Persian Endocentric Compounds: Simple or Complex Conceptual Structures?

A number of linguistic studies on compounding have acknowledged that due to the existence of head element, endocentric compounds are semantically compositional and transparent. The current study aims to focus on the semantic aspect of Persian endocentric compounds to show that: 1) in some cases, the existence of head element does not entail the semantic compositionality and simplicity of conceptual structure in endocentric compounds, and 2) compound words which are categorized as endocentric compounds differ in terms of the complexity of conceptual structure. Considering that the ability of Conceptual Blending Theory (Fauconnier & Turner, 2002) to describe meaning construction in compound words has been previously approved by some cognitive linguists, this theory has been applied to analyze meaning construction in a number of Persian endocentric noun-noun nominal compounds. A close analysis reveals that although some endocentric compounds are semantically compositional and prompt for simplex networks, there are endocentric compounds which are not semantically as transparent and compositional. In this kind of endocentric compounds, metaphor or metonymy has affected the modifier element, thus meaning construction triggers single-scope networks which are neither as complex as double-scope networks nor as simple and compositional as simplex networks. This result implies the diversity of conceptual structure in words which are defined as endocentric compounds..