Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T10:33:18.052Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

8 - Word formation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 September 2009

Roland Sussex
Affiliation:
University of Queensland
Get access

Summary

Types of word formation

Slavic stands between Germanic and Romance in its utilization of word formation. It does not share the long compound nouns found especially in German technical vocabulary, or to some extent in phrasal expressions like ‘post-hostage resolution crisis’ in some English professional styles. On the other hand, Slavic as a whole does not follow the analytic tendencies of the Romance languages, which prefer coding compound nouns as phrases.

In Slavic there are rich resources of word formation. For example, the root pis- ‘write’ forms prefixed (Slk podpis ‘signature’, pod ‘under’) and suffixed derivatives (Slk písmeno ‘letter (of the alphabet)’, písomný ‘written, writing’ [Adj]). There are productive patterns of root-combination in nouns (Slk zem ‘earth’, zemepis ‘geography’). Word formation is both a key component of the exploitation of roots in different parts of speech, and a major source of lexical renewal and development (chapter 9).

The scope of word formation includes prefixation, root combination and suffixation other than inflexional suffixation (endings: chapter 5). Word formation overlaps with morphophonology (chapter 4), since the form of roots and affixes may be affected by the combinatorics of derivation. It overlaps with inflexional morphology (chapter 5), since it is concerned with the combination of roots and affixes, an area where the formation of verbal aspect spans both inflexion and word formation. It overlaps with syntax (chapter 7), since word combinations, and particularly the combinations of word-roots, share with syntax major patterns like Modifier + Head (Marchand, 1969; Selkirk, 1982).

Type
Chapter
Information
The Slavic Languages , pp. 421 - 471
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2006

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×