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In linguistics, conversion, also called zero derivation, is a kind of word formation; specifically, it is the creation of a word (of a new word class) from an existing word (of a different word class) without any change in form.
As a type of word-formation, conversion exists in many languages. "What is specific for the English vocabulary is not its mere presence, but its intense development.
The study of conversion in present-day English is of great theoretical interest, as nowhere, perhaps, are the interdependence of vocabulary and grammar and the systematic character of language so obviously displayed. Studying it, one sees the dependence of word-building types on the character of word structure already frequent in the language.
The main reason for the widespread development of conversion in present-day English is no doubt the absence of morphological elements serving as classifying signals, or, in other words, of formal signs marking the part of speech to which the word belongs. The fact that the sound pattern does not show to what part of speech the word belongs may be illustrated by the following table.
|
Words |
Parts of speech in which they occur |
|
Noun |
Verb |
Adjective |
Adverb |
Other parts of speech |
|
|
back home silence round |
+ + + + |
+ + |
+ + + |
+ + |
+ + + |
Recent research suggests that this regular or patterned or modelled homonymy has some characteristic features: statistical data obtained at Leningrad University show, for example, that it regularly involves monosyllabic words of a simple morphological structure.
Conversion from suffixed and prefixed words, although quite possible (c f. commission n : : commission v) is uncommon. This is easily accounted for, as a word of complete divisibility is already a member of certain structural correlations. There is, of course, no point in forming a verb from the noun arrival by conversion when there exists a verb of the same root, arrive.
As the percentage of root words among adjectives is smaller than in other parts of speech and as English adjectives mostly show a complex morphological structure, it is but seldom that they serve as basis for conversion.
On the other hand conversion may be considered to be the predominant method of EnglfsTi verb-formatiom\ Actually, apart from the stand up type there are no competitive ways "as far as English verbs are concerned: composition is almost non-existent, prefixation extremely scarce. One might think of the denominal verbs with the suffixes -ate, -ify, -ize, but these are stylistically limited to learned and technical formations.
One more debatable point has to be dealt with Prof. A.I. Smirnitsky and his school consider the paradigm to be the only word-forming means of conversion. A.I. Smirnitsky sees conversion as a case where a word is transferred from one paradigm to another and the paradigm is the only means at work. It is difficult to accept this view as it ignores the syntactic pattern which is in fact of great importance.
If we bear in mind that a new word coined in this way appears not in isolation but only in a definite environment of other words, we shall invariably come to the conclusion that conversion is a combined morphological and syntactic way of word-building.
The following example will make it clear: // one struck lucky, one had a good buy (C.P. Snow). Here buy is a noun, because it occupies the position of a noun and possesses the syntactical ties of а пэип (it is preceded by the indefinite article and modified by an adjective) and not because being used in the plural it would take the ending -s and so enter the paradigm of nouns. Actually in this case the linguist can go by what he has before him. E.g.: The bus stops. The conductor rips off the platform mid round to the front for a lean on the radiator and a quick drag with the driver.
Conversion here is partly usual and partly occasional.
Moreover, it is impossible to identify the paradigm in the isolated form. Having the form buys one cannot say whether it is the plural of a noun or the third person singular (Present Indefinite Tense) of a verb. Thus, even the paradigm can be recognized only on the evidence of distribution, i.e. by contrasting formal arrangements. It is the context that shows whether a word is to be taken as a noun or as a verb.
In the humorous complaint: Why when quitting a taxi do I invariably down the door handle when it should be upped, and up it wlien it should be downed? (O. Nash) the fact that down and up are verbs is signalled not by the possibility of upped and downed but by the syntactical function and syntactical ties.
Also, if the paradigm is accepted as the only word-building means in conversion, it necessarily follows that conversion does not exist for the parts of speech or separate words where either the prototype or the derived word possess no paradigm, i.e. do not change. What is, for example, the word-building pattern in the following pairs?
must v — must n why adv — why particle down adv — down adv.
These very numerous cases remain then completely out of the general system and there is no telling how they are to be classified.
As has been mentioned above, the bulk of words coined by means of conversion is constituted by verbs. Among them we find those correlating not only with nouns (the predominating pattern) but with adjectives, adverbs and other parts of speech as well.
Among verbs derived from adverbs and other parts of speech there are some that are firmly established in the English vocabulary: to down, to encore, to pooh-pooh
Other examples of words that are completely substantivized (i.e. ma, have the plural form or be used in the Possessive case) are captive, conservative, criminal, female, fugitive, grown-up, intellectual, male, mild, native, neutral, radical, red, relative and many more.
Completely substantivized adjectives may be associated with determinatives, e. g.: Swinton combed out all the undesirables (Lindsay).
There is no universally accepted evaluation of this group. E. Kruis-inga2 speaks of conversion whenever a word receives a syntactic function which is not its basic one.
The prevailing standpoint among Leningrad linguists is different. L.P. Vinokurova, I.P. Ivanova and some other scholars maintain that substantivation in which adjectives have the paradigm and syntactic features of nouns differs from conversion, as in substantivation a new word arises not spontaneously but gradually, so that a word already existing in the language by and by acquires a new syntactic function ana* changes its meaning as a result of a gradual process of isolation. There are other scholars, however, who think this reasoning open to doubt: the coining of a new word is at first nothing but a fact of contextual usage, be it a case of recognized conversion or substantivation. The process of conversion is impossible outside a context. No isolated word can ever be formed by conversion.
L.P. Vinokurova distinguishes two main types of substantivation: (1) it may be the outcome of ellipsis in an attributive phrase, e. g. the elastic (cord), or (2) it may be due to an unusual syntactic functioning. E.g.: I am a contemplative, one of the impossibles.
It may be argued, however, that there must be a moment of the first omission of the determined word or the first instance when the adjective is used in speech in a new function.
There is one more point to be considered, namely a radical difference at the synchronic level: whereas words coined by conversion form regular pairs of homonyms with words from which they are derived, no such regular pattern of modelled homonymy is possible in substantivation of adjectives. It has already been emphasized that in nouns and verbs it is the morphologically simple words that form the bulk of material used in conversion. The predominance of derived adjectives prevents this class of words from entering modelled homonymy.
The degree of substantivation may be different. Alongside with complete substantivation of the type already mentioned (the private, the private’s, the privates), there exists partial substantivation. In this last case a substantivised adjective or participle denotes a group or a class of people: the blind, the dead, the English, the poor, the rich, the accused, the condemned, the living, the unemployed, the wounded, the lower-paid.
We call these words partially substantivised, because they undergo no morphological changes, i.e. do not acquire a new paradigm and are only used with the definite article and a collective meaning. Besides they keep some properties of adjectives. They can, for instance, be modified by adverbs. E.g.: Success is the necessary misfortune of human life, but it is only to the very unfortunate that it comes early (Trollope). It was the suspicious and realistic, I thought, who were most easy to reassure. It was the same in love: the extravagantly jealous sometimes needed only a single word to be transported into absolute trust (Snow).
Besides the substantivised adjectives denoting human beings there is a considerable group of abstract nouns, as is well illustrated by such grammatical terms as: the Singular, the Plural, the Present, the Past, the Future, and also: the evil, the good, the impossible. For instance: “One should never struggle against the inevitable,” he said (Christie)/
It is thus evident that substantivation has been the object of much controversy. Some of those, who do not accept substantivation of adjectives as a variant of conversion, consider conversion as a process limited to the formation of verbs from nouns and nouns from verbs. But this point of view is far from being universally accepted.