English Neology: A Journey through the Oxford English Dictionary Online Newest Entries (2018-2022)
Keywords:
neology, word formation, Oxford English Dictionary Online, productivityAbstract
This paper aims at examining English neologisms that were introduced into the Oxford English Dictionary Online between 2018 and 2022. The research seeks to provide information about the most productive word formation mechanism during that period. The compilation of the data required the creation of a corpus with all the new terms to fulfil that objective. Due to the great volume of new word entries, proportional samples were selected to ensure the representativeness of the data for each of the years. The findings were analysed quantitatively and qualitatively to obtain a comprehensive discussion of the results. The conclusions drawn from this study highlight a shift in the most productive word formation process from affixation to compounding.
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