Conjugation of compound words that include verbs

Hey everyone!

Going through my Anki decks I sometimes encounter compound words that end with the stem of a verb:

後回し

里帰り

I understand for example with 後回し, that にします is what follows as such:

その問題は後回しにしよう

Is it a general rule for these nouns that にします is what follows? Does this form express decision or simply doing an action?

Thanks!

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~にする is a grammar point that means “to decide on” or “to go with.”

It’s often used for ordering food… ハンバーガーにします

Here 後回し is a noun. Turning a verb into its stem form can make it a noun.

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Understood, this clarifies my doubts, thank you!

後回(あとまわ)し seems to only be used with にする (at least from what I can tell by Google searching), but other such compounds that are formed with the verb stem (Leebo correctly pointed out that these are grammatically nouns) will take simply する to turn them into a verb.

里帰(さとがえ)りする, for example.

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Right, so now I’m back to being doubtful, should I then only use する because they are nouns?Should I only use にする?Is it a noun to noun basis in which case I can’t decide to use one or the other?

I think using する as a rule of thumb is OK. Just remember 後回し as an exception for now. When in doubt, look at the example sentence or Google search for it.

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What are you trying to actually say? Japanese uses the pattern [stem] + auxiliary verb for all kinds of different things.

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