Abstract
Chapter 12 examines certain nominal multi-word units of the domain of scientific terminology, whose behaviour is similar to that of compounds in many respects. It is demonstrated that these formations are distinct from both ordinary one-word compounds and ordinary noun phrases and may be classified into three types, depending on their morphological-like properties and syntactic (semi) accessibility: (a) phrasal compounds, (b) phrasal-compound-like phrases and (c) constructs. It is proposed that phrasal compounds are created by a compounding process which is still marginal in Greek, while the other two categories belong to a special type of noun phrases. However, while one-word compounds are formed in morphology, phrasal compounds are syntactic formations. As a corollary, it is suggested that compounding is a process which cuts across morphology and syntax, depending on the language and the data one deals with.
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Notes
- 1.
In fact, pairs of alternating forms of compounds and NPs are possible in Greek. They share the same lexemes and meaning, as the following examples illustrate:
(i)   NP          versus     compound
 a. keftés patátas             patat-o-keftés
   roll.NOM.SG potato.GEN.SG       potato-CM-roll
   ‘roll of potato’
 b. xazó korÃtsi              xaz-o-kóritso
   silly.NOM.SG girl.NOM.SG        silly-CM-girl
   ‘silly girl’
See Sect. 2.3.8, for discussion and similar examples.
- 2.
In this compound, there is no marker -o- between the two constituents because the first member aγorá ‘buying’ is not a stem but an inflected word. However, its inflection is not functionally active. This is shown by the fact that in the plural number, aγorá remains invariable and only the second member assumes the plural inflection (aγora-polisÃ-es lit. buyings-sellings). Along the lines of the proposal put forward in Sect. 11.3, I consider aγorapolisÃa to be built analogically to an AG compound.
- 3.
The same argument for pointing out the compoundhood of these [A N] formations has been used by Ralli and Stavrou (1998: 253) and Booij (2010: 184). However, while Ralli and Stavrou consider these items to be morphological constructions, Booij treats them as compounds built in syntax (phrasal compounds for him).
- 4.
Inflection is usually distinguished into inherent and contextual. According to Booij (1994, 1996), only the first type can appear word internally. Contextual inflection is relevant to syntax and, thus, is found at the periphery of words. Exceptional contextual inflection is found in a certain number of compounds originating from AG, but as shown in Sect. 4.2.1, it is not syntactically active.
- 5.
- 6.
Since the beginning of lexicalist theory (Chomsky 1970), the position of morphology inside the architecture of grammar and the demarcation between morphology and syntax has been one of the hot subjects of discussion among linguists (see, among others, Ackema and Neeleman 2004, 2010; Lieber and Scalise 2006).
- 7.
- 8.
In these languages, the so-called neoclassical compounds are not combinations of word forms, since, as already mentioned in Chap. 10, they are based on stems of AG and/or Latin origin and are not subject to native compounding.
- 9.
The same view is also expressed by Spencer (2001: 330) for similar English NN formations. The notion of lexicalization and its difference from compounding have been discussed in Sect. 2.3. Di Sciullo and Williams (1987) call these units ‘listemes’ that is, listed, non-analyzable entities of the lexicon.
- 10.
In Gaeta and Ricca’s (2009: 36) terms ‘…nothing in the referential properties of a certain unit tells us whether the denotatum is referred to by means of a compound or a phrase or even a simplex’.
- 11.
The examples in (18) are the results of a small interview, which has been conducted by Maria Koliopoulou, among 50 students at the Department of Philology of the University of Patras, in the academic year 2006–2007.
- 12.
These structures may be used as an illustration in favour of Dahl’s (2004) hypothesis that compounds rise from phrasal structures.
- 13.
- 14.
See Bauer (2008) for the same assumption with respect to English formations like singer-songwriter.
- 15.
See Gavriilidou (1997) for more examples.
- 16.
When the order is reversed, focus is put on the determining item.
- 17.
See Fradin (2003) for examples in French (e.g. [N N] allocation logement lit. ‘benefit housing’, corresponding to formations containing a noun and a prepositional phrase, such as allocation de logement ‘benefit of housing’). The use of appositional constructions without determiners and prepositions can also be observed in Dutch, as shown by Booij (2009, 2010).
- 18.
A lexicalization has also been proposed by Sadler and Arnold (1994) in order to account for similar phrases in English. They distinguish between weak and strong lexicalized phrases, depending on the degree of their semantic and structural transparency.
- 19.
In the approach taken in this book, analogy should be regarded as a different operation from that responsible for compound formation. Analogy does not occur systematically but has a rather random character. In contrast, the word-formation patterns that are proposed in this book are rule based and do not function as redundancy schemas listed in the lexicon. This word-formation analysis is different from Jackendoff’s (1975, 2002), and most recently from Booij’s (2005, 2010) constructionist approach, according to which morphological patterns of different degrees of abstraction express generalisations about sets of listed expressions.
- 20.
Following Kiparsky (2010), I suppose that the two phonological words of [word-word] compounds are restructured into one phonological word within the lexical phonological domain.
- 21.
For more information on this hypothesis, the reader is referred to Sect. 2.3.6.
- 22.
Borer (1988) has proposed this model on the basis of certain Hebrew constructions which involve two nouns but have features that are not found in typical NPs. She calls this category construct-state nominals and assigns their generation at the lowest level of the morphological component. In her model, morphology is parallel to syntax and accepts some syntactic interference only for formations which occur at this particular level. A more syntactically oriented approach is proposed in her (2009) article, where she attempts to derive all types of compounds via syntactic procedures. See Gaeta and Ricca (2009: 62) for a criticism of Borer’s (2009) recent position.
- 23.
In fact, on the basis of evidence drawn from several languages, Lieber and Scalise (2006) have questioned the validity of the lexical integrity hypothesis and formalised the limited syntactic accessibility to morphological structures as the limited access principle, according to which morphological combinations can involve a phrasal property on a language-specific basis.
- 24.
In MG, the morphological realisation of the dative case has disappeared. It has been replaced by the genitive or the accusative case, depending on the case (see Appendix 1).
- 25.
Crucially, derived items such as those of (38) occur with bases that are taken only from the range of phrasal compounds and not from that of constructs, something which supports the compoundhood of the former.
- 26.
In few cases, there is a word-internal aspectual marker, but it is syntactically inactive and should be reanalysed as part of the stem (Ralli 2005):
(ii) xalazmenos  < xala-s-men-os
  ‘damaged’    damage-PERF-PPART-INFL
- 27.
As opposed to morphological compounds, no adverbs or verbs are involved in the formation of phrasal compounds which belong to naming categories.
- 28.
In accordance with the lexicalist model that I follow in this book (see the Introduction), I assume that inflected X0 categories are built in morphology and that they are inserted in syntax carrying their own inflection; the role of syntactically active functional categories, such as Agr, is thus to ensure the right matching between X0s (words).
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Ralli, A. (2013). Compounds Versus Phrases. In: Compounding in Modern Greek. Studies in Morphology, vol 2. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4960-3_12
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