SHORTENING.

ABBREVIATION. MINOR
TYPES OF WORD
FORMATION

LECTURE 5
 OUTLINE

• Blending
• Shortening
• Abbreviation
• Minor types of word formation
 BLENDING/TELESCOPES/FUSIONS

Shortening + Compounding
The words formed by both shortening and
compounding (composition of clipped stems) are
called fusions, or blends, or telescopic words, or
portmanteau.
Author Lewis Carroll is credited with coining this term in
"Through the Looking-Glass," published in 1871. In that
book, Humpty Dumpty tells Alice about making up
new words from parts of existing ones:
"You see it's like a portmanteau — there are two
meanings packed up into one word."
 BLENDING PATTERNS

The ways of blending are:

a) initial element of the first stem + the second stem,
e.g. emotion + icon
Emoticon
Friend + enemy
Frenemy
biological + chemistry
Biochemistry
Europe + Asia
Eurasia
Electronic mail
email
 BLENDING PATTERNS

b) the first stem + the final element of the second

stem,
e.g. fan + magazine
Fanzine
Work/shop + alcoholic
Workaholic / shopaholic
Covid + idiot
Covidiot
brain + maniac
Brainiac
 BLENDING PATTERNS
c) the initial element of the first stem + the final element of the
second stem,
e.g. smoke + fog
smog
Binary + digit
Bit
advertisement +‎editorial
Advertorial
d) the initial element of the first stem + the initial part of the
second stem
situational + comedy
sitcom
Foreign + exchange
Forex
coronavirus + vaccine
CoronaVac
 SHORTENING. DEFINITION

Shortening is a way of coining new words by clipping

a part of their prototypes.
The remaining part does not usually change
phonetically so it is sometimes necessary to change
the spelling:
mike (from microphone),
biz (show business)
dub (from double)
kook (cuckoo).
SHORTENING. CHANGE OF MEANING

a) shortened words are usually colloquial while their

prototypes may be neutral
(e.g. bike, mike, doc, prexy (for President), undies
(underpants – underwear + pantaloons));

b) shortened words are as a rule monosemantic while their

prototypes may be polysemantic
e. g. to double has several meanings:
1) to increase twofold; 2) to multiply by two; 3) to add the
same note in the lower or higher octave; 4) to make
another soundtrack of a film in a different language.
The shortened word to dub retains only the fourth
meaning.
 SHORTENING

The correlation of a shortened word and its prototype

may be as follows:

a) the curtailed form is a lexical variant or a synonym

differing from the prototype stylistically or emotionally
(e.g. exam: examination, doc: doctor, lab:
laboratory);

b) the connection can be established only

etymologically, e.g. fan: fanatic, fancy: fantasy.
 SHORTENING VS CONVERSION

Unlike conversion, shortening produces new words

belonging to the same part of speech as their
prototypes.

The bulk of shortened words is constituted by nouns.

Verbs are hardly ever shortened (e.g. to rev from
revolve).
Shortened adjectives are few and mostly reveal a
combined effect of shortening + affixation,
e.g. comfy from comfortable, mizzy from miserable.
SHORTENED WORDS AND HOMONYMS

Shortened words are often homonymous with other

shortened words, e.g.
van (the short for caravan and for vanguard),
gym (gymnastics and gymnasium),
vet (veterinary and veteran),
doc (document and doctor).
CLASSIFICATION OF SHORTENINGS

The classification of shortened words is based on the

position of the clipped part. This way it is possible to
single out:
1) final clipping (the end is cut off, the beginning of
the prototype is retained),
ad / advert (advertisement),
ed (editor),
coke(coca-cola)
CLASSIFICATION OF SHORTENINGS

2) initial clipping (the final part of the prototype is

retained),
e.g. story (history), phone (telephone), drome
(airdrome), gator(allilgator), (hur)rah, (em)ploy
(ice)berg, (cara)van, (heli)copter, (o)possum,
(violin)cello);
CLASSIFICATION OF SHORTENINGS

3) final and initial clipping combined,

e.g. fridge (refrigerator), tec (detective), flu
(influenza), still (distillery);
4) medial clipping (the central part of a word falls
out),
e.g. specs (spectacles), ma’am (madam), maths
(mathematics), fancy (fantasy)
 SHORTENED PHRASES

Shortened words are opposed to shortened phrases,

which result from a combined effect of clipping,
ellipsis and substantivation,
e.g. weekly (weekly paper),
finals (final exams),
coed (ucational student),
narc(otics agent),
noncom(missioned officer),
pub(lic house),
typo(graphical error),
and zoo(logical garden).
 ABBREVIATIONS. DEFINITION

Abbreviations are words formed by initial letters of

some other words.
 ABBREVIATIONS

Depending on the way they are read, abbreviations

are divided into:
a) those preserving alphabetical reading,
e.g. NBC, SAP, BBC, SOS, TV;
b) acronyms read as though they were ordinary
English words,
e.g. UNO, NATO, NOW, RADAR, UNESCO.
 ABBREVIATIONS

A specific group is represented by Latin abbreviations

which may be read:
a) alphabetically, e.g. a.m., p.m.
b) as corresponding Latin words, e.g.- exampli gratia,
p.m. – post meridium, a.m. – ante meridium.
c) as corresponding English words, e.g. - for example,
a.m. – in the morning, p.m. – in the afternoon.
MINOR TYPES OF WORD-BUILDING

1. Sound interchange.

It is a way of forming new words by changing some

sound(s) in the root,
e.g.
Food - feed, hot – heat, foot – feet, life - live, speak -
speech.
Sound interchange + affixation,
e.g. strong – strength, wide – width, high – height,
Sound interchange + affixation + shift of stress,
Democrat - democracy.
MINOR TYPES OF WORD-BUILDING

2. Distinctive stress.
It is a way of coining new words by changing the
place of stress,
e.g. import (n, v),
increase (n, v)
record (n, v)
conduct (n, v),
research (n, v in AmE).
MINOR TYPES OF WORD-BUILDING

3. Sound imitation (or onomatopoeia).

It is a way of forming new words by imitating sounds
associated with the objects or actions the words
denote,
e.g. to bang, to giggle, to buzz, whisper, bark, cock-a-
doodle-doo, quack (ducts), croak (frogs), mew ( or
miaow, meow), moo etc.
MINOR TYPES OF WORD-BUILDING

4. Back formation.
It is a way of coining new words by cutting a
supposed or real suffix from existing words,
e.g. to beg (from beggar),
to bookkeep (bookkeeping)
To housekeep (from house-keeper),
To babysit (babysitter)
To bartend (bartender)
To funk (funky) etc.