2. Classification of compounds

The great variety of compound types brings about a great variety of classifications. Compound words may be classified according to the type of composition and the linking element; according to the part of speech to which the compound belongs; and within each part of speech according to the structural pattern. It is also possible to subdivide compounds according to other characteristics, i.e. semantically, into motivated and idiomatic compounds (in the motivat­ed ones the meaning of the constituents can be either direct or figura­tive). Structurally, compounds are distinguished as endocentric and exo-centric, syntac­tic and asyntactic combinations. A classification according to the type of the syntactic phrase with which the compound is correlated has also been suggested. Even so there remain some miscellaneous types that defy classification, such as phrase compounds, reduplicative compounds, pseudo-compounds and quotation compounds.

The classification according to the type of composition permits us to establish the following groups:

1) The predominant type is a mere juxtaposition without connecting elements: heartache n, heart-beat n, heart-break n, heart-breaking a, heart-broken a, heart-felt a.

2) Composition with a vowel or a consonant as a linking element. The examples are very few: electromotive a, speedometer n, Afro-Asian a, handicraft n, statesman n.

3) Compounds with linking elements represented by preposition or conjunction stems: down-and-out n, matter-of-fact a, son-in-law n, pepper-and-salt a, wall-to-wall a, up-to-date a, on the up-and-up adv (continually improving), up-and-coming, as in the following example: A'o doubt he'd had the pick of some up-and-coming jazzmen in Paris (Wain). There are also a few other lexicalized phrases like devil-may-care a, for­get-me-not n, pick-me-up n, stick-in-the-mud n, what's-her name n.

The classification of compounds according to the structure of imme­diate constituents distinguishes:

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: maths-mistress (in British English) and math-mistress (in American Eng­lish). The subgroup will contain abbreviations like H-bag (handbag) or Xmas (Christmas), whodunit n (for mystery novels) considered sub­standard;

4) compounds where at least one of the constituents is a compound stem; wastepaper-basket.

3. Relationship between the components of a compound word

Compound words are inseparable vocabulary units that are structurally and semantically based on the relationship between their components through which they are motivated. There are two types of relationship between the components of a compound generally recognized in linguistic literature:

that of coordination and subordination and accordingly com­pound words may be classified into coordinative (often termed copulative) and subordinative (often termed deter­minative).

a) coordinative compounds

In coordinative compounds neither of the components dominates the other, both are structurally and semantically independent and constitute two structural and semantic cen­tres as in secretary-stenographer, actor-manager, bitter­sweet, etc. The constituent stems in these compounds belong to the same part of speech and most often to the same seman­tic group. Coordinative compounds distinguish three groups:

a) the so-called additive compounds that best represent coordinative compound words, e.g. queen-bee, actor-manager. They denote a person or an object that is two things at the same time; thus, e.g. secretary-stenographer is a person who is both a stenographer and a secretary; actor-manager is an actor and a manager at the same time.

b) reduplicative compounds which are the result of the repetition of the same stem as in goody-goody, fifty-fifty, hush-hush, pooh-pooh, tick-tick.

c) compounds formed by joining the phonically variated rhythmic forms of the same stem which either alliterate with the same initial consonant but vary the vowels, e.g. drip-drop, sing-song, ding-dong, or rime by varying the initial con­sonants, e.g. walkie-talkie, clap-trap, willy-nilly, pell-mell, helter-skelter. Words of this subgroup are often termed pseudo-compounds and some linguists consider them irrele­vant to productive word-formation owing to the doubtful morphemic status of their components. In most cases the constituent members of these words, when substracted from them do not present stems of independently functioning words, carry no lexical meaning of their own and are mere rime combinations of fanciful, meaningless sound-clusters.

Coordinative compounds of the last two groups (re­duplicated and riming words) are mostly restricted to the colloquial layer and are characterized by a heavy emotive charge.

b) subordinative compounds.

In subordinative compounds the components are neither structurally nor semantically equal in importance but are based on the domination of one component over the other. The second component in these words is the structural centre, the grammatically dominant part of the word, which imparts its part-of-speech meaning to the whole word and refers it to a certain lexico-grammatical class, as in stone-deaf, age­long which are obviously adjectives, wrist-watch, baby-sit­ter, road-building which are nouns.

It must be mentioned that though a distinction between coordinative and subordinative compounds can generally be made, there is no hard and fast borderline between them. On the contrary, the borderline, and this is especially true of additive coordinative compounds, is rather vague and tran­sitions are greatly fluctuating. 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. woman-doctor may be understood as 'a woman who is at the same time a doctor'; clock-tower—'a tower that at the same time serves as a clock' or there can be traced a difference of importance between the components—a woman-doctor is primarily felt to be 'a doctor who happens to be a woman'; a clock-tower—'a tower with a clock fitted in'; mother-goose is primarily understood as 'a goose, who is a mother', etc.; thus the relations between the components tend to be under­stood as relations of apposition, i.e. relations of subordina­tion. Coordinative compounds make a comparatively small group of words whereas the bulk of Modern English com­pound words belong to subordinative words, so in our further treatment we shall confine ourselves to the description of subordinative compounds.

c) distributional formulas of subordinative compaunds.

The internal structure of subordinative compounds is marked by a specific pattern of order and arrangement in The order in which the stems are placed within a compound is rigidly fixed in Modern English as the structural centre of the word is always its second component. Stems of almost every part of speech are found in compounds but they are combined to make up compound words accord­ing to a set of rigid rules for every part of speech. The choice of stems and the rules of their arrangement and order are known as distributional or structural formulas and patterns of compound words.

As to the order of components subordinative compound words may be classified into two groups:

a) 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 stems in compounds, e.g. bluebell, slow­coach, mad-doctor (a+n) reminds one of the order and arrange­ment of the corresponding words in phrases like a blue bell, a slow coach, a mad doctor (A+N); compounds like, e.g. know-nothing, kill-joy, tell-tale made up on the formula v+n resemble the arrangement of words in phrases like (to) kill joy, (to) know nothing, (to) tell tales (V+N); the order of components in compounds consisting of two noun-stems door-handle, day-time (n+") resembles the order of words in nominal phrases with the attributive function of the first noun as in stone wall, spring time, peace movement, etc. (N+N).

b) Asyntactic compounds whose stems are not placed in the order in which the corresponding words can be brought together under the rules of syntax of the language. For example it is universally known that in free phrases adjec­tives cannot be modified by adjectives, noun modifiers can­not be placed before adjectives or participles, yet this kind of asyntactic arrangement of stems is typical of compounds among which we find combinations of two adjective stems, e.g. red-hot, bluish-black, pale-blue; words made up of noun-stems placed before adjective or participle stems, e.g. oil-rich, tear-stained, etc.

Both syntactic and asyntactic compound words in each part of speech should be described in terms of their distribu­tional formulas. For example, compound adjectives are mostly formed of noun, adjective or participle stems according to the formulas n+a, e.g. oil-rich, world-wide; n+Ved¹, e.g. snow-covered, home-grown; a+a, e.g. pale-green, red-hot, etc.