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Funktionsverbgefüge stehen seit jeher in der Sprachkritik, die sich nun auch auf digitale Räume ausbreitet. Vertreten wird dort die These, Funktionsverbgefüge und ihre entsprechenden Basisverben seien äquivalent und könnten in allen Kontexten durch die verbalen Entsprechungen ersetzt werden. Dies kann durch die vorliegende korpusbasierte und textlinguistische Studie am Beispiel des Gefüges Frage stellen widerlegt werden. Anhand eines extensiven Datenmaterials aus den Wikipedia-Artikel-Korpora des IDS zeige ich die semantischen, grammatischen und textlinguistischen Unterschiede zwischen dem Basisverb und dem Funktionsverbgefüge im Gebrauch auf, die sich in der Anreicherung, Verdichtung, Perspektivierung, Gewichtung und Wiederaufnahme von Informationen im Text manifestieren.
The aim of this article is to show how linguistic and literary studies can benefit from the joint analysis of linguistic structures in poetry. Firstly, the analysis of poetry has an important impact on linguistic theory as it leads our attention to specific structures and meanings that so far have not been considered. Secondly, a close linguistic analysis can reveal hitherto overlooked facets of meaning which have a great significance for the overall interpretation of a poem. We focus on Bare Root Infinitives (BRIs) in German. As they lack the features for tense, mood, person and number, they are more flexible in meaning than finite forms. When looking at poetry, besides the well-known deontic and bouletic meanings (cf. Reis 1995, 2003; Gärtner 2014) a third meaning that we call reactive meaning stands out. Remarkably, this reactive meaning can also be found in everyday language. Its specific semantic properties show that a semantic analysis of BRIs in the style of Kaufmann (2012) is adequate: modality, but not non-referentiality, is a grammatically given semantic property of BRIs. The specific case study of the poem ‘muster fixieren’ (‘fixing patterns’) by Nico Bleutge reveals how the restricted context of the poem interacts with the different interpretations of BRIs, resulting in a complex interpretation of the text.
The (mis)management of rapport amongst groups in Niger Delta (ND) communities has become a significant issue, which Ahmed Yerima's Hard Ground (HG) depicts as having the capacity to aid or control the conflicts in the region. Linguistic studies on Yerima's drama from the perspective of pragmatics have tended to use pragmatic acts to identify the discourse value of proverbs and functions of characters' utterances but have not accounted for the politeness strategies utilised for rapport management, especially in conflict situations. This article, drawing on a rapport management model of politeness and aspects of speech act discourse, identifies the face, sociality rights, and interactional goals that characterise the conflict-motivated dialogues sampled in HG, and reveals the rapport management (RM) strategies through which these are managed in the text. Three conflict situations can be observed as prompting different RM strategies: cause-effect identification (CEI), militancy support (MSP), and disagreement (DSG) situations. CEI is marked by incriminating (involving eliciting and informing acts) and exonerating (including complimenting and acknowledging acts) strategies; MSP is indexed by strategies of persuasion (realised with face-enhancing/threatening acts), whereas DSG is typified by requesting (featuring explicit head acts and alerters) and blaming strategies (including insulting and threatening, aggravating moves). Generally, the requesting, blaming, and exonerating strategies are largely used by the ND youth in HG to probe, threaten, or disagree on specific issues, while the incriminating and persuasion strategies are mainly employed by the women to indict, influence, and predict future actions. The study of RM in the conflict situations depicted in the play sheds light on the often neglected cause of conflicts in contemporary Africa.
Social media, asthe fifth estate, increasingly influence public dis-courses and play a major role in shaping public opinion.Undoubt-edly, they have the potential to promote participation and democra-cy. On the other side, they also constitute a risk for democratic soci-eties, as the spread of hate speech and fake news has shown. As aresponse,forms of counterspeech organisedby civil society have emerged in social media to counter the normalisation of hate speech and democracy-threateningdiscourses. In order to influence dis-course in social media in terms of the fifth estate, counterspeech campaigns must be visible alsoquantitatively. In this ethnographic contrastive study, I analysed the activitiesof the German and Finn-ish Facebook groups of the network #iamhere international. The in-tensity and continuity of their activities is obviously influenced by their strategic organisation: conventionalised rules support them whereas lacking or inconsequent rules seemed to be counterpro-ductive.
As kindergartens and schools closed down during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany, two hashtags emerged on Twitter: #CoronaEltern (#CoronaParents) and #CoronaElternRechnenAb (#CoronaParentsDocumentTheCosts). In this paper, we examine the positioning practices around both hashtags as expressions of “digital activism” (Joyce 2010: VIII). One characteristic of the hashtag campaign is that political demands are hardly ever made directly. Rather, the participants resort to five main linguistic patterns: (1) they address different target groups; (2) they refer to different protagonists; (3) in the subcorpus #CoronaEltern specifically, they constitute themselves as a collective through (4) the recurring use of first-person narratives; (5) and generalization and typification. Our findings show that #CoronaParents are not just parents in times of a pandemic: #CoronaParents are only those who see themselves as such, participating in an evolving, at times misunderstood community.
Am 5. und 6. Mai 2022 fand am Institut für Germanistik der Universität Leipzig der von Adele Baltuttis, Anna Bliß, Barbara Schlücker und dem Autor dieses Berichts organisierte internationale Workshop "Word Formation and Discourse Structure" statt. Gegenstand des Workshops war ein bisher in der Forschung weitgehend unbeachtetes Thema, nämlich die Rolle der Wortbildung für die Struktur und Verständlichkeit von Texten: Inwieweit tragen komplexe Wörter zum Strukturaufbau und zur inhaltlichen Verknüpfung über Satzgrenzen hinweg bei? Vor dem Hintergrund dieses Desiderats sollte der Workshop ein Forum bieten, in dem zu diesem Thema Perspektiven interdisziplinärer Forschung erarbeitet werden. Zwar sind bereits in den 1970er bis 1990er Jahren erste Arbeiten zur Interaktion von Wortbildung und Text- bzw. Diskurslinguistik entstanden, im Anschluss ist das Thema jedoch kaum noch verfolgt worden. Dabei fanden in der Text-/Diskurslinguistik enorme Entwicklungen statt, etwa bei der Einbeziehung neuer Methoden, insbesondere aus der Psycho- und Computerlinguistik oder hinsichtlich elaborierter theoretischer Modellierungen. Der Aspekt der Wortbildung blieb hierbei aber weitgehend außen vor. Der Workshops sollte deshalb neue und bekannte Fragen und Probleme (wieder) aufgreifen und vor dem Hintergrund der aktuellen Erkenntnisse und Methoden neu diskutieren. Das Thema Wortbildung und Diskursstruktur ist insofern ein neues und interdisziplinäres Thema, das das Zusammenspiel unterschiedlicher linguistischer Bereiche und Traditionen erfordert. Dies zeigt sich auch im Programm des Workshops, das internationale Wissenschaftler:innen aus verschiedenen linguistischen Teilbereichen (Wortbildung, historische Sprachwissenschaft, Diskurs-/Textlinguistik, Fachsprachen, Korpus- und Computerlinguistik) zusammengebracht hat.
Based on the privative derivational suffix -los, we test statements found in the literature on word formation using a – at least in this field – novel empirical basis: a list of affective-emotional ratings of base nouns and associated -los derivations. In addition to a frequency analysis based on the German Reference Corpus, we show that, in general, emotional polarity (so-called valence, positive vs. negative emotions) is reversed by suffixation with -los. This change is stronger for more polarized base nouns. The perceived intensity of emotion (so-called arousal) is generally lower for -los derivations than for base nouns. Finally, to capture the results theoretically, we propose a prototypical -los construction in the framework of Construction Morphology.
"Ausgangssperre light" und "digitales Semester" – Wortgruppenlexeme zwischen Lexikon und Syntax
(2022)
In recent years, the relation between lexicon and syntax as distinct domains has been questioned repeatedly. For all languages under discussion word-like examples that do not fit the category word have been found, so that the boundary between lexical unit and syntactic unit becomes leaky. Furthermore, relative borderlines vary from language to language. One of the problematic domains are phrasemes (phraseological units). This article concentrates on German multi-word lexemes which are very similar to compounds in respect to structure, semantics, and cognitive aspects (rechter Winkel 'right angle'). Though mostly neglected or treated peripherally, this group is not exactly small, and patterns are productive – in contrast to the rest of phrasemes. We argue in favor of a transition between words and phrases and gradient distinctions between categories and a position of the problematic examples close to compounds and rather not among phrasemes. Finally, we look at how theoretical approaches deal with the problem.
This article addresses the controversial question how non-derived denominal verbs (e.g. wingsuit, kennel, trombone) build their argument structures. Based on selected subsets of conceptually related verbs it will be shown that the argument structures of these verbs are flexible though not arbitrary. Without context, these verbs evoke frame-like default situations which are determined by speakers' shared encyclopaedic knowledge and sensorimotor experience and which are mapped onto a small set of abstract event schemata that 'predesign' thematic configurations. The discourse context, which also provides the syntactic context, either meets or models our expectations as to the context-free readings. In the latter case, new (metaphorical) readings are contextually created. These configurations are not arbitrary either because the meanings of verbalized nouns should always be (a) in a relation of contiguity to the base-noun concepts and (b) compatible with the semantics of the syntactic constructions.
Am 2. und 3. Dezember 2021 fand im Haus der Universität in Düsseldorf die von Katrin Hein (IDS Mannheim) und Sascha Michel (RWTH Aachen) organisierte Tagung "Wortbildung und Konstruktionsgrammatik" statt, welche von der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) sowie der Gesellschaft von Freunden und Förderern der HHU (GFFU) finanziert wurde. Aufgrund der aktuellen Corona-Lage wurde die Tagung in einem hybriden Veranstaltungsformat durchgeführt, sodass neben den Veranstaltern und fünf ReferentInnen vor Ort weitere fünf ReferentInnen aus Deutschland, den Niederlanden, Italien und Frankreich zugeschaltet wurden. Daneben fand sich mit 46 digital Teilnehmenden aus dem In- und Ausland ein großer und disziplinär breit aufgestellter Rezipientenkreis aus LinguistInnen, GermanistInnen, RomanistInnen, AnglistInnen sowie Literatur- und ÜbersetzungswissenschaftlerInnen ein, die nicht nur die Vortragsdiskussionen bereicherten, sondern insgesamt die bestehende Relevanz des Tagungsthemas unterstrichen.
So-called gender-neutral nouns like Freund*innen, Redakteur_in or AutorInnen are suspected to not fit into the linguistic system. This paper argues that if these forms are pronounced with a glottal stop (e.g. Freund[ʔ]innen), only small changes in the grammar are needed to integrate them. It is shown that the suffix [ʔ ɪn] in these derivatives can be analysed as a phonological word and therefore could be a new suffix that is added to the grammar. The phonological structure of its derivatives is shown to be just like the phonological structure of many native German derived nouns as many suffixes form a phonological word of their own. Also, the insertion of [ʔ] in these derived wordforms can be explained by the status of the suffix as a phonological word. Hence, it is argued that speakers do not ignore the regularities of the grammar when they use gender-neutral nouns with [ʔ ɪn], but rather work with these rules to create new words with new meanings.
This study proposes a cross-linguistic, corpus-based, and constructionist analysis of denominal verbs (DNVs) in English, Dutch and German. DNV constructions include various morphological construction types, such as conversion (e.g. English bottle > to bottle), prefixation (e.g. Dutch arm 'arm' > omarmen 'to embrace') and suffixation (e.g. German Katapult 'catapult' > katapultieren 'to catapult'). We investigate the correlation between the distribution of DNV constructions and the typological properties of the languages, focusing on boundary permeability, inflectional complexity, syntactic configurationality and word-class assignment. The study shows that, although the three languages have the same repertoire of DNV constructions at their disposal, a Germanic cline can be detected in their preferences for non-overt vs overt marking of the word-class change. As such, the study highlights the impact of typological factors on the shape of language-specific constructional networks.
The present study investigates word formation processes and strategies in monolingual and bilingual children by age 7 to 8. Using an elicitation task in form of naming of low frequent complex objects, it is analyzed whether bilingual children use other word formation strategies than monolinguals do. Therefore, N=9 monolinguals and N=9 bilinguals were tested. N=268 elicited reactions were analyzed. Results show bilinguals to use the same word formation strategies to the same extent as monolinguals do. Compounding overweighs derivation in each child. However, a more in-depth qualitative analysis shows that the complex compounds formed by bilingual children disregard the German composition rule of right-hand heads to a significantly higher extent than the monolingual children do. Since this acquisition process has been reported for German monolingual 2-year old children, this result is interpreted as a delayed acquisition process rather than a transfer from the respective first language.
This paper deals with German kinship terms ending with the form "n" (Muttern, Vatern). Firstly, data from newspapers are presented that show that especially Muttern denotes very special meanings that can only be derived to a limited extent from the lexical base: a) Muttern referring to a home where mother cares for you, b) Muttern standing for overprotection, and c) Muttern representing a special food style (often embedded in prepositional phrases and/or comparative constructions like wie bei or wie von Muttern). Secondly, it is argued that the addition of n to kinship terms is not a word-formation pattern, but that these word forms are instead lexicalized and idiomatized in contemporary German. Hence, a diachronic scenario is applied to account for the data. It is argued in the present paper that the n-forms have been borrowed from Low German dialects, especially from constructional idioms of the type ‘X-wie bei Muttern’ and that forms were enriched by semantic concepts associated with the dialect.
The paper explores factors that influence the distribution of constituent words of compounds over the head and modifier position. The empirical basis for the study is a large database of German compounds, annotated with respect to the morphological structure of the compound and the semantic category of the constituents. The study shows that the polysemy of the constituent word, its constituent family size, and its semantic category account for tendencies of the constituent word to occur in either modifier or head position. Furthermore, the paper explores the degree to which the semantic category combination of head and modifier word, e.g., x=substance and y=artifact, indicates the semantic relation between the constituents, e.g., y_consists_of_x.
Nominalization in French can be done by means of conversion, which is characterized by the identity between the base and the derived lexeme. Since both noun→verb and verb→noun conversions exist, this property raises directionality issues, and sometimes leads to contradictory analyses of the same examples. The paper presents two approaches of conversion: derivational and non-derivational ones. Then it discusses various criteria used in derivational approaches to determine the direction of conversion: diachronic ones, such as dates of first attestation or etymology; and synchronic ones, such as semantic relations, noun gender or verb inflection. All criteria are evaluated on a corpus of 3,241 French noun~verb pairs. It is shown that none of them enables to identify the direction of conversion in French. Finally, the consequences for the theory of morphology are discussed.
This article examines French Verb-Noun compounds with Means value (couvre-pied 'blanket', lit. cover-feet), derived from stative bases. It shows that they are generally ambiguous between Means and Instrument reading. The regularity of this double value discards an analysis relying on verbal homonymy, in favor of Rothmayr's (2009) hypothesis of bi-eventive verbs. We assume that the presence of an agentive as well as a stative component in the verbal bases accounts for the double Means/Instrument value of the VNs studied here. We also examine "pure" Instrument VNs, available with similar verbal bases. We show that the distribution of the Instrument vs. Means/Instrument values relies on the state of the referent of the noun involved in the compound after the event described by the verbal base occurred. A permanent state entails a "pure" Instrument reading, whereas Means/Instrument reading obtains if the state of N is reversible (Fábregas & Marín 2012).
Simple Event nominals with Argument Structure? – Evidence from Irish deverbal nominalizations
(2020)
Deverbal nominals in Irish support Grimshaw's (1990) tripartite division into complex event (CE-), simple event (SE-) and result nominals (R-nominals). Irish nominals are ambiguous only between the SE- and R-status. There are no CE-nominals containing the AspP layer in their structure. SE-nominals (also found in Light Verb Constructions) are number-neutral and incapable of pluralizing and are represented as [nP[vP[Root]]]. R-nominals are devoid of the vP layer and behave like ordinary nouns. The Irish data point to v as the layer introducing event implications and the vP or PPs as the functional heads introducing the internal argument (Alexiadou and Schäfer 2011). Event denoting nominals in Irish can license the internal argument but aspectual modification and external argument licensing are not possible (cf. synthetic compounds in Greek (Alexiadou 2017)), which means that, counter to Borer (2013), the licensing of Argument Structure need not follow from the presence of the AspP layer.
We investigate deverbal zero-derived nominals in English (e.g., to walk > a walk) from the perspective of the lexical semantics of their base verbs and the interpretations they may receive (e.g., event, result state, product, agent). By acknowledging that, in the absence of an overt affix, the meaning of zero-nominals is highly dependent on that of the base, the ultimate goal of this study is to identify possible meaning regularities that these nominals may display in relation to the different semantic verb classes. We report on a newly created database of 1,000 zero-derived nominals, which have been collected for various semantic verb classes. We test previous generalizations made in the literature in comparison with suffix-based nominals and in relation to the ontological type of the base verb. While these generalizations may intuitively hold, we find intriguing challenges that bring zero-derived nominals closer to suffix-based nominals than previously claimed.
Deutsche Komposita haben einige forschungsrelevante Eigenarten, zum Beispiel die Fugenelemente. Kopf hatte deshalb befürchtet, das Thema Fugenelement sei längst "leergeforscht" (S. 1). Natürlich ist kein Thema wirklich leergeforscht. Weil wir verschiedene Ansichten und Einsichten haben. Weil niemand auf Forschungsfragen definitiv antworten kann. Weil sich unsere Sprache – wie alles in der Welt – ständig verändert.
Multiple exponence in morphology has recently attracted a good deal of attention (see, among others, Harris 2017; Caballero & Inkelas 2018). In this paper, I examine Modern Greek verbs which take an extra verbalizer (implicit multiple exponence). The simple base (bare form) and the base with the verbalizer co-exist in the lexicon without any semantic or aspectual opposition and can be used in the same syntactic context. Thus, they raise important questions for morphological theory. I argue that the explanation of this pleonastic addition may be hidden in the relation between inflection and derivation and the polyfunctional character of verbalizers in synthetic languages. Since the two forms co-exist and one member of each pair features an idiomatic association of meaning and complex form, morphological theory is challenged. I argue that these formations find a natural account within the framework of Construction Morphology (Booij 2010; Jackendoff & Audring 2019).
In ihrer neuesten Publikation befasst sich die ausgewiesene Wortbildungsexpertin Elke Donalies mit Fällen wie Wetterbeobachter, Dickhäuter, Vergissmeinnicht, zartfühlend und wieviel, deren linguistische Erfassung nach wie vor Probleme bereitet. Grund dafür dürfte zum einen sein, dass die Worthaftigkeit der untersuchten Einheiten vielfach fraglich ist (z. B. zart fühlend als syntaktische Fügung vs. zartfühlend als Wort bzw. Wortbildungsprodukt). Zum anderen ist die Analyse der Einheiten – bei Zuordnung zum Bereich Wortbildung – schwierig und im Resultat entsprechend vielfältig (z. B. Dickhäuter als Derivation, Zusammenbildung oder synthetic compound (vgl. S. 114)). Donalies hat sich also mit der Wahl derartiger "linguistischer Problemmacher" viel vorgenommen und insgesamt drei Jahre Projektzeit im Rahmen ihrer IDS-Tätigkeit dafür aufgewendet (Januar 2015–Januar 2018).
This paper deals with complex prefix-particle structures like aberkennen in German. First, it presents a scheme to analyse these double complex words from a synchronic point of view. Second, it is shown for words with ab-, that this type of word formation is typical for Middle and Early Modern High German and reasons for the decrease are discussed.
This study explores four German nominalization patterns (-ung; -erei; Ge- -X-e; nominalized infinitives) using corpus and web data. We conclude that they can be considered a word formation paradigm, as some functions depend on paradigmatic oppositions. Our case study supports gradual differences between inflectional and word formation paradigmaticity.
Besides some well-established forms like autoritär 'authoritarian'; humanitär 'humanitarian'; new coinages ending with -itär can be found in German. These adjectives are closely related to nouns ending with -ität. From an etymological point of view; these formations are morphologically transparent. Not only are the adjectives new; but -itär emerges as a new suffix.
Die hier zu besprechende Dissertation des schwedischen Germanisten Nicolaus Janos Raag ist an der Universität Uppsala (Schweden) unter der Betreuung von Dessislava Stoeva-Holm entstanden. Die Arbeit will zeigen, welche Rolle Substantivkomposita im Rahmen der Wissensvermittlung und des Kulturtransfers spielen, wie deutsche Komposita lateinisch vermittelte Inhalte in die eigene frühmittelalterliche klösterliche Kultur der Rezipienten integrieren und welche Veränderungen sie dabei erfahren. Für die Untersuchung wurden Substantivkomposita ausgewählt, da sie prädestiniert für die Benennung von bisher Unbekanntem sind und durch ihre binäre Struktur die Fähigkeit besitzen, zwei Größen zueinander in Beziehung zu setzen, wobei die semantische Relation zwischen den Konstituenten eines Kompositums prinzipiell offen und auf morphologischer Ebene nicht ausgedrückt ist.
Phrasal compounding is a phenomenon illustrated by slept all day look. Prototypical examples are determinative compounds with a nominal head and a phrasal non-head. They raise interesting questions about the interaction of syntax and morphology and have been discussed in this context by Botha (1981) for Afrikaans and Lieber (1992) for English. Also in German and Turkish, they have received ample attention. This volume has as its main purpose to extend the range of languages for which phrasal compounds are discussed. It consists of a brief introduction (chapter 1), six chapters devoted to individual languages, and a final chapter with a more general outlook. The use of further in the title is perhaps surprising, in particular because the volume under review is the first of a new series. It is motivated by the fact that the papers are from “the second workshop on phrasal compounding”, held in Mannheim in 2015. In this review, I will first present and discuss each chapter, then consider some general points about the volume.
The project WBLUX (Wortbildung des moselfränkisch-luxemburgischen Raumes) at the University of Luxembourg aims at the investigation of Luxembourgish word formation through different text sorts and genres. In order to achieve this goal the compilation of an annotated corpus is needed. This article gives an example for benefits of using a corpus with annotations like parts of speech, lemmata and word formation affixes in the analysis of productivity of some selected word formation affixes of Luxembourgish. Then it describes how one can achieve such a corpus from a technical point of view. This includes the choice of corpus format, of a database platform and the designing of programs needed for the annotation process of word formation itself. This article also suggests new corpus linguistic approaches for research of word formation like analyzing the usage of word formation bases in the entire corpus or performing context analysis in order to determine semantical functions of each suffix.
This paper provides an overview of the connection between word formation and text type linguistics. Following a brief outline of the current state of research, desiderata and weaknesses of previous research as well as perspectives of a text type oriented research on word formation will be introduced. Here, I advocate a stronger inclusion of oral (with regard to the medium) and conceptually spoken text types (cf. Koch/Oesterreicher 1985). The focus is on the analysis of word formations within the text type of battle rap, which can be classified as oral and conceptually spoken. The analysis gives an insight into my habilitation project outlined in the essay and shows how this project can be realized.
A typical characteristic of Central German dialects, especially of the Ripuarian dialect, is that it has collective nouns with ge- + -ze (cf. gesteinze) besides those with ge- + -e (cf. gesteine) corresponding to Dutch gesteente and gestene. A relationship between ge- + -ze and ge- + -te has been assumed for a long time. A corpus-based comparison is given in order to explain the genesis of these different formation types (ge- + -e, ge- + -ze, ge- + -te) and their relations. It seems likely that earlier Dutch formations influenced their Ripuarian counterparts. Rarely, the circumfix ge- + -te also occurs in Ripuarian texts and may be autochthone. One main result is that the suffic -ze in Ripuarian restores the collective formation in the circumfix ge- + -e when it was destroyed by the e-apokope. This is a rare instance where an element of word formation is replaced by another one in order to neutralize the isolation effect of sound change.
German "-isch" and English "-ish" share a common Germanic origin, which is evidenced by striking similarities concerning the derivation of ethnic adjectives "(englisch/English)" or property-denoting adjectives "(kindisch/childish)". However, after an initial period of parallel characteristics, the two languages display drastic changes, with English developing an approximative sense when attached to adjectival bases (e.g. "greenish") and expanding to a wide range of other word categories, while German "-isch" develops multiple functions and also comes to firmly occupy a morphological niche with non-native bases. The paper sheds light on the evolving divergence between German and English by presenting results from two diachronic corpus-based studies. Additionally, explanations with respect to the typological parameter of 'Boundary Permeability' are provided.
This paper investigates the spelling of compound nouns in a corpus comprised of Early New High German protocols of witch trials from the 16th and 17th century. Previous studies on the spelling of compound nouns in printed texts have found that scribes increasingly write compound nouns as one word during the 16th century. However, this paper will show that there is still much variation in handwritten texts from that time. The study focusses on identifying factors that lead scribes to write compound nouns either as one word or two, such as linking elements and the use of upper case letters. I will argue that while there is more variation in the spelling of compound nouns in the handwritten corpus than in printed texts, there still is a strong tendency to line up the boundaries of the graphemic and syntactic words.