1. Topic
Stress in compound words

2. Contents
• Introduction
• Rules of compound stress
• Hypotheses on compound stress
• Conclusion

3. Introduction
• Compound vs. phrases
e.g.
Family tree, doctor’s dilemma, black board
Family affairs, doctor’s office, blackboard

4. • Two main criteria for classification
a) Whether the combination of words is
functioning as a compound or a phrase e.g
gentleman ,gentle man
Jesperson (1942)
Criticism : the word unit is vague
b) Whether the combination has primary stress on
the first element or second.
Bloomfield: Ice- cream , ice cream

5. Bloch and Trager
 formal distinction between compound and
phrase
 English has formal distinction
• phonemic modification of their components
• kind of juncture
• Stress pattern
Or the combination of above factors

6. Trager and Smith
 rules out “stress pattern”
 “simply two different dialects”
E.g. Long Island , long island

7. Levi
 explored complex nominals
 distinguished it from other compound constructions
 Divided complex nominals into three types
• nominal compounds
e.G apple cake (forestressed N+N)
• nominalizations
e.G presidential refusal (afterstressed Adj+N)
metal detection (forestressed N+N)
• non-predicate adjectives
e.G musical clock, electrical engineering (afterstressed Adj+N)

8. Schmerling
It does seem to be the case that in some instances
stress assignment is governed by the choice of head or
attribute, in others by syntactic characteristics(whether
the attitude has the superficial form of an adjective or
a noun).There ought to be rules that captures these
generalizations. In other cases stress assignment is an
idiosyncratic property of individual compounds and
ought to be indicated in the lexicon as such. The fact
that stress placement is sometimes predictable should
not make us try to predict it always.

9. Chomsky/Halle analysis
 “relative prominence tends to be preserved
under embedding both for compounds and
phrases”.
 both combinations occur as constituents of
larger construction and the relative stress levels
are maintained.
E.g whale oil , whale oil lamp
American history, American history teacher,
teach American history.

10. • Chomsky/Halle analysis is not applicable at a
large scale.
• Liberman and Prince: Nuclear Stress rule, The
compound stress rule, Rhythm rule

11. The Nuclear Stress Rule
• The Nuclear Stress Rule specifies that
the strongest stress in a phrase will fall
as far back, i.e., as close to the end as
possible.

12. . . * . . . * . . line 2
__________ ____________
(* . *) (* . . *) . . line 1
Jesus wept Madison Avenue

13. Metrical Boundaries
(to (the (people (of Judea))))
××××××
to the (people of Judea)
√√√√√√

14. Larger Constituents
. . . *
----------------------------------------------------
(. . . * )
--------------------------------------------
. ( . . * )
----------------------------
* * (* * )
[Jesus[preached[to[the[people[of[Judea]]]]]]]

15. Stress Equalization
Convention
• When two or more constituents are
conjoined into a single higher level
constituent, the asterisk columns of the
heads of the constituents are equalized
by adding asterisk to the lesser
column(s).

16. Line 4 . . . *
____________________________________
Line 3 {*} . . *
-----------------------------------------
Line 2 {*} {*} . *
---------------------
Line 1 * * * *
(Jesus(preached to the(people of Judea)))

17. • JESUS preached to the people of Judea
• Jesus PREACHED to the people of Judea
• Jesus preached to the PEOPLE of Judea
• Jesus preached to the people of JUDAE

18. The Rhythm Rule
• The Rhythm Rule specifies that the stress on a
word will be retracted (i.e., moved forward) in
order to avoid consecutively stressed syllables.
This rule reflects the tendency in English towards
alternating stressed and unstressed syllables.
• In a constituent composed of two or more words,
retract the right boundary of the
prefinalsubconstituent of constituent to a
position immediately before the head of
subconstituent, provided that the head of
subconstituent is located in the last word of
subconstituent (with further restrictions if the
subconstituent consists of a single word).

19. • “Rhythm rule is universally constrained from
moving the absolute stress peak of the phrase to
which it applies”. Prince (1983)
3 1 2 4
New York Maine Route
3 1 2 4
Maine New York Route
Like the nuclear stress rule, the rhythm rule for
word sequences applies cyclically.

20. Removing Stress Clashes
• JapaNEse
• INstitute
• Japanese (adjecent) Institute =
• JApanese INstitute
• sixTEEN JapaNEse vs. SIXteen JApanese
INstitutes
• ANtique NINEteen TWENty MOtor

21. Cooper and Eady (1986)
• Thirteen corporations/companies submitted
bids...
• thirTEEN
• THIRteen
Look ahead???

22. The Compound Stress Rule
• No new rule is required, for the stress contours of
compound words result from the interaction of
the nuclear stress rule and the rhythm rule.
• In particular, the nuclear stress rule freely applies
to all constituents composed of two or more full
words (that is, not clitics).
• The rule will apply to compounds as well as to
noncompounds and will place an extra asterisk
on the rightmost subconstituent.

23. Three hypothesis
• Structural hypothesis
• Semantic hypothesis
• Analogical Hypothesis

24. Plag(2006)Structural hypothesis
• Compounds are regularly left-stressed
• Word combinations with right stress cannot
be compounds.
• Questions raised and confusions
• Stress is the only distinction between Madison
street and Madison Avenue

25. • Giegrich (2004) has proposed a new variant of
structural hypothesis
Compliment –head: structures like truck driver
cannot be syntactic phrases hence must be
compounds i.e left-stressed
Modifier-head: structures such as steel bridge
display the same word order as corresponding
modifier-head phrase (wooden bridge) hence are
syntactic structures and are right-stressed.

26. • Contradictions:
e.G opera glasses , table cloth
• Giegrich: above is the result of lexicalization.
• Problems with the above idea:
• Lexicalization---- not a categorical process
• It cannot be decided whether an item is
lexicalized?

27. Contradictions
• We should not find rightward stress among
NN constructs that exhibit comliment- head
order.
Counter example:
Tory leader
• structural hypothesis------Not Valid!

28. Semantic Hypothesis
“ stress assignment according to semantic
categories”
• rightward stress--- well defined categories
• E.g geologist-astronomer , scholar- activist
• Above are----Copulative compounds

29. • Other meaning relations :
Temporal: summer night
Locative : Boston marathon
Causative: aluminium foil, silk tie-----(made of)
Shakespeare sonnet, Mahler
symphony(created by)

30. Contradictions
• Summer school, summer camp , day job
• Fudge’s theory: NNs in which N refers to the
period or point of time are right-stressed----
REFUTED!
• Common point in both hypothesis?
Rightward stress is restricted to modifier- head
compounds.

31. Analogical hypothesis
• Schmerling:
------ “many compounds choose their stress
pattern in analogy to combinations that have
the same head”------
e.G Oxford street, Main street, Fourth Street
Madison Avenue, Fifth Avenue
• It is however unclear that how far this
approach can reach.

32. • Manufactures Rule
Made-of-Rule - Final stress
apple 'pie, raspberry 'jam, wooden 'doll
• One word Rule
Compounds written as one word almost
always have initial stress
Blackbird, Greenhouse

33. • Location Rule - Final stress
• Country, region, town - Final stress
Russian 'Roulette, Siamese 'Cat
• Place names - Final stress
King's 'Square, Western 'Avenue
• Parts of a house, building - Final stress
Garden 'Shed, Church 'clock, School 'Hall

34. • Positioning - Final stress
Left 'hand, West 'wing
• Time Location - Final stress
March 'sales, winter 'sports
• Magazines, Newspapers - Final stress
Western 'Mail, New York 'Times

35. • Skills, academic subjects - Initial stress
'French teacher, 'Russian class, 'swimming
instructor
• Compound nouns formed from a phrasal verb
- Initial stress
'set-up, 'make-up, 'comeback, 'feedback
• Compound nouns with verb + er/ing +
participle - Final stress
hanger-'on, passer- 'by

36. • Verb + ing + noun (purpose is aided or
achieved by the object) - Initial stress
'Washing machine, 'running shoes
• Verb + ing + noun (a characteristic) - Final
stress
sliding 'scale, running 'water
• Adjective +verb + er - Final stress
high-'flier, fast-'breeder, loud'speaker