WORD FORMATION

Compounding or word composition

Blending

Shortening

According to the parts of speech

According to their structure

a) nouns, such as: baby-moon, globe-trotter,

b) adjectives, such as: free-for-all, power-happy,

c) verbs, such as: tohoney-moon, to baby-sit, to henpeck,

f) numerals, such as: sixty-five.

d) adverbs, such as: downdeep, headfirst,

e) prepositions, such as: into, within,

a) compound words proper consisting of simple stems, e. g. bookshelf, snowwhite, tip-top;

b) derivational compounds, where besides the stems we have affixes, e. g. chain-smoker, ear-minded, hydro-skimmer,

c)compound words consisting of three or more stems, e. g. wastepaper-basket, newspaper-ownership, eggshell-thin,

d) compound-shortened words, e. g. T-shirt, Eurodollar.

Back-formation (Reversion)

Abbreviations

  1. Acronyms are read in accordance with the reading rules as though they were ordinary words: NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization), and UNO (United Nations Organization).
  1. Alphabetic abbreviations in which letters get their full alphabetic pronunciation and full stress: USA, BBC, FBI, CIA, NBA. Alphabetic abbreviations sometimes concern names of famous people: G.B.S. (George Bernard Shaw), B.B. (Brigitte Bardot).
  1. Compound abbreviations in which the first constituent is a letter and the second part is a complete word: A-bomb (atomic-bomb), L-driver (learner – driver). One or both constituents may also be clipped in compound abbreviations: Interpol (international police).
  1. Graphic abbreviations can be found in texts for the economy of space.

a) days of the week, e. g. Mon – Monday, Tue – Tuesday, etc.

b) names of months, e. g. Apr – April, Aug – August, etc.

c) names of counties in UK, e. g. Yorks – Yorkshire, Berks –Berkshire, etc.

d) names of states in USA, e. g. Ala – Alabama, Alas – Alaska, etc.

e) names of address, e. g. Mr., Mrs., Ms., Dr., etc.

f) military ranks, e. g. capt. –captain,col. – colonel, sgt – sergeant, etc.

g) scientific degrees, e. g. B.A. – Bachelor of Arts, D.M. – Doctor of Medicine.

  1. Latin abbreviations can be read as separate letters or be substituted by the English
    equivalents: e. g. (for example), cf. (compare), i. e. (that is).

Clipping

  1. Final clipping (apocope). The omitting of the last part of the word: doc (doctor), mag (magazine), Nick (Nickolas).
  1. Initial clipping (apheresis). The omitting of the fore part of the word. plane (airplane), van (caravan), phone (telephone).
  1. Medial clipping (syncope). The omitting of the middle part of the word: fancy (fantasy), specs (spectacles), maths (mathematics).
  1. Mixed clipping, where the fore and the final parts of the words are clipped: flu(influenza), tec (detective), fridge (refrigerator).

Splinters

burglar→to burgle, enthusiasm→to enthuse, beggar→to
beg, television→to televise

dramedy←drama+comedy, teleplay←television+play, fantabulous←fantastic+fabulous, pollutician←pollution+politician

Sound imitation (Onomatopoeia)

Sounds produced by human beings: to whisper, to giggle, to mumble, to sneeze, to whistle.

Sounds produced by animals, birds, and insects: to hiss, to buzz, to bark, to moo, to twitter.

Sounds produced by nature and objects: to splash, to rustle, to clatter, to bubble.

Reduplication (Repetition)

1) the words in which the same stem is repeated without any changes (pretty-pretty, goody-goody, never-never (утопія)

2) words with a vowel variation (chit-chat (плітки), ping-pong, tip-top);

3) words with pseudomorphemes (rhyme combinations) (lovey-dovey, walkie-talkie, willy-nilly); the parts of such words don’t exist as separate words.

Ellipsis is the omission of a word or words considered essential for grammatical completeness but not for the conveyance of the intended lexical meaning: pub←public house, daily←daily newspaper, sale←cutprice sale, taxi←taximotor cab (ellipsis+apocopy in the last word).

Sentence-condensation is the formation of new words by substantivising the whole locutions (forget-me-not, merry-go-round).

Sound interchange

It can be the consequence of Ancient Ablaut which the phonetic laws cannot explain during the period of the language development known to scientists, e. g. to strike – stroke, to sing – song, etc. It can be also the result of Ancient Umlaut or vowel mutation which comes from palatalizing the root vowel because of the front vowel in the syllable following the root (regressive assimilation), e. g. hot – to heat (hotian), blood – to bleed (blodian), etc.

Sound interchange is divided into two groups: vowel interchange and consonant interchange. With the help of vowel interchange we differentiate parts of speech, e. g. full – to fill, food – to feed, blood – to bleed, etc. In some cases vowel interchange is connected with affixation, e. g. long – length, strong – strength, etc. Intransitive verbs and the corresponding transitive ones with a causative meaning also display vowel interchange, e. g. to rise – to raise, to sit – to set, to lie – to lay, to fall – to fell.

The type of consonant-interchange typical of Modern English is the interchange of a voiceless fricative consonant in a noun and the corresponding voiced consonant in the corresponding verb, e. g. use – to use, mouth – to mouth, house – to house, advice – to advise, etc.

There are some particular cases of consonant-interchange: [k] – [t∫]: to speak – speech, to break – breach; [s] – [d]: defence – to defend; offence – to offend; [s] – [t]: evidence – evident, importance – important, etc. Consonant-interchange may be connected with vowel-interchange, e. g. bath – to bathe, breath – to breathe, life – to live, etc.

Stress interchange

to conflict –conflict, to export –export, to import –import, to extract –extract, to conduct –conduct, to present –present, to contrast –contrast, to increase –increase,

Lexicalization

look (погляд) – looks (зовнішність)