Compounds and multi-word expressions in Polish

Abstract

This chapter offered a brief overview of multi-word expressions in Polish, focusing on phrasal nouns (which are often referred to as “juxtapositions”) and their interaction with compound nouns. The following subtypes of juxtapositions were discussed at greater length: N+N.gen, N+A, A+N, and coordinate N+N phrasal lexemes. Juxtapositions do not meet the majority of the criteria for morphological compounds (as stated by Lieber/Štekauer 2009). A morphological compound in Polish, i. e. a compound proper, is written as one orthographic word and inflected like one morphological word (with the inflectional endings attached to the righthand constituent). It carries one primary lexical stress (typically on the penultimate syllable). A juxtaposition, in contrast, consists of two or more orthographic words, each of which is inflected. Constituents of a juxtaposition can carry independent lexical stresses, e. g. mĄż stAnu (man.nom state.gen) ‘statesman’. On the other hand, juxtapositions act as naming units, therefore they can be regarded as multi-word lexical items. It is important to emphasise here that phrasal nouns in Polish are far from being exclusively idiomatic and unanalysable multi-word expressions. While selected multi-word units are semantically non-compositional (and can be treated as figurative idioms), e. g. biały kruk (white raven) ‘rare specimen’, the majority of phrasal nouns in Polish show varying degrees of semantic transparency. They are also analysable syntactically, which results in some degree of their syntactic mobility, as is shown above for coordinate N+N juxtapositions and for phrasal nouns consisting of a head noun and a relational adjective. The syntactic analysability of phrasal nouns also tallies with the fact that their constituents are inflected as independent morphological words. The approach of Construction Morphology allows the researcher to provide a proper account of the above-mentioned properties of phrasal nouns in Polish. Multi-word units inherit their syntactic structure from construction schemas. In other words, phrasal construction schemas can be employed to analyse the internal structure of existing phrasal nouns. The construction schemas state that phrasal nouns are generally interpreted as “names of kinds” (i. e. as subtypes of entities), e. g. droga dojazdowa (road access.ra) ‘access road’, miernik promieniowania (meter.nom radiation.gen) ‘radiation meter’, kierowca-dostawca (driver. nom supplier.nom) ‘delivery driver’. Phrasal schemas can be used not only as redundacy statements (to license conventionalised phrasal nouns), but also as patterns for creating novel multi-word units. The latter function of schemas is particularly important in Polish since the patterns for phrasal nouns discussed above are very productive. Novel phrasal lexemes abound in Polish, e. g. in the vocabulary associated with the Internet technology, as is illustrated by such multi- word units as dostawca usług internetowych (provider.nom.sg service.gen.pl Internet.ra.gen.pl) ‘Internet service provider’, pióro świetlne (pen light.ra) ‘light pen’, ekran dotykowy (screen touch.ra) ‘touch screen’, telefon z klapką (phone with flip) ‘clamshell phone’. Schemas for multi-word units in Polish both compete with and complement patterns of compounding. As was shown in Section 6, fairly numerous examples can be found of co-existence of synonymous compound nouns and phrasal nouns in Polish, such licencjodawca (licence+lv+giver) and dawca licencji (giver.nom licence.gen) ‘licensor’. However, the formation of synthetic compounds appears to be more restricted than the coinage of N+N.gen or N+A multi-word units. Moreover, some types of naming units can be formed only by using phrasal schemas, e. g. attributive N+N compounds, such as człowiek- zagadka (man mystery) ‘mystery man’, and coordinate phrasal nouns consisting of units denoting Kinship+Profession, e. g. mąż prawnik (husband lawyer) ‘lawyer husband’. Finally, it was shown that multi-word units need to be accessible to affixation and compounding processes (i. e. to morphological construction schemas), as they undergo morphological condensation. Such evidence indicates that the study of both morphologically complex words (such as compounds proper) and multi-word units should be of interest to morphologists. Researchers should pay greater attention to the interaction between phrasal lexemes and morphologically complex words in Polish, which is the kind of phenomenon that can find an appropriate account within the framework of Construction Morphology.