Irregular Word Formation of Lexical Innovations in James Dashner’s The Maze Runner

Dhyani Natasha Kartikasari (English Department, Universitas Gadjah Mada)
Ni Gusti Ayu Roselani (English Department, Universitas Gadjah Mada)

Lexicon
Vol 5, No 2 (2018)

This study investigates lexical innovations in The maze runner by James Dashner (2010), especially in terms of irregular word-formation techniques. 34 units of lexical innovations were found and classified according to their word classes: nouns, verbs, adjectives, and exclamations. The analysis focuses mainly on the examination of the word-formation processes undergone by the lexical units. The results reveal that four irregular word-formation techniques were used in the coinage of the new lexicon: compounding with left-headedness, compounding with unrecognizable constituent, compounding with irregular combination, and rhyming.