5. Composition. Structural classification.

Composition is the making of a new word by joining two or more stems together.

Structurally these words are classified into the following groups:

1.) простые сложные слова. neutral compounds, where the stems are joined together, without any linking element. EG: shop-window, badroom.

2.) морфологические слож. слова. morphological compounds, in which the stems are joined by a vowel or a consonant. EG: Anglo-Saxon, statesman, bridesmaid

3.) Синтаксич. слож. слова или компрессивы или телескопные. Synthetic compounds, in which stems are joined by a prepositions or by some other form-word. The formal sign is a hyphen. EG: mother-in-law, good-for-northing.

4.) Сложнопроизводные слова. Derivational compounds, in which the stems have affixes in their stems. EG: film-goer, blue-eyed.

5.) Сложносокращ. слова. Contracted compounds, in which one of the stems is shortened. EG: TV-set, sitcom.

6. Semantic aspect of compound words. Unstable compounds.

Semantically compounds are divided into idiomatic and non-idiomatic.

Non-idiomatic compounds are the words in which the meaning of the whole is the sum of the meanings of components. EG: classroom, writing-table, bedroom.

Idiomatic compounds are those in which the meaning is changes or transferred EG: blackbird-(дрозд), tallboy-комод

The degree of transparence of meaning may be different. There are idiomatic compounds in which only one of the components has change its meaning. The meaning of the whole can be guessed. EG: blackbird, cranberry (we guess it’s a kind of a berry)

Side by side there are idiomatic compounds with a global change of meaning. The meaning of the word can not be guessed or understood from the meanings of the components. EG: tallboy, a wall flower (n)-девушка которую не пригласили танцевать.

So the difference between non-idiomatic and idiomatic compounds is based on the degree of the semantic cohesion of its elements.

In the word “tallboy” this degree of cohesion is the strongest. It doesn’t exist all together in the word like “bedroom”, “classroom”

“Stone wall” problem

The problem is: “Is the “stone wall” a compound or a word combination. The answer depends on how we treat the first component. If we understand it as a noun stem then it is a compound. If the first component is an adjective it’s a word combination. The generally accept point of view is that “stone wall” is a specific type of compound, so called unstable compound. \

There are several criteria which help us distinguish between a compound and a word combination:

1.) Semantic criterion. A compound denotes one notion a word combination, denotes two or several or more notions. EG speech sound – it’s a sound of phoneme (1 notion), a difficult sound (2 notion)

2.) Phonetic criterion – in a compound there is one stress, in a word combination there are two stresses. EG: ,black’board, ‘blackboard.

3.) Morphological criterion – a compound has single grammatical framig a word combination doesn’t have such a quality. EG: a spring day-spring days.

4.) Syntactical criterion. We can always enlarge a word combination by inserting a word. EG: a tall boy- a tall handsome boy, stone and concrete wall.