UNREGISTRATED GERUNDS IN SERBIAN

Abstract

In Serbian, gerunds are mostly derivated from imperfective intransitive verbs with suffix -nje and only in exceptional cases it could be derivated from perfective transitive verbs. Processuality, fragmentation, divisibility are the basic concepts for derivation of gerunds. This paper deals with the perspective of gerunds with suffix -nje in the lexical system of Serbian on the examples of the new and unregistered gerunds contained in the Obratni rečnik novih i nezabeleženih reči (2003) by Đorđe Otašević. However, the focus of the research is oriented on motivated verbs and their semantic and derivative characteristics. In most cases gerunds show that their motivated verb also does not exist in the system, so that hypothetical verb and gerund are innovative units. Unregistered gerunds indicate the process of spreading of semantic-derivational potential of some nouns and adjectives in the derivative stem of motivated verbs. The potential of gerunds is reflected in their ability to create the new lexemes, especially new compounds and prefixed words.