English nominal compounds in online newspaper Articles
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ENGLISH NOMINAL COMPOUNDS IN ONLINE NEWSPAPER ARTICLES
A Thesis Presented to
The Graduate Program in English Language Studies In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
for the Degree of Magister Humaniora (M.Hum.)
in
English Language Studies
by
Hernita Ratna Aulia 146332025
Sanata Dharma University Yogyakarta
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DEDICATION PAGE
“I dedicate this thesis to
Allah SWT,
my late father, Herry Sulistyawan Purnomosidi,
my mother, Eni Suwarni,
my brother, Nicki Sukmawan Putra,
and the special one, Adityo”
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Alhamdulilahirrabbil’alamiin, I firstly would like to express my gratitude to Allah SWT for the blessings and bliss of my whole life, the one who gives me patience, strength, and spirit so that I could finish this thesis.
I deliver my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. Fr. B Alip, M.Pd., M.A. for his patience and guidance in supporting and teaching me during the process of doing this work. I would have done nothing without his advice and encouragement. I would also like to thank all lecturers of the Graduate Program in English Language Studies of Universitas Sanata Dharma for sharing their valuable and useful knowledge during my study in this university and the reviewers as well as examiners of my thesis: Dr. B.B. Dwijatmoko, M.A., Dr. J. Bismoko, and Dr. E. Sunarto, M.Hum.
I specially dedicate this thesis to my late father, Herry Sulistyawan Purnomosidi. I am glad to finish this so that I could continue what you had not finished yet. I express my greatest gratitude to my mother, Eni Suwarni, whom I owe everything in my whole life, thanks for always supporting and praying for me. For my brother, Nicki Sukmawan Putra, keep fighting and do the best for your future. Moreover, I dedicate my special thanks to my aunt who always supports me spiritually and materially so that I could finish my study in university Thank you for everything you have given me.
I would like to thank all my classmates ELS C 2014 and Linguistics Class for the togetherness and lesson we share. I am glad to have them. Great thanks to my bestfriends who always encouraged me to do this thesis, Mbak Ajeng and Lisa. I love you so much. May God bless you all and your family. I also give my gratitude to those who have helped me find books, references, data, and anything I needed to finish this thesis. To whom I may have forgotten to mention, I offer my most sincere apologies.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
COVER PAGE ... i
APPROVAL PAGE ... ii
DEFENSE APPROVAL PAGE ... iii
STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY ... iv
DEDICATION PAGE ... v
LEMBAR PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI ... vi
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ... vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS ... viii
LIST OF TABLES ... x
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ... xi
LIST OF APPENDICES ... xii
ABSTRACT ... xiii
ABSTRAK ... xiv
CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Research Background... 1
1.2 Research Questions ... 5
1.3 Problem Limitation ... 5
1.4 Research Objectives ... 6
1.5 Research Benefits ... 7
CHAPTER 2LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Theoretical Review ... 8
2.1.1 English Compounds ... 8
2.1.2 English Nominal Compounds ... 12
2.1.2.1 Headed Compounds ... 13
2.1.2.1.1 Right-headed Compounds ... 13
2.1.2.1.2 Left-headed Compounds ... 15
2.1.2.2 Headless Compounds ... 15
2.1.2.2.1 Exocentric/Bahuvrihi compounds ... 15
2.1.2.2.2 Copulative/Dvandva compounds ... 17
2.1.3 Compounding and Phrases ... 18
2.1.4 Related Studies ... 20
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CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY
3.1 Type of Research... 23
3.2 Data Source ... 23
3.3 Data Collection Technique ... 24
3.4 Technique of Analysis... 25
CHAPTER 4FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 4.1 Elements of Nominal Compounds ... 29
4.1.1 N+N Pattern ... 29
4.1.2 V+N Pattern ... 34
4.1.3 A+N Pattern ... 37
4.1.4 P+N Pattern ... 40
4.1.5 Other Patterns ... 42
4.2 Types of Nominal Compounds ... 44
4.2.1 Headed Compounds ... 45
4.2.1.1 Right-hand Head Compounds ... 45
4.2.1.2 Left-hand Head Compounds ... 49
4.2.2 Headless Compounds ... 50
4.2.2.1 Exocentric Compounds ... 50
4.2.2.2 Copulative Compounds ... 53
CHAPTER 5CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 5.1 Conclusion ... 55
5.2 Recommendations ... 56
BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 58
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LIST OF TABLES
Table 3.1: An example of how the data are presented to answer research question 1...26
Table 3.2: An example of how the data are presented to answer research question 2...28
Table 4.3: Two-word nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in TJP...30
Table 4.4: One-word nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in TJP...31
Table 4.5: N+N nominal compounds in TJP with ambiguous elements...31
Table 4.6: Nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in NYT...32
Table 4.7: One-word nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in NYT...33
Table 4.8: N+N nominal compounds in NYT with ambiguous elements...34
Table 4.9: Nominal compounds composed of verbs and nouns in TJP...35
Table 4.10: Nominal compounds composed of verbs and nouns in NYT...36
Table 4.11: Nominal compounds composed of adjectives and nouns in TJP...37
Table 4.12: Nominal compounds composed of adjectives and nouns in NYT...38
Table 4.13: Nominal compounds composed of prepositions and nouns in TJP...40
Table 4.14: Nominal compounds composed of prepositions and nouns in NYT...41
Table 4.15: Nominal compounds composed of other patterns in TJP...42
Table 4.16: Patterns of nominal compounds in TJP and NYT...43
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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
TJP : The Jakarta Post NYT : New York Times
N : noun
A : adjective
V : verb
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LIST OF APPENDICES
APPENDIX 1: Patterns of Nominal Compounds in The Jakarta Post ... 60
APPENDIX 2: Patterns of Nominal Compounds in New York Times ... 67
APPENDIX 3: Types of Nominal Compounds in The Jakarta Post ... 75
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xiii ABSTRACT
Hernita Ratna Aulia. 2017. English Nominal Compounds in Online Newspaper Articles. Yogyakarta: The Graduate Program in English Language
Studies, Sanata Dharma University.
Compounding as one of the word-formation processes in English is considered the most productive as it can produce words with specific meanings. In particular, nominal compound becomes the main subject in this research because this is the most common type of compound in English which poses difficulties about distinguishing such compounds from noun phrases. This research firstly attempts to discover elements that make up nominal compounds. Secondly, it aims to reveal the most common type of nominal compounds appearing in newspaper articles.
This research focuses on the most basic form of English nominal compounds, so the data were nominal compounds composed of two elements. They were collected from online newspaper articles of both local and international newspapers, namely The Jakarta Post and New York Times. They were gathered from articles in the same topic and length in World column published in one-week edition starting from 25 to 31 October 2016. The data were then presented in tables showing the elements, which include Nouns, Adjectives, Verbs, and Prepositions, as well as the types, which include headed and headless compounds.
The research findings show that nominal compounds composed of N+N are the most common in both newspapers. It is also revealed that, apart from N+N, A+N, V+N, and P+N, other patterns of nominal compounds are possible. In TJP, the possible patterns are V+P, P+V, and N+A, whereas in NYT the only possible pattern is V+P. Furthermore, more than three fourths of the data found in both newspapers indicate that endocentric compounds with right-hand heads are the most frequent compounds appearing in the articles, compared to other types, such as exocentric and copulative compounds. In the meantime, the rarest types of nominal compounds are left-hand head endocentric and copulative compound.
This research is expected to give useful knowledge and information not only for students but also for other researchers. It is important for students to be more aware of nominal compounds, as opposed to phrases. Moreover, other researches focusing on this topic are necessary to carry out so that English nominal compounds can be clearly and elaborately discussed, considering that nominal compounds are recursive, that is they can be used to form larger and more complex compounds that might cause problem in the interpretation of nominal compounds.
Keywords: Nominal Compounds, Newspapers, World Column, Endocentric
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xiv ABSTRAK
Hernita Ratna Aulia. 2017. English Nominal Compounds in Online Newspaper Articles. Yogyakarta: Proram Pasca Sarjana Kajian Bahasa Inggris,
Universitas Sanata Dharma.
Compounding yang merupakan salah satu proses pembentukan kata dalam bahasa Inggris dianggap sebagai proses yang paling produktif karena dapat menghasilkan kata-kata yang memiliki makna yang spesifik. Pokok bahasan dalam penelitian ini adalah kata benda majemuk yang merupakan jenis kata majemuk yang paling umum dalam bahasa Inggris. Tetapi, jenis kata majemuk ini berpotensi menimbulkan masalah tentang perbedaannya dengan frasa kata benda. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menemukan elemen-elemen yang membentuk kata benda majemuk. Selain itu, penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menemukan jenis kata benda majemuk yang paling sering muncul di artikel koran.
Penelitian ini berfokus pada kata benda majemuk, yang dibentuk dari dua elemen, yang ditemukan di artikel online koran lokal dan internasional, yaitu The Jakarta Post dan New York Times. Data penelitian ini diambil dari artikel dengan topik dan panjang yang sama yang ada di kolom Dunia. Data tersebut diambil dari artikel yang diterbitkan selama satu minggu dari tanggal 25 sampai 31 Oktober 2016. Setelah semua data terkumpul, data kemudian disajikan dengan menggunakan tabel untuk lebih jelas menunjukkan elemen-elemen apa saja yang membentuk kata benda majemuk dan jenis apa saja yang muncul di artikel-artikel tersebut.
Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa kata benda majemuk yang dibentuk dari N+N merupakan kata benda majemuk yang paling sering digunakan di artikel kedua koran tersebut. Hasil penelitian juga menunjukkan bahwa terdapat pola-pola lainnya yang dapat membentuk kata benda majemuk, seperti V+P, P+V, dan N+A di koran The Jakarta Post, dan V+P di koran New York Times. Selain itu, lebih dari tiga perempat data yang ditemukan menunjukkan bahwa kata benda majemuk endocentric adalah jenis kata benda majemuk yang paling sering muncul di artikel kedua koran tersebut. Sementara itu, jenis kata benda majemuk yang paling jarang muncul adalah kata benda majemuk endocentric dengan head di elemen pertama dan kata benda majemuk copulative.
Penelitian ini diharapkan untuk dapat memberikan pengetahuan dan informasi yang berguna tidak hanya untuk para murid tapi juga para peneliti lainnya. Para murid diharapkan untuk dapat mengenali kata benda majemuk yang sering keliru dengan frase kata benda. Selain itu, para peneliti lainnya diharapkan untuk dapat melakukan penelitian dengan topik yang sama agar kata benda majemuk dapat dibahas secara jelas dan lebih mendalam, mengingat bahwa kata benda majemuk bersifat recursive yang dapat menimbulkan masalah dalam menafsirkan maknanya.
Kata Kunci: Kata Benda Majemuk, Koran, Kolom Dunia, Kata Benda Majemuk Endocentric, Kata Benda Majemuk Exocentric, Kata Benda Majemuk Copulative.
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1 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION
In this chapter, there are 5 parts discussed that include research background describing the general information why this research is carried out, research questions stating the problem formulation, problem limitation indicating the scope of this research, research objectives covering what this research aims at, and research benefits showing the significance of this research.
1.1 Research Background
Morphological processes are divided into two types, according to Szymanek (1989), namely concatenative and nonconcatenative. Concatenative processes include compounding, incorporation, and affixation. On the other hand, nonconcatenative processes consist of reduplication, internal modification, conversion, and back-derivation. This research discusses compounding as one of the concatenative processes which “is the freest, involves the largest class of items, with the richest and most specific meanings” (Bybee 1985, as cited in Szymanek 1989).
Compounding as one of the productive processes in word formation is common in English (Libben, 2006; Fernández & Domínguez, 2010; Hendrickx, Kozareva, Nakov, S´eaghdha, Szpakowicz, & Veale, 2013). It can be used to form larger and more complex compounds which may, therefore, create difficulty in comprehending it. As what Plag (2003) argues, “Although compounding is the most productive type of word-formation process in English, it is perhaps also the most controversial one in terms of its linguistic analysis” (p.132). This is the first reason why this research is conducted to examine English compound. He further
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argues that the relation between the elements in a compound is complex so that several analyses are utilized in clarifying the meaning of compounds (Plag, 2003). Those analyses of compounding involve syntactic theory representation, such as labeled bracketing and tree-diagrams (Szymanek, 1989). Spencer (1991) equally argues that “the existence of compound words regularly poses difficulties even when we wish merely to provide a language-particular definition of wordhood (p.309). Moreover, another reason why this research is conducted is because people have difficulties in identifying compounds and syntactic phrases so this research attempts to give a solution to the problem. It is expected to help people distinguish compounds from phrases.
In particular, English nominal compound is examined in this research because it constitutes the most common type of word-formation processes in English. It is supported by Plag (2003) saying that “noun-noun compounds are the most common type of compound in English” (p.145). Likewise, Carstairs & McCarthy (2002) also agree that this type of compound is common. In English, nominal compounds can be more easily found than any other types of compounds like compound verbs or compound adjectives. “Cultural and technical change produces more novel artefacts than novel activities or novel properties. These changes therefore generate new vocabulary needs that are more readily answered by new nouns than by new verbs or adjectives” (Carstairs & McCarthy, 2002, p.61). Furthermore, compounding is free and open that it may include meanings, that are idiosyncratic or unpredictable, and elements with more possible items, just like what Bybee (1985) says that “Compounding is the freest, involves the largest class of items, with the richest and most specific meanings (p.108). Thus, it
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is interesting to carry out a research on this type of nominal compound regarding its productivity. Szymanek (1989) declares that “one obvious reason for this continuing interest in compounding is its productivity, the simple fact that compounds are such a characteristic and frequently encountered trait of the English language in all its styles and dialects” (p.36).
Compounding is defined as the lexical process of combining two or more words to form a new word (Matthews, 1991; Spencer, 1991). Szymanek (1989) states that “…the simplest possible compound consists of two underived lexemes…” (p.37). However, more complex compounds constructed from more than two words are also possible (Plag, 2003). The stress pattern of compounds occurs on the first element (Szymanek, 1989; Spencer, 1991; Plag, 2003; Jackson & Punske, 2013). The left-hand elements of compound modify the right-hand elements functioning as the head. The subject of this research, i.e. nominal compounds are compounds whose heads are nouns. The possible first elements of compound nouns are nouns, adjectives, verbs, and prepositions (Szymanek, 1989; Spencer, 1991; Carstairs & McCarthy, 2002). There are three types of nominal compounds according to Plag (2003) namely endocentric, exocentric, and copulative compounds. In endocentric compounds, “The semantic head of these compounds is inside the compound, which is the reason why these compounds are called endocentric compounds (Plag, 2003, p.145). Bauer & Tarasova also argue that endocentric compounds are “ones which are hyponyms of their righthand element” (p.2). The examples are garden party, literature book. Meanwhile, exocentric compound refers to those which lack of heads because “the unit as a whole belongs to a different external distribution class from the nuclear
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constituent or from both of the immediate constituents” (Nida, 1949, p.94). The examples are pickpocket, loudmouth. Finally, copulative compounds are mentioned to have two heads because there is no element which is more important than the other. It is stated by Plag (2003) that “…no member is semantically prominent, but both members equally contribute to the meaning of the compound” (p.146). The examples are speaker-listener, secretary-treasurer.
This research investigates the use of English nominal compounds in online newspaper articles. The reason why newspapers are used as the data source is because they are regarded as the most resourceful mass media which people read in order to get the information about what is happening both nationally and internationally. The researcher believes that newspapers are a good source of getting nominal compounds because the writers of newspaper articles are constrained by deadline so there is a tendency to use nominal compounds to save time. The online version is chosen as nowadays technology has become more and more advanced so that more and more people prefer to read online because of practicality and accessibility. They can easily access the websites of newspapers anywhere and anytime. Moreover, reading newspapers online is free of charge compared to reading the printed ones that people have to buy them. In this research, Indonesian newspaper, The Jakarta Post, and American newspaper, New York Times, are the data sources. The reason why an international newspaper is used is because native speakers of English are skilful in modifying the words so that the newspaper mentioned is a rich source for English compounds, particularly nominal compounds. The articles taken online are those which are similar in topic and length.
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5 1.2 Research Questions
The research questions in this research include:
1. What elements make up nominal compounds found respectively in The Jakarta Post and New York Times news articles?
2. What types of nominal compounds appear frequently in The Jakarta Post and New York Times news articles?
1.3 Problem Limitation
The research topic that is discussed is limited to nominal compounds only because this type of compound is considered as the most common compound. Specifically, the nominal compounds that are used as the data in this research are those consisting of maximum two elements only although nominal compounds composing of more than 2 elements are likely. The reason is because the researcher intends to explore the most basic form of nominal compound, so that this research could easily give a clear understanding about the problems related to nominal compounds.
As mentioned in the research background, two different newspapers are utilized in this research, namely The Jakarta Post and New York Times. The Indonesian newspaper The Jakarta Post is chosen to be the data source because it constitutes the most popular newspapers in Indonesia written in English. In other words, Indonesians are much more familiar with this newspaper compared to others, such as The Jakarta Globe, Inside Indonesia, and The President Post. Besides, The Jakarta Post is acknowledged to have accurate and educated coverage with good analysis (Pakpahan, 2009). Meanwhile, New York Times is chosen because of its excellence in journalism proven with 122 Pulitzer Prizes
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achieved by this newspaper. None of other newspapers have ever achieved this number of prizes. The website of New York Times is said to be one of the top websites since it was first launched.
The online versions of both newspapers are used in this research considering that this version is practical and accessible. It is easy for the researcher to reach the data anytime and anywhere without having to deal with the printed ones. In addition, the online version of the newspapers is also free of charge. To find the nominal compounds in the articles of the newspapers, the researcher focuses on World column in the websites of each newspaper reporting about what is currently happening in the world so that the topics of the articles from both newspapers are more or less equal. The world topics cover issues happening in Africa, Americas, Asia, Australia, Europe, and Middle East.
1.4 Research Objectives
Based on the two research questions, this research firstly attempts to discover English nominal compounds appearing in the online articles of Indonesian and American newspapers. It is mentioned earlier that the newspapers used in this research are The Jakarta Post and New York Times. The first objective of this research is to figure out the elements that make up English nominal compounds. As a recursive process, nominal compounds can be used to create longer and more complex compounds which involve more than one different element.
Secondly, it tries to find out the type of nominal compounds appearing frequently in the articles by identifying the heads of the compounds. A compound is called endocentric compound if the head is inside the compound itself. On the
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other hand, exocentric compound is used to refer to a compound whose meaning or head cannot be drawn from the words inside the compound. The last type of English nominal compound is called copulative compound that has two heads inside the compound.
1.5 Research Benefits
This research provides both theoretical and practical benefits. Firstly, it is theoretically expected to provide beneficial information for readers in general on English nominal compounds as it presents detail explanations on the topic and how English nominal compounds are made up. Secondly, it also provides an alternative theory or reference for the upcoming studies conducted on the same topic so that they can give further elaboration and explanation on English nominal compounds.
In addition to theoretical benefits, this research is also expected to give practical benefits. The first benefit includes giving solution to the problem so that the meanings of English nominal compound, particularly the larger and more complex one, can be easily interpreted. Secondly, the benefit contributes to a better understanding of the form, meaning, and usage of English nominal compounds as well as a better understanding of the phenomenon.
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8 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). Similarly, 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).
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[[[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] meaning ‘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
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(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. Similarly, 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
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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 compound 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
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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
Like what the name suggests, nominal compounds are compounds whose heads are nouns. This is the most common type of English compound (Plag, 2003; Szymanek, 1989; Katamba, 1993). This kind of compounds may involve nouns, verbs, and adjectives as the elements which are not the heads. This idea is supported by Szymanek (1989) who declares that “compounding crucially involves putting together two (or more) lexical items, representing the major
syntactic categories N, V, A” (p.37). However, according to Spencer (1991), the
syntactic category P (prepositions) is also included in the elements of nominal compounds. In noun-noun compound, it is not possible to do consistent transformation because generally, the first noun of the compound modifies the second (Matthews, 1991). These are the possible elements composing nominal compounds according to Carstairs & McCarthy (2002, p.62):
verb-noun (VN): swearword, drophammer, playtime
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adjective-noun (AN): blackboard, greenstone, faintheart preposition-noun (PN): in-group, outpost, overcoat
As what Plag (2003), Szymanek (1989), and Spencer (1991) argue, compound-stress rule occurs in the first element of the compound itself. “All of these have the main stress on the left. The fact that hair restorer, butterfly net, and mosquito net are spelled with a space does not affect the fact that, from the grammatical point of view, they each constitute one complex word” (McCarthy (2002, p.62).
According to Katamba (1993), English nominal compounds are generally classified into two categories and below are the explanations.
2.1.2.1 Headed Compounds
There are two categories of headed compounds, namely right-headed and left-headed compounds.
2.1.2.1.1 Right-headed Compounds
Katamba (1993) states that most English compounds have heads in their right element, and those compounds can be called endocentric compounds because, according to Plag (2003), “The semantic head of these compounds is inside the compound, which is the reason why these compounds are called endocentric compounds (endo- means ‘inside’)”. Nida (1949) agrees with this statement by saying that “endocentric constructions are those in which the unit as a whole belongs to substantially the same external distribution class as the nuclear immediate constituent or both immediate constituents” (p.94). Here are the examples:
garden party magazine cover literature book
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A garden party is a kind of party, a magazine cover is a kind of cover, and literature book is a book of literature. Thus, it is clear that the head of those compounds can be found inside the compounds themselves. Spencer (1991) mentions that “in endocentric compounds one element functions as the head. Most English compounds are of this type” (p.310). In addition, endocentric nominal compounds are characterized by recursiveness (Szymanek, 1989). It is, therefore, possible for this type of compounds to have long and complex constructions.
The head itself is what determines the category of the whole compound as what is said by Katamba (1993), “It is clear...that the right-hand constituent is the one whose syntactic category like (noun, verb, adjective) percolates to the entire compound word” (p.311). To show that a compound is plural, it is the head which should be inflected by the plural form, and the two possible analyses of inflected compounds is as follows according to Katamba (1993).
(a.) N̅ [+pl.] (b.) N̿ [+pl.]
N N [+pl.] N [+pl.] Af [+pl.]
N [+pl.] Af [+pl.] N N [+pl.]
air port s air port s
The first possibility is that affixation happens in the head of the compound and then compounding is established, as seen in example (a), while the second possibility, example (b), compounding is established first and attached to the plural form –s. However, in a case where irregular inflection occurs as in firemen, field mice, underwrote, outdid, oversaw, the analysis in example (a) would be appropriate “...since there is no separate inflectional affix and the inflection is assigned directly to the second element” (Katamba, 1993, p.313).
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15 2.1.2.1.2 Left-headed Compounds
As the name implies, left-headed compounds are those whose heads are in the left-hand element of the compound. Like the right-hand head rule, these compounds are also referred to as endocentric compounds because the head is inside the compound (Plag, 2003; Nida, 1949). It is mentioned earlier that an inflectional affix is attached in the head component as mentioned by Katamba (1993) that “the genuine generalisation which we should attempt to capture is that inflectional affixes are (normally) attached to the head, regardless of whether it is on the left or on the right of a compound” (p.319). Thus, the affix or in this case, a plural morpheme is inflected in the left element, as seen in the list below (Quirk and Greenbaum, 1973, p.84).
singular plural
passer-by passers-by (*passer-bys)
notary public notaries public (*notary publics) grant-in-aid grants-in-aid (*grant-in-aids) coat of mail coats of mail (*coat of mails) mother-in-law mothers-in-law (*mother-in-laws) 2.1.2.2 Headless Compounds
There are two categories of headless compounds, namely exocentric/bahuvrihi and copulative/dvandva compounds.
2.1.2.2.1 Exocentric/Bahuvrihi Compounds
Unlike endocentric compounds, the semantic head of exocentric compounds is outside the compounds (Plag, 2003). Like what Nida (1949) states that “exocentric constructions are those in which the unit as a whole belongs to a different external distribution class from the nuclear constituent or from both of the immediate constituents” (p.94). In line with this statement, Spencer (1991) mentions that “a compound which lacks a head is called exocentric. Such compounds are sometimes called bahuvrihi compounds, a term used by Sanskrit
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grammarians. Examples in English are not common” (p.311). Here are the examples:
pickpocket redneck loudmouth
From a semantic point of view, those compounds are headless because the meaning of the entire compound does not refer to any of the meanings of its constituents. They lack heads, meaning that the head is not determined within the compound, and the meaning of this type of compound is outside the head itself (Carstairs & McCarthy, 2002 & Spencer, 1991). A pickpocket is someone who picks pocket. It does not mean a kind of pocket. A redneck is not a kind of neck but a kind of person, and loudmouth refers to a kind of person as well. They are not related to a kind of neck or mouth. “Many of those that do exist are (predominantly) pejorative terms referring to people” (Spencer, 1991, p.311). The compounds normally refer to “someone or something marked by what is expressed in the composite determinant” (Marchand 1969, as cited in Szymanek 1989). In other words, the meaning of an exocentric compound is not predictable “so there is a case for listing their meanings in the lexicon” (Katamba, 1993, p.320).
From a syntactic point of view, however, these compounds are not headless because they are established according to the phrase structure rule in which the compound pickpocket is generated by the rule N V N, while the compounds redneck and loudmouth are generated by the rule N A N (Katamba, 1993). They basically apply RHR.
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17 2.1.2.2.2 Copulative/Dvandva Compounds
Copulative compounds are considered to have two heads because there is no element which is more important than the other. It is stated by Plag (2003) that “…no member is semantically prominent, but both members equally contribute to the meaning of the compound” (p.146). Similarly, “It is possible for a compound to be a simple conjunction of two elements, without any further dependency holding between them. The Sanskrit term dvandva (literally ‘two-and-two’, meaning ‘pair’) is used to describe these” (Spencer, 1991, p.311). Here are the examples:
speaker-listener secretary-treasurer the doctor-patient gap the nature-nurture debate
The first and second examples are called appositional compounds because they “refer to one entity that is characterized by both members of the compound” (Plag, 2003, p.146). In principle, appositional compounds are reversible (Szymanek, 1989). Thus, one can say either speaker-listener or listener-speaker. Meanwhile, the last two examples are called coordinative compounds because they “denote two entities that stand in a particular relationship with regard to the following noun” (Plag, 2003, p.146).
Copulative compounds are headed from a syntactic point of view because they obey RHR in which the head, in the right-hand component, is where the affixation is attached as in player-managers, worker-priests and boyfriends (Katamba, 1993). However, from a semantic point of view, “the coupled elements are of equal status, with neither element being regarded as the head that dominates
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the entire word. Copulative compounds are not semantically opaque” (Katamba, 1993, p.321).
2.1.3 Compounding and Phrases
To differentiate compounds and phrases, there are at least four aspects to consider. The first aspect is in term of morphology. The elements of compounds are uninterruptable. “One property of words which distinguishes them from phrases is morphological integrity: their elements can’t be split up by other words or phrases, for example, by parentheticals” (Spencer, 1991, p.313). In other words, it is not possible to insert a word within constructions of compounds. Szymanek (1989) supports this idea by stating that “a criterion which may appear more promising in bringing out the word-like nature of compounds, as opposed to phrases, is the property of ‘uninterruptability’” (p.42). However, there are some exceptions regarding this notion. The compounds spoonful and bagful, as examples, can be interrupted by the plural marker –s (Szymanek, 1989). Furthermore, compounds are not completely productive. As examples, “BLACKBIRD and BLUEBIRD, BLACKTHORN and WHITETHORN are lexemes, but ‘whitebird’ and ‘redbird’, ‘greenthorn’ and ‘pinkthorn’ are not. In this case it is obvious which forms a dictionary has to list.” (Matthews, 1991, p.83).
Secondly, in phonological perspective, compounds and phrases are different in their stress patterns. It is mentioned earlier that the primary stress of compounds occurs on the first element whereas in phrases, the primary stress is on the last element (Bybee, 1985; Plag, 2003; Szymanek, 1989; Spencer 1991). In addition, if seen from the perspective of semantics, this stress pattern determines
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the meaning of the compound itself like what Carstairs & McCarthy (2002) says that “the distinction between compounds and phrases is valid. There is a difference in sound corresponding to the difference in meaning: in a green house, with its literal meaning, the main stress in on house, while in a greenhouse, meaning a glass structure where delicate plants are reared, the main stress is on green” (p.59).
Furthermore, “Apart from stress, a second criterion traditionally used for distinguishing compounds from phrases is semantic: a compound tends to have a meaning that is more or less idiosyncratic or unpredictable” (Carstairs & McCarthy, 2002, p.60). The meaning is said to be unpredictable because it cannot be revealed from the meanings of the elements forming the compound. Here are some more examples of semantic contrast between expressions stressed in different places, taken from Carstairs & McCarthy (2002, p.59).
(1) black bóard bláckboard
‘board that is black’ ‘board for writing on’
(2) silk wórm sílkworm
‘worm made of silk (e.g. a soft toy)’ ‘caterpillar that spins silk’
(3) hair nét háirnet
‘net made of hair’ ‘net for covering hair’
(4) white hóuse (the) Whíte House
‘house that is white’ ‘residence of the US President’
(5) toy fáctory tóy factory
‘factory that is a toy (e.g. in a model city)’ ‘factory where toys are made’
It is obviously seen that the left items are phrases since they are stressed on the last word whereas the right items are compounds as they are stressed on the first element.
Fourthly, the last point determining compounds and phrases is orthography which is “spelling convention for compounds. Some compounds are written as
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single words (postcard, football), in others the constituents are hyphenated (sound-wave, tennis-ball), and in still others the constituent elements are spaced off (blood bank, game ball)” (Szymanek, 1989, p.41). Orthography is deemed helpless in determining whether or not a construction is a compound (Katamba, 1993).
2.1.4 Related Studies
There have been at least two studies conducted on English nominal compounds. The first study was written by Nadia Gitya Yulianita as an undergraduate thesis in English Language Education, Universitas Sanata Dharma. The second study was a journal written by Preslav Nakov entitled On the Interpretation of Noun Compounds: Syntax, Semantics, Entailment.
The first study entitled Compound Nouns in the Articles of the Jakarta Post Online Edition Used by National and International Writers aims to find the types and frequency of compound nouns used by Indonesian and non-Indonesian writers in the articles of the mentioned newspaper. The result showed that national writers used more compound nouns than international writers. The percentages of compound nouns used by national and international writers were 1.9% and 1.5% respectively. Although the data source of this previous study is similar to the present study, the objectives of both studies are different. The present study attempts to find out the types of nominal compounds and elements composing nominal compounds. The topics of the articles are also different since the previous study examined Digital Life column while this present study focuses on the World column.
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The second study entitled On the Interpretation of Noun Compounds: Syntax, Semantics, Entailment was conducted by Preslav Nakov with an underlying reason that interpretation of noun compounds leads to significant problems for automated analysis. The study attempted to prove that the syntax and semantics of noun compounds can help overcome textual entaiment problems. Compared to the present study, the previous study focused on interpreting noun compounds such as colon cancer tumor suppressor protein. Meanwhile, the present study discusses the elements and types of nominal compounds. Although it talks about the meaning of noun compounds in determining the type of nominal compounds, it only emphasis on the most basic form of noun compounds constructing from 2 elements.
2.2 Theoretical Framework
In this research, there are two research questions that will be answered according to the theoretical review that has been previously provided. The first research question is related to the elements that make up nominal compounds found in The Jakarta Post and New York Times news articles. Meanwhile, the second research question deals with the types of nominal compounds appearing frequently in the news articles.
The Jakarta Post is one of Indonesian newspapers written in English that constitutes the most popular one. In other words, Indonesians are much more familiar with this newspaper compared to others, such as The Jakarta Globe, Inside Indonesia, and The President Post. The Jakarta Post is acknowledged to have accurate and educated coverage with good analysis (Pakpahan, 2009). This study utilizes the online version of this newspaper whose website is
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thejakartapost.com. Particularly, articles from the World column are used as the data source containing current issues happening in Asia, America, Europe, Middle East, and so on. Meanwhile, New York Times is one of American newspapers chosen as the data source in this study because of its excellence in journalism proven with 122 Pulitzer Prizes achieved. None of other newspapers have ever achieved this number of prizes. The website of New York Times, nytimes.com, is said to be one of the top websites since it was first launched. This study utilizes the online version of this newspaper, obtaining articles specifically from the World column containing current issues happening in Asia, America, Europe, Middle East, and so on.
In particular, the theory of elements, constituents, and types of nominal compounds from Katamba (1993) and Plag (2003) is utilized in this research. Additionally, some theories from other experts will be used as well to support the main theory including Szymanek (1989), Spencer (1991), Bybee (1985), Carstairs & McCarthy (2002), Nida (1949), and Matthews (1991). The elements of compounds include Nouns as the head with Nouns, Adjectives, Verbs, and Prepositions as modifiers while the constituents deal with constructions of compounds. Finally, the types of nominal compounds include endocentric, exocentric, and copulative compounds.
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23 CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY
This chapter provides information on how this research is carried out in an attempt to answer the research questions which cover what elements compose nominal compounds and what types of nominal compounds frequently appear in the newspapers. It begins with discussing type of research, data source, data collection technique, and technique of analysis.
3.1 Type of Research
This research is categorized as a research of morphology. There are some considerations why this research is regarded to be a morphological research.
Firstly, this research attempts to examine one of morphological processes, which is compounding. Szymanek (1989) mentions that compounding is included in concatenative processes in morphology. It examines two bases which include words or root morphemes. Katamba (1993) argues that a research involving the analysis of roots, stems, and bases is called a morphological research. This is, therefore, said to be a research of morphology also because “compounding creates new items of vocabulary (Bauer, 2003, p.135). In other words, the order of words is very essential in constructing a compound.
3.2 Data Source
This research generally aims to find out nominal compounds in both local and international online newspapers, namely The Jakarta Post and New York Times. It attempts to reveal the elements composing nominal compounds and to identify which type of nominal compounds appears frequently in the newspapers.
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Regarding the focus of the research previously mentioned, the field of this research is morphology.
The object of this research is two newspapers which have been previously mentioned. The online version of the newspapers is chosen because of the accessibility and practicality in collecting the data. In addition, the reason for choosing online newspapers is because it is easy to filter the data because it has been well organized. The websites are thejakartapost.com and nytimes.com. Particularly, articles from the World column are used in this research as the data source.
Newspapers are chosen as the data source because they are resourceful, trustworthy, and always up to date. Since the goal of this research is to discover nominal compounds, newspapers are a good data source because many articles are written there and a lot of nominal compounds can be easily found. The underlying reason why nominal compounds are frequently used in newspapers articles is because newspapers writers work with deadline and so, using nominal compounds in their writings can save the limited time that they have. For example, rather than saying member of committee responsible for the teaching award of university, a newspaper writer can merely write university teaching award committee member. 3.3 Data Collection Technique
The data of this research are nominal compounds collected from 2 different online newspapers, i.e. The Jakarta Post and New York Times, composed of two elements. As mentioned before, this research attempts to analyze nominal compounds in their most basic forms. They are taken from any articles of the same column and length in both newspapers. In other words, articles which can be
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taken for the data collection are those in the World column containing at least 500 words considering that a short article might not ideally provide enough information. The topics are the world issues which might include economic, political, educational, social, and several other issues happening in Africa, Americas, Asia, Australia, Europe, and Middle East.
The data which should be collected are at least 150 nominal compounds for each newspaper. Overall, there are 348 nominal compounds to be collected from both newspapers. To collect the data, the researcher firstly opens the websites of the two newspapers in one-week edition from 25 to 31 October 2016. The websites from which the data are taken are thejakartapost.com and nytimes.com. Afterwards, the researcher opens the World column containing current issues happening in Asia, America, Europe, Middle East, and so on. It is then continued by selecting articles from both newspapers with similar length. Finally, the researcher carefully reads the articles to identify nominal compounds used in both newspapers.
3.4 Technique of Analysis
After all data are collected from both newspapers, they are analyzed in several steps in order to reach the goals of this research. The data will be separately examined to see clearly how nominal compounds work in each newspaper considering that the newspapers used as the data source in this research are both local and international. In writing articles in newspapers, since reporters are constrained by deadline and space, using nominal compound is common and relatively simple. They avoid using complicated structure because it is time-consuming.
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To answer the first research question, the elements making up nominal compounds in each of the 150 nominal compounds found in each newspaper are to be analyzed in this step. Compounds are said to be nominal compounds when the right element, or the head, of the compound is Noun and the possible elements composing nominal compounds in the first elements are Nouns, Adjectives, Verbs, and Prepositions. For example, greenhouse is composed of an adjective green and a noun house. In fact, it will be easier to analyze nominal compounds with simple constructions, meaning that the compounds consist of two words only. However, there is a case when a nominal compound is inside another nominal compound. The word fruit-juice carton, for example, as mentioned earlier, is composed of the nominal compound fruit-juice and carton. Then, the word fruit-juice is also a nominal compound which is repeatedly used to form another nominal compound. Thus, the data consisting of more than two words will be analyzed not only in terms of their elements but also the constituents of the structure by using label bracketing. In the same example, after the elements are analyzed, fruit-juice carton will be labeled [[fruit-juice] carton]] instead of [fruit [juice carton]] because the innermost constituent is fruit-juice then it later forms fruit-juice carton. The data are presented in the table like in the following to clearly show the elements that compose a nominal compound.
Table3.1.An example of how the data are presented to answer research question 1 No. Nominal Compounds Patterns of Nominal Compounds
N+N V+N A+N P+N
1. Greenhouse √
2. Blackboard √
3. Pickpocket √
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As seen above, the first column is the number to show the quantity of nominal compounds found in newspapers. The second column is the nominal compounds themselves. Then, the four last columns are patterns of nominal compound construction. The letter N stands for noun, V for verb, A for adjective, and P for preposition. If a nominal compound is composed of two nouns, the column N+N is ticked, just like the word greenhouse that is composed of an adjective and a noun, so the column A+N is ticked.
To answer the second research question regarding the types of nominal compounds, the data of each newspaper will be gathered and classified according to their types. Plag (2003) mentions that the three types of nominal compounds are endocentric, exocentric, and copulative compounds. Determining the types of nominal compounds can be carried out by analyzing the headedness of the data. According to Katamba (1993), the heads of nominal compounds can exist either in the right or left position inside the compound itself. If the head of the nominal compounds can be found inside the compound itself, they are called endocentric. For instance, a blackbird is a kind of bird and a garden party is a kind of party. In contrast, if the head of the nominal compounds are outside the compound itself, they are called exocentric because the whole meaning of the nominal compound refers to a different external distribution. The examples pickpocket and redneck are not a kind of pocket or neck but a kind of person. In the meantime, nominal compounds are said to be copulative because they have two heads which contribute to the meaning of the compound. As an example, a student-teacher refers to a student who is also a teacher or a teacher who is also a student. There is no element that is more important than the other. They both contribute to the
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whole meaning. In identifying the headedness, a dictionary might be used to figure out the meaning, particularly for nominal compounds consisting of one word as they are listed in the dictionary entry. After all data are classified, the result is presented in the table so that the difference among the types can be obviously seen. The table is given as follows.
Table3.2.An example of how the data are presented to answer research question 2 No. Nominal
Compounds
Types of Nominal Compounds
Headed Compounds Headless Compounds
Right-hand head
Left-hand head
Exocentric Copulative
1. greenhouse √
2. blackboard √
3. pickpocket √
... etc
As shown above, the first column is the numbers indicating the quantity of nominal compounds found in newspapers. The second column is the nominal compounds themselves. Then, the next column is types of nominal compounds that are divided into 2, namely headed and headless compounds. Headed compounds consist of compounds with right-hand and left-hand heads, whereas headless compounds comprise of exocentric and copulative compounds.
More than one theoretical scheme will be involved in analyzing the data. In analyzing the composing elements, constituents, and types of nominal compounds, for instance, theory from Plag (2003) and Katamba (1993) are utilized. In addition to Plag’s and Katamba’s theory, other theories from some other experts are also used to support the main theory, including Szymanek (1989), Spencer (1991), Bybee (1985), Carstairs & McCarthy (2002), Nida (1949), and Matthews (1991).
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29 CHAPTER 4
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
This chapter presents the results of the research and discussion presented according to 2 research questions. The first discussion covers the elements that compose nominal compounds, and the second discusses the types of nominal compounds found in TJP and NYT.
4.1 Elements of Nominal Compounds 4.1.1 N+N Pattern
As previously mentioned in Chapter 1, the first research question is What elements make up nominal compounds found in The Jakarta Post and New York Times news articles? The discussion focuses on the patterns of nominal compound constructions which include, according to Szymanek (1989), noun+noun, verb+noun, and adjective+noun. However, the pattern preposition+noun is also feasible according to Spencer (1991) and Carstairs & McCarthy (2002).
Nominal compounds mostly involve nouns in the last element functioning as the head whereas the first elements can be nouns, verbs, adjectives, and prepositions, as mentioned before. According to the data found in both newspapers, the vast majority of nominal compounds are made up of noun and noun (NN). Noun in the last element is the head of the compound. So, it is true, according to the theory, that nominal compound constitutes the most common compound in English. The data, therefore, approve Plag’s and Carstairs & McCarthy’s theory. Carstairs & McCarthy (2002) state that English nominal compounds can be more easily found than any other types of compounds like compound verbs or compound adjectives. The underlying reason is because
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“cultural and technical change produces more novel artefacts than novel activities or novel properties. These changes therefore generate new vocabulary needs that are more readily answered by new nouns than by new verbs or adjectives” (Carstairs & McCarthy, 2002, p.61).
Of 169 nominal compounds found in TJP, there are 144 compounds made up of nouns and nouns. Some of them are analyzed below.
Table 4.3: Two-word nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in TJP
Nouns Nouns Nominal
Compounds terrorist
insurance TV
contribution
attack payment screen report
terrorist attack insurance payment TV screen
contribution report
In the four examples presented above, the elements of the compounds are written separately resulting in two-word compounds. The heads are modified by the first element of the compound, and they can be paraphrased into: a kind of attack, a kind of payment, a kind of screen, and a kind of report. To put it in another way, the meaning of the compounds can be identified by paraphrasing the compounds using prepositions (Lauer, 1995; Kim & Nakov, 2011). The compounds terrorist attack is an attack from terrorists; insurance payment is payment for insurance; TV screen is a screen of TV; and contribution report is report on contribution. Therefore, it is obvious that the elements coming before the heads are nouns. To show that the compounds are plural, the plural marker –s is inflected in the head element. This is stated by Katamba (1993) saying that it is the head where an inflection, in this case a plural marker, is attached.
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On the other hand, there are N+N nominal compounds which are written as a single word, and the samples are given below.
Table 4.4: One-word nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in TJP
Nouns Nouns Nominal
Compounds foot news chair air ball paper man strike football newspaper chairman airstrike
Both elements in the compounds above are nouns. Syntactically, the heads of those compounds are in the rightmost element in which the first elements of the compounds function as the modifier of the heads. Semantically, the true meanings of the nominal compounds, especially those written as one word, should be assured by looking up in a dictionary since one-word compounds are enlisted as stated by Katamba (1993).
However, ambiguity might exist in the construction of English nominal compounds as a result of words possessing more than one class of word. In the table below, the construction of nominal compounds are obscure whether it is composed of N+N or V+N because the first element of the compounds is both a noun and a verb.
Table 4.5: N+N nominal compounds in TJP with ambiguous elements
Nouns Nouns Nominal
Compounds torture campaign rain gun program plane storm point torture program campaign plane rainstorm gunpoint
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The problem of ambiguity can be solved by considering the meaning of the compound based on the context in the newspaper. For instance, a nominal compound torture program refers to the technique of interrogation carried out by torturing detainees. In other words, torture program is a program of torture for detainees as one of the techniques of interrogation. As another example, the word campaign in a nominal compound campaign plane is a noun because according to the article in the newspaper, the campaign plane is a plane used for a campaign of Republican vice presidential candidate Indiana Gov. Mike Pence. The similar case applies in the nominal compounds rainstorm and gunpoint whose meanings, according to Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, are a sudden heavy fall of rain and under a threat with a gun respectively. Thus, it is clear that the words torture, campaign, rain, and gun are nouns, and that the construction of those compounds is N+N.
In the meantime, in articles in NYT, there are 159 out of 179 compounds made up of nouns and nouns. Some of them are presented below.
Table 4.6: Nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in NYT
Nouns Nouns Nominal
Compounds leg
tourist drug law
brace shop link enforcer
leg brace tourist shop drug link law enforcer
Similar to TJP, NYT has noun-noun nominal compounds as the most productive pattern. The four above examples are composed of two elements that are written separately resulting in two-word compounds. The first elements coming before the head modify the heads. For example, leg brace is a brace for legs; tourist shop is a shop for tourists; drug link is a link of drug; and law
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enforcer is an enforcer of law. In other words, the meanings of nominal compounds can be identified by using prepositions (Lauer, 1995). It is obvious that the first elements modifying the heads are nouns. Although the word leg and tourist in the real meaning refers to something in plural, they cannot be inflected with –s as a plural marker when it comes as the first element of a nominal compound. If a plural marker –s has to be added, it should be attached in the second element to indicate that the entire nominal compound is in plural (Katamba, 1993).
There also examples of N+N compounds written as a single word, as presented below.
Table 4.7: One-word nominal compounds composed of nouns and nouns in NYT
Nouns Nouns Nominal
Compounds wind
home law battle
shield land maker field
windshield homeland lawmaker battlefield
As previously mentioned, identifying the meaning of single-word nominal compounds is much more obvious than identifying the meaning of two-word nominal compounds as nominal compounds written as one word exist in dictionary. Generally, paraphrasing can be carried out to determine the elements of those compounds, for instance windshield is shield to protect from wind, homeland is a land of home, lawmaker is a maker of law, battlefield is a field for battles. Thus, it is clear that both elements of those compounds are nouns in which the first nouns modify the second nouns functioning as the heads.
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However, there is an ambiguity in the nominal compounds whose elements have more than one word class. The table below shows data having obscure construction as a result of the elements that are both a noun and a verb.
Table 4.8: N+N nominal compounds in NYT with ambiguous elements
Nouns Nouns Nominal
Compounds protest
service fire
action men
extinguisher
protest action servicemen fire extinguisher
The nominal compounds given in the table above have ambiguous construction because the first elements of the compounds constitute a verb and a noun. As previously stated, the problem of ambiguity can be overcome by identifying the meaning of the compounds, which is to consider the context in the newspaper. For example, protest action is an action of protest done by Venezuelans as Venezuela’s Electoral Council postponed a drive to gather signatures needed to call the referendum. Next, the word servicemen is men giving military service. The nominal compound fire extinguisher has suffix –er in the second element implying that this nominal compound refers to a device protecting from fire. Thus, it is clear that all nominal compounds mentioned in the table are composed of N+N instead of V+N.
4.1.2 V+N Pattern
There are 6 compounds, from 169 nominal compounds found in TJP, made up of verbs and nouns. The analysis of those compounds can be seen in the following.
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Table 4.9: Nominal compounds composed of verbs and nouns in TJP
Verbs Nouns Nominal
Compounds vote
quake spoke
rigging zone man
vote-rigging quake zone spokesman
From the 6 examples of V+N nominal compounds, almost all are written as one word either with or without hyphens, except quake zone. The constrution of this compound is rather ambiguous because the word quake is both a verb and a noun. As previously mentioned, the context is supposed to be considered to find out the true element of the compound. The nominal compound quake zone means a zone where quake/earthquake happens, thus it can be said that the word quake is obviously a noun.
In the nominal compound vote-rigging, the second element originally comes from a verb rig meaning “to dishonestly arrange the result of an election or competition before it happens” (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English). The word is then attached with suffix –ing to become a noun. The word vote is a noun instead of a verb because the entire compound means the dishonest arrangement of the result of the vote.
The nominal compound spokesman is originally from a verb speak and a noun man. According to its etymology, the word speak changes into spoke that is a back-formation of spoken. According to Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, spokesman means “a man who has been chosen to speak officially for a group, organization, or government.” There is a plural marker –s between the elements of nominal compound. It actually violates the rule that morphologically, a nominal compound is uninterruptable meaning that no words can be placed
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between the compound elements. Spencer (1991) says that “one property of words which distinguishes them from phrases is morphological integrity: their elements can’t be split up by other words or phrases, for example, by parentheticals” (p.313). However, there is an exception as mentioned by Szymanek (1989) stating that the compounds spoonful and bagful, as examples, can be interrupted by the plural marker –s. Similarly, the word spokesman belongs to this exception, but what is important is that the plural marker –s here does not indicate plural meanings because it is mentioned previously that “syntactically the head is the dominant constituent of the entire compound word” (Katamba, 1993, p.305). Thus, the inflectional properties should be attached in the head (e.g. tense, number, and so on).
Three compounds, from 179 nominal compounds found in NYT, are made up of verbs and nouns. The analysis of those compounds can be seen in the following.
Table 4.10: Nominal compounds composed of verbs and nouns in NYT
Verbs Nouns Nominal
Compounds spoke
spoke pick
man woman pocket
spokesman spokeswoman pickpocket
Similar to TJP, V+N nominal compounds found in NYT are written without space. The nominal compounds spokesman and spokeswoman come originally from a verb speak and a noun man/woman. However, the word speak changes into spoke according to its etimology. Then, the suffix –s is also added between the elements of the compounds. This is an exception of a theory saying that nominal compounds are uninterruptable (Spencer, 1991). Other examples
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belonging to this exception, as mentioned by Szymanek (1989), are spoonful and bagful. They can be interrupted by a suffix –s without giving any plural meaning. If a plural meaning is intended, the plural suffix is supposed to be inflected in the head, which is in the right elements of the compounds. The nominal compound pickpocket is composed of a verb pick and a noun pocket. The relation of the first and second element is verb-object in which the word pocket is the object of the first element pick.
4.1.3 A+N Pattern
Of 169 nominal compounds found in TJP, there are 6 compounds made up of adjectives and nouns. Some of them are analyzed below.
Table 4.11: Nominal compounds composed of adjectives and nouns in TJP
Adjectives Nouns Nominal
Compounds main
high grand
land way parent
mainland highway grandparent
When a nominal compound is constructed from an adjective and a noun, there is a great deal of possibility that people are mistaken whether that is a compound or a noun phrase. The difference between a compound and a phrase can be identified by considering four aspects, according to the theory, including morphology, phonetics, semantics, and orthography. However, since this research uses newspapers as data source, identifying compounds and phrases with phonetics aspect, which focuses on the stress patterns, is not feasible. Identifying them with orthographical aspect is not possible either because according to Katamba (1993), “Orthographic conventions offer limited help in distinguishing
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compounds in this newspaper are written as one word. So, it is clear that they are nominal compounds, instead of phrases, because orthographically, they are written as one word, whereas no noun phrases are written as one word. In addition, semantically, those compounds have more specific meanings than noun phrases, and a dictionary is needed to find out the true meanings.
According to Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, mainland is “the main area of land that forms a country, rather than the islands near to it that are also part of it.” Next, highway is “a wide main road that joins one town to another.” Lastly, grandparent is “one of the parents of your mother or father.” Hence, the heads or nouns are not merely modified by the adjectives but the compounds themselves have more specific meanings. Like idioms, the meanings of one-word compounds are unpredictable and should be assured by looking up in dictionary (Katamba, 1993).
From 179 nominal compounds found in NYT, there are 6 compounds made up of adjectives and nouns. All of them are analyzed below.
Table 4.12: Nominal compounds composed of adjectives and nouns in NYT
Adjectives Nouns Nominal
Compounds dead
high wrong
line way doing
deadline highway wrongdoing
In some circumstances, nominal compounds are mistakenly considered as noun phrases since both are constructed from adjectives and nouns. For instance, White house is not predictably a house that is white in color, but as a compound, it refers to official residence of the President of the US. Nominal compounds have more specific meanings as argued by Carstairs & McCarthy (2002) that “a
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compound tends to have a meaning that is more or less idiosyncratic or
unpredictable” (p.60). To identify whether or not a construction is a compound or
a phrase, there are four aspects to consider comprising phonetics, morphology, orthography, and semantics. Phonetically, stress patterns can determine whether a construction is a phrase or a compound (Carstairs & McCarthy, 2002). However, this aspect cannot be utilized in this research because all data are written, and the stress pattern cannot be determined. Morphologically, the construction of a nominal compound cannot be interrupted as said by Spencer (1991). No words can be inserted between the elements of nominal compounds. If seen from the orthographical aspect, examples above belong to nominal compounds because they are written as one word which is one of the characteristics of nominal compounds, whereas noun phrases are written as two separate words. Katamba (1993) states that “some very well established compounds are written as one word, with or without a hyphen (e.g. breakfast and ice-cream)” (p.293). Moreover, if seen from semantic aspect, examples above have more specific meanings which are unpredictable. Thus, a dictionary is necessary to find out the true meanings of those compounds.
The nominal compound deadline has nothing to do with a line but, according to Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, “a date or time by which you have to do or complete something.” In the meantime, highway is “a wide main road that joins one town to another.” Lastly, wrongdoing is “illegal or immoral behaviour.” Hence, the meanings of those compounds are more specific.
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There are 3 compounds, from 169 nominal compounds found in TJP, made up of prepositions and nouns. The analysis of those compounds can be seen in the following.
Table 4.13: Nominal compounds composed of prepositions and nouns in TJP
Prepositions Nouns Nominal
Compounds out
after out
skirt shock sider
outskirt aftershock outsider
As seen in the table above, the prepositions composing nominal compounds found in TJP are out and after. In the first example, the preposition out is combined with the word skirt to mean “the parts of a town or city that are furthest from the centre” (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English). The similar case exists in the second example in which the preposition after is combined with the word shock to mean a small earthquake. Katamba (1993) argues that placing –s as a plural marker in the head is important and that the process of suffix inflection happens after a nominal compound is formed. Moreover, the first two examples of nominal compounds are composed of free morphemes without any addition in each of the element, whereas in the third example, the right element of the nominal compound has the suffix -er. The compound occurs first, then the suffix –er is attached to the right-most element of the nominal compound. This suffix implies that the meaning of this nominal compound refers to someone or a person. To be exact, according to Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, the word outsiders means “someone who is not accepted as a member of a particular social group.”
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48. detention centers √
49. detention facilities √
50. development projects √
51. dinner tables √
52. doorways √
53. drug industry √
54. drug links √
55. drug suspect √
56. drug test √
57. drug trade √
58. drug war √
59. earthquake √
60. earthquake areas √
61. election campaign √
62. electricity costs √
63. emergency workers √
64. factory building √
65. fallout √
66. fire extinguisher √
67. firecracker √
68. fish vendor √
69. food producer √
70. foodstuffs √
71. football stadiums √
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73. fruit vendor √
74. funeral service √
75. garbage truck √
76. gatekeepers √
77. gateway √
78. grocery store √
79. gun shooting √
80. health benefits √
81. highway √
82. homeland √
83. hotel lobby √
84. hour usage √
85. immigration minister √
86. independence referendum √
87. influx √
88. intelligence agents √
89. kingmaker √
90. law enforcers √
91. lawmakers √
92. leadership battle √
93. leadership style √
94. leg braces √
95. lifestyle check √
96. mainland √
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98. migrant crisis √
99. migrant crisis √
100. migrant flow √
101. migration laws √
102. mountain communities √
103. mountain range √
104. news accounts √
105. news agency √
106. news conference √
107. news media √
108. news reports √
109. newspaper √
110. newspaper columnists √
111. office workers √
112. opposition lawmakers √
113. opposition legislator √
114. opposition parties √
115. opposition parties √
116. outposts √
117. outskirts √
118. panel discussion √
119. party members √
120. payment windows √
121. pickpockets √
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123. pirate party √
124. police checkpoint √
125. police officers √
126. police officials √
127. police report √
128. police unit √
129. policy coordination √
130. policy making √
131. port city √
132. poultry staple √
133. powerhouse √
134. press jacket √
135. pro-democracy protests √
136. pro-migrant groups √
137. property speculation √
138. protest actions √
139. recruitment problems √
140. refugee advocates √
141. refugee policy √
142. refugee tent √
143. retirement home √
144. satellite campus √
145. science writers √
146. security clearance √
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148. security facility √
149. security forces √
150. security officials √
151. security services √
152. servicemen √
153. sidewalk √
154. sleeper city √
155. spokesman √
156. spokeswoman √
157. staff member √
158. stalemate √
159. state affairs √
160. studio complex √
161. studio space √
162. sunlight √
163. sunlight √
164. sunset √
165. swordfish √
166. taxi driver √
167. television commentators √
168. tourism industry √
169. tourist shop √
170. town employees √
171. trash compactor √
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89 173. village administrator √
174. warehouse district √
175. watchdog group √
176. windshield √
177. winter afternoons √
178. workday √
179. wrongdoing √