engleski

Intensification by means of word-formation processes in English and Croatian

The paper is an attempt to find out the most common word-formation processes in English and Croatian used for intensification of concepts. The two major word-formation processes found in this function are compounding and derivation. The data presented in this paper imply that intensification by means of compounding is mostly attested in the compound adjectives. In English, such compounds are very common, but, as it can be seen from the previous section of the paper, there are just a few examples of such intensification in Croatian, like mrtav pijan, mrtav umoran, etc. Instead, most of the Croatian counterparts are either single words or adjectives premodified by an adverb or postmodified by a PP expressing comparation. There is also a small group of compound verbs which have an intensified meaning, and those are the verbs beginning with out-, like outdo, outfight, outclass, outrun, etc. In Croatian, they are mostly translated with verbs beginning with nad-, like nadjačati, nadmašiti, and with pre-, like prestići, preteći, etc. As for intensification by means of derivation, it is achieved entirely by prefixation, with the prefixes arch/ archi-, macro-, maxi-, mega-, super-, hyper-, and ultra- for the augmentatives and mini- and micro- for the diminutives. Croatian does not normally provide its own translations for these intensifying prefixes, except for the occasional use of nad- in the case of the prefixes arch/ archi- and super-. Derivation, is equally used for the purposes of intensification in both Croatian and English, while the other process, compounding, is much more widespread in English than in Croatian.

intensification; word formation; compounding; prefixation; metaphor; figurative meaning

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