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The analysis of semantic relationships existing between the constituents of a compound present many difficulties. Some authors have attempted a purely logical interpretation. They distinguish copulative, existential, spatial and some other types of connection. Others, like H. Marchand, think that the most important factor is that the under lying concept may be grammatical. He illustrates the verb/object relation by such compounds as skyscraper or housekeeping and subject/verb relation in rattlesnake and crybaby. The first element in well-being or shortcoming is equivalent to the predicate complement.

N.G. Guterman pointed out that syntactic ties are ties between words, whereas in dealing with a compound one studies relations within a word, the relations between its constituents, the morphemes. In the compound spacecraft space is not attribute, it is the determinant restricting the meaning of the determinatum by expressing the purpose for which craft is designed or the medium in which it will travel.

Phrases correlated with compounds by means of transformational analysis may show objective, subject/predicative, attributive and adverbial relations. E. g. house-keeping : : to keep house, well-being : : to be well. In the majority of cases compounds manifest some restrictive relationship between the constituents; the types of restrictions show great variety.

Some examples of determinative compound nouns with restrictive qualitative relations are given below. The list is not meant to be exhaustive and serves only to illustrate the manifold possibilities.

Purpose or functional relations underlie such compounds as bathrobe, raincoat, classroom, notice-board, suitcase, identity-card, textbook. Different place or local relations are expressed in dockland, garden-party, sea-front. Comparison is the basis of blockhead, butter-fingers, floodlight, goldfish. The material or elements the thing is made of is pointed out in silverware, tin-hat, waxwork, clay-pipe, gold-foil. Temporal relations underlie such compounds as night-club, night-duty, summer-house, day-train, season-ticket. Sex-denoting compounds are rather numerous: she-dog, he-goat, jack-ass, Jenny-ass, tom-cat, pea-hen. When characterising some process, the first element will point out the agent (cock-crowing), the instrument (pin-prick), etc.

Many compounds defy this kind of analysis or may be explained in different ways: thus spacecraft may be analysed as ‘a craft travelling in space’ (local) or ‘a craft designed for travelling in space’ (purpose). There are also some tautological compounds such as pathway, roadway and the French translation loan courtyard. They are especially numerous in uneducated speech which is generally given to producing redundant forms: tumbler-glass, trout-fish, engineerman.

Often different relations are expressed by the same determinant: ear-ache (local) ‘an ache in the ear’, earmark (comparison) ‘a mark like an ear’, ear-lobe (part) ‘a lobe of the ear’, eardrop (purpose) ‘a drop for the ear’, ear-ring (local or purpose). Compare also: lip-reading (instrumental relations) ‘interpretation of the motion of the lips’; lip-service (comparison) ‘superficial service from the lips only’; lipstick (purpose) ‘a stick of cosmetics for rouging lips’.

In the beginning of the present chapter it has been mentioned that in describing the structure of a compound one has to examine three types of relations. We have discussed the relations of the elements to each other, and the relations of the whole compound to its members. The third approach is comparing compounds with phrases containing the same morphemes, e.g. an ashtray → ‘a tray for ashes’.

The corresponding structural correlations take the following form:

                           ashtray                hairbrush              paperknife

                    a tray for ashes     a brush for hair         a knife for paper

Such correlations are very helpful in showing similarity and difference of meaning in morphologically similar pairs. Consider, for example, the following:

                          bookselling    bookbinding    bookmaking

                          sell books       bind books       make books

A bookmaker is not one who makes books but a person who makes a living by taking bets on horse-races. The method may be used to distinguish unmotivated compounds.

Compounds that conform to grammatical patterns current in present-day English are termed syntactic compounds, e. g. seashore. If they fail to do so, they may be called asyntactic, e. g. baby-sitting.

In the first type the functional meaning and distribution coincide with those of the elements of a free phrase, no matter how different their lexical meaning may be. This may be shown by substituting a corresponding compound for a free phrase.

Compare: A slow coach moves slowly.

                 A slow-coach moves lowly.

Though different in meaning, both sentences are grammatically correct.

In these compounds the two constituent elements are clearly the determinant and the determinatum. Such compounds receive the name of endocentric compounds.

There are, however, other compounds where the determinatum is not expressed but implied. A killjoy ‘a person who throws gloom over social enjoyment’ is neither ‘joy’ nor ‘kill’ and the case is different from the slow-coach above, as in the corresponding free phrase ‘kill’ is a verb in the Imperative Mood and ‘joy’ is a noun on which the action of this verb is directed. A phrase of this type cannot be used predicatively, whereas the predicative function is typical of the compound killjoy. The essential part of the determinatum is obviously missing, it is implied and understood but not formally expressed. H. Marchand considers these words as having a zero determinatum stem and calls such compounds exocentric, e. g. cut-throat, dare-devil, scarecrow because their determinatum lies outside as opposed to the endocentric: sun-beam, blackboard, slow-coach, wall-flower.

The absence of formal determinatum results in the tendency to append the inflectional ending to the element that happens to be final. Thus, brothers-in-law, but in-laws. E. g.: Laws banning unofficial strikes, go-slows and slow-downs ("Morning Star").

As English compounds consist of free forms, it is difficult to distinguish them from phrases. The combination top dog ‘a person occupying foremost place’, for instance, though formally broken up, is neither more nor less analysable semantically than the combination underdog ‘a person who has the worst of an encounter’, and yet we count the first (top dog) as a phrase and the second (underdog) as a word. How far is this justified? In reality the problem is even more complex than this isolated example suggests. Separating compounds from phrases and also from derivatives is no easy task, and scholars are not agreed upon the question of relevant criteria. The following is a brief review of various solutions and various combinations of criteria that have been offered.

The problem is naturally reducible to the problem of defining word boundaries in the language. It seems appropriate to quote E. Nida who writes that “the criteria for determining the word-units in a language are of three types: (1) phonological, (2) morphological, (3) syntactic. No one type of criteria is normally sufficient for establishing the word-unit. Rather the combination of two or three types is essential."

E. Nida does not mention the graphic criterion of solid or hyphenated spelling. This underestimation of written language seems to be a mistake. For the present-day literary language, the written form is as important as the oral. If we accept the definition of a written word as the part of the text from blank to blank, we shall have to accept the graphic criterion as a logical consequence. It may be argued, however, that there is no consistency in English spelling in this respect. With different dictionaries and different authors and sometimes even with the same author the spelling varies, so that the same unit may exist in a solid spelling: headmaster, loudspeaker, with a hyphen: head-master, loud-speaker and with a break between the components: head master, loud speaker. Compare also: airline, air-line, air line’, matchbox, matchbox, match box’, break-up, breakup. Moreover, compounds that appear to be constructed on the same pattern and have similar semantic relations between the constituents may be spelt differently: textbook, phrase-book and reference book. Yet if we take into consideration the comparative frequency of solid or hyphenated spelling of the combinations in question, the criterion is fairly reliable. These three types of spelling need not indicate different degrees of semantic fusion. Sometimes hyphenation may serve aesthetic purposes, helping to avoid words that will look too long, or purposes of convenience, making syntactic components clearer to the eye: peace-loving nations, old-fashioned ideas.

This lack of uniformity in spelling is the chief reason why many authors consider this criterion insufficient. Some combine it with the phonic criterion of stress. There is a marked tendency in English to give compounds a heavy stress on the first element. Many scholars consider this unity of stress to be of primary importance. Thus L. Bloomfield writes: “Wherever we hear lesser or least stress upon a word which would always show a high stress in a phrase, we describe it as a compound member: ice-cream ['ajs-krijm] is a compound but ice cream ['ajs'krijm] is a phrase, although there is no denotative difference in meaning."

It is true that all compound nouns, with very few exceptions, are stressed on this pattern. Cf. ‘blackboard : : ‘blackboard’, ‘blackbird : : ‘black'bird; ‘bluebottle : : ‘blue'bottle. In all these cases the determinant has a heavy stress, the determinatum has the middle stress. The only exception as far as compound nouns are concerned is found in nouns whose first elements are all- and self-, e. g. ‘All-'Fools-Day, ‘self-con'trol. These show double even stress.

The rule does not hold with adjectives. Compound adjectives are double stressed like ‘gray-'green, ‘easy-'going, ‘new-'born. Only compound adjectives expressing emphatic comparison are heavily stressed on the first element: ‘snow-white, ‘dog-cheap.

Moreover, stress can be of no help in solving this problem because word-stress may depend upon phrasal stress or upon the syntactic function of the compound. Thus, light-headed and similar adjectives have a single stress when used attributively, in other cases the stress is even. Very often the stress is structurally determined by opposition to other combinations with an identical second element, e. g. ‘dining table : : ‘writing table. The forestress here is due to an implicit contrast that aims at distinguishing the given combination from all the other similar cases in the same series, as in ‘passenger train, ‘ freight train, ex'press train. Notwithstanding the unity stress, these are not words but phrases.

Besides, the stress may be phonological and help to differentiate the meaning of compounds:

'overwork ‘extra work'

'over'work ‘hard work injuring one’s health'

'bookcase ‘a piece of furniture with shelves for books'

^'book'case ‘a paper cover for books'

'man'kind ‘the human race'

'mankind ‘men’ (contrasted with women)

'toy,factory ‘factory that produces toys'

'toy'factory ‘factory that is a toy’.

It thus follows that phonological criterion holds for certain types of words only.

H. Paul, O. Jespersen, E. Kruisinga and many others, each in his own way, advocate the semantic criterion, and define a compound as a combination forming a unit expressing a single idea which is not identical in meaning to the sum of the meanings of its components in a free phrase. From this point of view dirty work with the figurative meaning ‘dishonorable proceedings’ is a compound, while clean work or dry work are phrases. Сf. fusspot, slow-coach. The insufficiency of this criterion will be readily understood if one realises how difficult it is to decide whether the combination in question expresses a single integrated idea. Besides, between a clearly motivated compound and an idiomatic one there are a great number of intermediate cases. Finally, what is, perhaps, more important than all the rest, as the semantic features and properties of set expressions are similar to those of idiomatic compounds, we shall be forced to include all idiomatic phrases into the class of compounds. Idiomatic phrases are also susceptible to what H. Paul calls isolation, since the meaning of an idiomatic phrase cannot be inferred from the meaning of components. For instance, one must be specially explained the meaning of the expressions (to rain) cats and dogs, to pay through the nose, etc. It cannot be inferred from the meaning of the elements.

As to morphological criteria of compounds, they are manifold. Prof. A. I. Smirnitsky introduced the criterion of formal integrity. He compares the compound shipwreck and the phrase (the) wreck of (a) ship comprising the same morphemes, and points out that although they do not differ either in meaning or reference, they stand in very different relation to the grammatical system of the language. It follows from his example that a word is characterised by structural integrity non-existent in a phrase. Unfortunately, however, in the English language the number of cases when this criterion is relevant is limited due to the scarcity of morphological means.

“A Grammar of Contemporary English” lists a considerable number of patterns in which plural number present in the correlated phrase is neutralised in a compound. Taxpayer is one who pays taxes, cigar smoker is one who smokes cigars, window-cleaner is one who cleans windows, lip-read is to read the lips. The plural of still-life (a term of painting) is still-lifes and not still lives. But such examples are few. It cannot be overemphasised that giving a mere description of some lexicological phenomenon is not enough; one must state the position of the linguistic form discussed in the system of the language, i.e. the relative importance of the type. Therefore the criterion of structural integrity is also insufficient.

The same is true as regards connective elements which ensure the integrity. The presence of such an element leaves no doubt that the combination is a compound but the number of compounds containing connective elements is relatively insignificant. These elements are few even in languages morphologically richer than English. In our case they are -s- (craftsman), -o- (Anglo-Saxon), -i- (handiwork.)

Diachronically speaking, the type craftsman is due either to the old Genitive (guardsman, kinsman, kinswoman, sportsman, statesman, tradesman, tradeswoman, tradesfolk, tradespeople) or to the plural form.

The Genitive group is kept intact in the name of the butterfly death’s head and also in some metaphorical plant names: lion’s snout, bear’s ear, heart’s ease, etc.

The plural form as the origin of the connective -s- is rarer: beeswax, woodsman, salesman, saleswoman. This type should be distinguished from clothes-basket, goods-train or savings-bank, where the singular form of the word does not occur in the same meaning.

It has already been pointed out that the additive (copulative) compounds of the type Anglo-Saxon are rare, except in special political or technical literature.

Sometimes it is the structural formula of the combination that shows it to be a word and not a phrase. E. g. starlit cannot be a phrase because its second element is the stem of a participle and a participle cannot be syntactically modified by a noun. Besides the meaning of the first element implies plurality which should have been expressed in a phrase. Thus, the word starlit is equivalent to the phrase lit by stars.

It should be noted that lit sounds somewhat, if a very little, obsolete: the form lighted is more frequent in present-day English. This survival of obsolete forms in fixed contexts or under conditions of fixed distribution occurs both in phraseology and composition.

To some authors the syntactical criterion based on comparing the compound and the phrase comprising the same morphemes seems to ,be the most promising. L. Bloomfield points out that “the word black in the phrase black birds can be modified by very (very black birds) but not so the compound-member black in blackbirds." This argument, however, does not permit the distinguishing of compounds from set expressions any more than in the case of the semantic criterion: the first element of black market or black list (of persons under suspicion) cannot be modified by very either.

This objection holds true for the argument of indivisibility advanced by B. Bloch and G. Trager who point out that we cannot insert any word between the elements of the compound blackbird³ The same example black market serves H. Marchand to prove the insufficiency of this criterion. Black market is indivisible and yet the stress pattern shows it is a phrase.

Some transformational procedures that have been offered may also prove helpful. The gist of these is as follows. A phrase like a stone wall can be transformed into the phrase a wall of stone, whereas a toothpick cannot be replaced by a pick for teeth. It is true that this impossibility of transformation proves the structural integrity of the word as compared with the phrase, yet the procedure works only for idiomatic compounds, whereas those that are distinctly motivated permit the transformation readily enough:

a toothpick ↔ a pick for teeth tooth-powder → powder for teeth a tooth-brush →  a brush for teeth

In most cases, especially if the transformation is done within the frame of context, this test holds good and the transformation, even if it is permissible, brings about a change of meaning. For instance, ...the wall-papers and the upholstery recalled ... the refinements of another epoch (Huxley) cannot be transformed without ambiguity into the papers on the wall and the upholstery recalled the refinements of another epoch.

That is why we shall repeat with E. Nida that no one type of criteria is normally sufficient for establishing whether the unit is a compound or a phrase, and for ensuring isolation of word from phrase. In the majority of cases we have to depend on the combination of two or more types of criteria (phonological, morphological, syntactic or graphical). But even then the ground is not very safe and the path of investigation inevitably leads us to the intricate labyrinth of “the stone wall problem” that has received so much attention in linguistic literature.

 

Specific Features Of English Compounds

There are two important peculiarities distinguishing compounding in English from compounding in other languages. Firstly, both immediate constituents of an English compound are free forms, i.e. they can be used as independent words with a distinct meaning of their own. The conditions of distribution will be different but the sound pattern the same, except for the stress. The point may be illustrated by a brief list of the most frequently used compounds studied in every elementary course of English: afternoon, anyway, anybody, anything, birthday, day-off, downstairs, everybody, fountain-pen, grown-up, ice-cream, large-scale, looking-glass, mankind, mother-in-law, motherland, nevertheless, notebook, nowhere, post-card, railway, schoolboy, skating-rink, somebody, staircase, Sunday.

It is common knowledge that the combining elements in Russian are as a rule bound forms (руководство), but in English combinations like Anglo-Saxon, Anglo-Soviet, Indo-European or politico-economical, where the first elements are bound forms, occur very rarely and seem to be avoided. They are coined on the neo-Latin pattern.

The second feature that should attract attention is that the regular pattern for the English language is a two-stem compound, as is clearly testified by all the preceding examples. An exception to this rule is observed when the combining element is represented by a form-word stem, as in mother-in-law, bread-and-butter, whisky-and-soda, deaf-and-dumb, good-for-nothing, man-of-war, mother-of-pearl, stick-in-the-mud.

If, however, the number of stems is more than two, so that one of the immediate constituents is itself a compound, it will be more often the determinant than the determinatum. Thus aircraft-carrier, waste-paper-basket are words, but baby outfit, village schoolmaster, night watchman and similar combinations are syntactic groups with two stresses, or even phrases with the conjunction and: book-keeper and typist.

The predominance of two-stem structures in English compounding distinguishes it from the German language which can coin monstrosities like the anecdotal Vierwaldstatterseeschraubendampfschiffgesellschaft or Feuer- and Unfallversicherungsgesellschaft.

One more specific feature of English compounding is the important role the attributive syntactic function can play in providing a phrase with structural cohesion and turning it into a compound. Compare: ... we’ve done last-minute changes before ...( Priestley) and the same combination as a free phrase in the function of an adverbial: we changed it at the last minute more than once. Cf. four-year course, pass-fail basis (a student passes or fails but is not graded).

It often happens that elements of a phrase united by their attributive function become further united phonemically by stress and graphically by a hyphen, or even solid spelling. Cf. common sense and common-sense advice; old age and old-age pensioner; the records are out of date and out-of-date records; the let-sleeping-dogs-lie approach (Priestley). Cf.: Let sleeping dogs lie (a proverb). This last type is also called quotation compound or  holophrasis. The speaker (or writer, as the case may be) creates those combinations freely as the need for them arises: they are originally nonce-compounds. In the course of time they may become firmly established in the language: the ban-the-bomb voice, round-the-clock duty.

Other syntactical functions unusual for the combination can also provide structural cohesion. E. g. working class is a noun phrase, but when used predicatively it is turned into a compound word. E. g.: He wasn’t working-class enough. The process may be, and often is, combined with conversion and will be discussed elsewhere.

The function of hyphenated spelling in these cases is not quite clear. It may be argued that it serves to indicate syntactical relationships and not structural cohesion, e. g. keep-your-distance chilliness. It is then not a word-formative but a phrase-formative device. This last term was suggested by L. Bloomfield, who wrote: “A phrase may contain a bound form which is not part of a word. For example, the possessive [z] in the man I saw yesterday’s daughter. Such a bound form is a phrase formative." Cf. ... for the I-don’t-know-how-manyth time (Cooper).