Although we have concentrated on each of these word-formation processes in isolation, it is possible to trace the operation of more than one process at work in the creation of a particular word. For example, the term deli seems to have become a common American English expression via a process of first borrowing delicatessen (from German) and then clipping that borrowed form. If someone says that problems with the project have snowballed, the final word can be analyzed as an example of compounding in which snow and ball were combined to form the noun snowball, which was then turned into a verb through conversion. Forms that begin as acronyms can also go through other processes, as in the use of lase as a verb, the result of backformation from laser. In the expression waspish attitudes, the acronym WASP (“white Anglo-Saxon Protestant”) has lost its capital letters and gained a suffix (-ish) in the derivation process.

An acronym that never seems to have had capital letters comes from “young urban professional”, plus the -ie suffix, as in hypocorism, to produce the word yuppie (first recorded in 1984). The formation of this new word, however, was helped by a quite different process, known simply as analogy, whereby new words are formed to be similar in some way to existing words. Yuppie was made possible as a new word by analogy with the earlier word hippie and another short-lived analogy yippie. The word yippie also had an acronym basis (“youth international party”) and was used for some students in the USA who were protesting against the war in Vietnam. One joke has it that yippies just grew up to be yuppies. And the process continues. Another analogy, with the word yap (“to make shrill noises”), helped label some of the noisy young professionals as yappies.

اخر الاخبار

اخبار العتبة العباسية المقدسة

مكتب المتولي الشرعي للشؤون النسوية يناقش استعداداته لإقامة مهرجان روح النبوة الثامن وحفل تخرج الطالبات العاشر

الهيأة العليا لإحياء التراث تشارك بمؤتمر دولي عن السيد الميلاني (قدس سره) في إيران

وفد متحف الكفيل يطّلع على النفائس والوثائق التاريخية في متاحف العتبة الرضوية المقدسة

قسم الشؤون الطبية يواصل تنظيم ورش تدريبية لرفع كفاءة المنتسبين في الإسعافات الأولية

المزيد

الآخبار الصحية

خصوصا مع تقدم السن.. 6 سلوكيات يومية قد تدمّر صحتك

فاكهة خضراء.. علاج طبيعي فعّال للإمساك واضطرابات الهضم

روسيا تبدأ أولى التجارب السريرية للقاح واعد ضد السرطان

كنز غذائي على طبقك.. ماذا تفعل السبانخ بجسمك؟

المزيد

الآخبار التكنلوجية

رصد نوع نادر من القطط في تايلاند للمرة الأولى منذ عقود

روسيا تخطط لإقامة محطة نووية في القمر خلال العقد المقبل

كيف قاد إيلون ماسك حملة "غروك" لاختراق عرش الذكاء الاصطناعي

ألتمان: الذكاء الاصطناعي سيتجاوز البشر في 2026 !

المزيد

مواضيع ذات صلة

Constituent structure

A typology of word structure

Analyzing position classes

Representing word structure

Different kinds of morphemes

Morphemes Definition of “morpheme”

Analyzing word structure

Mirror in nominal morphology

Appendix 2: Hapax legomena from the Cobuild corpus

Appendix 1: 20th century neologisms from the OED

Morphological Productivity Structural Constraints in English Derivation Conclusion

Verbal derivation and the separation hypothesis