Pars-pro-toto-Metonymien und -Metaphern in der Substantivkomposition des Deutschen
Pars pro toto Metonymies and Metaphors in German Nominal Compounds

Summary/Abstract: The paper aims at investigating an idiosyncratic category of contemporary German exocentric nominal compounds that comprise an underlying pars pro toto metonymy or metaphor. The structural pattern of determinative compounding is used to create common nouns that explicitly contain a lexeme designating a body part or a component while referring to the related whole. These units reveal a feature of the part that is actually or metaphorically present, designating the corresponding whole entity in a more or less motivated way. The article further discusses the defining formal, semantic-referential and stylistic features of such terms describing people, and, less frequently, animals, plants or objects, with a view to highlighting their distinctly colloquial and affective-evaluative nature.

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