An Analysis of Blends in Local English Newspapers

Abstract

There are many blends found in the newspapers such as a-meow-zing (amazing + meow) and purr-sible (purr + possible). The blend is a type of word-formation technique combining two or more source words (SWs) to become one compact new word. This qualitative study aims to classify the types of blends and analyse the semantic relationships between paradigmatic and syntagmatic blends found in local English newspapers (The Star, NST, The Malay Mail, and The Borneo Post). This study uses two theories dealing with the types and semantic relationship of blends. The classifications of blends are recorded based on Mattiello’s framework: morphotactic (total and partial), morphological and graphic (overlapping and non-overlapping), and morphosemantic (attributive and coordinative). The semantic relationship between paradigmatic and syntagmatic in blends are studied based on the headedness and meanings of the blend using Bauer’s framework. A total of 168 blends were analysed to classify the types of blends and semantic categories using a descriptive qualitative research design. The findings show that local English newspapers used total type blends and syntagmatic blends. The paradigmatic blends share the same lexical class, while syntagmatic blends share different lexical categories. The syntagmatic blends have two types, termed as right-headed (modifier + head) and left-headed (head + modifier). The findings of this study can help to identify semantic relations regarding the headedness in word-formation, especially in blends. The paper concludes that the headedness determines the semantic types and function of blends.