Practice Exercises in Morphology

Linguistics 201

Free and Bound Morphemes

List the morphemes in each word below, and state whether each morpheme is free (F) or
bound (B).

1. creating 6. unhealthy

create (F) un (B)

ing (B) health (F)
y (B)

2. seaward 7. waiter

sea (F) wait (F)

ward (B) er (B)

3. wastage 8. reconsider

waste (F) re (B)

age (B) consider (F)

4. poetic 9. keys

poet (F) key (F)

ic (B) s (B)

5. modernize 10. incompletion

modern (F) in (B)

ize (B) complete (F)
ion (B)
Word Trees

For each word below, draw a word tree.

1. shipper 6. simply
2. disobey 7. jumping
3. resettled 8. digitizes
4. anticlimaxes 9. activity
5. disengagement 10. confrontational

1. N 2. V

V DAff DAff V

ship er dis obey

3. V

DAff V IAff

re settle d

4. N

DAff N IAff

anti climax es

5. 3. N

DAff V DAff

dis engage ment

6. Adv 7. V

Adj DAff V IAff

simple y jump ing

For #7, “jumping” could also be either a noun (“Jumping over the water was dangerous”)
or an adjective (“The jumping bunnies looked ridiculous.”) In both of these cases, “ing”
is a derivational affix.

8. V

N DAff IAff

digit ize s

9. N

Adj

V DAff DAff

act ive ity

10. Adj

V DAff DAff

confront ation al
 Practice Exercises in Morphology III
Linguistics 201

I. Morphological Analysis

From the following data sets, identify the strings of sounds which correspond to the
morphemes in each language.

Swahili

Swahili is a Bantu language which is spoken primarily in East Africa. There are
approximately 800,000 native speakers of Swahili, and some 30,000,000 people (!)
worldwide speak Swahili as a second language.

anapenda 'he likes' alimona 'he saw him'

atapenda 'he will like' alimsaidia 'he helped him'
alipenda 'he liked' alimpiga 'he hit him'
amependa 'he has liked' alimchukua 'he carried him'
alinipenda 'he liked me' alimua 'he killed him'
alikupenda 'he liked you' ananitazama 'he looks at me'
alimpenda 'he liked him' atakusikia 'he will hear you'
alitupenda 'he liked us' alitupanya 'he cured us'
aliwapenda 'he liked them' ninakupenda 'I like you'
nitampenda 'I will like him' nitawapenda 'I will like them'

Pronouns Tenses Verbs

he: a [present]: na see: ona
me: ni [future]: ta help: saidia
you: ku [past]: li hit: piga
him: m [past part.]: me carry: chukua
us: tu kill: ua
them: wa look: tazama
I: ni hear: sikia
cure: panya
like: penda

Translate the following English sentences into Swahili:

i. He has hit me.

amenipiga

ii. He helps us.

anatusaidia

iii. I will look at you.

nitakutazama