Compound Words

 Compound words

It consist of two or three morphemes of which at least two are free morphemes.


(a) Two-free morphemes

mother tongue, girlfriend, classmate

(b) Three-free morphemes

mother-in-law, chief-of-staff

(c) Two-free morphemes + One bound morpheme

tax-collector, class teacher

(d) Two-free morphemes + two bound morpheme

elevator-operator

(e) Three-free morphemes + one bound morpheme

football player

Sub compounds and co-compounds 

Tatspurusa

Dwanda

Tatpurusa is a class of words having a first constituent, a noun or noun stem which modifies the second constituent by standing in relation to it of a possessor as in sheep's skin, a thing possessed as in motor boat, object of action as in shoe-maker. Agent as man-made, instrument as in landlocked.

In Sanskrit tatpurusa means 'his servant'.

French 'Tad' means 'that one'.

Dwanda

Is a class of compound words having two immediate constituents that are equal in rank and related to each other as if joined by 'and'. It is a compound word belonging to this class as in bread-butter, man-woman, bitter-sweet memories, secretariat-treasurer etc.

A dwanda means a pair or twin or Siamese. Linguistic compound refer to one or more objects that would be connected in sense by the conjunction 'and' where the objects refer to the parts of an agglomeration (a group) described by the compound. Dwanda's are common in some languages such as Sanskrit where the term originates. As well as Chinese, Japanese and some modern Indic languages such as Hindi and Urdu but less common in English. 


Prepared by:

Dr. Susan Mathew

Dept. of English

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