English Compounds Theoretical Review

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CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter provides theoretical review comprising the theories on which this research is based and previous studies which have been conducted on the similar topic, and theoretical framework. The theoretical review discusses the theories of compounds, and the theoretical framework indicates which theories will be used to analyze the data.

2.1 Theoretical Review

The theoretical review covers the theories of English compounds, English nominal compounds, the differences between compounds and phrases, and two related studies.

2.1.1 English Compounds

Generally, compounding can be defined as the combination of two or more words or morphemes to create a new word. Matthews 1991 says that “compounding is a lexical process: it derives lexemes from lexemes” p.82. Similarl y, Spencer 1991 states that “compounding is prototypically the concatenation of words to form other words p.309. The simplest compounds are constructed from two words only. As what Szymanek 1989 states that “…the simplest possible compound consists of two underived lexemes…” p.37. However, more complex compounds are also possible in which they are constructed from more than two words. Plag 2003 says that “there are compounds with four, five, or even more members, e.g. university teaching award committee member. He further analyzes the above compound using bracketing as seen below Plag, 2003, p.133. 9 [[[university [teaching award]] committee] member] It can be said that compounds have binary structures even though there are more than two words compounded Plag, 2003. Carstairs McCarthy 2002 agree with this statement by saying that “any compound has just two immediate constituents ” p.76. In the above case, the binary structures are university teaching award committee and member. The innermost constituent is [teaching award] which consists of [teaching] and [award]. The next larger constituent is [university teaching award] meanin g ‘the teaching award of the university’. Then, the constituent [university teaching award] is combined with [committee] to form [university teaching award committee ] which means ‘the committee responsible for the university teaching award’. Finally, the largest constituent [university teaching award committee member] is made up of [university teaching award committee] and [member ]. It is said that “…the rules of compound formation are able to repeatedly create the same kind of structure. This property is called recursivity” Plag, 2003, p.134. Katamba 1993 agrees that English compounds are recursive, and that is why they are unlimited in size. In other words, “the compound can itself be an element in a larger compound ” Carstairs McCarthy, 2002, p.77, just as shown in the above example in which the compound teaching award is used repeatedly to form another compound which is larger. Moreover, the elements like bound elements astro-, bio-, photo-, grammatical words teeth marks, systems analyst, and syntactic phrases off-the-rack dress, over-the-fence gossip can occur in compounds Plag, 2003. According to Plag 2003, “Compounds exhibit what is called a modifier- head structure. The left-hand member somehow modifies the right- hand member” PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 10 p.135. In other words, the element on the right-hand is the head. If the head is a verb, the compound will be a verb, if the head is a count noun, the compound will be a count noun, and so on. Likewise, to determine that a compound is in a plural form, the plural marking is not given in the non-head but the head. It is confirmed by Katamba 1993 saying that “syntactically the head is the dominant constituent of the entire compound word. Normally inflectional properties of the head e.g. tense, number, and so on percolate to the entire compound” p.305. Here is the structure of compounds according to Plag 2003, p.137. [X Y] Y X = {root, wood, phrase} Y = {root, wood} Y = grammatical properties inherited from Y The stress pattern in compounds, particularly nominal compounds, is different from that in phrases. As what Plag 2003 states, “Compounds tend to be stressed on the first element which is called compound- stress rule” p.137. Equally, Szymanek 1989 says that prominent stress exists in the modifying pre- head element. However, the stress pattern for compounds consisting of more than two words is different. For example, [government [[pay review] policy]] will be stressed: government páy review policy [[government pay] [review policy]] will be stressed: gòvernment pay reviéw policy Another example is taken from Plag, 2003, p.140. [[máil delivery] service] means a service related to máil delivery [mail [delívery service]] is a delívery service concerned with mail Spencer 1991 states that stress makes the meaning clear because it indicates the structure of the constituent. Simil arly, Plag 2003 agrees that “certain interpretations consistently go together with certain stress patterns” p.140. Although the stress pattern is different, there is one general conclusion that can be 11 drawn from those patterns: “The most prominent stress is always placed on the left-hand member of the compound inside the compound and never on the member of the compound that is not a comp ound itself” Plag, 2003, p.140. According to Spencer 1991, there are two characteristic properties of compounds. First, compounding resembles syntax, and second, it is similar to word-formation. This idea is supported by Matthews 1991 saying that “compound words have structures that are syntax-like” p.85. In term of the first characteristic property, compounding is said to be recursive, just similar to syntax. An example has been previously provided in 1, i.e. the compound teaching award is repeatedly used to form a complex compound university teaching award and a more complex compound university teaching award committee and so on. This is referred to as layers of compounds by Matthews 1991. “The second point is that compounds have a constituent structure, which in general is dependent on the way the compound is built up” Spencer, 1991, p.310. For instance, example 1 can be interpreted as [university [teaching award]] which means the teaching award of the university; or [[university teaching] award] which means award for university teaching. The last aspect of why compounding is said to be similar to syntax is the relations among the elements in compounds which resemble the sentence constituents Spencer, 1991. The relations include head-modifier, predicate-argument, and apposition. In term of the second characteristic property, the similarity of compounding and word-formation is due to the lexicalization of compounds. “They are then often subject to semantic drift of a kind associated with stored words, which means that their meaning becomes non-compositional or even 12 totally idiosyncratic” Spencer, 1991, p.312. Likewise, Bybee 1985 states that “compounding resembles lexical expression in that the resulting unit is a word, and the meaning of this word is not predictable from a summation of the meaning of its parts ” p.106. To exemplify, although the original meaning is the knife used for cutting quills, the compound penknife has nothing to do with pens. In addition, according to Spencer 1991, non-referentiality also contributes to the aspect why compounding is linked to words. It means that certain objects are not specifically referred by the non- heads. “For instance, neither student nor film in student film society serve to pick out any specific student or film. This is why these non-heads can be used attributively” Spencer, 1991, p.312.

2.1.2 English Nominal Compounds