Chapter 5 & 6: Morphology & Word Formation

Suffixes

-able - sense of being -er - agent -ful - characterized by -fy - make, become, cause to be -ism - action or practice, state or condition -less - lack of -ly - like -ology - study, science -ship - condition, character, skill -y - characterized by, condition

What about the other ways to express the plural in English?

-s: cats, dogs horses -ves: wolves, wives Ø: sheep, fish -en: oxen, brethren umlaut: men, feet, mice Latin endings: (i as in cacti), (ae as in algae), (a as in criteria)

So, are bound morphemes always easily categorized into one or the other category?

/ Contact the tribunal to find out if the hearing was recorded / Change of grammatical category of hear? YES! (Verb to noun) = Derivational suffix / It's most likely that you were hearing voices and you weren't going crazy / Change of grammatical category of hear? NO! (still a verb) = Inflectional suffix

When do we have to hyphenate?

1. Generally, hyphenate two or more words when they come before a noun they modify and act as a single idea. This is called a compound adjective: - an off-campus apartment - state-of-the-art design. 2. When creating new original or unusual compound nouns or verbs, writers should hyphenate to avoid confusion: - I changed my diet and became a no-meater. - He video-gamed his way through puberty. Sometimes compounded words are hyphenated (stir-fry), sometimes they are written together (babysit), and sometimes they are written separated from one another (turn on).

Adjective to noun / Adjective to verb

A final match —> a final an empty bin —> to empty the bin

Neologisms / Coinages

A process of word formation where new words (either deliberately or accidentally) are invented. This is a very rare process to create new words, but in the media and industry, people and companies try to surpass others with unique words to name their services or products. kodak, google, nylon, frisbee, aspirin etc.

Loan Translation / Calque

A special type of borrowing where elements of foreign words are translated into the borrowing language. skyscraper —> Wolkenkratzer (German), gratte-ciel (French) computer (from computare (to count)) —> Rechner (German, "counter, calculator"). Lehnwort (German) —> loanword Übermensch (German) —> superman Ohrwurm (German) —> ear worm

Clipping

A 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. Similar to an abbreviation, the shorter version of the word becomes accepted usage in a language and is, at some point, automatically associated with the meaning of the whole word. Ad from advertisement Gas from gasoline Exam from examination Cab from cabriolet Fan from fanatic Lab from laboratory Flu from Influenza (note the middle clipping here) Gator from alligator (note the fore-clipping here)

Backformation

A word formation process in which an affix detaches from the base form of a word to create a new word. Babysitter = (to) babysit Donation = (to) donatr Gambler = (to) gamble Television = (to) televise As you can see, new verbs are usually the result of backformation processes, and their originals are usually nouns.

What is the difference between words and morphemes?

A word, by definition, is a freestanding meaningful unit. A morpheme may or may not stand alone as a meaningful unit, as for instance -ly in quickly. quick - a meaningful morpheme + -ly (a "meaningless" morpheme).

Affixation

Affixation is the word formation process where a new word is created by adding a suffix or prefix to a root word. In English, affixation usually involves prefixes and suffixes, as infixes are rare and only used in creative expressions (unfeckingbelievable).

Acronyms & Initialisms

An acronym is a word formed from the initial letters of words in a phrase or a multi- syllable word. In acronyms, the letters are usually not pronounced individually but as a whole word, and usually written in capital letters. CD for compact disk NATO for North Atlantic Treaty Organization NASA for National Aeronautics and Space Administration ATM for Automatic Teller Machine PIN for Personal Identification Number

Blending / Blends

Blending is a compounding process in which only parts of two (or more) words are combined to form a new word. The meaning of the new word is usually a combination of the meanings of its constituents (compositional). Smog (smoke + fog) Motel (hotel + motor) Brunch (breakfast + lunch ) Infotainment ( information + entertainment) Spanglish (Spanish + English)

Bound morphemes

Bound morphemes cannot stand alone as a meaningful unit, they must occur with another morpheme to produce meaning (-ly). Usually, bound morphemes are affixes: Prefix: un- in undo Suffix: -er in undoer Infix: uncommon in English Usually realized as interjections within a word: Un****ingbelievable, Hallebloodyluhjah.

Allomorphs

Compare the plural endings of the words in the sentence below: "At our farm, we have two four cats, three dogs, two horses." Clear difference between -s in cats and dogs, and -es in horses. The different realisations of the plural ending in English can be classified as a set of morphs within the morpheme of "plural endings". In phonology, different realisations of a specific phoneme are called allophones —> we can apply the same in morphology as well: allomorphs. Hence, /-s/, /-z/ and /-ɪz are allomorphs of the morpheme "plural endings".

Compounds

Compounding is a type of word formation (common in many languages) where two words are combined to create a new word.

Compounds can form... what?

Compounds can form new words in a variety of word classes such as adj, verbs, nouns. Sometimes, compounded words are hyphenated; sometimes they are written together; and sometimes they are written separated from one another. Part + time = part-time (adj) Book + case = bookcase (noun) Low + paid = low-paid (adj) Stir + fry = stir-fry (verb) Finger + print = fingerprint (noun) Baby + sit = babysit (verb) Sun + burn = sunburn (noun) Turn + on = turn on (verb) Good + looking = good-looking (adj)

Derivation

Derivation is the most common word formation process, in which a derivational affix attaches to the base form of a word to create a new word.

Derivational Morphemes

Derivational morphemes: Prefixes and suffixes Change the grammatical category of words or their meaning: -er in baker (turning the verb bake into a noun). Un- in undo (no grammatical change, but the complete opposite meaning.

What is a "cran", and what is a "mul"? And what do they carry?

Etymology: "cran" is related to the bird crane "mul" is related to the latin "mor-us", which means mulberry tree. These morphemes carry lexical meaning, but they are only used in these words —> They are bound to the composition in cranberry and mulberry. Hence, they are bound lexical morphemes, even called bound stems or "cranberry morphemes".

What does word comprises?

Every word comprises one or more morphemes: walk, walker, walked, walking.

Bound stems?

Find the odd one(s) out, from a morphological perspective! Blackberry Cranberry Mulberry Raspberry Strawberry All berries mentioned above consist of two free lexical morphemes, except for cranberry and mulberry.

What are the two types of morphemes?

Free morphemes and bound morphemes

Free morpheme

Free morphemes can stand alone as a meaningful unit (quick). - Can stand alone as single words. - Called a root (or even stem). - Further divided into functional and lexical morphemes.

What is free morphemes divided into?

Functional morphemes and lexical morphemes

Functional Morphemes

Functional morphemes define a relationship between lexical morphemes, e.g. conjunctions, prepositions, articles, auxiliaries —> no lexical meaning, but a grammatical one. - New functional morphemes not easily added to a language = closed class.

Eponyms

In the word formation process, sometimes neologisms are derived from the name of a person or a place. Hoover: the person and company who marketed it Jeans: Genoa, a city in Italy Watt: scientist James Watt Fahrenheit: scientist Gabriel Fahrenheit Sandwich: 4th Earl of Sandwich (1718-1792)

Inflectional Morphemes

Inflectional morphemes: Usually suffixes. Adds grammatical property to the word added to but does not change the essential meaning of the word itself: -ing in hearing (change in tense) -s in girls (change in number)

Lexical Morphemes

Lexical morphemes carry the meaning of the message, i.e. the meaningful content (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs). - New lexical morphemes are easily added = open class.

What are morphemes?

Morphemes are the minimal units of words that cannot be subdivided further, like quick- & -ly.

Word Formation Process

Morphology also deals with word formation. - A word formation process relates to the creation of a new word by making changes in existing words or by creating new words. - There are multiple word formation processes, and sometimes, several of them are involved in the creation of a new word.

What does morphology analyse and deal with?

Morphology analyses the internal structure of words and morphemes, such as stems, root words, and affixes. Finally, morphology deals with word formation by explaining different processes involved when new words are created.

Are all of these different realisations of the plural also allomorphs?

Simple Solution: Only realisations of the plural resulting in similar forms of the singular and the plural word are allomorphs, i.e. the /-s/ morphs and the "zero" plural. The other realisations should be regarded as seperate lexical morphemes. E.g. ox is a lexical morpheme, denoting one castrated bull, and oxen is a lexical morpheme denoting two castrated bulls.

Borrowings / Loan words

The process by which a word from one language is adapted for use in another language. The word that is borrowed is called a borrowing, a loan word, or a borrowed word. It is the most common source of new words in most languages. Dope (Dutch) Croissant (French) Zebra (Bantu) Lilac (Persian) Pretzel (German) Yogurt (Turkish) Piano (Italian) Sofa (Arabic) Tattoo (Tahitian) Tycoon (Japanese)

What is important to remember about categorizing bound morphemes?

The same suffixes can sometimes be both inflectional and derivational, the context of the word is hence important to consider.

What is morphology in linguistics?

The study of word construction. - How new words are formed. - What is their relationship to other words in English?

What is bound morphemes divided into?

Two types of bound morphemes as well: inflectional & derivational.

What happens when an acronym loses its association?

When an acronym loses its association with the original word or phrase, it usually becomes the norm to write it in lowercase: - laser for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation scuba for Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus - radar for Radio Detecting And Ranging

Noun to verb

You can send me an e-mail later vs. You can e-mail me later. Can you put butter on my slice of bread? vs. Can you butter my slice of bread?

Zero-derivation

Zero-derivation, or conversion, is the word formation process in which a word of one grammatical form becomes a word of another grammatical form without any changes to spelling or pronunciation. -able - sense of being -er - agent -ful - characterized by -fy - make, become, cause to be -ism - action or practice, state or condition -less - lack of -ly - like -ology - study, science -ship - condition, character, skill -y - characterized by, condition

Prefixes

a- - without, not co- - together de- - opposite, negative, separation dis- -opposite, negative en- - cause to be ex- - former, previous, from in- - negative, not non- - absence, not re- - again, repeatedly un- - negative, not, opposite

What are the two different types of compounds?

compositional compounds: the meaning of the new word is determined by combining the meanings of the parts: blueberry —> a blue berry non-compositional compounds: the meaning of the new word cannot be determined by combining the meanings of the parts: jet lag, face time

Verb to noun / Verb to adjective

to permit —> to have / get a permit to stand up —> a stand-up / comedian to buy —> to make a good buy