MORPHOLOGY (LINGUISTICS)

WHAT'S MORPHOLOGY?

a) Morphology is the study of the structure of words.

-Paradoxically, however, the concept of word itself defies simple definition. In English, for example, words tend to be smaller than the sentence, and we combine words to form sentences. One tricky thing, however, is that in many languages, a single word can have "sentence" meaning

SUMMING UP THE TOPICS : Morphology is the study of word structure and word

formation. Words, though impossible to define in absolute terms,

can be thought of as the units that are combined to form sentences in a language such as English.

Just as sentences can be broken down into smaller units (words), we can break words down into smaller, meaningful parts.

The smallest meaningful part of a word is called a morpheme.

Note: not all words have more than one morpheme. Words that have only one morpheme are also called monomorphemic words (e.g. pig). Words with more than one morpheme are called polymorphemic words, as in foolishness (fool + ish + ness).

 

MORPHEMES:minimal unit in which there is an arbitrary union of a sound and a meaning (lexical meaning or grammatical function).

A morpheme: may be represented by a single sound ( ‘a’ in “amoral” )

: may be represented by a single syllable ( “child” “ish” )

: may be represented by more than one syllable

2 syllables: (camel ,lady , water) 3 syllables: (crocodile) 4 syllables: (elevator)

MORPHEMES

one of two or more words pronounced alike but differ in meaning or spelling.  Example: to too two

One of two or more words spelled identically but differ in meaning or pronunciation

Example: Bow and arrowBow of a violinBow of a shipBow a tieJapanese bow

Homonyms (a.k.a Homophones)

Homograph

TYPES OF MORPHEMES

Free Morphemes :is a morpheme that by itself can function as a

word in a languageExamples : Boy , desire , gentle , man.

CONTENT VERSUS FUNCTION WORDS

Content Words: The nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs that constitute the major part of the vocabulary. Content words are referred to as OPEN CLASS words because we can add new words to these classes

Function Words: A word that does not have clear lexical meaning but has a grammatical function. Function words include: conjunctions, prepositions, articles, auxiliaries, complementizers, and pronouns. Function words are referred to as CLOSED CLASS words because we can not add new words to these classes.

Content Words Function Words

Bound Morpheme: is a morpheme that cannot stand by itself to

form a word; it must be joined to other morphemes It is bound because although it has meaning, it cannot stand alone. It must be attached to another morpheme to produce a word.

Examples : -ish -ness -ly dis-trans-

Free morpheme : badBound morpheme : lyWord : badly

AFFIXES

Affix: is a bound morpheme that occurs before (prefix), after (suffix), in the middle of (infix), and around (circumfix) stems (root morphemes)

Prefix: un-, pre-, bi-Suffix: -ing, -er, -ist, -lyInfix: un-freaking-believable Morphemes that are inserted between other

morphemesCircumfix:Morphemes that are attached to another

morpheme both initially and finally. Also known as: discontinuous morphemes

ROOTS & STEMS

Root : is a non-affix lexical morpheme that cannot be analyzed into smaller parts. Roots may or may not stand alone as a word

Examples : Paint (paint-er) Read (re-read)

Ceive (con-ceive) Stem : is that part of a word to which

grammatical/ inflectional affixes are added. It may consist amongst others

a). Solely single root morpheme such as e.g. (Simple stem such as dog)

b). Two root morphemes e.g. ( compound stem as in blackbird)

c). A root morpheme plus a derivational suffix e.g. (a complex stem as in unscrew)

a) cats: single root morpheme: cat + inflectional suffix –s

b) crowbar: two root morphemes (crow + bar) ) + inflectional suffix –s

c) inventions: : root morpheme invent + lexical suffix -ion+ inflectional suffix -s

WORD FORMATION (WORD COINAGE)In linguistics, the ways in which new words are made on the basis of other words or morphemes.

COMMON TYPES OF WORD FORMATIONCoinages

Nonce words

Borrowing

Calquing

Clipping

COINAGES

Coinage is the word formation process in which a new word is created either deliberately or accidentally without using the other word formation processes and often from seemingly nothing .For example, the following list of words provides some common coinages found in everyday English:

Aspirin Escalator heroin Band-aid Factoid Frisbee Google linoluem

NONCE WORDS

Nonce words are new words formed through any number of word formation processes with the resulting word meeting a lexical need that is not expected to recur. Nonce words are created for a single occasion. For example, the following list of words provide some nonce words with definitions as identified in the Oxford English Dictionary

Cotton-wool: to stuff or close ears with cotton wool.

Twi-thought: an indistinct or vague thought

BORROWING ARE ALSO REFERRED TO AS LOANWORDS Borrowing is the word formation process in which a word from one

language is borrowed directly into another language. For example, the following common English words are borrowed from foreign languages: algebra – Arabic bagel – Yiddish cherub – Hebrew chow mein – Chinese fjord – Norwegian galore – Irish haiku – Japanese kielbasa – Polish murder – French near – Sanskrit paprika – Hungarian pizza – Italian smorgasbord – Swedish tamale – Spanish yo-yo – Tagalog

CALQUING

Calquing is the word formation process in which a borrowed word or phrase is translated from one language to another. For example, the following common English words are calqued from foreign languages: beer garden – German – Biergarten blue-blood – Spanish – sangre azul commonplace – Latin – locus commūnis flea market – French – marché aux puces free verse – French – vers libre loanword – German – Lehnwort long time no see – Chinese – hǎo jiǔ bu jiàn pineapple – Dutch – pijnappel scapegoat – Hebrew – ez ozel wisdom tooth – Latin – dēns sapientiae

Calques are also referred to as root-for-root or word-for-word translations

CLIPPING

Clipping is the word formation process in which a word is reduced or shortened without changing the meaning of the word. Clipping differs from back-formation in that the new word retains the meaning of the original word. For example:

advertisement – ad alligator – gator examination – exam gasoline – gas gymnasium – gym influenza – flu laboratory – lab mathematics – math

memorandum – memo photograph – photo public house – pub raccoon – coon reputation – rep situation comedy – sitcom telephone – phoneThe four types of clipping are back clipping, fore-

clipping, middle clipping, and complex clipping. Back clipping is removing the end of a word as in gas from gasoline. Fore-clipping is removing the beginning of a word as in gator from alligator. Middle clipping is retaining only the middle of a word as in flu from influenza. Complex clipping is removing multiple parts from multiple words as in sitcom from situation comedy

IDENTIFYING MORPHEMES

1. Segmentation of words into minimal sound-meaning constituents

basic strategy comparing and contrasting forms that are

partially similar in sound and meaning associating shared sound with shared

meaning continuing to do so until forms cannot be

broken into smaller sound-meaning units

EXAMPLES 1. segmenting repayment into its

constituent morphemes: comparing contrasting isolating1. repayment : payment re- payment2. payment : pay pay-ment re- pay-ment prefix+root+suffix2. segmenting instructions into its

constituent morphemes: comparing contrasting isolating

1. instructions : instruction instruction-s

2. instruction : instruct instruct-ion3. instruct : construct in-struct in-struct-ion-s prefix+root+suffix+suffix3. segmenting inconsistent into its

constituent morphemes:comparing contrasting isolating1. inconsistent : consistent in-

consistent2. consistent : consist in-consist-ent3. consist : desist, insist, persist con-sist

in- con-sist –ent prefix+prefix+root+suffix identifying the meaning of the various

forms

the meaning of re-pay-ment = the meaning of re- + the meaning of pay- + the

meaning of -ment the meaning of in-struct-ion-s = the meaning of in- + the meaning of -struct +

the meaning of -ion + the meaning of –s the meaning of in-con-sist-ent = the meaning of in- + the meaning of con- +

the meaning of -sist + the meaning of -ent

2. Bound roots in segmenting a word into its

constituent morphemes, not all morphemes obvious

some of the segmentations, or breaks, are less obvious

compare: -sist in consist re- in rewrite -er in writer some root morphemes never occur alonein modern English, morphemes such as -

ceive, -mit, -fer have lost their independent meaning – their meaning depends on the entire word in which they occur