A classification of compounds in Karachay-Balkar

Abstract

This study proposes a classification of compound forms in Karachay- Balkar (krc), an understudied Turkic language from the Kipchak group. The classification of compounds, a type of binominal, is based on three elements: firstly, an analysis of the grammatical relations between the constituents of noun-noun compounds with and without a linking element; secondly, an analysis of the semantic relations between the constituents of noun-noun compounds with and without a linking element; and thirdly, a comparison of compounds with and without a linking element based on a set of morpho-syntactic diagnostics. In line with Gürer (2017), we suggest that the distribution of the linking element is not optional but rather signals an argument relation between the head and the dependent. Analysis indicates further that the presence of a linking element is observed with endocentric subordinate compounds, although not all compounds within this group have one. The comparison of compounds with and without a linking element reveals that the two types show the same morpho-syntactic properties and that the constituents of a compound act as a single atomic unit, in contrast to syntactic phrases. © 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston.