Chapter 4  Word formation

1.       Acronymy (9%) （首字母拼音法）

The process of forming new words by joining the initial letters of names of social and political organizations or special noun phrases and technical terms.

Initialism（首字母连写词）: It is a type of shortening,using the first letter of words to form a proper name,a technical term, or a phrase; an initialism is pronounced letter by letter. e.g. : BBC(for British Broadcasting corporation)

Acronym(首字拼音词): Acronyms are words formed from the initial letters of the name of an organization or a scientific term,etc.Acronyms differ from initialisms in that they are prounced as words rather than as sequences of letters. e.g. : NATO(the North Qtlantic Treaty Organization) pronuouced /`neitou/  but not  /`en`ei`ti:`ou/.

2.        Blend（拼缀词）

Blending is a process of word-fromation in which a new word is formed by combining the meanings and sounds of two words,one of which is not in its full form or both of which are not in their full forms:e.g. : motor + hotel = motel, smoke + fog = smog, formula + translation = FORTRAN

3.        Front and back clipping(    缩略词的首部同尾部)

Clipping refers to a word-formation process which involes the deletion of one or more syllables from a word(usually a noun),which is also availabe in its full form, e.g. plane from airplane,phone from telephone,etc.gym from gymnastics,taxi from taxicab.Clippings may be divided into four main types:

1).Back clippings:

2).Front clippings:

3).Front and back cippings:

4).Phrase cippings:

 

4.        Back-formation(逆构词,反成法)

Back-formation-- is a process of word-formation by which a word is created by the deletion of a supposed affix. It is considered to be the opposite process of suffixation.

5.        Reduplication(重垒法)

 Reduplication is a minor type of word-formation by which a compound word is created by the repetition of 1)one word like go-go:2)of two almost identical words with a change in the vowel’s  such as ping-pong 3) of two almost identical words with change in the initial consonants, as in teenyweeny . most of the reduplicatives are informal

 

 

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