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Abstract

Finding the range of possible semantic relations between the constituents of a compound has been an elusive goal. The current paper presents a model of compound formation with the goal of demonstrating how the meaning of a compound is built from that of its constituents, and the relations between them, within the framework of the Slot Structure Model (SSM) (Benavides 2003; 2009; 2010; 2022). The SSM is a constraint-based model of morphology that is based on percolation of both syntactic and semantic features and on slot structure, which organizes the information in the lexical entries of words and affixes. The SSM is partly based on the dual-route model of morphology. It is shown that analyzing compound formation using SSM brings with it several advantages, including a more comprehensive explanation of how the semantics of compounding works; a more systematic way to determine the headedness of a compound; the ability to explain the generativity of compounds on the basis of the actual and potential information contained in the lexical entries of the components; and the simplification of the interpretation of compounds, due to the structure of the lexical information involved in the determination of compound meaning. The analysis of compounds based on Conceptual Semantics is taken as a basis for comparison. The current paper provides an account for a wide range of compound types, including NN, NA, AN, VN, and AA, in English, Spanish and German. Example compounds to support the analysis have been obtained from corpora and other sources.

Details

1009240
Title
Compounding in the Slot Structure Model
Author
Benavides, Carlos 1 

 University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, US 
Publication title
Glossa; London
Volume
10
Issue
1
Pages
1-37
Publication year
2025
Publication date
2025
Publisher
Ubiquity Press
Place of publication
London
Country of publication
United Kingdom
Publication subject
e-ISSN
23971835
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
Document type
Journal Article
ProQuest document ID
3176800678
Document URL
https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/compounding-slot-structure-model/docview/3176800678/se-2?accountid=208611
Copyright
© 2025. This work is published under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.
Last updated
2025-11-07
Database
ProQuest One Academic