Lietuvių kalbos naujažodžių duomenynas ir naujadarų tyrimo perspektyvos
Database of Lithuanian Neologisms and prospects for research on neologisms

Summary/Abstract: The article reviews some derivational links between neologisms given in the Database of Lithuanian Neologisms (further referred to as DLN) and aims at identifying the direction of further research on the formation of neologisms and gaining a deeper insight into the possibilities offered by DLN as a means of such research.In terms of derivational relations, the neologisms in DLN can be analysed in a variety of ways. Out of them, the most promising and mutually related ones are the following: according to the roots; according to word-formation categories and the characteristic derivational affixes; according to semantic lexical groups.The first direction of research would focus on the analysis of mutual relations of words sharing the same root and on formation, comparison and analysis of derivational nests to find out the following: if they are abundant with neologisms; the number of their derivational levels; the distance of new derivatives from the initial word; if there is an increase in the morphemic complexity of derivatives; which part of neologisms are formed in an unusual way (mixed, analogous, contaminative, and the like), etc. It has been determined that during the period researched DLN has presented neologisms (derivatives, compounds, hybrids, semantic neologisms) with 800 Lithuanian roots. Most of their derivational nests are not plentiful; however, abundant derivational nests comprising 26–40 coinages (roots kalb-, raš-, dien-, žmog-, darb-/dirb-, žod-, etc.) and consisting of 4–5 derivational levels also occur (e.g. derivational nests of words rašyti, dirbti). There was a single DLN neologism that accounted for 47 per cent of roots; however, this by no means demonstrates that such a share of neologisms with Lithuanian roots does not share the same root with other neologisms and does not belong to any derivational nests.A small-scale pilot study following the second line of research demonstrated certain shifts in the category of forming tool names. For instance, one might presuppose that according to the data of Lithuanian and Modern Lithuanian grammars the most productive suffix of this derivational category -tuvas is replaced by the previously second-ranked suffix -iklis and sixth-ranked -yklė.The third line of research is represented by the analysis of derivatives formed on the basis of personal names – surnames of politics, suggesting that: DLN contains considerably less derivatives of this type than there are actually used; the productivity of surnames and the abundance and variety of their derivatives largely depend on non-lingual reasons; the derivatives of some affixes (-izmas, -oidas) bear negative connotations regardless of the context, etc.Evaluation of DLN as a means of researching derivational relations of neologisms should take into account the uniqueness of its structure and the classification levels (card index, repository, database) of this source resulting in a gap between the DLN data of a certain period and the actual usage during that period. The formal criterion for distinguishing lexical and semantic neologisms in the DLN (on the basis of records (or absence thereof) in reference sources) is not suitable for the analysis of the formation of neologisms, where the starting point should be derivational opposition, while new senses (semantic neologisms) should only be regarded as results of semantic development (transfer and narrowing of senses, lexicalisation, specialisation, etc.). However, these specific aspects of building and managing DLN do not prevent the research into its data in terms of word-formation; on the contrary, they further the investigation of neologisms included in the DLN, comparison of research results with those obtained using other methods (e.g. using neologism catchers), and exploration of derivational relations of neologisms, the degree of changes compared to traditional word-formation, and if the changes observed are at all essential.

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