Dictionary

univerbation en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˌjuːnɪvɜː(ɹ)ˈbeɪʃən/
• (Southern-England) audio
• /ˌjynɪvɜˈbeʃən/ (Multicultural-London-English)
• (General-American) audio

Etymology

Probably from French univerbation, from uni- (“uni-”) + Latin verbum (“word”) + French -ation (“-ation”).

Meanings

1. (countable, uncountable) The diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words.
   • Standard examples of univerbation are cupboard, brainstorming, or necklace. 2004, Walter Bisang, Nikolaus P. Himmelmann, Björn Wiemer, What makes Grammaticalization?: A Look from its Fringes and its Components, Walter de Gruyter, →ISBN:
   • Lexicalization and grammaticization compared In Section 3, it was pointed out that there are two kinds of lexicalization which can be usefully compared with grammaticization, i.e. fossilization and univerbation. The discussion and examples in this section will be confined to the more general and widespread of these two types, i.e. univerbation (the emergence of new lexical entries from collocations), primarily in order to keep the presentation simple and straightforward. 2004, Walter Bisang, Nikolaus P. Himmelmann, Björn Wiemer, What makes Grammaticalization?: A Look from its Fringes and its Components, Walter de Gruyter, →ISBN, page 34:
   • This process is referred to as univerbation. An example from English is the word notwithstanding, which derives historically from the word not and the participle withstanding. In modern English it counts as a single word, namely, as a preposition, as in the prepositional phrase notwithstanding his request (compare the ungrammatical withstanding his request). Further examples are the conjunction because from Middle-English bi + cause 'by cause of', parallel to French par cause […] 2015, John R. Taylor, The Oxford Handbook of the Word, OUP Oxford, →ISBN, page 173:
2. (countable, uncountable) A new word formed by this process.
   • The two suppletive pronominal paradigms *se/o- ~ *te/o- ‘that’ and *i-/ei̯- ~ *e/o- ‘this’ are continued in many IE [Indo-European] languages, both as simplicia and as univerbations with other pronouns and adverbs[.] 2025 May 14, Sergio Neri, “On the origin and development of the Albanian demonstratives”, in Journal of Historical Linguistics, volume 15, number 2, John Benjamins, →DOI, →ISSN, page 320:

Forms

Relateds

grammaticalization · compound word · portmanteau

Synonyms

monophrasis · monolexis · word-amalgamation · monolexia

Translations (26)

ru универба́ция ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · sk univerbizácia ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · hu egyszavasulás ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · hu egyszavas formává válás ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · hu univerbáció ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · fr univerbation ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · hu egyszavasítás ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · el μονόφραση ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · de Univerbierung ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · de Zusammenrückung ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · sh pojednorječenje ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · hu univerbálódás ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · nl univerbering ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · el μονολεξία ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · sq njëfjalëzim ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · de Univerbation ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · oc univerbacion ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · ar نَحْت ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · fi univerbaatio ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · hu összeolvadás ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · fi syntagmaattinen sulautuminen ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · it univerbazione ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · pl uniwerbizacja ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · cs univerbizace ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · hu összetétellé válás ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words) · es univerbación ((linguistics) the diachronic process of forming a new single word from a fixed expression of several words)