Spelling of words together, with a hyphen, separately in the general structure of the “Ukrainian orthography” of 2019

Abstract

The article analyzes the content of the section “Îrthography of words together, with a hyphen, separately” from the point of view of its place in the general structure of the current edition of “Ukrainian Îrthography”, approved by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on May 22, 2019. Its evolution is traced from a small section devoted to the îrthography of complex words, and individual comments in other sections in UP-1929, to a complete collection of relevant rules in the analyzed text, which regulates the writing of not only complex words belonging to full-fledged parts of speech, but also derivatives units without status of part of speech — analytical syntactic morphemes (prepositions, conjunctions, particles). Single changes in the rules for writing words together, with a hyphen, or separately from the end of the 19th to the beginning of the 21st century are indicated, due to a change in the speakers’ perception of the degree of unity of the components of derived words. The only essential innovation of this section compared to the UP-1993 was approved, which was the separate îrthography of piv in the meaning of ‘half’. It is proposed to streamline the use of certain terms (skladne slovo — ‘compound word’, pokhidne slovo — ‘derived word’, slovtvirna pokhidnist — ‘word-formation’, spivvidnosnist — ‘correlation’, tvirna osnova — ‘generating basis’) in relation to the analyzed material and to improve the structure of the section, harmonizing its content with other sections and eliminating repetitions. Some suggestions for improving the illustrative material of the section have been made. Keywords: Ukrainian îrthography; writing words together, with a hyphen, separately; compound word, derived word.