Breath — to breathe

As far as cases of this type are concerned, sound-interchange distinguishes only between words, it does not differentiate word-forms of one and the same word. Consequently it has no relation to the paradigms of the words. Hence, cases of this type cannot be regarded as conversion.

2) song — to sing

In the above given example the vowel in song interchanges with three different vowels, the latter interchanging with one another in the forms of the verb to sing:

Like the previous type, the words song — to sing are not related by conversion: song differs from to sing (sang, sung) not only in the paradigm. Its root-vowel does not occur in the word-forms of the verb and vice versa.

3) house — to house

In such cases the type of sound-interchange distinguishing the two words (verb and noun) is the same as that which distinguishes the word-forms of the noun, cf, house [haus] — houses [hauziz] and to house [hauz] — houses [hauziz]. Consequently, the only difference between the two words lies in their paradigms, in other words, word-pairs like house — to house are cases of conversion.

It is fairly obvious that in such cases as present — to present, accent — to accent, etc. which differ in the position of stress, the latter does not distinguish the word-forms within the paradigm of the two words. Thus, as far as cases of this type are concerned, the difference in stress is similar

to the function of sound-interchange in cases like breath — "to breathe. Consequently, cases of this type do not belong to conversion.

There is, however, another interpretation of the relationship between conversion and sound (stress)-interchange in linguistic literature. As sound- and (stress-)interchange often accompanies cases of affixation, e.g. courage — courageous, stable — stability, it seems logical to assume that conversion as one of the types of derivation may also be accompanied by sound- (stress-)interchange. Hence, cases like breath — to breathe; to sing — song; present — to present; increase — to increase, etc. are to be regarded as those of conversion.

1. Conversion, an exceedingly productive way of forming words in Modern English, is treated differently in linguistic literature. Some linguists define it as a morphological, others as a morphological-syntactic way of forming words, still others consider conversion from a purely syntactic angle.

2. There are several criteria of semantic derivation within conversion pairs. The most universal are the semantic and the frequency criteria.

3. On the synchronic plane conversion is regarded as a type of derivative correlation between two words making up a conversion pair.

4., On the diachronic plane conversion is a way of forming new words on the analogy of the semantic patterns available in the language. Diachronically distinction should be made between cases of conversion as such and those of homonymy due to the disappearance of inflections in the course of the development of the English language.

Word-Composition

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, as has been mentioned elsewhere, 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 degree² 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.

¹ See ‘Word-Structure’, § 8, p. 97.

² See ‘Word-Formation’, § 6, p. 114.

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).

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 characterised 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 itis 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 ¹ is most obvious in some compounds, especially in compound adjectives. Adjectives like long, wide, rich are characterised 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.

Phоnetiсallу 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 ‘ hot-house — ‘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) a high or unity stress on the first component as in ‘ honeymoon, doorway, etc.

¹ See ‘Word-Structure’, § 8, p. 97,

b) 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 — ‘a psychiatrist’, ´ washing-ma ` chine, etc. These two stress patterns are the commonest among compound words and in many cases they acquire a contrasting force distinguishing compound words from word-groups, especially when the arrangement and order of ICs parallel the word-order and the distributional pattern of a phrase, thus a ‘ greenhouse — ‘a glass house for cultivating delicate plants’ is contrasted to a ‘ green ‘house — ‘a house that is painted green’; ‘ dancing-girl — ‘a dancer’ to a ‘ dancing ‘girl — ‘a girl who is dancing’; a ´mad-`doctor — ‘apsychiatrist’ to ‘mad ‘doctor — ‘a doctor who is mad’. The significance of these stress patterns is nowhere so evident as in nominal compounds built on the n+n derivational pattern in which the arrangement and order of the stems fail to distinguish a compound word from a phrase.

c) It is not infrequent, however, for both ICs to have level stress as in, e.g., ‘ arm-'chair, ‘icy-'cold, ‘grass-'green, etc.

The significance of the stress pattern by itself should not be overestimated though, as it cannot be an overall criterion and cannot always serve as a sufficient clue to draw a line of distinction between compound words and phrases. This mostly refers to level stress pattern. In most cases the level stress pattern is accompanied by other structural and graphic indications of inseparability.

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 emphasise 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 the n+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 break.¹ 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

¹ The spelling is given according to Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary, 1956 and H. С Wyld. The Universal English Dictionary, 1952.

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 recognised 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 class 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.¹

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, carboard are built on the base meaning ‘thick, stiff paper’; the base board -meaning ‘an authorised 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.²

¹ See ‘Word-Composition’, § 34, p. 151,

² See ‘Semasiology’, § 15, p. 24.

The lexical meanings of the bases alone, important as they are, do not make the meaning of the compound word. The meaning of the compound is derived not only from the combined lexical meanings of its components, but also from the meaning signalled by the patterns of the order and arrangement of its ICs.

A mere change in the order of bases with the same lexical meanings brings about a drastic change in the lexical meaning of the compound or destroys it altogether. As an illustration let us compare life-boat — ‘a boat of special construction for saving lives from wrecks or along the coast’ with boat-life — ‘life on board the ship’; a fruit-market — ‘market where fruit is sold’ with market-fruit — ‘fruit designed for selling’; board-school with school-board, etc. Thus the structural or distributional pattern in compound words carries a certain meaning of its own which is largely independent of the actual lexical meaning of their ICs. It follows that the lexical meaning of a compound is derived from the combined lexical meanings of its components and the structural meaning of its distributional pattern.¹

The structural meaning of the derivational pattern of compounds may be abstracted and described through the interrelation of its ICs. In analysing compound adjectives, e.g. duty-bound, wind-driven, mud-stained, we observe that their underlying pattern n+Ven conveys the generalised meaning of instrumental or agentive relations which can be interpreted as ‘done by’ or ‘with the help of something’; the lexical meanings of the bases supply the individual action performed and the actual doer of the action or objects with the help of which the action is done — duty-bound may be interpreted as 'bound by duty’, wind-driven as ‘driven by wind’, mud-stained as ’stained with mud’.

The derivational patterns in compounds may be monosemantic as in the above-given examples, and polysemantic.² If we take the pattern п+а -> A which underlies such compound adjectives as snow-white, world-wide, air-sick, we shall see that the pattern has two different meanings which may be interpreted: a) through semantic relations of comparison between the components as in world-wide — ‘wide as the world’, snow-white — ‘as white as snow’, etc. and b) through various relations of adverbial type (circumstantial) as in road-weary — ‘weary of the road’, colour-blind — ‘blind to colours’, etc. The structural pattern n+n -> N that underlies compound nouns is also polysemantic and conveys different semantic relations such as relations of purpose, e.g. bookshelf, bed-room, relations of resemblance, e.g. needle-fish, bowler-hat, instrumental or agentive relations, e.g. steamboat, windmill, sunrise, dogbite.

The polysemy of the structure often leads to a certain freedom of interpretation of the semantic relations between the components and consequently to the polysemy of the compound. For example, it is equally

¹ See also ‘Word-Groups’, § 5, p. 69.

² See also ‘Word-Groups’, § 8, p. 71.

correct to interpret the compound noun toy-man as ‘a toy having the shape of a man’ or ‘a man who makes toys, a toy-maker’, the compound clock- tower may likewise be understood as a ‘tower with a clock fitted in’ or ‘a tower that serves as or is at the same time a clock’.

It follows that the meaning of a compound is made up of the combined lexical meaning of the bases and the structural meaning of the pattern. The semantic centre of the compound is the lexical meaning of the second component modified and restricted by the meaning of the first. The semantic centres of compounds and the semantic relations embedded in the structural patterns refer compound words to certain lexico-semantic groups and semantic sets within them as, for example: 1) compound words denoting action described as to its agent, e.g. sunrise, earthquake, handshake, 2) compounds denoting action described as to its time or place, e.g. day-flight, street-fight, 3) compounds denoting individual objects designed for some goal, e.g. bird-cage, table-cloth, diving-suit, 4) compounds denoting objects that are parts of the whole, e.g. shirt-collar, eye-ball, 5) compounds denoting active doers, e.g. book-reader, shoe-maker, globe-trotter.

The lexical meanings of both components are closely fused together to create a new semantic unit with a new meaning which is not merely additive but dominates the individual meanings of the bases and is characterised by some additional semantic component not found in any of the bases. For example, a hand-bag is essentially ‘a bag, designed to be carried in the hand’, but it is also ‘a woman’s bag to keep money, papers, face-powder and the like’; a time-bomb is ‘a bomb designed to explode at some time’, but also ‘after being dropped or placed in position’. The bulk of compound words are monosemantic and motivated but motivation in compounds like in all derivatives varies in degree. There are compounds that are completely motivated like sky-blue, foot-pump, tea-taster. Motivation in compound words may be partia1, but again the degree will vary. Compound words a hand-bag, a flower-bed, handcuffs, a castle-builder are all only partially motivated, but still the degree of transparency of their meanings is different: in a hand-bag it is the highest as it is essentially ‘a bag’, whereas handcuffs retain only a resemblance to cuffs and in fact are ‘metal rings placed round the wrists of a prisoner’; a flower-bed is neither ‘a piece of furniture’ nor ‘a base on which smth rests’ but a ‘garden plot where flowers grow’; a castle-builder is not a ‘builder’ as the second component suggests but ‘a day-dreamer, one who builds castles in the air’.

There are compounds that lack motivation altogether, i.e. the native speaker doesn't see any obvious connection between the word-meaning, the lexical meanings of the bases and the meaning of the pattern, consequently, he cannot deduce the lexical meaning, of the word, for example, words like eye-wash — ’something said or done to deceive a person’, fiddlesticks — ‘nonsense, rubbish’, an eye-servant — ‘ a servant who attends to his duty only when watched’, a night-cap — ‘a drink taken before going to bed at night’ all lack motivation. Lack of motivation in compound words may be often due to the transferred

meanings of bases or of the whole word as in a slow-coach — ‘a person who acts slowly’ (colloq.), a sweet-tooth — ‘one who likes sweet food and drink’ (colloq.). Such words often acquire a new connotational meaning (usually non-neutral) not proper to either of their components. Lack of motivation may be often due to unexpected semantic relations embedded in the compound.

Sometimes the motivated and the non-motivated meanings of the same word are so far apart that they are felt as two homonymous words, e.g. a night-cap: 1) ‘a cap worn in bed at night’ and 2) ‘a drink taken before going to bed at night’ (colloq.); eye-wash: 1) ‘a liquid for washing the eyes’ and 2) ’something said or done to deceive somebody’ (colloq.); an eye-opener: 1) ‘enlightening or surprising circumstance’ (colloq.) and 2) ‘a drink of liquor taken early in the day’ (U.S.)

Compound words may 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: 1) of general relationship and degree of semantic independence of components; 2) of the parts of speech compound words represent; 3) of the means of composition used to link the two ICs together; 4) of the type of ICs that are brought together to form a compound; 5) of the correlative relations with the system of free word-groups.

Each type of compound words based on the above-mentioned principles should also be described from the point of view of the degree of its potential power, i.e. its productivity, its relevancy to the system of Modern English compounds. This description must aim at finding and setting a system of ordered structural and semantic rules for productive types of compound words on analogy with which an infinite number of new compounds constantly appear in the language.

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 recognised 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 most often to the same semantic group. Coordinative compounds make up a comparatively small group of words. Coordinative compounds fall into three groups:

a) 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.

b) 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, zig-zag, sing-song, or rhyme by varying the initial consonants as in clap-trap, a walkle-

talkie, 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.

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.

c) The bases of a d d i t i v e 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’, cf. 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.

Subordinative compounds make the bulk of Modern English compound words, as to productivity most of the productive types are subordinative compounds.

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 characterised 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

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 babysit 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:

1) 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 (cf. 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: a) asуntасtiс compound 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; b) 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 type door-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.

2) 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, e.g., 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 nonassimilated 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-.¹

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'

¹ See ‘Word-Structure’, § 3, p. 92,

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 —> [(long-leg) + -ed] -> 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 of 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 of 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:

a) 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; [(num + n) + -ed], e.g. two-sided, three-cornered; [(n + n) + -ed], e.g. doll-faced, heart-shaped.

b) 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, e.g., a breakdown, a break-through, a cast-away, a lay-out. 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 or recipient of the action, e.g. cast-offs — ‘clothes that the 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, e.g., 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 robbin’. 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) compounds¹. 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.

The structural correlation manifests itself in the morphological character of components, range of bases and their order and arrangement. It is important to stress that correlative relations embrace only minimal, non-expanded nuclear types of phrases.

The bases brought together in compound words are built only on the stems of those parts of speech that may form corresponding word-

¹ Prof. A. I. Smirnitsky as far back as the late forties pointed out the rigid parallelism existing between free word-groups and derivational compound adjectives which he termed “grammatical compounds".

groups. The head of the word-group becomes the head-member of the compound, i.e. its second component. The typical structural relations expressed in word-groups syntactically are conveyed in compounds only by the nature and order of its bases.

Compounds of each part of speech correlate only with certain types of minimal variable phrases.

Semantically correlation manifests itself in the fact that the semantic relations between the components of a compound mirror the semantic relations between the member-words in correlated word-groups. For example, compound adjectives of the n+V_en type, e.g. duty-bound, snow-covered, are circumscribed by the instrumental relations typical of the correlated word-groups of V_en+ by/with + N type regardless of the actual lexical meanings of the bases. Compound nouns of the n+n type, e.g. story-teller, music-lover, watch-maker, all mirror the agentive relations proper to phrases of the N who V+N, cf. a story-teller and one who tells stories, etc.

■ Correlation should not be understood as converting an actually functioning phrase into a compound word or the existence of an individual word-group in actual use as a binding condition for the possibility of a compound. On the contrary there is usually only a potential possibility of conveying the same semantic content by both a word-group and a compound, actually this semantic content is conveyed preferably either by a phrase or by a compound word.

Correlation, it follows, is a regular interaction and interdependence of compound words and certain types of free phrases which conditions both the potential possibility of appearance of compound words and their structure and semantic type. Thus, the fact that there is a potential possibility of individual phrases with the underlying pattern, for example, as A + as N in as white as snow, as red as blood presupposes a potential possibility of compound words of the n+ a type snow-white, blood-red, etc. with their structure and meaning relation of the components preconditioned. It happens that in this particular case compound adjectives are more typical and preferred as a language means of conveying the quality based on comparison.

Structural and semantic correlation by no means implies identity or a one-to-one correspondence of each individual pattern of compound “words to one phrase pattern. For example the n + n_v type of compound nouns comprises different patterns, such as ln+(v+ -er)] — rocket-flyer, shoe-maker, bottle-opener; [n+(v + -ing)] — rocket-flying, football-playing; [n+(v+ -ion)] — price-reduction. All these patterns differing in the individual suffix used in the final analysis correlate with verbal-nominal word-groups of the V+N type (e.g. to fly rockets), the meaning of the active doer (rocket-flyer) or the action (rocket-flying) is conveyed by the suffixes. However the reverse relationship is not uncommon, e.g. one derivational pattern of compound adjectives (n+a) in words like oil-rich, sky-high, grass-green corresponds to a variety of word-group patterns which differ in the grammatical and semantic relationship between member-words expressed in phrases by different prepositions. Thus compound adjectives of this type may correspond to phrase patterns A + of + N, e.g.

Table 1

e. g. case for (keeping) pencils; a suit for driving

e. g. the neck of the bottle; the handle of the door

e. g. a club in the country; a chair on wheels

e. g. a door (that) is a trap; the doctor is a woman

e. g. a fish like a sword; a hat like a bowler

e. g. a mill worked by the wind; a boat run by steam

pleasure-tired; A+in+N, e.g. oil-rich; as A as N, e.g. grass-green. Another example of the same type of correlation is the polysemantic n+n pattern of nominal compounds which mirror a variety of semantic relations underlying word-groups of the N +prp+ N type, such as relations of resemblance (e.g. needle-fish), local and temporal relations (e.g. country-house, night-flight), relations of purpose (e.g. search-warrant), etc. which in word-groups are conveyed by prepositions or other function words. (Table 1) (see p. 153) represents the most common and frequent types of semantic correlation between n+n pattern of compounds and various patterns of nominal word-groups.

Compound words, due to the fact that they do not require any explicit way to convey the semantic relationship between their components except their order, are of much wider semantic range, leave more freedom for semantic interpretation and convey meaning in a more compressed and concise way. This makes the meaning of compounds more flexible and situationally derived.

It follows that motivation and regularity of semantic and structural correlation with free word-groups are the basic factors favouring a high degree of productivity of composition and may be used to set rules guiding spontaneous, analogic formation of new compound words.

It is natural that those types of compound words which do not establish such regular correlations and that are marked by a lack or very low degree of motivation must be regarded as unproductive as, for example, compound nouns of the a+n type, e. g. bluebell, blackbird, mad-doctor.

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. Adjectival-nominal 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. colour-blind, road-weary, care-free, etc.

2) the monosemantic pattern n+v_en based mainly on the

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