The Word Formation of Gailaigo Hybrids: Comparative Analysis of Wago and Kango Constituents

Japanese lexicon is comprised of three major categories: Wago (native Japanese 和語), Kango (Sino-Japanese 漢語), and Gailaigo (loanwords 外來語). This paper examines how Wago and Kango constituents play different roles in loan translation and coinage as far as the formation of Gailaigo hybrid is concerned. My research shows that first, While Kango constituents demonstrate strong capacity for compounding with Gailaigo in both loan translation and coinage, Wago constituents function mainly in the latter. Second, When compounded with one unit of Gailaigo, Kango and Wango also show different patterns. A complex base of Kango constituents generally exhibits higher compounding capacity or tendency than when it is a single base, while the Wago constituents do the opposite. This suggests that if one unit of Gailaigo constituent equals two units of Kango constituents (as many others have asserted), then we may also assume that one unit of Gailaigo constituent. Last but not the least, for the Gailaigo hybrid representing nominal classification, if it is compounded by the rule of loan translation, the last element of the hybrid tends to be a Kango constituent, but no such tendency is found if it is a case of coinage.