Word formation Making new lexemes from existing ones. Kuiper and Allan Chapter

Word formation Lexemes may be: –morphologically simple e.g. cat –or –morphologically complex. catfish

Morphologically complex lexemes have other lexemes as component parts (constituents). –compound lexeme bookshelf –derived lexeme gentleness

Compound lexemes (Kuiper and Allan Chapter 2.2.1) blackboard adjective noun have two lexemes as immediate constituents.

The stress pattern of compounds Compound lexemes normally have primary stress on the first lexeme. –líghthouse vs light hóuse

The grammar of compounds –One lexeme is normally the HEAD. –Head constituents determine the grammatical properties of the whole. –Compounds belong to all the major grammatical categories.

Productivity of compounding Not all compounding structures are productive, i.e. can be used to form new compounds, e.g. compound prepositions.

The meaning of compounds Compounds are usually semantically headed. –i.e. What the whole lexeme denotes is a subset of what the head denotes. –e.g. A steamboat is a kind of boat.

Existing and possible compounds Some compounds are part of your vocabulary. –e.g. lifeboat Others you can make up that have never been made up before and are not part of your vocabulary. –e.g. hatboat

Exercise Find the compounds in the following passage: –A LaserWriter can print a document more quickly if the fonts used in the document are stored in the printer's memory or on a hard disk attached to the printer. Some LaserWriter printers come with built-in fonts, which are stored in the printer's read-only memory (ROM). You can transfer, or download, additional fonts to the printer's random access memory (RAM) or to a hard disk attached to the printer. »System 7 Reference Manual »Apple Computer, Inc.