Iconicity in word formation

Abstract This chapter deals with paradigmatic and syntagmatic iconicity in word formation within the framework of Natural Morphology, using various data ranging from poetry to child language acquisition. The chapter focuses on morphological iconicity to be distinguished from phonetic, phonological, syntactic, and pragmatic iconicity. Grammatical compounding and derivation (including conversion) as well as extra-grammatical (e.g. onomatopoeia, echo words, reduplications, interjections, abbreviations, blends) and marginal word formation (e.g. onomastics) are investigated. In word formation, syntagmatic iconicity is best represented by the immediate repetition of affixes or of complex word formations sharing the same basis. The most general case of paradigmatic iconicity in derivational morphology is represented by the preference for diagrammatic iconicity in preferring concatenative morphology (affixation) to non-concatenative morphology. Paradigmatic iconicity in compounding consists first of all in the great preference for the morphosemantic head (in the signified element) to be also the morphotactic head (in the signifying element). It appears that anti-iconic techniques (e.g. subtraction) occur mostly in extra-grammatical morphology (e.g. abbreviatory devices). In grammatical word formation, iconicity, together with transparency, is related to productivity. For example, the diagrammatic parallel between the morphotactic and the morphosemantic head–non-head relations holds for most productive English compounds but not for the unproductive type.