Subordinate and Synthetic Compounds in Morphology

Subordinate and synthetic represent well-attested modes of compounding across languages. Although the two classes exhibit some structural and interpretative analogies cross-linguistically, they denote distinct phenomena and entail different parameters of classification. Specifically, subordinate makes reference to the grammatical relation between the compound members, which hold a syntactic dependency (i.e., head-argument) relation; synthetic makes reference to the synthesis or concomitance of two processes (i.e., compounding and derivation). Therefore, while the former term implies the presence of a syntactic relation realized at the word level, the latter has strictly morphological implications and does not directly hinge on the nature of the relation between the compound members.