Vocabulary 09 - Compound Words Indicating Direction
There are thousands of words in the English language and we can learn them in other places besides our English classes. We read newspapers, we read novels, we read instruction booklets, we read advertisements, we watch TV, we listen to radio, we watch movies and we surf the Internet. All the time we are learning many more words and we store them in our vocabulary bank. But have you ever wondered where these words came from?
Sometimes we are aware that the word has come into English from another language. Sometimes we are aware that new technologies create new words and these new words spawn more new words. We know that the eight parts of speech (nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interjections) contribute to the words list, but from these words we can derive one more class of words:
compound words.
Compound words are essentially two other words combined to form a new word. It is likely that the new word formed will be related to the two words used to make it, but not always. It may have a meaning that is not related to the words used at all. It is also possible that the new word could fit into any category of words and sometimes more than one category.
UP and HILL are two words that combine to form UPHILL. We know that UP is used as an adverb, preposition, adjective or noun. HILL is used as a noun or verb. The compound word UPHILL is used as an adverb, adjective or noun. It is this diversity found in the English language that helps us to form newer and newer words.
When you hear somebody say “His organisation’s sales are on a DOWNWARD path” the word in capitals is a compound word and it gives us a sense of direction. There are many compound words that are formed which help us to describe a sense of direction. The quiz that follows tests your knowledge of such words.