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Anonymous Posted 15 years ago
Grammar

Compound Names

I'm homeschooling my children and one of the workbooks required my son to make compound words. He was given one root word and had to come up with another to add to it. One of the words listed was "her". Not knowing what else to do, he spelled the word "Hermen".

This of course is a name probably derived from the more popular spelling "Herman". In the sense of the definition, it seems that this would qualify as a compound word in that it is made up of "her" and "men", however, I'm wondering if proper names of people, when made up of more than one root word, are considered compound words?

Thanks

Alex
  

Top answer

Hi, No, the term 'compound word' does not really include proper names. Suggesting this will not help your child get a good understanding of the term. One consideration is that a proper name can be anything the parents choose, however odd it may be.

— Clive

  • Hi, No, the term 'compound word' does not really include proper names.
  • Suggesting this will not help your child get a good understanding of the term.
  • One consideration is that a proper name can be anything the parents choose, however odd it may be.
  • A compound word, on the other hand, has to have some reasonable degree of acceptance and currency and meaning.
  • eg I can't just jam together any two words I choose, like the words 'kitchen' and 'nuclear', and claim that there is a compound word 'kitchennuclear'.
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3 Answers
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Hi,

No, the term 'compound word' does not really include proper names. Suggesting this will not help your child get a good understanding of the term.

One consideration is that a proper name can be anything the parents choose, however odd it may be.

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hi;

First, her is a pronoun, not a proper name. I cannot think of a true compound word using her as one of the parts.

Second, it is somewhat traditional in the southern states to give babies, especially girls, two first names (http://usads.ms1
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AnonymousI'm homeschooling my children and one of the workbooks required my son to make compound words. He was given one root word and had to come up with another to add to it. One of the words listed was "her".
It's time to get a different workbook. her is not a root word unless they're going for the word hernia, which comes from the Indo-Europ
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