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COMPOUNDING
Compounding (composition) is a word-formation process in which two or more bases are combined to form a
new word.
Compounds usually consist of two elements: playground, draw-back, windmill, self-help, skinhead, sky-blue, seasick,
good-looking, world-wide, type-write, hitchhike, within, etc. However, there are some examples of compounds made
up of more than two elements, e.g.: father-in-law, hit-and-miss, good-for-nothing, nevertheless, etc.
Not any two words that are put next to each other are compounds. Consider the following example:
’white house’ vs. ’White House’
(syntactic group)
(compound noun)
Criteria for distinguishing compounds from syntactic groups:
1. Orthographic criterion: the elements of a compound may be put together in writing (bedroom), they may be
hyphenated (writing-table), or even be separated by blanks (summer school).
2. Phonological criterion: compounds usually have main stress on the first constituent (and secondary stress on
the second one), while syntactic structures have main stress on each word; e.g. ’gentle ’man (syntactic structure)
vs: ’gentleman (compound).
3. Semantic criterion: the meaning of a compound is somehow related to, but not simply deducible from the
meaning of its constituents, while the meaning of a syntactic structure is more predictable and transparent.
Example: stone-cold (very cold).
Compounds can belong to different parts of speech: compound nouns, compound adjectives, compound verbs,
compound adverbs, compound pronouns, compound prepositions and compound conjunctions.
Compound nouns:
noun + noun (steamboat, lighthouse, bedtime, weekend, window-cleaner);
noun + gerund (housekeeping, weight-lifting, air-conditioning);
gerund + noun (writing table, frying-pan, driving licence, waiting list);
noun genitive + noun (traveller’s cheque, driver’s license (AmE));
verb + noun (runway, pickpocket, kill-joy);
noun + verb (birth control, handshake, earthquake);
verb + particle (setback, drawback, take-off, turn-over);
Compound adjectives:
noun + adjective (seasick, light-headed, sky-blue);
adjective + adjective (British-made, reddish-brown);
noun + present participle (heart-breaking, good-looking);
adjective + past participle (new-born, clean-shaven, old-fashioned);
ordinal number + noun (first-rate, second-hand);
adjectival string compounds (wall-to-wall (carpet), go-go (dancer), up-to-date).
Compuond verbs:
noun + verb (colour-code, freeze-dry);
verb + verb (type write, ice-skate);
adjective + verb (freeload, blackmail, dry-clean);
particle + verb (outvote, underestimate, overcook).
Compound adverbs:
qualifier + adverb (somewhere, whenever);
suffixation of -ly to a compound adjective (whole-heartedly, single-mindedly).
Compound prepositions:
within, upon, without, etc.
Compound pronouns:
possessive pronoun + self (yourself, themselves);
indefinite pronouns containing -thing, -body, -one (anything, somebody, everyone).
Compound conjunctions:
Although, as though, nevertheless, etc.
- Compound types according to semantic relation Endocentric compounds: they have a head (i.e. centre) inside themselves, and the compound represents a
subclass of the head element; e.g. a gold-fish is a kind of fish and a wedding-ring is a kind of ring. The majority of
endocentric compounds are right-headed (blackboard, seasick, fast-food, bedroom, steamboat, etc). However, there
are endocentric compounds which have their head on the left side, e.g. attorney general, mother-in-law, lady-inwaiting, etc.
Exocentric compounds: those compounds have a head outside themselves (also called headless compounds), i.e.
the meaning of a compound does not follow from the meaning of its parts.
Examples: cutthroat does not designate a throat, but someone who cuts throats; pickpocket does not denote a
pocket, but rather someone who ‘picks’ pockets - i.e. robs pockets; faint heart is not a kind of heart, but a kind of
person who has a faint heart (metaphorically); loudmouth, birdbrain and blackcap are all exocentric, because they
do not refer to mouths, brains or caps, but to people and birds.
Exocentric compounds also include nouns consisting of a verb and preposition/adverb: sit-in, take-off,
underground, breakdown; adjectives consisting of a preposition and a noun: downmarket, overland, etc.
Dvandva (copulative, coordinative) compounds: these compounds are bi-headed, i.e. both elements contribute
to the meaning and thus they are both considered heads. An owner-builder is both the owner of a house and its
builder. A woman doctor is ‘a woman who is a doctor’, or ‘a doctor who is a woman’. Other examples: BosniaHerzegovina, boy-friend, Anna-Maria, singer-songwriter, manservant, Afro-American, bitter-sweet, etc.
I State whether the following compounds are endocentric, exocentric or dvandva.
sky blue……………………...........
bigfoot…………………………………..
merry-go-round …………………..
Anglo-Saxon…………………………
strawberry jam…………………….
skinhead……………………………….
chewing-gum……………………….
whiskey-and-soda…………………
bath towel……………………………..
laser printer………………………….
bus driver……………………………..
chess table……………………………
airport……………………….………….
maidservant…………………………
walkman……………………………….
blackberry……………………………..
cutthroat………………….……………
bookshelf……………………………..
outcast …………………………………
window-cleaner…………………..
deaf-mute …………………………….
daughter-in-law …………………..
rattlesnake ……………………………
producer-director………………….
spoilsport……………………………..
crybaby…………………….…….…….
forget-me-not……………………….
windmill …………………………………
armchair……………………………….
must-have…………………………....
shortcut…………………….………….
diesel motor…………………………..