Compound words in word composition

Word compositionmay be looked upon as the most ancient way of word building. The result of this process is creation of compound words.

Compound words are such words, which consist of at least two stems. These stems are free morphemes. But it is impossible to insert any element between these two stems.

postman – post/man

But what stem is the main?

The word, which form changes, is the main word (обычнопоследняяоснова)

The peculiarity of English compounds

The English language is very rich in compounds. But it is possible to single out three features which differentiate compounds from other words:

1. Most of the English compounds have no connecting element.

2. The greatest part of the English compounds consists of 2 members. Three member compounds are very rare.

3. But for the English language is very typical to have the whole phrases as the attributes, written with dash.

Letthesleepingdoglie. – Поговорка, означающая что-то вроде «Не буди лихо, пока оно тихо»

I don’t like your let-the-sleeping-dog-lie attitude to life. – Мнененравитсятвоёпофигистическоеотношениекжизни.Здесь let-the-sleeping-dog-lie используется в качестве прилагательного.

I don’t remember the girl-you-have-been-dancing-with ’s name. (разг.)

Classification of the English compounds.

1) structure

They may be subdivided into compounds with connecting element and without; consisting of two members and compounds having more than two elements.

The problems of meaning

Speaking about nature of meaning changes we can’t help noticing the connection between the old meaning and the new one. This connection may be based on similarity and association by similarity leads to metaphorical usage of words. And here we come across to stylistic devices which we call metaphor and metonymy.

the leg of the table

the foot of the mountain - dead metaphors

the mouth of the river

He plays football like a devil.

He is a devil on a football field.

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.

Most compounds in Modern English belong to nouns and adjectives. Compound verbs are less frequent; they are often made through conversion (N -> V pattern). Compound adverbs, pronouns, conjunctions and prepositions are rather rare. The classification of compounds according to the means of joining their

IC’s together distinguishes between the following structural types:

juxtapositional (neutral) compounds whose ICs are merely placed
one after another: classroom, timetable, heartache, whitewash,
hunting-knife, weekend, grey-green, <deep-blue, H-bomb, U-turn,
etc.;

morphological compounds whose ICs are joined together with a
vowel or a consonant as a linking element, e.g.: gasometer, handicraft, electromotive, Anglo-Saxon, sportsman, saleswoman, etc.;

syntactic compounds (integrated phrases) which are the result of the
process of semantic isolation and structural integration of free word-
groups, e.g.: blackboard (<black board), highway (<high way), forget-
me-not, bull’s-eye, up-to-date, son-in-law, go-between, know-all, etc.
The classification according to the structure of immediate constituents
(составляющие):

1. compounds, consisting of simple stems: film-star;

2. compounds, where at least one of the constituents is a derived stem: chain-smoker;

3. compounds, where at least one of the constituents is a clipped stem: math-mistress.

4. The subgroup will contain abbreviations like: H-bag (handbag), Xmas (Christmas).

5. Compounds, where at least one of the constituents is a compound stem: wastepaper-basket.

15) Morphemic meaning (differential meaning, distributional meaning, changes of meaning - results of changes as narrowing or extending of meaning; metaphorical adding to meaning, metonymy); causes of changes: linguistic and extra linguistic causes

Meaning and Definition on Morphemic

In linguistics, a morpheme is the smallest component of word, or other linguistic unit, that has semantic meaning. The term is used as part of the branch of linguistics known as morpheme-based morphology. A morpheme is composed by phoneme(s) (the smallest linguistically distinctive units of sound) in spoken language, and by grapheme(s) (the smallest units of written language) in written language.

The concept of word and morpheme are different, a morpheme may or may not stand alone. One or several morphemes compose a word. A morpheme is free if it can stand alone (ex: "one", "possible"), or bound if it is used exclusively alongside a free morpheme (ex: "im" in impossible). Its actual phonetic representation is the morph, with the different morphs ("in-", "im-") representing the same morpheme being grouped as its allomorphs.

The word "unbreakable" has three morphemes: "un-", a bound morpheme; "break", a free morpheme; and "-able", a free morpheme. "un-" is also a prefix, "-able" is a suffix. Both "un-" and "-able" are affixes.

The morpheme plural-s has the morph "-s", /s/, in cats (/kæts/), but "-es", /ɨz/, in dishes (/dɪʃɨz/), and even the voiced "-s", /z/, in dogs (/dɒɡz/). "-s". These are allomorphs.

16)Semasiological problems (figurative meanings of words, primary meanings)+examples! Free combinations of words (ex: "long grass")
Semasiological problems

Discussing the problems of Semasiology, we should keep in mind that we can analyze words syntagmatically in the context and paradigmatically out of the context.

to swim

It presupposes nouns which indicates some quality of water in which we can swim.

to swim in the sea/river etc.

But when these norms are broken, we come across metaphorical usage:

toswiminbliss – парить в небесах, купаться в блаженстве

In the second combination the rules of agreement are brokenbecause a bliss is an abstract noun. So this phrase acquired metaphorical meaning “to be absolutely happy”. This set expression is emotionally coloured and very expressive.

17) Derivational basis, derivative structure of the word
DERIVATIONAL COMPOUNDS

Derivational compounds or compound-derivatives like long-legged do not fit the definition of compounds as words consisting of more than one free stem, because their second element (-legged) is not a free stem. Derivational compounds are included in this chapter for two reasons: because the number of root morphemes is more than one, and because they are nearest to compounds in patterns. Derivational compounds or compound-derivatives are words in which the structural integrity of the two free stems is ensured by a suffix referring to the combination as a whole, not to one of its elements: kind-hearted, old-timer, schoolboyishness, teenager. In the coining of the derivational compounds two types of word-formation are at work. The essence of the derivational compounds will be clear if we compare them with derivatives and compounds proper that possess a similar structure. Take, for example, brainstraster, honeymooner and mill-owner. The ultimate constituents of all three are: noun stem + noun stem+-er. Analysing into immediate constituents, we see that the immediate constituents (IC’s) of the compound mill-owner are two noun stems, the first simple, the second derived: mill+owner, of which the last, the determinatum, as well as the whole compound, names a person. For the word honeymooner no such division is possible, since *mooner does not exist as a free stem. The IC’s are honeymoon+-er, and the suffix -er signals that the whole denotes a person: the structure is (honey+moon)+-er. The process of word-building in these seemingly similar words is different: mill-owner is coined by composition, honeymooner — by derivation from the compound honeymoon. Honeymoon being a compound, honeymooner is a derivative. Now brains trust ‘a group of experts’ is a phrase, so brainstruster is formed by two simultaneous processes — by composition and by derivation and may be called a derivational compound. Its IC’s are (brains+ trust)+-еr1. The suffix -er is one of the productive suffixes in forming derivational compounds. Other examples of the same pattern are: backbencher ‘an M.P. occupying the back bench’, do-gooder (ironically used in AmE), eye-opener ‘enlightening circumstance’, first-nighter ‘habitual frequenter of the first performance of plays’, go-getter (colloq.) ‘a pushing person’, late-comer, left-hander ‘left-handed person or blow’. Nonce-words show some variations on this type. The process of their formation is clearly seen in the following examples: "Have you ever thought of bringing them together?” "Oh, God forbid. As you may have noticed, I'm not much of a bringer-together at the best of times.” (Plomer) "The shops are very modern here,” he went on, speaking with all the rather touchy insistence on up-to-dateness which characterises the inhabitants of an under-bathroomed and over-monumented country (Huxley). Another frequent type of derivational compounds are the possessive compounds of the type kind-hearted: adjective stem+noun stem+ -ed. Its IC’s are a noun phrase kind heart and the suffix -ed that unites the elements of the phrase and turns them into the elements of a compound adjective. Similar examples are extremely numerous. Compounds of this type can be coined very freely to meet the requirements of different situations. Very few go back to Old English, such as one-eyed and three-headed, most of the cases are coined in Modern English. Examples are practically unlimited, especially in words describing personal appearance or character: absent-minded, bare-legged, black-haired, blue-eyed, cruel-hearted, light-minded, ill-mannered, many-sided, narrow-minded, shortsighted, etc. The first element may also be a noun stem: bow-legged, heart-shaped and very often a numeral: three-coloured. The derivational compounds often become the basis of further derivation. Cf. war-minded:: war-mindedness; whole-hearted:: whole-heartedness:: whole-heartedly, schoolboyish:: schoolboyishness; do-it-yourselfer:: do-it-yourselfism. The process is also called phrasal derivation: mini-skirt>mini-skirted, nothing but>nothingbutism, dress up>dressuppable, Romeo-and-Julietishness, or quotation derivation as when an unwillingness to do anything is characterised as let-George-do-it-ity. All these are nonce-words, with some ironic or jocular connotation.

Дата добавления: 2015-07-18