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 8) [n+ ing + n] –
туалетный
столик
eyebrow - (ch 1 p 8) [n+ n] – бровь
satinwood - (ch 1 p 8) [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]
|
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