Word formation compound words

WORD FORMATION • Compounding/composition – Criteria of compounds. – Classification of compounds. • Secondary ways of word formation.

Recommended literature: • Антрушина, Г. Б. , Афанасьева, О. В. , Морозова, Н. Н. Лексикология английского языка: Учеб. пособие для студентов. – 3 -е изд. , стереотип. – M. : Дрофа, 2001. — С. 104 -120. • Arnold I. V. The English word. – M. : Высш. школа, 1986. – С. 108 -133, 134 -152. • Харитончик З. А. Лексикология английского языка: Учеб. пособие. –Мн. : Выш. шк. , 1992. – С. 177 — 187, 188 -191. • Дубенец Э. М. Лексикология современного английского языка: лекции и семинары. Пособие для студентов гуманитарных вузов. – М. : «Глосса. Пресс» , 2002. – С. 37 -45, 58 -70.

Compounding/Composition is the way of word building when a word is formed by joining two or more stems to form one word. • I. V. Arnold: Compounds are words consisting of at least 2 stems, which are characterized by semantic integrity and structural cohesion.

• R. S. Ginsburg distinguishes between 2 levels of analysis: derivational and morphemic. • E. g. to nickname, to baby-sit, to honeymoon • On the morphemic level these are compound words, • On the derivational level these are words created by either conversion (to nickname, to honeymoon) or by back formation (to babysit) => they are derivatives.

Compound words are characterized • by semantic integrity and structural cohesion. • Structurally compounds are characterized by the specific order of arrangement in which stems follow one another.

The lexical meaning of a compound • may be a sum of meanings of its constituents, i. e. they may be motivated, e. g. tablecloth, shoemaker, bookshelf; • the lexical meanings of the constituents may be fused together to create a new additive meaning, i. e. partially motivated, e. g. handbag – a bag to be carried in the hand -> additive meaning: a women’s bag to keep money and other stuff; flowerbed), • the meaning of a compound has nothing to do with the meanings of its constituents, i. e. nonmotivated or idiomatic, e. g. a sweet tooth, a chatter box.

Main features of compounds • The unity of stress; • Solid or hyphenated spelling; • Semantic unity; • Unity of morphological and syntactic functioning.

Criteria of compounds • Eugene Nider: Criteria for determining the word units in a language are of 3 types: phonological, morphological, and syntactic. • Charles Bally suggested the graphic criterion, • Otto Jesperson – the semantic criterion.

The phonological criterion • compound words are, as a rule, characterised by 1 main primary stress (and a secondary stress) in compound, while in free word combinations both components are stressed: • /blackboard — /black /board; • /laughing gas — /laughing /boys.

The morphological criterion • the structural integrity of compounds enables compounds to function as an inseparable unit and has 1 paradigm.

The syntactic criterion • The components of compounds can t have modifiers. E. g. compare: sky – blue (adj. ), but: blue sky -> very blue sky. • The semantic criterion • A combination of words refers to the number of concepts/notions = the number of words, a compound refers to 1 concept : Its colour; kind of colour.

The graphic criterion • everything written in one word or hyphenated is considered a compound and the words written separately are elements of a combination e. g. a tall boy – a tallboy

Classifications of compounds • Compounds may be classified in accordance with different principles: • -part of speech reference: Noun honeymoon, Verb to babysit, Adjective power-happy; • -the way components are joined: • neutral compounds (without a linking element) to window-shop; • morphological compounds (with a linking element) handicraft; • syntactical compounds free-for-all, do-or-die, here-and-now;

— the syntactic relations between the stems (coordination or subordination) • compounds fall into coordinative and subordinative. • In coordinative compounds the constituents are semantically and structurally equal. The coordinative compounds may be subdivided into • 1. additive actor – manager, secretary –stenographer • 2. reduplicative tic-tic, hash-hash • 3. words with varied rhythmic form of the same stem: willy- nilly, tic-toc, drip – drop.

• In subordinative compounds the components are neither semantically nor structurally equal. • Their relation is based on the domination of 1 component over the other. The 2 nd component is usually a structural and semantic center of a compound, e. g. ship – wreck, inn – keeper, tooth – brush

-the order of components: syntactic compounds in which the components are put in the same order as in a free word group (direct word order): sun -rise <= the sun rises, blackbird <= a black bird, long-tailed <= long tail, killjoy<= to kill joy; • asyntactic compounds in which the order of the components is not the same as in a free word-group (indirect word order): sky-blue <= blue sky, lamp-lit <= to lit a lamp, well-dressed <= to dress well, mud-stained <= stained with mud. •

-structure: • compounds proper (2 root stems): to job-hunt; • compound-affixed words: videoplayer; • compounds of 3 or more stems: cornflower-blue, singer-songwriter; • compound-shortened words: V-day, motocross, AIDSphobia, motel;

Semi-affixes • The words with such elements as -man, -land, -like, –proof, -worthy stand between compounds and derived words because the mentioned elements • 1) have all the features of a stem and preserve the semantic associations with the free form and • 2) their meaning has become so generalized that it is close to the meaning of an affix: • • • Sportsman, policeman, seaman, countryman (man = -er, -or); Ireland, Scotland, motherland, wonderland; Businesslike, ladylike, starlike; kissproof, fireproof, foolproof, bulletproof; Trustworthy, praiseworthy, seaworthy.

Secondary ways of word formation • Shortening/clipping can be of different types: • initial clipping – the initial part of a word is clipped: phone <= telephone, bus<= omnibus • final clipping — the final part of a word is clipped: vac <= vacations, cab<= cabriolet, lab <= laboratory; • initial and final clipping – frige <= refrigerator; • Acronyms are words made of initial letters of a word group: UNO, BBC, MP, PM, NATO, USA, EU, etc.

Blending • is a way to combine elements of two words to create one, so it includes 2 word building processes: clipping and composition: smog<= smoke + fog, brunch<= breakfast + lunch, Oxbridge<= Oxford + Cambridge; edutainment <= education + entertainment, slanguage <= slang +language, • medicare <= medical care; • •

Back-formation/reversion • is such a way of word building when a new word is produces not by adding an affix to a stem but by subtracting an affix. • It is normally used to create a verb from a noun: • beggar => to beg, • burglar => to burgle, • baby-sitter => to baby-sit, • television =>to televise.

Stress and sound interchange: • import- to import, export – to export, conduct –to conduct; • sing-song, bleed-blood, feed – food. • Lexicalization • is a process of turning a word form into a separate lexical unit: Customs, arms, irons, glasses.

Sound imitation/onomatopoeia • is a way of coining a word by imitating different sounds produced in nature by animals: bark, croak, miaow; people: giggle, gargle, groan; things: crack, etc; • Reduplication – • doubling a stem, either without phonetic changes: bye-bye, or with variation of a root sound: ping-pong, riff-raff (the disreputable elements of society), dilly -dally (wasting time)

• -structure: compounds proper (2 root stems): to job-hunt; • compound-affixed words: videoplayer; • compounds of 3 or more stems: cornflowerblue, singer-songwriter; • compound-shortened words: V-day, motocross, AIDSphobia, motel;

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

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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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)

Compounding is the process which probably characterises English the most.
Compounds are formed by combining two, or more, already existing words into a new
one. The graphical form of its constituents remains unaltered (which is not always the
case for their phonological form — changes often occur on the level of suprafixes, that
is regarding tone or stress): chairlift, ashtray, fast-food, dry-clean, sex symbol, sewage disposal works. English compounds very in their orthography and can be constructed
out of more than two constituents. They can be either spelled together, separately or be
hyphenised — the rules regarding a preferred form are not clearly internalised, although
there are some tendencies in frequency of particular forms ^[1].

Structure[edit | edit source]

What is common for compounds, however, is their structure. Each consists of a
head and a modifier. The head of a compound is the part that is more important than the
other in a way it determines the word-class of the whole word and takes inflectional
endings. It also follows the general rule of importance of meaning — that is, the more
meaningful or important a constituent is, the more likely it will be placed at the end of a
given structure. Hence, we can conclude that in English compounds are generally rightheaded
— in the example of fast-food, the whole word denotes ‘a kind of food’ rather
than any attempt to describe a way of ‘being fast’. Also, since the morpheme food is a
noun, the whole word belongs to the very same word-class. What remains is the lefthand
of a compound, namely the modifier. Modifiers are characterised by being applied
stress onto, which helps us distinguish them from other constructs — a ‘blackboard is ‘a
board that teachers write on’, while a black ‘board is any board that happens to be black
— which is not necessarily true for the former.

Productivity[edit | edit source]

The vast majority of English compounds are nouns ^[2]. However, the productivity of this process allows to create items that vary greatly in word classes they belong to — there exists a considerable number of combinations of grammatical categories one can choose from when merging them into compounds, and this is the basis for establishing the primary classification of compounds. There is a category of compounds, though, that contain constituents of a slightly different character. What is meant here is that they not only can be attached to bases like bound morphemes (affix-like behaviour), but can also be combined with themselves. These abound in the medical and scientific terminology and often stem from Greek or Latin, and some examples include astro-, electro-, hydro-, -ology, -photo, bio-. What is more, they often function on their own in the linguistic word, which effectively narrows the meaning of a newly-coined word that is created by combing these segments. Such constituents are labelled ‘combining forms’ and form a structure called neo-classical compounds.

References[edit | edit source]

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2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module ‘Module:Citation/CS1/Whitelist’ not found.