic
compounds
if their components are placed in the order that resembles the order
of words in free phrases made up according to the rules of Modern
English syntax, e.g. a
know-nothing
— to know nothing, a
blackbird
– a black bird;

-asyntactic
compounds
if they do not conform to the grammatical patterns current in
present-day English, e.g. baby-sitting
– to sit with a baby, oil-rich
– to be rich in oil.

According
to the
way of composition:

—compound
proper
is a compound formed after a composition pattern, i.e. by joining
together the stems of words already available in the language, with
or without the help of special linking elements, e.g. seasick,
looking-glass, helicopter-rescued, handicraft;

-derivational
compound is
a compound which is formed by two simultaneous processes of
composition and derivation; in a derivational compound the structural
integrity of two free stems is ensured by a suffix referring to the
combination as a whole, e.g. long-legged,
many-sided, old-timer, left-hander.

According
to the
semantic relations
between the constituents:

non-idiomatic
compounds,
whose meanings can be described as the sum of their constituent
meanings, e.g. a
sleeping-car, an evening-gown, a snowfall;

compounds
one of the components of which has undergone semantic derivation,
i.e. changed its meaning, e.g. a
blackboard,
a
bluebell;

idiomatic
compounds,
the meaning of which cannot be deduced from the meanings of the
constituents, e.g. a
ladybird,
a
tallboy,
horse-marine.
The
bahuvrihi compounds
(Sanskrit ‘much riced’) are idomatic formations in which a
person, animal or thing is metonymically named after some striking
feature (mainly in their appearance) they possess; their
word-building pattern is an
adjectival stem + a noun stem,
e.g.
bigwig,
fathead, highbrow, lowbrow, lazy-bones.

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What is word composition?

Composition is another word for writing — the act of writing or the piece of writing that results. It also refers to what something is made of. The word composition comes from the Latin componere, meaning “put together” and its meaning remains close to this.

What is composition in simple words?

1 : a short piece of writing done as a school exercise. 2 : the act of writing words or music. 3 : the manner in which the parts of a thing are put together : makeup, constitution The president discussed the population’s changing composition.

What is a composition noun?

noun. noun. /ˌkɑmpəˈzɪʃn/ 1[uncountable] the different parts that something is made of; the way in which the different parts are organized the chemical composition of the soil the composition of the board of directors the size and composition of an average class Thesaurus.

What is the example of composition?

The definition of composition is the act of putting something together, or the combination of elements or qualities. An example of a composition is a flower arrangement. An example of a composition is a manuscript. An example of a composition is how the flowers and vase are arranged in Van Gogh’s painting Sunflowers.

What is the verb of composition?

compose. (transitive) To make something by merging parts. [from later 15th c.] (transitive) To make up the whole; to constitute.

What is a synonym for composition?

compositionnoun. a mixture of ingredients. Synonyms: makeup, penning, typography, writing, composing, constitution, make-up, opus, theme, piece of music, paper, authorship, physical composition, musical composition, report, piece. musical composition, opus, composition, piece, piece of musicnoun.

How is a composition written?

In writing, composition refers to the way a writer structures a piece of writing. The four modes of composition, which were codified in the late 19th century, are description, narration, exposition, and argumentation. Good writing can include elements of multiple modes of composition.

What part of speech is the word composition?

noun. the act of combining parts or elements to form a whole. the resulting state or product. manner of being composed; structure: This painting has an orderly composition.

What is the difference between composition and paragraph?

Answer. A paragraph is consists of sentences dealing with the same thought or idea…. However, a composition is made up of paragraphs: the introduction, body, and the ending paragraph…..

What is another word for a musical composition?

musical arrangement, larghetto, Programme Music, divertimento, tone poem, suite, medley, canon, duette, passage, vocal, song, octette, octet, septet, quartette, realisation, serenade, allegro, sestet, duet, arrangement, pastiche, quartet, capriccio, trio, pastorale, quintette, intermezzo, pastoral, idyll, program music …

What does size and composition mean?

uncountable the way that something is formed from separate parts or people. Households differ widely in their size and composition.

What is the size of a composition?

In the United States, exercise books used by writers and students are known as composition books. Typically, they have dimensions of 93⁄4 by 71⁄2 inches (250 mm × 190 mm) or 81⁄2 by 67⁄8 inches (220 mm × 170 mm) and 20, 40, 80 or 100 sheets.

What is the purpose of composition?

Composition is a way of guiding the viewer’s eye towards the most important elements of your work, sometimes – in a very specific order. A good composition can help make a masterpiece even out of the dullest objects and subjects in the plainest of environments.

What are the 3 rules of composition?

To achieve successful composition, you must include three things: A focal point, structure, and balance.

What are the 8 rules of composition?

8 of the Best Photography Composition Rules

• Always use the Rule of Thirds.
• Frame the scene.
• Follow the leading lines.
• Accentuate patterns.
• Get creative with color.
• Play with the background.
• Find a unique point of view.
• Try, try, and try again.

What are two rules of composition?

9 Top Photography Composition Rules You Need To Know

• Fill The Frame / Cropping.
• Don’t Cut Off Limbs.
• Understand The Rule Of Thirds.
• Use Frames.
• Make The Most Of Lead In Lines / Shapes.
• Simplify – Know Your Focus.
• Watch The Background.
• Look For Symmetry/Patterns.

What are the 6 rules of composition?

TOP 6 PHOTOGRAPHY COMPOSITION RULES

• Simplify the scene. Declutter the background to draw attention to your subject.
• Rule of thirds. Instead of placing your subject centre-frame, split the frame into thirds.
• Fill the frame. Too much ‘negative’ or unused space might not work for your photo.
• Diagonal lines.
• High or low.
• Reflect.

What are the principles of composition?

Some principles of organization affecting the composition of a picture are: Shape and proportion. Positioning/orientation/balance/harmony among the elements. The area within the field of view used for the picture (“cropping”)

What is the first camera called?

Kodak

What were old cameras called?

So let us take a chronological journey through the evolution of cameras.

• Camera Obscura. The first camera was the Camera Obscura used by the ancient civilizations of Greece and China.
• Plate Cameras. Later, copper plates with silver coating were used.
• Roll Film Cameras.
• Polaroid and Digital Cameras.

Who invented the very first camera?

Johann Zahn

What DSLR stands for?

digital single-lens reflex camera

Who invented the TV?

Philo Farnsworth

When was TV invented?

1927

CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION 3
CHAPTER 1. THEORETICAL BACKGROUNDS OF WORD-COMPOSITION AS A WAY OF
WORD-FORMATION IN ENGLISH 6
1.1 The means of word-formation in English language 6
1.2 The concept and the essence word-composition 14
CHAPTER 2. STRUCTURAL-SEMANTIC AND FUNCTIONAL FEATURES OF COMPOUND WORDS 19
2.1 The analysis of semantic features of compound words 19
2.2 The analysis of functional features of compound words 24
CHAPTER 3. ANALYTICAL BASES OF USE OF WORD-COMPOSITION 36
3.1 Practical examples of compound words in modern English 36
3.2 New tendencies of use of word-composition as a way of word-formation in
English 38
CONCLUSION 41
LITERATURE 44
APPENDIXES 46
Appendix 1 46
Appendix 2 49
Appendix 3 52
Appendix 4 54

INTRODUCTION

  In linguistics, word formation is the creation of a new word. Word formation is sometimes contrasted with semantic
change, which is a change in a
single word’s meaning. The line between word formation and semantic
change is sometimes a bit
blurry; what one person views as a new use of an old word, another person might
view as a new word derived from an old one and identical to it in form.  Word
formation can also be contrasted with the formation of idiomatic expressions, though sometimes words can form from
multi-word phrases.

The
subject-matter of the Course Paper is to investigate the
word – composition in the English system of word – formation.

The
topicality of the problem  results from the necessity to devote 
to description of theoretical bases of allocation of word-composition as way of
word-formation in modern English language.

The
novelty of the problem arises from the necessity to define the
role of word-composition way which is, along with abbreviations, stays one of
the most productive for last decades..

The
main aim of the Course Paper is to summarize and systemize
different  methods of word — composition in English.

The
aim
of the course Paper presupposes the solutions of the following tasks:

·                  
To
expand and update the definition of the term “word — composition”

·                  
to
define the role of word-composition

According the tasks of the Course
Paper its structure is arranged in the following way:

Introduction,
the Main Part, Conclusion, Resume, Literature, test of Reference Material, List
of Electronic References.

In
the Introduction we provide the explanation of the theme choice, state the
topicality of it, establish the main aim, and the practical tasks of the Paper.

In
the main part we analyze
the character features of the modern classification of word – composition in
the English system of word – formation.

In conclusion we
generalize the results achieved.

CHAPTER 1. THEORETICAL BACKGROUNDS OF WORD-COMPOSITION AS A
WAY OF WORD-FORMATION IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE.
1.1 The means of word-composition in English language              The chapter is devoted to
description of theoretical bases of allocation of word-composition as way of
word-formation in modern English language. We try to define the role of
word-composition way which is, along with abbreviations, stays one of the most
productive for last decades. The main way of enrichment of lexicon of any
language is word-formation. All innovations in branches of human knowledge are
fixed in new words and expressions. 

               The
word-formation system of language is in constant development, as it reflects
evolution of the language. At different stages of language development ways of
word-formation become more or less productive. However there are also ways of
the word-formation which stay productive for a very long time. One of such
methods is word-composition.
             Word-composition is a very ancient way of word-formation, and it
serves as powerful tool of the replenishment of language and its grammatical
system perfection for hundred years.
              Many researches are devoted composition studying. So, the
considerable contribution to studying of this problem was brought by V.Guz’s,
G.Marchand’s, S.Ulman’s researches, and also the studies of I.V.Arnold,
N.V.Kosarev, E.S.Kubrjakov, O.D.Meshkova, V.J.Ryazanov, A.I.Smirnitsky,
M.D.Stepanova, M.V.Tsareva. That is the problem is widely studied both in domestic,
and in foreign practice.
However it should be noticed that the majority of word-composition studies
concern 70-80 years of the last century, and during last 20 years no serious
researches appeared.
Besides,
the analysis of researches reveals considerable confrontation in opinions of
different authors both in questions of defying the concept of word-formation,
and in approaches of classification of its kinds. There
are different
opinions in concerning quantity of ways of word-formation. 
        These divergences speak that various ways change the activity and
become more or less productive in a definite period. Anyhow, it is conventional
that modern English has different ways of word-formation: Affixation, suffixation, shortening,  prefixation, conversion and
composition or compound.                     Compounding or word-composition is
one of the productive types of word-formation in Modern English. Composition
like all other ways of deriving words has its own peculiarities as to the means used, the nature of
bases and their distribution, as to the range of application, the scope of
seman­tic classes and the factors conducive to pro­ductivity. Compounding or
word composition  is one of the productive types of
word-formation in Modern English. Composition like all other ways of deriving
words has its own peculiarities as to the means used , the nature of  bases
and  their  distribution , as to  the  range of application  , the scope of 
semantic classes and  the factors  conducive to productivity. Compounds are
made up of  two ICs which are both derivational bases. Compound words are
inseparable vocabulary units. They are formally and semantically dependent on
the constituent bases and the semantic relations between them which mirror the
relations between the motivating units. The ICs of compound words represent
bases of all three structural types.

1.    
The
bases built on stems may be of different degree

2.      Of complexity as,
e.g., week-end,
office-management, postage-stamp, aircraft-carrier, fancy-dress-maker, etc. However, this complexity of
structure of bases is not typical of the bulk of Modern English compounds. In this connection
care should be taken not to confuse compound words with polymorphic words of
secondary derivation, i.e. derivatives built according to an affixal
pattern but on a compound stem for its base such as, e.g., school-mastership ([n+n]+suf), ex—housewife (prf+[n+n]),to weekend, to
spotlight ([n+n]+conversion).

CHAPTER 2. STRUCTURAL-SEMANTIC AND FUNCTIONAL
FEATURES OF COMPOUND WORDS

2.1 Structural
features

              Compound words like all
other inseparable vocabulary units take shape in a definite system of
grammatical forms, syntactic and semantic features. Compounds, on the one hand,
are generally clearly distinguished from and often opposed to free word-groups,
on the other hand they lie astride the border-line between words and
word-groups and display close ties and correlation with the system of free
word-groups. The structural inseparability of compound words

finds expression in the unity of their specific
distributional pattern and specific

stress
and spelling pattern.

Structurally compound
words are characterized by the specif­ic order and arrangement in which bases
follow one another. The order in which the two bases are placed within a
compound is rigid­ly fixed in
Modern English and it is the second IC that makes the head-member of the word,
i.e. its structural and semantic centre. The head-member is of basic importance
as it preconditions both the lexico-grammatical and semantic features of the
first component. It is of inter­est to note that the difference between stems
(that serve as bases in com­pound words) and word-forms they coincide with is most
obvious in some compounds, especially in compound adjectives. Adjectives
like long, wide,
rich are
characterized by grammatical forms of degrees of comparison longer, wider, richer. The
corresponding stems functioning as bases in compound words lack grammatical
independence and forms proper to the words and retain only the part-of-speech
meaning; thus com­pound adjectives with adjectival stems for their second
components, e. g. age-long, oil-rich, inch-wide, do not form degrees of comparison as the compound
adjective oil-rich does not form
them the way the word rich does, but conforms to the general rule of
polysyllabic adjectives and has analytical forms of degrees of comparison. The
same difference be­tween words and stems is not so noticeable in compound nouns
with the noun-stem for the second component.

Phonetically compounds
are also marked by a specific structure of their own. No phonemic changes of
bases occur in composition but the compound word acquires a new stress pattern,
different from the stress in the motivating words, for example words key and hole or hot and house each possess
their own stress but when the stems of these words are brought together to make
up a new compound word, ‘keyhole — ‘a hole in a lock into which a key fits’, or ‘hothouse — ‘a heated
building for growing delicate plants’, the latter is given a different stress
pattern — a unity stress on the first component in our case. Compound words
have three stress patterns: a high or unity stress on the first component as
in ‘honeymoon,
‘doorway, etc. a double stress, with a primary stress on the first
component and a weaker, secondary stress on the second component, e. g. ‘blood-ֻvessel, ‘mad-ֻdoctor, ‘washing-ֻmachine,
etc. It is not infrequent, however, for both ICs to have level stress as in,
for instance, ‘arm-‘chair,
‘icy-‘cold, ‘grass-‘green, etc.

Graphically most
compounds have two types of spelling — they are spelt either solidly or with a
hyphen. Both types of spelling when accompanied by structural and phonetic
peculiarities serve as a sufficient indication of inseparability of compound
words in contradis­tinction to phrases. It is true that hyphenated spelling by
itself may be sometimes misleading, as it may be used in word-groups to
emphasize their phraseological character as in e. g. daughter-in-law, man-of-war,
brother-in-arms or in longer combinations of words to indicate
the se­mantic unity of a string of words used attributively as, e.g., I-know-what-you’re-going-to-say
expression, we-are-in-the-know jargon, the young-must-be-right attitude. The two types of
spelling typical of com­pounds, however, are not rigidly observed and there are
numerous fluc­tuations between solid or hyphenated spelling on the one hand and
spell­ing with a break between the components on the other, especially in
nominal compounds of then+n type. The spelling of these compounds varies
from author to author and from dictionary to dictionary. For example, the
words war-path,
war-time, money-lender are spelt both with a hy­phen and solidly; blood-poisoning, money-order,
wave-length, war-ship— with a hyphen and with a break; underfoot, insofar, underhand—solidly
and with a break²⁵.
It is noteworthy that new compounds of this type tend to solid or hyphenated
spelling. This inconsistency of spelling in com­pounds, often accompanied by a
level stress pattern (equally typical of word-groups) makes the problem of
distinguishing between compound words (of the n + n type in particular) and word-groups
especially dif­ficult.

           
In
this connection it should be stressed that Modern English nouns (in the Common
Case, Sg.) as has been universally recognized possess an attributive function
in which they are regularly used to form numer­ous nominal phrases as, e.
g. peace years,
stone steps, government office, etc. Such variable nominal phrases are semantically
fully derivable from the meanings of the two nouns and are based on the
homogeneous attributive semantic relations unlike compound words. This system
of nominal phrases exists side by side with the specific and numerous classes
of nominal compounds which as a rule carry an additional semantic com­ponent
not found in phrases.

            
It
is also important to stress that these two classes of vocabulary units —
compound words and free phrases — are not only opposed but also stand in close
correlative relations to each other.

2.2
Semantic features

             
Semantically compound
words are generally motivated units. The mean­ing of the compound is first of
all derived from the combined lexical meanings of its components. The semantic
peculiarity of the derivational bases and the semantic difference between the
base and the stem on which the latter is built is most obvious in compound
words. Compound words with a common second or first component can serve as
illustra­tions. The stem of the word board is polysemantic and its multiple mean­ings serve as
different derivational bases, each with its own selective range for the
semantic features of the other component, each forming a separate set of
compound words, based on specific derivative relations. Thus the base board meaning ‘a flat
piece of wood square or oblong’ makes a set of compounds chess-board, notice-board,
key-board, diving-board, foot-board, sign-board; compounds paste-board, cardboard are built on the
base meaning ‘thick, stiff paper’; the base board– meaning ‘an author­ized body of men’, forms
compounds school-board,
board-room. The
same can be observed in words built on the polysemantic stem of the word foot. For example,
the base foot– in foot-print, foot-pump,
foothold, foot-bath, foot-wear has the meaning of ‘the terminal
part of the leg’, in foot-note, foot-lights, foot-stone the base foot– has the
meaning of ‘the lower part’, and in foot-high, foot-wide, footrule — ‘measure of
length’. It is obvious from the above-given examples that the meanings of the
bases of compound words are interdependent and that the choice of each is
delimited as in variable word-groups by the nature of the other IC of the word.
It thus may well be said that the combination of bases serves as a kind of
minimal inner context distinguishing the particular individual lexical meaning
of each component. In this connection we should also remember the significance
of the differential meaning found in both components which becomes especially
obvious in a set of compounds containing iden­tical bases.

CLASSIFICATION
OF WORD — COMPOSITION

Compound
words can be described from different points of view and consequently may be
classified according to different principles. They may be viewed from the point
of view:

·       
of
general relationship and degree of semantic independence of components;

·       
of
the parts of speech compound words represent;

·       
of
the means of composition used to link the two ICs to­gether;

·       
of
the type of ICs that are brought together to form a compound;

·       
of
the correlative relations with the system of free word-groups.

          
From the point of view of degree of se­mantic independence there are two types
of relationship between the ICs of com­pound words that are generally
recognized in linguistic literature: the relations of coordination and
subordination, and accordingly compound words fall into two classes: coordinative compounds (often
termed copulative or additive) and subordinative (often termed determinative).

In coordinative compounds
the two ICs are semantically equally important as in fighter-bomber, oak-tree,
girl-friend, Anglo-Amer­ican. The constituent bases belong to the
same class and той often to the same
semantic group. Coordinative compounds make up a comparati­vely small group of
words. Coordinative compounds fall into three groups:

1.    
Reduplicative compounds
which are made up by the re­petition of the same base as in goody-goody, fifty-fifty,
hush-hush, pooh-pooh. They are all only partially motivated.

2.    
Compounds
formed by joining the phonically variated rhythmic twin forms which either
alliterate with the same initial consonant but vary the vowels as in chit-chat, zigzag, sing-song, or
rhyme by varying the initial consonants as in clap-trap, a walky-talky, helter-skelter. This subgroup
stands very much apart. It is very of­ten referred to pseudo-compounds and
considered by some linguists irrelevant to productive word-formation owing to
the doubtful morphem­ic status of their components. The constituent members of
compound words of this subgroup are in most cases unique, carry very vague or
no lexical meaning of their own, are not found as stems of independently
functioning words. They are motivated mainly through the rhythmic doubling of
fanciful sound-clusters.

3.    
Coordinative compounds of both subgroups
(a, b) are mostly restrict­ed to the colloquial layer, are marked by a heavy
emotive charge and possess a very small degree of productivity.

The bases of additive compounds such as a queen-bee, an actor-manager,
unlike the compound words of the first two subgroups, are built on stems of the
independently functioning words of the same part of speech. These bases often
semantically stand in the genus-species relations. They denote a person or an
object that is two things at the same time. A secretary-stenographer is thus a person who is
both a stenograph­er and a secretary, a bed-sitting-room (a bed-sitter) is both a bed-room and a sitting-room at
the same time. Among additive compounds there is a specific subgroup of
compound adjectives one of ICs of which is a bound root-morpheme. This group is
limited to the names of nationalities such as Sino-Japanese, Anglo-Saxon, Afro-Asian, etc.

Additive compounds of this group are
mostly fully motivated but have a very limited degree of productivity.

However it must be stressed that though
the distinction between coor­dinative and subordinative compounds is generally
made, it is open to doubt and there is no hard and fast border-line between
them. On the contrary, the border-line is rather vague. It often happens that
one and the same compound may with equal right be interpreted either way — as a
coordinative or a subordinative compound, e. g. a woman-doctor may be
understood as ‘a woman who is at the same time a doctor’ or there can be traced
a difference of importance between the components and it may be primarily felt
to be ‘a doctor who happens to be a woman’ (also a mother-goose, a clock-tower).  In
subordinative compounds the components are neither structurally nor
semantically equal in importance but are based on the domination of the
head-member which is, as a rule, the second IC. The second IC thus is the
semantically and grammatically dominant part of the word, which preconditions
the part-of-speech meaning of the whole compound as in stone-deaf, age-long which
are obviously adjectives, a wrist-watch, road-building, a baby-sitter which
are nouns.

Functionally compounds are viewed as words
of different parts of speech. It is the head-member of the compound, i.e. its
second IC that is indicative of the grammatical and lexical category the
compound word belongs to.

Compound words are found in all parts of
speech, but the bulk of com­pounds are nouns and adjectives. Each part of
speech is characterized by its set of derivational patterns and their semantic
variants. Compound adverbs, pronouns and connectives are represented by an
insignificant number of words, e. g. somewhere, somebody, inside, upright, otherwise moreover,
elsewhere, by means of, etc. No new compounds are coined on this pattern.
Compound pronouns and adverbs built on the repeating first and second IC
like body, ever,
thing make
closed sets of words

SOME	+	BODY
ANY	THING
EVERY	ONE
NO	WHERE

On the whole composition is not productive
either for adverbs, pro­nouns or for connectives. Verbs are of special
interest. There is a small group of compound verbs made up of the combination
of verbal and adverbial stems that language retains from earlier stages, e.
g. to bypass, to
inlay, to offset. This type according to some authors, is no longer
productive and is rarely found in new compounds. There are many polymorphic
verbs that are represented by morphem­ic sequences of two root-morphemes,
like to weekend,
to gooseflesh, to spring-clean, but derivationally they are all words of secondary
deriva­tion in which the existing compound nouns only serve as bases for
derivation. They are often termed pseudo-compound verbs. Such polymorph­ic
verbs are presented by two groups: 1)verbs formed by means of conversion from
the stems of compound nouns as in to spotlight from a spotlight, to sidetrack from a side-track, to
handcuff from handcuffs, to blacklist from a blacklist, to
pinpoint from a pin-point;

2) verbs formed by back-derivation from
the stems of compound nouns, e. g. to baby-sit from a baby-sitter, to playact from play-acting, to
housekeep from house-keeping, to spring-clean from spring-cleaning.

From the point of view of the means by
which the components are joined together, compound words may be classified
into:

Words formed by merely placing one constitu­ent
after another in a definite order which thus is indicative of both
the semantic value and the morphological unity of the compound, e. g. rain-driven, house-dog,
pot-pie (as opposed to dog-house, pie-pot). This means of linking
the components is typical of the majority of Modern English compounds in all
parts of speech.

As to the order of components,
subordinative compounds are often classified as:

Ø asyntactic compounds in which the order of
bases runs counter to the order in which the motivating words can be brought
together under the rules of syntax of the language. For example, in vari­able
phrases adjectives cannot be modified by preceding adjectives and noun
modifiers are not placed before participles or adjectives, yet this kind of
asyntactic arrangement is typical of compounds, e. g. red-hot, bluish-black,
pale-blue, rain-driven, oil-rich. The asyntactic order is
typical of the majority of Modern English compound words;

Ø syntactic compounds whose components are
placed in the order that re­sembles the order of words in free phrases arranged
according to the rules of syntax of Modern English. The order of the components
in compounds like blue-bell, mad-doctor, blacklist ( a + n ) reminds one of the order and
arrangement of the corresponding words in phrases a blue bell, a mad doc­tor, a
black list (
A + N ), the order of compounds of the typedoor-handle, day-time,
spring-lock (
n + n ) resembles the order of words in nominal phrases with
attributive function of the first noun ( N + N ),e. g. spring time, stone steps, peace movement.

Ø Compound words whose ICs are joined
together with a
special linking-element — the linking vowels [ou] and occasionally
[i] and the linking consonant [s/z] — which is indicative of composition as in,
for example, speedometer,
tragicomic, statesman. Compounds of this type can be both nouns and
adjectives, subordinative and additive but are rather few in number since they
are considerably restricted by the nature of their components. The additive
compound adjectives linked with the help of the vowel [ou] are limited to the
names of nationalities and represent a specific group with a bound root for the
first component, e. g. Sino-Japanese, Afro-Asian, Anglo-Saxon.

In subordinative adjectives and nouns the
productive linking element is also [ou] and compound words of the type are most
productive for scientific terms. The main peculiarity of compounds of the type
is that their constituents are non-assimilated bound roots borrowed mainly from
clas­sical languages, e. g. electro-dynamic, filmography, technophobia, video­phone,
sociolinguistics, videodisc.

A small group of compound nouns may also
be joined with the help of linking consonant [s/z], as in sportsman, landsman,
saleswoman, brides­maid.This small group of words is restricted by the second
component which is, as a rule, one of the three bases man–, woman–, people–.
The commonest of them is man–.

Compounds may be also classified according
to the nature of the bases and the interconnection with other ways of
word-formation into the so-called compounds proper and derivational compounds.

Compounds
proper are formed by joining together bases
built on the stems or on the word-forms of independently functioning words with
or without the help of special linking element such as door­step, age-long,
baby-sitter, looking-glass, street-fighting, handiwork, sportsman. Compounds
proper constitute the bulk of English compounds in all parts of speech, they
include both subordinative and coordinative classes, productive and
non-productive patterns.

Derivational
compounds, e. g. long-legged, three-cornered, a
break-down, a pickpocket differ from compounds proper in the nature of bases
and their second IC. The two ICs of the compound long-legged — ‘having long
legs’ — are the suffix –ed meaning ‘having’ and the base built on a free
word-group long
legs whose
member words lose their grammatical independence, and are reduced to a single
component of the word, a derivational base. Any other segmentation of such
words, say into long– and legged– is impossible
because firstly, adjectives like *legged do not exist in Modern English and secondly, because
it would contradict the lexical meaning of these words. The derivational
adjectival suffix –ed converts this newly formed base into a word. It can be
graphically represented as long legs à [ (long–leg) + –ed] à long–legged.
The suffix –ed becomes the grammatically
and semantically dominant component of the word, its head-member. It imparts
its part-of-speech meaning and its lexical meaning thus making an adjective
that may be semantically interpreted as ‘with (or having) what is denoted by
the motivating word-group’. Comparison of the pattern of compounds proper
like baby-sitter,
pen-holder
[ n +
( v + –er ) ] with the pattern of derivational compounds
like long-legged [ (a + n) + –ed ] reveals the
difference: derivational compounds are formed by a derivational means, a suffix
in case if words of the long-legged type, which is applied to a base that each time is
formed anew on a free word-group and is not recurrent in any other type if
words. It follows that strictly speaking words of this type should be treated
as pseudo-compounds or as a special group of derivatives. They are habitually
referred to derivational compounds because of the peculiarity of their
derivational bases which are felt as built by composition, i.e. by bringing
together the stems of the member-words of a phrase which lose their
independence in the process. The word itself, e. g. long-legged, is built by the
application of the suffix, i.e. by derivation and thus may be described as a
suffixal derivative.

Derivational compounds or pseudo-compounds
are all subordinative and fall into two groups according to the type of variable
phrases that serve as their bases and the derivational means used:

Ø derivational
compound adjectives formed
with the help of the highly-productive adjectival suffix –ed applied to bases
built on attributive phrases of the A + N, Num + N, N + N type, e. g. long legs, three corners, doll
face. Accordingly
the derivational adjectives under discussion are built after the patterns [ (a + n ) + –ed], e.
g. long-legged,
flat-chested, broad-minded; [ ( пит + n) + –ed], e. g. two-sided, three-cornered; [ (n + n ) + –ed], e. g. doll-faced, heart-shaped.

Ø derivational
compound nouns formed
mainly by conversion applied to bases built on three types of variable phrases
— verb-adverb phrase, verbal-nominal and attributive phrases.

The commonest type of phrases that serves
as derivational bases for this group of derivational compounds is the V + Adv type
of word-groups as in, for instance, a breakdown, a breakthrough, a castaway, a layout.
Semantically derivational compound nouns form lexical groups typical of
conversion, such as an act or instance of the action, e. g. a holdup — ‘a delay in
traffic’’ from to
hold up — ‘delay, stop by use of force’; a result of the
action, e. g. a
breakdown —
‘a failure in machinery that causes work to stop’ from to break down — ‘become
disabled’; an active agent orrecipient of the action, e. g. cast-offs — ‘clothes that he
owner will not wear again’ from to cast off — ‘throw away as unwanted’; a show-off —
‘a person who shows off’ from to show off — ‘make a dis­play of one’s abilities
in order to impress people’. Derivational compounds of this group are spelt
generally solidly or with a hyphen and often retain a level stress.
Semantically they are motivated by transparent deriva­tive relations with the
motivating base built on the so-called phrasal verb and are typical of the
colloquial layer of vocabulary. This type of derivational compound nouns is
highly productive due to the productiv­ity of conversion.

The semantic subgroup of derivational
compound nouns denoting agents calls for special mention. There is a group of
such substantives built on an attributive and verbal-nominal type of phrases.
These nouns are semantically only partially motivated and are marked by a heavy
emotive charge or lack of motivation and often belong to terms as, for
example, a
kill-joy, a wet-blanket — ‘one who kills enjoyment’; a turnkey —
‘keeper of the keys in prison’; a sweet-tooth — ‘a person who likes sweet
food’; a
red-breast — ‘a bird called the robin’. The analysis of these
nouns eas­ily proves that they can only be understood as the result of
conversion for their second ICs cannot be understood as their structural or
semantic centres, these compounds belong to a grammatical and lexical groups
different from those their components do. These compounds are all ani­mate
nouns whereas their second ICs belong to inanimate objects. The meaning of the
active agent is not found in either of the components but is imparted as a
result of conversion applied to the word-group which is thus turned into a
derivational base.

These compound nouns are often referred to
in linguistic literature as «bahuvrihi» compounds or exocentric compounds, i.e.
words whose seman­tic head is outside the combination. It seems more correct to
refer them to the same group of derivational or pseudo-compounds as the above
cited groups.

This small group of derivational nouns is
of a restricted productivity, its heavy constraint lies in its idiomaticity and
hence its stylistic and emotive colouring.

The linguistic analysis of extensive lan­guage
data proves that there exists a re­gular correlation between the system of free
phrases and all types of subordinative (and additive) compounds²⁶. Correlation
embraces both the structure and the meaning of compound words, it underlies the
entire system of productive present-day English composition conditioning the
derivational patterns and lexical types of compounds.

 

Compounds are words produced by combining
two or more stems which occur in the language as free forms. They may be classified
proceeding from different criteria:

according to the parts of speech to which
they belong;

according to the means of composition used
to link their ICs together;

according to the structure of their ICs;

according to their semantic characteristics.

3.1 Correlation
types of compounds

The
description of compound words through the correlation with variable word-groups
makes it possible to classify them into four major classes: adjectival-nominal,
verbal-nominal, nominal and verb – adverb compounds.

I. A d j e c t i v a l — n o m i n a l
comprise four subgroups of compound

adjectives, three of them are proper
compounds and one derivational.

All four subgroups are productive and
semantically as a rule motivated.

The main constraint on the productivity in
all the four subgroups is

the lexical-semantic types of the
head-members and the lexical valency of

the head of the correlated word-groups.

Adjectival-nominal compound adjectives
have the following patterns:

1) the polysemantic n+a
pattern
that gives rise to two types:

a) compound adjectives based on semantic
relations of resemblance

with adjectival bases denoting most
frequently colours, size, shape, etc. for

the second IC. The type is correlative
with phrases of comparative type as

A +as + N,
e.g.
snow-white,
skin-deep, age-long, etc.

b) compound adjectives based on a variety
of adverbial relations. The

type is correlative with one of the most
productive adjectival phrases of

the A +
prp
+
N
type
and consequently semantically varied, cf. colourblind,

road-weary, care-free, etc.

2) the monosemantic pattern n+ven
based
mainly on the instrumental, locative and temporal relations between the ICs
which are:

conditioned by the lexical meaning and
valency of the verb, e.g. stateowned,

home-made. The type is highly
productive. Correlative relations

are established with word-groups of the Ven+
with/by
+
N
type.

3) the monosemantic пит
+
п pattern
which gives rise to a small and

peculiar group of adjectives, which are
used only attributively, e.g. (a) twoday

(beard), (a) seven-day
(week),
etc. The type correlates with attributive

phrases with a numeral for their first
member.

4) a highly productive monosemantic
pattern of derivational compound

adjectives based on semantic relations of
possession conveyed by the suffix

-ed. The basic variant is [(a+n)+ -ed],
e.g.
low-ceilinged,
long- legged.

The pattern has two more variants: [(пит
+
n)
+
-ed),
l(n+n)+ -ed], e.g.

one-sided, bell-shaped, doll-faced. The
type correlates accordingly with

phrases with (having) + A+N,
with
(having) + Num +
N,
with
+
N + N

or with +
N + of + N.

The system of productive types of compound
adjectives is summarised

in Table 1. (Appendix)

II. V e r b a l — n o m i n a l compounds
may be described through one derivational structure n+nv,
i.e.
a combination of a noun-base (in most

cases simple) with a deverbal, suffixal
noun-base. The structure includes

four patterns differing in the character
of the deverbal noun- stem and accordingly

in the semantic subgroups of compound
nouns. All the patterns

correlate in the final analysis with V+N
and
V+prp+N
type
which depends

on the lexical nature of the verb:

1) [n+(v+-er)],
e.g.
bottle-opener,
stage-manager, peace-fighter. The

pattern is monosemantic and is based on
agentive relations that can be interpreted

‘one/that/who does smth’.

2) [n+(v+
-ing)],
e.g.
stage-managing,
rocket-flying. The pattern is

monosemantic and may be interpreted as
‘the act of doing smth’. The pattern

has some constraints on its productivity
which largely depends on the

lexical and etymological character of the
verb.

3) [n+(v+ -tion/ment)], e.g.
office-management,
price-reduction. The

pattern is a variant of the above-mentioned
pattern (No 2). It has a heavy

constraint which is embedded in the
lexical and etymological character of

the verb that does not permit
collocability with the suffix -ing or deverbal

nouns.

4) [n+(v +
conversion)],
e.g.
wage-cut,
dog-bite, hand-shake, the pattern

is based on semantic relations of result,
instance, agent, etc.

III. N o m i n a l c o m p o u n d s are
all nouns with the most

polysemantic and highly-productive
derivational pattern n+n; both bases

re generally simple stems, e.g. windmill,
horse-race, pencil-case. The

pattern conveys a variety of semantic
relations, the most frequent are the

relations of purpose, partitive, local and
temporal relations. The pattern

correlates with nominal word-groups of the
N+prp+N
type.

IV. V e r b — a d v e r b compounds are
all derivational nouns, highly

productive and built with the help of
conversion according to the pattern l(v + adv) + conversion].
The
pattern correlates with free phrases

V + Adv
and
with all phrasal verbs of different degree of stability. The pattern

is polysemantic and reflects the manifold
semantic relations typical of

conversion pairs.

The system of productive types of compound
nouns is summarized in

Table
2. (Appendix)

ANALYTICAL BASES
OF USE OF WORD-COMPOSITION 36
3.1 Practical examples of compound words.

Here are the
practical examples of compound words in “Theater” of W. Somerset Maugham.

Business – like [n+(v
+
conversion)],
is
based on semantic relations of result, – довольно по
деловому
(ch.1 p 3)

well – known
(ch
1 p
4) [a+v]
– хорошо известный

ink – stand (ch 1 p 4) [n+v] —
чернильница

heavily – painted lips  (ch 1 p 5)
[a+v+ed] ярко- накрашенные губы

dressing – table (ch 1 p [n+ ing + n] –
туалетный
столик

eyebrow — (ch 1 p [n+  n] – бровь

satinwood — (ch 1 p [n+  n] –
атласное дерево

CONCLUSION

1. Compound words are made up of two ICs,
both of which are derivational bases.

2. The structural and semantic centre of
acompound, i.e. its head-member, is its second IC, which preconditions the part
of speech the compound belongs to and its lexical class.

3. Phonetically compound words are marked
by three stress patterns

— a unity stress, a double stress and a
level stress. The first two are the

commonest stress patterns in compounds.

4. Graphically as a rule compounds are
marked by two types of spelling

— solid spelling and hyphenated spelling.
Some types of compound

words are characterised by fluctuations
between hyphenated spelling and

spelling with a space between the components.

5. Derivational patterns in compound words
may be mono- and

polysemantic, in which case they are based
on different semantic relations

between the components.

6. The meaning of compound words is
derived from the combined

lexical meanings of the components and the
meaning of the derivational

pattern.

7. Compound words may be described from
different points of view:

a) According to the degree of semantic
independence of components

compounds are classified into coordinative
and subordinative. The bulk of

present-day English compounds are
subordinative.

b) According to different parts of speech.
Composition is typical in

Modern English mostly of nouns and
adjectives.

c) According to the means by which
components are joined together

they are classified into compounds formed
with the help of a linking element

and without. As to the order of ICs it may
be asyntactic and syntactic.

d) According to the type of bases
compounds are classified into compounds

proper and derivational compounds.

e) According to the structural semantic
correlation with free phrases

compounds are subdivided into
adjectival-nominal compound adjectives,

verbal-nominal, verb-adverb and nominal
compound nouns.

8. Structural and semantic correlation is
understood as a regular interdependence

between compound words and variable
phrases. A potential

possibility of certain types of phrases
presupposes a possibility of compound

words
conditioning their structure and semantic type.

APPENDIX

TABLE 1. Productive Types of
Compound Adjectives

Free Phrases	Compound Adjectives
Compounds Proper	Derivational Compounds	Pattern	Semantic Relations
1) (a). as white as snow —	snow-white	—	n + a	relations of resemblance
(b). free from care; rich in oil; greedy for power; tired of pleasure care-free,	oil-rich, power-greedy, pleasuretired	—	— n + a	various adverbial relations
2.c o v e r e d w i t h snow; bound by duty	snow-covered duty-bound		n + ven	instrumental (or agentive relations
3. two days	(a) two-day (beard) (b) seven-year (plan)	— ‘	num + n	quantitative relations
wi t h ( h a v i n g ) long legs		long-legged	[(a + n) + -ed]	possessive relations

APENDIX 2.

TABLE 2. Productive Types of Compound Nouns

Free Phrases	Compound Nouns
Compounds Proper	Derivational Compounds	Pattern
Verbal — Nominal Phrases 1. the reducer of prices to reduce 2. the reducing of prices prices 3. the reduction of prices to shake 4. the shake of hands hands	1) price-reducer 2) price-reducing 3) price-reduction 4) hand-shake	—	— [n + (v + -er)] [n + (v + -ing)] [n + (v + -tion/- ment)] [n + (v + conversion)]
Nominal Phrases 1) a tray for ashes 2) the neck of the bottle 3) a house in the country 4) a ship run by steam 5) the doctor is a woman 6) a fish resembling a sword	1) ash-tray 2) bottle- neck 3) country- house 4) steamship 5) womandoctor 6) swordfish	—	— [n’ + n1]
Verb — Adverb Phrases to break down to cast away to run away		a break-down a castaway a runaway	[(v + adv) + conversion]

In linguistics, a compound is a lexeme (less precisely, a word or sign) that consists of more than one stem. Compounding, composition or nominal composition is the process of word formation that creates compound lexemes. Compounding occurs when two or more words or signs are joined to make a longer word or sign. A compound that uses a space rather than a hyphen or concatenation is called an open compound or a spaced compound; the alternative is a closed compound.

The meaning of the compound may be similar to or different from the meaning of its components in isolation. The component stems of a compound may be of the same part of speech—as in the case of the English word footpath, composed of the two nouns foot and path—or they may belong to different parts of speech, as in the case of the English word blackbird, composed of the adjective black and the noun bird. With very few exceptions, English compound words are stressed on their first component stem.

As a member of the Germanic family of languages, English is unusual in that even simple compounds made since the 18th century tend to be written in separate parts. This would be an error in other Germanic languages such as Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, German, and Dutch. However, this is merely an orthographic convention: As in other Germanic languages, arbitrary noun phrases, for example «girl scout troop», «city council member», and «cellar door», can be made up on the spot and used as compound nouns in English too.

For example, German «Donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellschaftskapitän» would be written in English as «Danube steamship transport company captain» and not as «Danubesteamshiptransportcompanycaptain».

The addition of affix morphemes to words (such as suffixes or prefixes, as in employ → employment) should not be confused with nominal composition, as this is actually morphological derivation.

Some languages easily form compounds from what in other languages would be a multi-word expression. This can result in unusually long words, a phenomenon known in German (which is one such language) as Bandwurmwörter or tapeworm words.

Sign languages also have compounds. They are created by combining two or more sign stems.

So-called «classical compounds» are compounds derived from classical Latin or ancient Greek roots.

Formation of compounds[edit]

Compound formation rules vary widely across language types.

In a synthetic language, the relationship between the elements of a compound may be marked with a case or other morpheme. For example, the German compound Kapitänspatent consists of the lexemes Kapitän (sea captain) and Patent (license) joined by an -s- (originally a genitive case suffix); and similarly, the Latin lexeme paterfamilias contains the archaic genitive form familias of the lexeme familia (family). Conversely, in the Hebrew language compound, the word בֵּית סֵפֶר bet sefer (school), it is the head that is modified: the compound literally means «house-of book», with בַּיִת bayit (house) having entered the construct state to become בֵּית bet (house-of). This latter pattern is common throughout the Semitic languages, though in some it is combined with an explicit genitive case, so that both parts of the compound are marked, e.g. Arabic عبد الله ʕabd-u l-lāh-i (servant-NOM DEF-god-GEN) «servant of-the-god: the servant of God».

Agglutinative languages tend to create very long words with derivational morphemes. Compounds may or may not require the use of derivational morphemes also. In German, extremely
extendable compound words can be found in the language of chemical compounds, where, in the cases of biochemistry and polymers, they can be practically unlimited in length, mostly because the German rule suggests combining all noun adjuncts with the noun as the last stem. German examples include Farb­fernsehgerät (color television set), Funk­fernbedienung (radio remote control), and the often quoted jocular word Donau­dampfschifffahrts­gesellschafts­kapitänsmütze (originally only two Fs, Danube-Steamboat-Shipping Company captain[‘s] hat), which can of course be made even longer and even more absurd, e.g. Donau­dampfschifffahrts­gesellschafts­kapitänsmützen­reinigungs­ausschreibungs­verordnungs­diskussionsanfang («beginning of the discussion of a regulation on tendering of Danube steamboat shipping company captain hats») etc. According to several editions of the Guinness Book of World Records, the longest published German word has 79 letters and is Donau­dampfschiffahrts­elektrizitäten­hauptbetriebswerkbau­unterbeamten­gesellschaft («Association for Subordinate Officials of the Main Electric[ity] Maintenance Building of the Danube Steam Shipping»), but there is no evidence that this association ever actually existed.

In Finnish, although there is theoretically no limit to the length of compound words, words consisting of more than three components are rare. Even those with fewer than three components can look mysterious^{[clarification needed]} to non-Finnish speakers, such as hätäuloskäynti (emergency exit). Internet folklore sometimes suggests that lentokone­suihkuturbiinimoottori­apumekaanikko­aliupseerioppilas (Airplane jet turbine engine auxiliary mechanic non-commissioned officer student) is the longest word in Finnish, but evidence of its actual use is scant and anecdotal at best.^[1]

Compounds can be rather long when translating technical documents from English to some other language, since the lengths of the words are theoretically unlimited, especially in chemical terminology. For example, when translating an English technical document to Swedish, the term «Motion estimation search range settings» can be directly translated to rörelse­uppskattnings­sökintervalls­inställningar, though in reality, the word would most likely be divided in two: sökintervalls­inställningar för rörelse­uppskattning – «search range settings for motion estimation».

Subclasses[edit]

Semantic classification[edit]

A common semantic classification of compounds yields four types:

• endocentric
• exocentric
• copulative
• appositional

An endocentric compound (tatpuruṣa in the Sanskrit tradition) consists of a head, i.e. the categorical part that contains the basic meaning of the whole compound, and modifiers, which restrict this meaning. For example, the English compound doghouse, where house is the head and dog is the modifier, is understood as a house intended for a dog. Endocentric compounds tend to be of the same part of speech (word class) as their head, as in the case of doghouse.

An exocentric compound (bahuvrihi in the Sanskrit tradition) is a hyponym of some unexpressed semantic category (such as a person, plant, or animal): none (neither) of its components can be perceived as a formal head, and its meaning often cannot be transparently guessed from its constituent parts. For example, the English compound white-collar is neither a kind of collar nor a white thing. In an exocentric compound, the word class is determined lexically, disregarding the class of the constituents. For example, a must-have is not a verb but a noun. The meaning of this type of compound can be glossed as «(one) whose B is A», where B is the second element of the compound and A the first. A bahuvrihi compound is one whose nature is expressed by neither of the words: thus a white-collar person is neither white nor a collar (the collar’s colour is a metonym for socioeconomic status). Other English examples include barefoot.

Copulative compounds (dvandva in the Sanskrit tradition) are compounds with two semantic heads, for example in a gradual scale (such a mix of colours).

Appositional compounds are lexemes that have two (contrary or simultaneous) attributes that classify the compound.

Type	Description	Examples
endocentric	A+B denotes a special kind of B	darkroom, smalltalk
exocentric	A+B denotes a special kind of an unexpressed different semantic meaning C	redhead, scarecrow
copulative	A+B denotes ‘the sum’ of what A and B denote	bittersweet, sleepwalk
appositional	A and B provide different descriptions for the same referent	hunter-gatherer, maidservant

Syntactic classification[edit]

Noun–noun compounds[edit]

All natural languages have compound nouns. The positioning of the words (i.e. the most common order of constituents in phrases where nouns are modified by adjectives, by possessors, by other nouns, etc.) varies according to the language. While Germanic languages, for example, are left-branching when it comes to noun phrases (the modifiers come before the head), the Romance languages are usually right-branching.

English compound nouns can be spaced, hyphenated, or solid, and they sometimes change orthographically in that direction over time, reflecting a semantic identity that evolves from a mere collocation to something stronger in its solidification. This theme has been summarized in usage guides under the aphorism that «compound nouns tend to solidify as they age»; thus a compound noun such as place name begins as spaced in most attestations and then becomes hyphenated as place-name and eventually solid as placename, or the spaced compound noun file name directly becomes solid as filename without being hyphenated.

German, a fellow West Germanic language, has a somewhat different orthography, whereby compound nouns are virtually always required to be solid or at least hyphenated; even the hyphenated styling is used less now than it was in centuries past.

In French, compound nouns are often formed by left-hand heads with prepositional components inserted before the modifier, as in chemin-de-fer ‘railway’, lit. ‘road of iron’, and moulin à vent ‘windmill’, lit. ‘mill (that works)-by-means-of wind’.

In Turkish, one way of forming compound nouns is as follows: yeldeğirmeni ‘windmill’ (yel: wind, değirmen-i: mill-possessive); demiryolu ‘railway’ (demir: iron, yol-u: road-possessive).

Occasionally, two synonymous nouns can form a compound noun, resulting in a pleonasm. One example is the English word pathway.

Verb–noun compounds[edit]

A type of compound that is fairly common in the Indo-European languages is formed of a verb and its object, and in effect transforms a simple verbal clause into a noun.

In Spanish, for example, such compounds consist of a verb conjugated for the second person singular imperative followed by a noun (singular or plural): e.g., rascacielos (modelled on «skyscraper», lit. ‘scratch skies’), sacacorchos ‘corkscrew’ (lit. ‘pull corks’), guardarropa ‘wardrobe’ (lit. ‘store clothes’). These compounds are formally invariable in the plural (but in many cases they have been reanalyzed as plural forms, and a singular form has appeared). French and Italian have these same compounds with the noun in the singular form: Italian grattacielo ‘skyscraper’, French grille-pain ‘toaster’ (lit. ‘toast bread’).

This construction exists in English, generally with the verb and noun both in uninflected form: examples are spoilsport, killjoy, breakfast, cutthroat, pickpocket, dreadnought, and know-nothing.

Also common in English is another type of verb–noun (or noun–verb) compound, in which an argument of the verb is incorporated into the verb, which is then usually turned into a gerund, such as breastfeeding, finger-pointing, etc. The noun is often an instrumental complement. From these gerunds new verbs can be made: (a mother) breastfeeds (a child) and from them new compounds mother-child breastfeeding, etc.

Verb-noun compounds derived from classical languages tend to be nouns; rarely, a verb-noun classical compound can be a verb. One example is miscegenate, a word that literally falls into disuse nowadays, which is derived from a Latin verb and a Latin noun. In the Australian Aboriginal language Jingulu, a Pama–Nyungan language, it is claimed that all verbs are V+N compounds, such as «do a sleep», or «run a dive», and the language has only three basic verbs: do, make, and run.^[2]

A special kind of compounding is incorporation, of which noun incorporation into a verbal root (as in English backstabbing, breastfeed, etc.) is most prevalent (see below).

Verb–verb compounds[edit]

Verb–verb compounds are sequences of more than one verb acting together to determine clause structure. They have two types:

• In a serial verb, two actions, often sequential, are expressed in a single clause. For example, Ewe trɔ dzo, lit. «turn leave», means «turn and leave», and Hindi जाकर देखो jā-kar dekh-o, lit. «go-CONJUNCTIVE PARTICIPLE see-IMPERATIVE«, means «go and see». In Tamil, a Dravidian language, van̪t̪u paːr, lit. «come see». In each case, the two verbs together determine the semantics and argument structure.

Serial verb expressions in English may include What did you go and do that for?, or He just upped and left; this is however not quite a true compound since they are connected by a conjunction and the second missing arguments may be taken as a case of ellipsis.

• In a compound verb (or complex predicate), one of the verbs is the primary, and determines the primary semantics and also the argument structure. The secondary verb, often called a vector verb or explicator, provides fine distinctions, usually in temporality or aspect, and also carries the inflection (tense and/or agreement markers). The main verb usually appears in conjunctive participial (sometimes zero) form. For examples, Hindi निकल गया nikal gayā, lit. «exit went», means ‘went out’, while निकल पड़ा nikal paRā, lit. «exit fell», means ‘departed’ or ‘was blurted out’. In these examples निकल nikal is the primary verb, and गया gayā and पड़ा paRā are the vector verbs. Similarly, in both English start reading and Japanese 読み始める yomihajimeru «read-CONJUNCTIVE-start» «start reading», the vector verbs start and 始める hajimeru «start» change according to tense, negation, and the like, while the main verbs reading and 読み yomi «reading» usually remain the same. An exception to this is the passive voice, in which both English and Japanese modify the main verb, i.e. start to be read and 読まれ始める yomarehajimeru lit. «read-PASSIVE-(CONJUNCTIVE)-start» start to be read. With a few exceptions, all compound verbs alternate with their simple counterparts. That is, removing the vector does not affect grammaticality at all nor the meaning very much: निकला nikalā ‘(He) went out.’ In a few languages both components of the compound verb can be finite forms: Kurukh kecc-ar ker-ar lit. «died-3pl went-3pl» ‘(They) died.’
• Compound verbs are very common in some languages, such as the northern Indo-Aryan languages Hindustani and Punjabi, and Dravidian languages like Tamil, where as many as 20% of verb forms in running text are compound. They exist but are less common in other Indo-Aryan languages like Marathi and Nepali, in Tibeto-Burman languages like Limbu and Newari, in Turkic languages like Turkish and Kyrgyz, in Korean and Japanese, and in northeast Caucasian languages like Tsez and Avar.
• Under the influence of a Quichua substrate speakers living in the Ecuadorian altiplano have innovated compound verbs in Spanish:

De rabia puso rompiendo la olla, ‘In anger (he/she) smashed the pot.’ (Lit. from anger put breaking the pot)

Botaremos matándote ‘We will kill you.’ (Cf. Quichua huañuchi-shpa shitashun, lit. kill-CP throw.1plFut.

Likewise in Hindi: तेरे को मार डालेंगे tere ko mār DāleNge, lit. «we will kill-throw you»).

• Compound verb equivalents in English (examples from the internet):

What did you go and do that for?

If you are not giving away free information on your web site then a huge proportion of your business is just upping and leaving.

Big Pig, she took and built herself a house out of brush.

• Caution: In descriptions of Persian and other Iranian languages the term ‘compound verb’ refers to noun-plus-verb compounds, not to the verb–verb compounds discussed here.

Parasynthetic compounds[edit]

Parasynthetic compounds are formed by a combination of compounding and derivation, with multiple lexical stems and a derivational affix. For example, English black-eyed is composed of black, eye, and -ed ‘having’, with the meaning ‘having a black eye’;^[3] Italian imbustare is composed of in- ‘in’, busta ‘envelope’, -are (verbal suffix), with the meaning ‘to put into an envelope’.^[4]

Compound adpositions[edit]

Compound prepositions formed by prepositions and nouns are common in English and the Romance languages (consider English on top of, Spanish encima de, etc.). Hindi has a small number of simple (i.e., one-word) postpositions and a large number of compound postpositions, mostly consisting of simple postposition ke followed by a specific postposition (e.g., ke pas, «near»; ke nīche, «underneath»).

Examples from different languages[edit]

Chinese (traditional/simplified Chinese; Standard Chinese Pinyin/Cantonese Jyutping):

• 學生/学生 ‘student’: 學 xué/hok6 learn + 生 shēng/sang1 living being
• 太空/太空 ‘space’: 太 tài/taai3 great + 空 kōng/hung1 emptiness
• 摩天樓/摩天楼 ‘skyscraper’: 摩 mó/mo1 touch + 天 tiān/tin1 sky + 樓 lóu/lau2 building (with more than 1 storey)
• 打印機/打印机 ‘printer’: 打 dǎ/daa2 strike + 印 yìn/yan3 stamp/print + 機 jī/gei1 machine
• 百科全書/百科全书 ‘encyclopaedia’: 百 bǎi/baak3 hundred + 科 kē/fo1 (branch of) study + 全 quán/cyun4 entire/complete + 書 shū/syu1 book
• 謝謝/谢谢 ‘thanks’: Repeating of 謝 xiè thank

Dutch:

• arbeids­ongeschiktheids­verzekering ‘disability insurance’: arbeid ‘labour’ + ongeschiktheid ‘inaptitude’ + verzekering ‘insurance’.
• rioolwater­zuiverings­installatie ‘sewage treatment plant’: riool ‘sewer’ + water ‘water’ + zuivering ‘cleaning’ + installatie ‘installation’.
• verjaardags­kalender ‘birthday calendar’: verjaardag ‘birthday’ + kalender ‘calendar’.
• klantenservice­medewerker ‘customer service representative’: klanten ‘customers’ + service ‘service’ + medewerker ‘worker’.
• universiteits­bibliotheek ‘university library’: universiteit ‘university’ + bibliotheek ‘library’.
• doorgroei­mogelijkheden ‘possibilities for advancement’: door ‘through’ + groei ‘grow’ + mogelijkheden ‘possibilities’.

Finnish:

• sanakirja ‘dictionary’: sana ‘word’ + kirja ‘book’
• tietokone ‘computer’: tieto ‘knowledge data’ + kone ‘machine’
• keskiviikko ‘Wednesday’: keski ‘middle’ + viikko ‘week’
• maailma ‘world’: maa ‘land’ + ilma ‘air’
• rautatieasema ‘railway station’: rauta ‘iron’ + tie ‘road’ + asema ‘station’
• kolmivaihe­kilowattitunti­mittari ‘electricity meter’: ‘three-phase kilowatt hour meter’

German:

• Wolkenkratzer ‘skyscraper’: Wolken ‘clouds’ + Kratzer ‘scraper’
• Eisenbahn ‘railway’: Eisen ‘iron’ + Bahn ‘track’
• Kraftfahrzeug ‘automobile’: Kraft ‘power’ + fahren/fahr ‘drive’ + Zeug ‘machinery’
• Stacheldraht ‘barbed wire’: Stachel ‘barb/barbed’ + Draht ‘wire’
• Rinder­kennzeichnungs- und Rindfleisch­etikettierungs­überwachungs­aufgaben­übertragungs­gesetz: literally cattle-marking- and beef-labeling-supervision-duties-delegation law

Ancient Greek:

• φιλόσοφος philosopher: φίλος phílos ‘beloved’ + σοφία sophíā ‘wisdom’
• δημοκρατία dēmokratíā ‘democracy’: δῆμος dêmos ‘people’ + κράτος ‘rule’
• ῥοδοδάκτυλος rhododáktylos ‘rose-fingered’: ῥόδον rhódon ‘rose’ + δάκτυλος dáktylos ‘finger’ (a Homeric epithet applied to the Dawn)

Icelandic:

• járnbraut ‘railway’: járn ‘iron’ + braut ‘path’ or ‘way’
• farartæki ‘vehicle’: farar ‘journey’ + tæki ‘apparatus’
• alfræðiorðabók ‘encyclopedia’: al ‘everything’ + fræði ‘study’ or ‘knowledge’ + orðabók ‘dictionary’ (orða ‘words’ + bók ‘book’)
• símtal ‘telephone conversation’: sím ‘telephone’ + tal ‘dialogue’

Italian:

• millepiedi ‘centipede’: mille ‘thousand’ + piedi ‘feet’
• ferrovia ‘railway’: ferro ‘iron’ + via ‘way’
• tergicristallo ‘windscreen wiper’: tergere ‘to wash’ + cristallo ‘crystal (pane of) glass’
• pomodoro: pomo d’oro = apple of Gold = tomatoes
• portacenere = porta cenere = ashtray

Japanese:

• 目覚まし（時計） mezamashi(dokei) ‘alarm clock’: 目 me ‘eye’ + 覚まし samashi (-zamashi) ‘awakening (someone)’ (+ 時計 tokei (-dokei) clock)
• お好み焼き okonomiyaki: お好み okonomi ‘preference’ + 焼き yaki ‘cooking’
• 日帰り higaeri ‘day trip’: 日 hi ‘day’ + 帰り kaeri (-gaeri) ‘returning (home)’
• 国会議事堂 kokkaigijidō ‘national diet building’: 国会 kokkai ‘national diet’ + 議事 giji ‘proceedings’ + 堂 dō ‘hall’

Korean:

• 안팎 anpak ‘inside and outside’: 안 an ‘inside’ + 밖 bak ‘outside’ (As two nouns compound the consonant sound ‘b’ fortifies into ‘p’ becoming 안팎 anpak rather than 안밖 anbak)

Ojibwe/Anishinaabemowin:

• mashkikiwaaboo ‘tonic’: mashkiki ‘medicine’ + waaboo ‘liquid’
• miskomin ‘raspberry’: misko ‘red’ + miin ‘berry’
• dibik-giizis ‘moon’: dibik ‘night’ + giizis ‘sun’
• gichi-mookomaan ‘white person/American’: gichi ‘big’ + mookomaan ‘knife’

Spanish:

• ciencia-ficción ‘science fiction’: ciencia, ‘science’, + ficción, ‘fiction’ (This word is a calque from the English expression science fiction. In English, the head of a compound word is the last morpheme: science fiction. Conversely, the Spanish head is located at the front, so ciencia ficción sounds like a kind of fictional science rather than scientific fiction.)
• ciempiés ‘centipede’: cien ‘hundred’ + pies ‘feet’
• ferrocarril ‘railway’: ferro ‘iron’ + carril ‘lane’
• paraguas ‘umbrella’: para ‘stops’ + aguas ‘(the) water’
• cabizbajo ‘keeping the head low in a bad mood’: cabeza ‘head’ + bajo ‘down’
• subibaja ‘seesaw’ (contraction of sube y baja ‘goes up and down’)
• limpiaparabrisas ‘windshield wiper’ is a nested compound:^[5] limpia ‘clean’ + parabrisas windshield, which is itself a compound of para ‘stop’ + brisas ‘breezes’.

Tamil:

• In Cemmozhi (Classical Tamil), rules for compounding are laid down in grammars such as Tolkappiyam and Nannūl, in various forms, under the name punarcci. Examples of compounds include kopuram from ‘kō’ (king) + ‘puram’ (exterior). Sometimes phonemes may be inserted during the blending process such as in kovil from ‘kō’ (king) + ‘il’ (home). Other types are like vennai (butter) from ‘veḷḷai’ (white) + ‘nei’ (ghee); note how ‘veḷḷai’ becomes ‘ven’.
• In koṭuntamizh (Non-standard Tamil), parts of words from other languages may be morphed into Tamil. Common examples include ‘ratta-azhuttam’ (blood pressure) from the Sanskrit rakta (blood) and Cemmozhi ‘azhuttam’ (pressure); note how rakta becomes ratta in Tamil order to remove the consonant-cluster. This also happens with English, for examples kāpi-kaṭai (coffee shop) is from English coffee, which becomes kāpi in Tamil, and the Tamil kaṭai meaning shop.

Tłįchǫ Yatiì/Dogrib:

• dlòotsǫ̀ǫ̀ ‘peanut butter’: dlòo ‘squirrel’ + tsǫ̀ǫ̀ ‘dung’
• eyakǫ̀ ‘hospital: eya ‘sick’ + kǫ̀ ‘house’
• dè gotłeè ‘kerosene’: dè ‘land’ + gotłeè ‘its fat’
• dǫ łèt’è ‘bannock’: dǫ ‘[Aboriginal] people’ + łèt’è ‘bread’

Germanic languages[edit]

In Germanic languages (including English), compounds are formed by prepending what is effectively a namespace (disambiguation context) to the main word. For example, «football» would be a «ball» in the «foot» context. In itself, this does not alter the meaning of the main word. The added context only makes it more precise. As such, a «football» must be understood as a «ball». However, as is the case with «football», a well established compound word may have gained a special meaning in the language’s vocabulary. Only this defines «football» as a particular type of ball (unambiguously the round object, not the dance party, at that), and also the game involving such a ball. Another example of special and altered meaning is «starfish» – a starfish is in fact not a fish in modern biology. Also syntactically, the compound word behaves like the main word – the whole compound word (or phrase) inherits the word class and inflection rules of the main word. That is to say, since «fish» and «shape» are nouns, «starfish» and «star shape» must also be nouns, and they must take plural forms as «starfish» and «star shapes», definite singular forms as «the starfish» and «the star shape», and so on. This principle also holds for languages that express definiteness by inflection (as in North Germanic).

Because a compound is understood as a word in its own right, it may in turn be used in new compounds, so forming an arbitrarily long word is trivial. This contrasts to Romance languages, where prepositions are more used to specify word relationships instead of concatenating the words. As a member of the Germanic family of languages, English is unusual in that compounds are normally written in separate parts. This would be an error in other Germanic languages such as Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, German and Dutch. However, this is merely an orthographic convention: As in other Germanic languages, arbitrary noun phrases, for example «girl scout troop», «city council member», and «cellar door», can be made up on the spot and used as compound nouns in English too.

Russian language[edit]

In the Russian language compounding is a common type of word formation, and several types of compounds exist, both in terms of compounded parts of speech and of the way of the formation of a compound.^[6]

Compound nouns may be agglutinative compounds, hyphenated compounds (стол-книга ‘folding table’, lit. ‘table-book’, «book-like table»), or abbreviated compounds (acronyms: колхоз ‘kolkhoz’). Some compounds look like acronym, while in fact they are an agglutinations of type stem + word: Академгородок ‘Akademgorodok’ (from akademichesky gorodok ‘academic village’). In agglutinative compound nouns, an agglutinating infix is typically used: пароход ‘steamship’: пар + о + ход. Compound nouns may be created as noun+noun, adjective + noun, noun + adjective (rare), noun + verb (or, rather, noun + verbal noun).

Compound adjectives may be formed either per se (бело-розовый ‘white-pink’) or as a result of compounding during the derivation of an adjective from a multi-word term: Каменноостровский проспект ([kəmʲɪnnʌʌˈstrovskʲɪj prʌˈspʲɛkt]) ‘Stone Island Avenue’, a street in St.Petersburg.

Reduplication in Russian is also a source of compounds.

Quite a few Russian words are borrowed from other languages in an already-compounded form, including numerous «classical compounds» or internationalisms: автомобиль ‘automobile’.

Sanskrit language[edit]

Sanskrit is very rich in compound formation with seven major compound types and as many as 55 sub-types.^[7] The compound formation process is productive, so it is not possible to list all Sanskrit compounds in a dictionary. Compounds of two or three words are more frequent, but longer compounds with some running through pages are not rare in Sanskrit literature.^[7] Some examples are below (hyphens below show individual word boundaries for ease of reading but are not required in original Sanskrit).

• हिमालय (IAST Himālaya, decomposed as hima-ālaya): Name of the Himalaya mountain range. Literally the abode of snow.^[8] A compound of two words and four syllables.
• प्रवर-मुकुट-मणि-मरीचि-मञ्जरी-चय-चर्चित-चरण-युगल (IAST pravara-mukuṭa-maṇi-marīci-mañjarī-caya-carcita-caraṇa-yugala): Literally, O the one whose dual feet are covered by the cluster of brilliant rays from the gems of the best crowns, from the Sanskrit work Panchatantra.^[7] A compound of nine words and 25 syllables.
• कमला-कुच-कुङ्कुम-पिञ्जरीकृत-वक्षः-स्थल-विराजित-महा-कौस्तुभ-मणि-मरीचि-माला-निराकृत-त्रि-भुवन-तिमिर (IAST kamalā-kuca-kuṅkuma-piñjarīkṛta-vakṣaḥ-sthala-virājita-mahā-kaustubha-maṇi-marīci-mālā-nirākṛta-tri-bhuvana-timira): Literally O the one who dispels the darkness of three worlds by the shine of Kaustubha jewel hanging on the chest, which has been made reddish-yellow by the saffron from the bosom of Kamalā (Lakshmi), an adjective of Rama in the Kakabhushundi Rāmāyaṇa.^[9] A compound of 16 words and 44 syllables.
• साङ्ख्य-योग-न्याय-वैशेषिक-पूर्व-मीमांसा-वेदान्त-नारद-शाण्डिल्य-भक्ति-सूत्र-गीता-वाल्मीकीय-रामायण-भागवतादि-सिद्धान्त-बोध-पुरः-सर-समधिकृताशेष-तुलसी-दास-साहित्य-सौहित्य-स्वाध्याय-प्रवचन-व्याख्यान-परम-प्रवीणाः (IAST sāṅkhya-yoga-nyāya-vaiśeṣika-pūrva-mīmāṃsā-vedānta-nārada-śāṇḍilya-bhakti-sūtra-gītā-vālmīkīya-rāmāyaṇa-bhāgavatādi-siddhānta-bodha-puraḥ-sara-samadhikṛtāśeṣa-tulasī-dāsa-sāhitya-sauhitya-svādhyāya-pravacana-vyākhyāna-parama-pravīṇāḥ): Literally the acclaimed forerunner in understanding of the canons of Sāṅkhya, Yoga, Nyāya, Vaiśeṣika, Pūrva Mīmāṃsā, Vedānta, Nārada Bhakti Sūtra, Śāṇḍilya Bhakti Sūtra, Bhagavad Gītā, the Ramayana of Vālmīki, Śrīmadbhāgavata; and the most skilled in comprehensive self-study, discoursing and expounding of the complete works of Gosvāmī Tulasīdāsa.^[10] An adjective used in a panegyric of Jagadguru Rambhadracharya. The hyphens show only those word boundaries where there is no sandhi. On including word boundaries with sandhi (vedānta=veda-anta, rāmāyaṇa=rāma-ayana, bhāgavatādi=bhāgavata-ādi, siddhānta=siddha-anta, samadhikṛtāśeṣa=samadhikṛta-aśeṣa, svādhyāya=sva-adhyāya), this is a compound of 35 words and 86 syllables.

Sign languages[edit]

Also in sign languages, compounding is a productive word formation process. Both endocentric and exocentric compounds have been described for a variety of sign languages.^[11] Copulative compounds or dvandva, which are composed of two or more nouns from the same semantic category to denote that semantic category, also occur regularly in many sign languages. The sign for parents in Italian Sign Language, for instance, is a combination of the nouns ‘father’ and ‘mother’. The sign for breakfast in American Sign Language follows the same concept. The words eat and morning are signed together to create a new word meaning breakfast.^[12] This is an example of a sequential compound; in sign languages, it is also possible to form simultaneous compounds, where one hand represents one lexeme while the other simultaneously represents another lexeme. An example is the sign for weekend in Sign Language of the Netherlands, which is produced by simultaneously signing a one-handed version of the sign for Saturday and a one-handed version of the sign for Sunday.^[11] In American Sign Language there is another process easily compared to compounding. Blending is the blending of two morphemes to create a new word called a portmanteau.^[13] This is different from compounding in that it breaks the strict linear order of compounding. ^[14]

Recent trends in orthography[edit]

Although there is no universally agreed-upon guideline regarding the use of compound words in the English language, in recent decades written English has displayed a noticeable trend towards increased use of compounds.^[15] Recently, many words have been made by taking syllables of words and compounding them, such as pixel (picture element) and bit (binary digit). This is called a syllabic abbreviation.

In Dutch and the Scandinavian languages there is an unofficial trend toward splitting compound words, known in Norwegian as særskriving, in Swedish as särskrivning (literally «separate writing»), and in Dutch as Engelse ziekte (the «English disease»). Because the Dutch language and the Scandinavian languages rely heavily on the distinction between the compound word and the sequence of the separate words it consists of, this has serious implications. For example, the Danish adjective røykfritt (literally «smokefree», meaning no smoking allowed) if separated into its composite parts, would mean røyk fritt («smoke freely»). In Dutch, compounds written with spaces may also be confused, but can also be interpreted as a sequence of a noun and a genitive (which is unmarked in Dutch) in formal abbreviated writing. This may lead to, for example, commissie vergadering («commission meeting») being read as «commission of the meeting» rather than «meeting of the commission» (normally spelled commissievergadering).

The German spelling reform of 1996 introduced the option of hyphenating compound nouns when it enhances comprehensibility and readability. This is done mostly with very long compound words by separating them into two or more smaller compounds, like Eisenbahn-Unterführung (railway underpass) or Kraftfahrzeugs-Betriebsanleitung (car manual). Such practice is also permitted in other Germanic languages, e.g. Danish and Norwegian (Bokmål and Nynorsk alike), and is even encouraged between parts of the word that have very different pronunciation, such as when one part is a loan word or an acronym.

Compounding by language[edit]

• Classical compounds
• English compounds
• German compounds
• Sanskrit compounds

See also[edit]

• Compound modifier
• Bracketing paradox
• Etymological calque
• Genitive connector
• Incorporation (linguistics)
• Kenning
• Multiword expression
• Neologism
• Noun adjunct
• Phono-semantic matching
• Portmanteau compounds
• Status constructus
• Syllabic abbreviation
• Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein, South African placename
• Word formation
• Univerbation: a phrase becomes a word

Notes[edit]

References[edit]

• Kortmann, Bernd: English Linguistics: Essentials, Cornelsen, Berlin 2005.
• The Oxford Handbook of Compounding, eds. Lieber, Rochelle & Pavol Štekauer, 2009. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Plag, Ingo: Word-formation in English, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2003.
• Scalise Sergio & Irene Vogel (eds.) (2010), Cross-Disciplinary Issues in Compounding, Amsterdam, Benjamins.

External links[edit]

• Compound word, encyclopedia.com
• Compounds and multi-word expressions in the languages of Europe by Rita Finkbeiner and Barbara Schlücker, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in English by Laurie Bauer, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in Finnish by Irma Hyvärinen, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in French by Kristel Van Goethem, 2018
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in German by Barbara Schlücker, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in Greek by Maria Koliopoulou, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in Hungarian by Ferenc Kiefer, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in Italian by Francesca Masini, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in Polish by Bozena Cetnarowska, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in Russian by Ingeborg Ohnheiser, 2019
  • Compounds and multi-word expressions in Spanish by Jesús Fernández-Domínguez, 2019

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)