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Identifying Adj + N compounds in Modern

Standard Arabic

Article October 2017

DOI: 10.1515/stuf-2017-0024

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Abdel Rahman Mitib Altakhaineh

Al Ain University of Science and Technology
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Identifying Adj + N compounds in Modern Standard Arabic

Abdel Rahman Mitib Altakhaineh

Assistant Professor of English Language and Linguistics
English Language Department
Al Ain University of Science and Technology, UAE
E-mail: abdelrahman.takhaine@aau.ac.ae or tkabd@yahoo.com

Abstract

The study aims to identify Adj+N compounds in Modern Standard Arabic by applying the cross-
linguistic criteria for compoundhood discussed in the relevant literature. The analysis reveals that
the most reliable cross-linguistic criteria to distinguish between phrases and compounds in MSA
are adjacency, referentiality, compositionality and the presence of inflection. Another language-
specific criterion, i.e. adjacency and the order of elements, which has asserted its validity, has been
suggested to distinguish between the two types of construct. I have also shown that all cases of
Adj+N compounding in MSA are bahuvrihis, since they denote a person in possession of the entity
denoted by the compound. Similar to Fassi Fehri (Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures
1999), I argue that the output of Adj+N compounding behaves more like a noun than an adjective.
I propose that Adj+N compounds have a silent N head, i.e. one/person, which determines the
syntactic category of such constructions in Modern Standard Arabic (cf. Gnther [The rich, the
poor, the obvious: Arguing for an ellipsis analysis of adjectives used as nouns, to appear) for a
similar analysis of nominalized adjectives in English).

Keywords: Adj+N compounds; phrases; Modern Standard Arabic; bahuvrihis; exocentric

Cite this article as:

Altakhaineh, A. R. M. (2017). Identifying Adj+ N compounds in Modern Standard Arabic.
STUF-Language Typology and Universals, 70(4), pp. 545578.
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