ENGLISH COMPOUND – Compound Words
Lesson 1 – Compound Verbs
Compound words are words formed by combining multiple words to create a different word.
- football
- blackboard
- breakwater
- underworld
- snowwhite
- undercut
- over-ripe
- tumbledown
- highlight
- without
Some compound words have become single words over time:
- housewife
- lawsuit
- wallpaper
- chatroom
- Username
- harddisk
TECHNICAL TERMS:
- Hardware
- Software
Some compounds are hyphenated:
- mother-of-pearl
Some adjectives can also be compounds:
- leftover ingredients
- gunmetalsheen
- green monkey disease
Note: Some compound words may have different stress patterns. For example:
A black board
A blackboard
White House
Some compound words are written as a single word in American English but hyphenated in British English:
earsplitting (American English), ear-splitting (British English): deafening
eyecatching (American English), eye-catching (British English): eye-catching