Exocentric Compounds Research Articles

Do Romance languages have phrasal compounds? A look at Italian

AbstractPhrasal compounds did not constitute a highly debated issue in Italian, apart from some sporadic observations (Ricca 2005) on peculiar compounds as, for example, V+N exocentric compounds likespazzaneve‘snowplough’ that admit NP constituents. This paper is devoted to the analysis of a group of N+NP constructions, found in the ItTenTen10 corpus, a corpus of 2.588.873.046 words investigated by means of the Sketch-Engine, with the purpose of establishing whether phrasal compounding is a phenomenon present in Italian too.

Vedische exozentrische Komposita mit drei Relationen

In this paper it is suggested that a large subset of Vedic exocentric nominal compounds can best be described by focusing on two semantosyntactic relationships that exist in addition to the first one, viz. the modificative relation an exocentric compound bears to the head noun: A second, external relation which establishes a link between one single member of the compound and the noun the compound modifies as a whole, and a third, internal relation which combines the two members of a compound to form a semantosyntactic unit. For both, internal and external relations, a distinct set of three preferred readings is established which provides a semantosyntactic framework for interpreting these compounds. It is emphasized that a correct interpretation always depends not only on these sets of possible readings, but, most importantly, on the semantics of the compound members and the modified noun as well as on the pragmatics and the context the syntagm occurs in.

Exocentric Compounds, Language and Proto-language

Exocentric Compounds, Language and Proto-language

Compound headedness in the mental lexicon: An event-related potential study

Compound words in Romance languages may have the head either in the initial or in the final position. In the present event-related potential (ERP) study, we address the hypothesis that Italian compounds are processed differently according to their head position and that this is mostly due to the perceived change in the canonical order of syntactic elements. Compound stimuli (head-initial, head-final, or exocentric) were visually displayed in two presentation modes, as whole words or separated into their constituents, in the context of a lexical decision task. Behavioural results showed an increased split cost in head-final and exocentric compounds as compared to head-initial compounds. ERP results showed an enhanced left anterior negativity (LAN) for head-final and exocentric compounds as compared to head-initial compounds, regardless of the presentation mode. Results suggest that the analogy with syntactic order may influence the internal structure of a compound and, as a consequence, its processing, but other characteristics (such as the grammatical properties of constituents) may affect the processing itself.

Prepositions inside (and at the edge) of words: a view from agrammatism

In this work, we aim at investigating the performance of an Italian Agrammatic speaker with compound words, with major emphasis on the processing of (complex and simple) prepositions inside words, thus aiming at especially evaluating the performance with prepositional compounds of the [NOUN HEAD-PREP-DEPENDANT NOUN; N-P-N] form (coda di cavallo, horse-tail) and exocentric compounds of the [PREP-NOUN; P-N] form (sopracciglio, eyebrow). Bisetto and Scalise (1999) showed that it is realistic to consider N-P-N items as fully productive compound words in Italian, due to the fact that they obey to a set of classic compound-hood tests.Our results demonstrate that SM is selectively impaired in retrieving the prepositions linking the modifying nouns to their head. Our data can trigger interesting interpretations, from a theoretical viewpoint. In particular, complex prepositions (e.g. fuori, outside), which are produced with no significant problems by SM, are likely to be relational nouns and not functional axial parts (Svenonius, 2006) when involved in the formation of Italian P-N compounds. Otherwise, a deficit in retrieving them correctly would be expected (specific agrammatic deficits for axial parts have been detected in Zampieri et al., 2011). Moreover, a crucial question is raised: are N-P-N real compounds, since they behave very differently from other compounds in SM performance? Possibly, the same underlying architecture holds both when these items are processed as phrased and when they are processed as “lexicalized syntax” in a constructionist fashion (Jackendoff, 2002; Booij, 2005; Starke, 2009). Given the very similar poor performance of SM with both N-P-N compound-like-items and analogous phrases, a unified analysis of this sort is strongly suggested by our study.

Variation between endocentric and exocentric word structures

This paper reports on the discovery of a new type of exocentric word structure in Japanese which consists of two “dependent” (rather than “head”) elements and whose category is determined by the collaboration of the category features of the two dependents in conjunction with their internal semantic relationship. A representative example is huto-ppara lit. ‘fat stomach/big heart’, which semantically denotes the subject's property of being big-hearted or generous rather than the physical entity ‘stomach, heart’, and which bears the lexical category of Adjectival Noun [AN], corresponding neither to the Adjective category of huto- ‘fat, big’ nor to the Noun category of -ppara [variant of hara] ‘stomach, heart’. This is entirely distinct from the familiar types of metaphor- and metonymy-based exocentric compounds like redhead and pickpocket, which are always nouns. In analyzing the novel type of Japanese compound, a mechanism called “bilateral category projection” is proposed, which fuses together the category features of the two dependent constituents by invoking their semantic structure. The assignment of a category to the new type of exocentric compound thus requires simultaneous reference to both morphological and semantic structure. This analysis lends support to the “parallel-representation” model of grammar in which form and meaning are represented separately but work in tandem with each other to determine the grammaticality of a given expression ( Jackendoff, 2002; Kageyama, 1996; Ackema and Neeleman, 2004).

Head position and the mental representation of nominal compounds

There is a significant body of psycholinguistic evidence that supports the hypothesis of an access to constituent representation during the mental processing of compound words. However it is not clear whether the internal hierarchy of the constituents (i.e., headedness) plays a role in their mental lexical processing and it is not possible to disentangle the effect of headedness from that of constituent position in languages that admit only head-final compounds, like English or Dutch. The present study addresses this issue in two constituent priming experiments (SOA 300ms) with a lexical decision task. Italian endocentric (head-initial and head-final) and exocentric nominal compounds were employed as stimuli and the position of the primed constituent was manipulated. A first-level priming effect was found, confirming the automatic access to constituent representation. Moreover, in head-final compounds data reveal a larger priming effect for the head than for the modifying constituent. These results suggest that different kinds of compounds have a different representation at mental level: while head-final compounds are represented with an internal head-modifier hierarchy, head-initial and exocentric compounds have a lexicalised, internally flat representation.

The Urge to Merge: Ritual Insult and the Evolution of Syntax

Throughout recorded history, sexually mature males have issued humorous insults in public. These ‘verbal duels’ are thought to discharge aggressive dispositions, and to provide a way to compete for status and mating opportunities without risking physical altercations. But, is there evidence that such verbal duels, and sexual selection in general, played any role in the evolution of specific principles of language, syntax in particular? In this paper, concrete linguistic data and analysis will be presented which indeed point to that conclusion. The prospect will be examined that an intermediate form of ‘proto-syntax’, involving ‘proto-Merge’, evolved in a context of ritual insult. This form, referred to as exocentric compound, can be seen as a ‘living fossil’ of this stage of proto-syntax — providing evidence not only of ancient structure (syntax/semantics), but also arguably of sexual selection.

The interaction of metonymy and metaphor in the meaning and form of ‘bahuvrihi’ compounds

This paper reports on ongoing work on a large sample of bahuvrihi compounds in English and Spanish. After a brief characterization of bahuvrihi compounds, distinguishing them from a similar type of exocentric compounds (V+O compounds), the goal of the paper is clearly stated, namely to answer a number of questions, especially these two: (a) Does the metonymy CHARACTERISTIC PROPERTY FOR CATEGORY motivate the exocentric nature of all the compounds in the sample?; (b) Are other metonymies or metaphors also involved? If so, which are the metonymic or metaphoric patterns observable in conceptualizations underlying these compounds? The bulk of the paper is devoted to the detailed conceptual analysis of a large set of representative bahuvrihis in both languages. The results show that the above metonymy is responsible for the exocentric nature of all the compounds in the sample and that the characteristic property mapped by that metonymy is conceptualized in one of these three ways: literally, metonymically or metaphorico-metonymically. These three conceptualization patterns constitute the three major types of bahuvrihis in both languages; various further subtypes are proposed for each type. The paper ends with some tentative remarks on the Cognitive Grammar representation of the semantic structure of these compounds, on the connection between their semantic structure and their grammar and prosody, on a blending account of these lexemes, and on the contrasts identified between both languages.

Exocentric compounds

Exocentric compounds

Thoughts On Indo–European Compounds – Inspired By A Look At Armenian

The article presents a descriptive and historical survey of the types of nominal compounds in Classical Armenian, and a number of potential archaisms are discussed: compositional i–stems, laryngeal loss, adjectives with two endings, particular compositional suffixes etc. In a concluding section it is claimed that beside the ‘co–compounds’, consisting of simple juxtapositions, the Indo–European proto–language only had one basic type, the exocentric or possessive compounds with accent on the first member, of which the traditional possessives (bahuvrihis)and the verbal governing compounds are secondary specializations.

From the history of the term ‘exocentric’

1. In hi s paper on Bloomfield and the Sanskrit Origin o f the Terms 'exocentric' nd 'endocentric' Wujastyk (1982) pointed to the Sanskrit background of both terms and argued that Bloomfield was very familiar wi th the writings of the cl assical Sanskrit grammarians, we can conclude from the discussion of these terms in his book Language of 1933. Following Lyons' well-known Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics (Cambridge, 1968) Wujastyk assumes that these terms were introduced into linguistic terminology by Leonard Bloomfield (1887-1949). It is not difficult, h owever, t o establish that at least the term 'exocentric' was current quite some time before Bloomfield wrote his influential book. As it happens, the term was used already in 1888 by Aleksander Aleksandrov (1861-1917 or 1918) in his Litauische Studien. I. Nominalzusammensetzungen, m onograph submitted an Inaugural-Dissertation zur Erlangung des Grades eines Doktors der Vergleichenden Sprachkunde to the h istorical-philological faculty of the Im perial University of Dorpat, at which Jan Baudouin de Courtenay (1845-1929) held the chair of Slavic philology (1883-93). In Chapter Six, Classification der Zusammensetzungen, Aleksandrov makes distinction between two types of compounds: ' exocentrische C omposita' (ohne Sch werpunkt der in den Bildungselementen) and 'esocentrische Composita' (mit dem Schwerpunkte der in einem der Bildungselemente). The second type is subdivided in 'bicentrische' und 'monocentrische Composita' (Aleksandrov (212) 1888:110). Monocentric compounds are either ' primocentralia' or ' alterocentralia'; regards the alterocentralia, i .e., those monocentric compounds that have the Schwerpunkt der Bedeutung in t he second element (in altera parte), Aleksandrov also notes down two Sanskrit terms: tat purua and karmadhâraya. For the bicentric compounds he mentions the term dvandva and likewise the exocentric compounds are called bahuvrihi compounds. As is well-known, the same Sanskrit terms are mentioned by Bloomfield in his discussion on compound constructions in the chapter on Morphological Types in Language (235ff.). There he di stinguishes the copulative compounds (Sanskrit dvandva) from the determinative (attributive or subordinative) compounds (Sanskrit tatpurusha); s ubset of the l atter category he mentions a special class of syntactic attribute-and-head compounds (karmadharaya), like blackbird. These co mpounds are called ' endocentric'. After t hat Bloomfield mentions the bahuvrihi composita, the possessive compounds, which he calls 'exocentric'. Most recently, Rogers (1987:104) has claimed t hat Bloomfield us ed ' exocentric' as direct translation of Pânini's term bahuvrihi. It seems to me, however, that different provenance of the term is more obvious.