Is compounding derivation?

Compounding combines two or more lexemes into a new one, such as 'blackboard'. It is a word-formation process and is usually grouped with derivation as part of lexeme creation, though it differs from affixation in joining free forms.

Conversion, or zero derivation, creates a new word in a different category without adding any affix, as when the noun 'email' is used as a verb. The change of category is the only mark of the derivation.

Derivational Morphology

Derivational morphology creates new lexemes from existing ones through processes such as affixation, compounding, and conversion, typically changing meaning, word class, or both.

Definition

Derivational morphology is the part of morphology that forms new lexemes from existing bases, usually producing a word with a new meaning and often a different part of speech.

Scope

This topic covers word formation: the principal derivational processes (prefixation, suffixation, compounding, conversion, and others), the way they alter meaning and syntactic category, the semantics of derived words, and the restrictions on derivation. It does not cover the realisation of grammatical categories (inflection), paradigm structure, or productivity measurement, which are treated in neighbouring topics.

Core questions

What processes are available for forming new words?
How does derivation change the meaning and syntactic category of a base?
How is the meaning of a derived word related to that of its base?
What restricts the application of derivational processes?

Key concepts

affixation
compounding
conversion (zero derivation)
category-changing derivation
head of a complex word
semantic transparency

Key theories

Word-formation rules: Aronoff's framework in which derivation is governed by rules that specify a base, an output, and the phonological, syntactic, and semantic changes involved, with the word as the unit over which rules operate.
Lexical-semantic representation of derivation: Lieber's theory that derivational affixes carry decomposed semantic features which combine with those of the base to predict the meaning of the derived word.

History

Aronoff (1976) launched generative derivational morphology with the word-based hypothesis and word-formation rules, displacing earlier morpheme-by-morpheme accounts for derivation. Subsequent work explored the semantics of word formation, with Lieber (2004) developing a feature-based lexical semantics and Booij (2012) advancing a construction-based view. Plag (2003) provided a comprehensive descriptive and theoretical treatment of English word formation.

Debates

Affix-based versus construction-based word formation: Whether derived words are built by attaching meaning-bearing affixes to bases or by instantiating constructional schemas that pair complex forms with meanings, with consequences for affixes lacking stable meaning.

Key figures

Mark Aronoff
Ingo Plag
Rochelle Lieber
Geert Booij

Seminal works

aronoff1976
lieber2004
plag2003

Frequently asked questions

Is compounding derivation?: Compounding combines two or more lexemes into a new one, such as 'blackboard'. It is a word-formation process and is usually grouped with derivation as part of lexeme creation, though it differs from affixation in joining free forms.
What is conversion?: Conversion, or zero derivation, creates a new word in a different category without adding any affix, as when the noun 'email' is used as a verb. The change of category is the only mark of the derivation.