Morphology Instruction

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Morphology and Implications for English Language Teaching
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DOI: 10.13140/2.1.4908.7685
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Öz, H. (2014). Morphology and implications for English language
teaching. In A. Saricoban (Ed.), Linguistics for English language
teaching studies (pp. 83‐120). Ankara: Ani Publishing.
LINGUISTICS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE
TEACHING Studies
Edited by
Arif Sarıçoban
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Sarıçoban, Arif
LINGUISTICS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING Studies
Anı Publishing, 1st edition, Ankara/Türkiye
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ISBN 978-605-5213-86-2
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1. English Language, 2. Morphology, 3.Teaching, 4. Pragmatics
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Evolution of A
ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART 1: MICRO-LINGUISTICS
Chapter 1: The Phonetics of English Language ............................................................ 1
Mehmet Demirezen, Hacettepe University
Chapter 2: Phonemics and Phonology of English Language ....................................... 39
Mehmet Demirezen, Hacettepe University
Chapter 3: Morphology and Implications for English Language Teaching ................ 83
Hüseyin Öz, Hacettepe University
Chapter4: Syntactic Knowledge and its Relevance to Language
Teaching and Learning .............................................................................. 121
Martina Gračanin-Yuksek, Middle East Technical University
Chapter 5: Semantics and Meaning ........................................................................... 149
Bilal Kırkıcı, Middle East Technical University
PART 3: MACRO-LINGUISTICS
Chapter 6: Psycholinguistics ..................................................................................... 161
Ayşe Gürel, Boğaziçi University
Chapter 7: Language Acquisition in Childhood ........................................................ 179
Belma Haznedar, Boğaziçi University
Chapter 8: Pragmatics and its implications for L2 classrooms .................................. 205
Murat Hişmanoğlu, Uşak University
Chapter 9: Sociolinguistics ........................................................................................ 227
Korkut İşisağ, Gazi University
iii
Chapter 10: L2 Classroom Discourse Analysis ......................................................... 293
Mehmet Kılıç, Gaziantep University
Erdoğan Bada, Çukurova University
Chapter 11: Corpus Linguistics and its implications for L2 classrooms ................... 311
Hale Işık Güler, Middle East Technical University
iv
Chapter 3
Morphology and Implications for English Language
Teaching
Hüseyin Öz
Hacettepe University
INTRODUCTION
As you have seen in the preceding chapter, phonological knowledge enables speakers
of a language to produce meaningful utterances. Similarly, words are an important
component of our mental grammar in our linguistic knowledge. Rather than being a
static system of information committed to our memory, our knowledge of words
constitutes a dynamic system in which we continually create new words and even
expand their meanings into new areas. Thus, words allow us to use the language
creatively.
Morphology is commonly defined as the study of the internal structure of words and
the rules governing the formation of words in a language. It is once again part of our
grammatical knowledge of a language, and like linguistic knowledge it is generally
unconscious knowledge. Students of English need to establish a sound knowledge base
in understanding the structure of words and word formation processes. Developing an
awareness of English morphology will enable language teachers to help their learners
understand how words enter a language, what they consist of and how they are formed
by combining prefixes, suffixes, and roots. Recent research suggests that learners with
an awareness of word-formation processes tend to have larger vocabulary and better
reading comprehension (Kieffer and Lesaux, 2008; Kieffer and Lesaux, 2012a/2012b),
and by extension better writing (Templeton, 2012). Consequently, morphology can be
a valuable instructional tool for language learners to develop and use vocabulary
creatively.
The purpose of this chapter is, therefore, to introduce the field of morphology within
the aims and scope of the current textbook. The chapter is intended for students of
Linguistic for English Language Teaching Studies
English in general and those of English teacher education programs in particular, not
primarily for those students of linguistics. Nevertheless, what is presented in this
chapter will be consistent with normal linguistic views on words and word structure. It
is assumed that any reader who continues with more advanced topics of morphology
will not meet many variations in topics discussed here. Accordingly, this chapter first
scrutinizes words and types of words to provide a general overview of the notion of
words. Then, it introduces a variety of morphological issues such as the concept of
morpheme, its types, the distinction between inflections and derivations, and
exceptions in English morphology as well as morphs, allomorphs and the
pronunciation of morphemes. The chapter later elaborates on word formation through
derivation, which is by far the most common word formation process in the creation of
new English words. Beyond this common process is the discussion of other word
formation processes such as coinage, compounding, backformation, borrowing and
conversion. Each of these and additional processes are examined and exemplified for
students of English to develop their awareness. Finally, the last part looks at some
morphological implications for English language teaching. In discussing implications
for language teaching, particular attention will paid to recent research findings that
focus on the explicit teaching of morphological awareness as metalinguistic ability.
WORDS AND THEIR STRUCTURE

Like many others, English dictionaries contain hundreds of thousands of words, but it
is fairly true to say that most speakers do not know all of these words. So, how many
words do we know? This is really a tough question to answer because our vocabulary
has an open-ended aspect that makes a great contribution to our using language
creatively. According to Pinker (1999, p. 3), a child of six who begins school knows as
many as 13,000 words, and this number increases surprisingly fast as he or she
becomes exposed to new words from spoken language and print media around them. A
typical high school graduate knows about 60,000 words; an average literate adult or a
university graduate knows probably twice this number, that is, 120,000 words. We
should acknowledge that we all learn new words throughout our lives. Briefly, anyone
who has learned a language has also learned an astonishingly huge “list of facts
encoded in the form of words” (Akmajian et al. 2010). Even though it may not be a
complete one, this long list of words for any language is called its lexicon (or mental
dictionary), an important component of our linguistic knowledge.
But what do we mean when we say we know a word? To put it another way, what does
knowing a word mean? Knowledge of a word is connected with different types of
information encoded in our mental dictionary. For pedagogical purposes, we can list
the kinds of information we have mastered about a word as follows:
1. Pronunciation and Meaning: We have learned a sound (pronunciation) and a
meaning for every word we know. Every word consists of a sound-meaning unit,
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so every word in our lexicon is stored together with a pronunciation and a

meaning, maybe several meanings. There is also an arbitrary relationship (based on
chance rather than being planned or based on reason) between sounds and
meanings. Consequently, we may encounter words that have the same
pronunciation and different meanings (for example, bare and bear) and words that
have the same meaning and different sounds (for example, sofa and couch). We
can conclude that we have learned a meaning or several meanings for almost every
word we know.
2. Grammatical Category: We also store other information about a word, such as
whether it is a verb, a noun, an adjective, an adverb, a conjunction, or a
preposition. This kind of information identifies the grammatical class of the word.
For example, in the sentences I love Jessica and Jessica is the love of my life, the
word love is both a verb and a noun according to our knowledge of its grammatical
or syntactic class. Unless we had such kind of information in our mental
dictionary, we could not know how to produce grammatically correct sentences.
We could not distinguish grammatical sentences from ungrammatical ones either.
We intuitively know how to use words in different types of sentences thanks to this
kind of information.
3. Orthography / Spelling: Every literate speaker of a language also stores
information about how to spell the words they know. However, not every speaker
knows – or has to know – the etymology of a word he or she knows. In daily life,
we may sometimes talk about the origin and history of words such as coffee or
yoghurt, but this kind of historical information encoded in our mental lexicon is
not truly representative of our knowledge of words.
To sum up, knowledge of a word contains various kinds of information we encode in
our mental lexicon. Not only do we know the meaning or several meanings of a word
and its pronunciation when we say we know a word, but we also recognize its
grammatical category such as noun or verb as well as its spelling or orthography as
educated people. When we loop up a word, any typical English dictionary should give
at least lexical entry information that contains spelling, standard pronunciation,
definitions to represent one or more meanings of the word, and parts of speech. An
average dictionary may also give additional information about the origin and history of
the word, whether the word is nonstandard (such as ain’t) or slang, vulgar, or archaic.
Content Words and Function Words

When discussing about words, we sometimes make an important distinction between
two types of words: content words and function words (also referred to as open-class
words and closed-class words, respectively). A summary list of both classes of words
is presented in Table 2.1. Examples of content words include the English words uncle,
manage, huge and rapidly. These words belong to the major parts of speech that
85
consist of nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs and represent ideas, actions, objects and
attributes. They are also called “open-ended” or “open-class” words because we can
frequently add new words to this class of words. That is, we can create and add an
infinite number of new words to these classes.
Table 2.1 Content and Function Words in English
Content Words Function Words

Nouns (computer, board, peace, school) Articles (the, a/an)
Verbs (say, walk, run, belong) Auxiliaries (can, must, might, will)
Adjectives (clean, quick, rapid, enormous) Demonstratives (this, these, that, those)
Adverbs (quickly, softly, enormously, Quantifiers (many, few, little, some)
cheerfully)
Prepositions (on, with, to, from)
Pronouns (he, she, they, we)
Conjunctions (and, but, or, but)
On the other hand, function words are those which do not have clear lexical meanings
or obvious concepts related to them. They are lexically unproductive and are generally
invariable in form. They belong to grammatical or function classes that consist of a
small number of fixed items, such as articles, demonstratives, quantifiers, prepositions
and conjunctions. These function words denote grammatical relations and unlike
content words, words have little or no semantic content. Examples of function words in
English include articles (the, a), demonstratives (this, that), quantifiers (most, few,
some, little), prepositions (up, from, to, with), and conjunctions (but, or, and, yet). To
illustrate, consider the articles the and a/an. The essential feature of these articles is
that they function grammatically to indicate whether a noun is definite or indefinite
(the teacher or a teacher). Likewise, the word and functions grammatically to connect
words and phrases, as in the combination of noun phrases the girl and the boy. In brief,
speakers of a language are likely to encounter many new content words such as nouns
and verbs, in the coming years. However, it is very unlikely that they will see a new
conjunction in the coming years or even in their entire life.
Following an approach that goes back to Latin, grammars of English also give a
traditional list of word classes under the name of parts of speech: verb, noun, adjective,
adverb, preposition, conjunction, pronoun, article, and interjection. In language
studies, we often need to talk about parts of speech so that we can “make general and
economical statements about the way the words of the language behave (Crystal, 1996,
p. 206). Definitions of these parts of speech may show variations among authors, but
they are often similar, for example, “A noun is a word that is used for naming a
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person, thing or concept.” You might refer to Çelik (2007, pp. 92-93) and Crystal
(1996, pp. 206-2013) for detailed characteristics of English parts of speech.
To sum up, then, we can distinguish two broad classes of words: content words and
function words. Content words (including nouns, verbs, adjectives, and most adverbs)
are those words that carry the ‘content’ or the meaning of a sentence and are open-class
words. In contrast, function words are those words that do not possess clear lexical
meaning but instead help to express grammatical relationships with other words within
a sentence, or specify the attitude or mood of the speaker. According to Fromkin,
Rodman and Hyams (2011, p. 40), the linguistic evidence suggests that content words
and function words play different roles in language. Content words take the brunt of
the meaning, whereas function words connect the content words to the larger
grammatical context.
MORPHEMES AND THEIR COMPOSITIONS

Speakers of a language can recognize that word forms may include a number of units.
For example, we can make out that English word forms like plays, player, played and
playing can be split into pieces; they are made up of one unit play, and a number of
other elements like -s, -er, -ed and -ing. All these elements are called morphemes, the
minimal units of meaning or grammatical function that are used to form words (Lieber,
2009, p. 32). From this definition of a morpheme we can say that units of meaning
include forms like play and units of grammatical function include elements used to
show present tense or plural. The word visitors consists of three morphemes. One
minimal unit of meaning is visit, another minimal unit of meaning –or, (marking
“person who does something”), and the other minimal unit of grammatical function -s
(indicating plural). In the news headline Shopping center in Taksim reopened after
‘suspicious package’ turns out to be empty suitcase, the word reopens also contains
three morphemes. Open is a minimal unit of meaning, re- is another minimal unit that
means “again” and –ed is the other minimal unit of grammatical function that shows
past tense. In linguistics, a morpheme is conventionally indicated between braces. For
example, the word refill consists of {re}+ {fill}+{ed}. In this chapter, this form of
technical notation is not employed for practical purposes.
Morphemes have many characteristics that will be examined in the next sections. For
now, it is worth emphasizing a few. One or more morphemes may represent a single
word, as exemplified below.
87
One morpheme child

help
mean
Two morphemes child + ish
help + less
mean + ing
Three morphemes child + ish + ness
help + less + ness
mean + ing + ful
Four morphemes gentle + man + li + ness
un + desire + able + ity
More than four morphemes un + gentle + man + li + ness
anti + dis + establish + ment + ari + an + ism
In addition, a single sound may represent a morpheme. For example, the morpheme a,
meaning “without” as in asocial and amoral, is composed of a single sound. A
morpheme may also consist of a single syllable, such as boy and –ish in boy + ish, and
two or more syllables, as in paper (two syllables), and crocodile (three syllables).
Another point is that a morpheme has a constant meaning. For example, the morpheme
–er means “someone who does” as in words like player, teacher, and singer. However,
there is also the comparative morpheme –er, meaning “more” as in faster, shorter and
prettier. Thus, the same sounds represent more than one morpheme, meaning that
different morphemes may be ‘homophonous’ or pronounced identically.
In summary, some morphemes may be simple words that cannot be broken down
further into meaningful units. These are called free morphemes. Other morphemes are
the smallest units of meaning or grammatical function that are attached to other forms
to generate complex words. Such morphemes are called bound morphemes. These two
types of morphemes are examined in detail in the next section. A classification of
English morphemes is given in figure 1.
Free and Bound Morphemes

From the examples given above, we can categorize morphemes into two broad classes:
free morphemes and bound morphemes. A free morpheme can stand alone as an
88
independent, single word, for example open and visit. In contrast, a bound morpheme
cannot normally stand alone and must be typically attached to another form. For
example, the plural morpheme -s can only occur when it is attached to nouns, or the
past tense -ed morpheme must be attached to verbs. Thus, we can state that all affixes
in English are bound morphemes, including prefixes attached to the beginning of
another morpheme (such as re- in words like reinvent, reopen and rewrite), and
suffixes attached to the end of another morpheme (such as -er/-or in words like opener,
inventor and writer). Some bound morphemes (e.g. cran-) are called “bound base
morphemes” and they are not meaningful in isolation but have meaning when
combined with other morphemes. For example, cran- must occur with berry
(cranberry, huckleberry) and more recently with apple, grape, or some other fruit
(cranapple, crangrape, crananidin). Finally, the morpheme to which we attach an affix
is called the base or stem morpheme, and it may be free like dog (both a free
morpheme and a free base) or bound (like -s or cran-).
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MORPHEMES
FREE BOUND
OPEN-CLASS CLOSED-CLASS AFFIXES BOUND CONTRACTED

(CONTENT OR (FUNCTION OR BASES FORMS
LEXICAL) WORDS GRAMATICAL) WORDS
DERIVATIONAL INFLECTIONAL
Verbs (love) Conjunctions (and, or)
Nouns (girl) Prepositions (in, at, from)
Adjectives (pretty, slow) Pronouns (she, they) PREFIXES SUFFIXES SUFFIXES
Adverbs (away, fast) Articles (the, a, an)
Auxiliary verbs (is, are) ’ll
Demonstratives (this, that) ’d
Comparatives (more, less) pre- -er -ing, -er, -s cran- ’re
Quantifiers (all, some) un- -ness -s, -est, -’s -ceive ’ve
con- -ly -en, -ed -mit .
dis- -ist . . .
re- -ment . . .
. -ful . .
. .
. .
Figure 1. Classification of English morphemes
90
Linguistic for English Language Teaching
Given the overall distinction between free and bound morphemes, it is important to
note that not all bound morphemes are affixes or bound bases. For example, in English
forms such as ’ll or ’ve, as in the sentences I’ll take coffee, please and I’ve just finished
it, ’ll and ’ve are contracted or shortened forms of the auxiliaries will and would. Thus,
the forms ‘ll and ‘ve are bound morphemes in that they cannot stand alone as
independent words and must be attached to the preceding words (as in I’ll or I’ve,
respectively). Other contractions in English are ’re (the contracted form of are, as in
They’re waiting for us in the hall), ’s (the contracted form of is, as in She’s expecting a
baby), ’d (the contracted form of would, as in I’d love to visit you soon) and some other
shortened forms of auxiliary verbs. All of these contracted forms are bound morphemes
just like ’ll and ’ve.
As a last point to note, some languages also have affixes known as infixes, which are
free or bound morphemes inserted into other morphemes. Infixation is common in
languages found in Southeast Asia and the Philippines as well as in some Native
American languages (Akmajian et al., 2010, p. 21). Some linguists state that o in
speed-o-meter and bar-o-meter, in in sister-in-law or mother-in-law, and a in now-a-
days are infixes we encounter in English words (Çelik, 2007, pp. 95-96). Similarly, the
plural morpheme -s placed internally in words like mothers-in-law or passers-by is also
interpreted like an infix-like element (Trask, 2000). To sum up, it seems that English
has almost no true infixes. Inserting morphemes within other morphemes is not a
productive process of affixation in English.
Lexical and Functional Morphemes

We can divide all free morphemes into two categories. These are lexical and functional
morphemes. Lexical morphemes in English consist of nouns, verbs, adjectives and
adverbs that all transmit the content of the messages speakers want to convey. Typical
examples of such lexical morphemes are student, teacher, spend, save, short, happy,
frankly, and honestly. Because we can add new lexical morphemes to both English and
other languages, they are also described as content words or open class of words
(Çelik, 2007, p. 94). On the other hand, functional morphemes contain mainly the
functional words in English such as articles, prepositions, conjunctions, quantifiers and
pronouns. Some examples are the, a/an, on, with, but, when, because, few, many, them
and she. Since we cannot create new functional morphemes in the language easily, they
are treated as a closed class of words. To sum up, we can understand the meaning of
lexical morphemes in and of themselves, but we can comprehend the meaning of
functional morphemes only when they occur with other words in a sentence.
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Inflectional and Derivational Morphemes

We can make a further distinction within the set of bound morphemes in English. One
type of bound morphemes consists of derivational morphemes that are used to create
new words or to “make words of a different grammatical class from the stem” (Yule,
2010, p. 69). For example, the addition of the derivational morpheme -ize changes the
adjective normal to the verb normalize. Similarly, we can derive the adjectives helpful
and helpless by adding the derivational morphemes -ful and less to the noun help.
Derivational morphemes are a powerful means of word formation in English, and we
will devote a separate section to this process of word formation and include numerous
prefixes and suffixes with examples later.
The second type of bound morphemes consists of inflectional morphemes that are
used to show some aspects of the grammatical function of a word. We use inflectional
morphemes to indicate if a word is singular or plural, whether it is past tense or not,
and whether it is a comparative or possessive form. In fact, inflection exists in many
languages, but compared to other languages of the world there is relatively little
inflection in English. Today there are only eight inflectional morphemes in English, as
given in table 2.2 below.
Table 2.2 Inflectional Morphemes of English

English Inflectional Morphemes Added to Examples
-s plural Nouns She has got two guitars.
-’s possessive Nouns Zeynep’s hair is long.
-er comparative Adjectives Zeynep has longer hair than Derya.
-est superlative Adjectives Zeynep has the longest hair.
-s 3rd person singular present tense Verbs Zeynep plays the guitar.
-ed past tense Verbs She played the guitar at the party.
-ing progressive Verbs She is playing the guitar at the party
-en past participle* Verbs She has taken the guitar to the party.
*The regular past participle morpheme is -ed, identical to the past tense form -ed. The
irregular past participle form -en is used to distinguish the two.
The first two inflectional morphemes (-’s, -s) are added to nouns, the first marking
possessive and the other indicating plural. There are two inflectional morphemes
attached to adjectives/adverbs. These are -er (comparative) and -est (superlative). The
rest of the inflectional morphemes are all added to verbs: -s (third person singular), -ing
92
(present participle), -ed (past tense) and -en (past participle). It should be noted that
some variation exists in the forms of the possessive and past participle morphemes. We
can see that the possessive morpheme sometimes appears as -s’ (these passengers’
suitcases) and the past participle as -ed (The plane has just landed). In English, the
above eight inflectional morphemes consist of suffixes added to the end of words.
Differences between Derivational and Inflectional Morphemes

There are some differences between inflectional and derivational morphemes. First,
inflectional morphemes never change the grammatical category (part of speech) of a
word. For example, tall and taller are both adjectives. The inflectional morpheme -er
(comparative marker) simply produces a different version of the adjective tall.
However, derivational morphemes often change the part of speech of a word. Thus, the
verb read becomes the noun reader when we add the derivational morpheme -er. It is
simply that read is a verb, but reader is a noun. However, some derivational
morphemes do not change the grammatical category of a word. For example, such
derivational prefixes as re- and un- in English generally do not change the category of
the word to which they are attached. Thus, both happy and unhappy are adjectives, and
both fill and refill are verbs, for example. The derivational suffixes -hood and -dom, as
in neighbourhood and kingdom, are also the typical examples of derivational
morphemes that do not change the grammatical category of a word to which they are
attached.
Second, when a derivational suffix and an inflectional suffix are added to the same
word, they always appear in a certain relative order within the word. That is,
inflectional suffixes follow derivational suffixes. Thus, the derivational (-er) is added
to read, then the inflectional (-s) is attached to produce readers. Similarly, in organize–
organizes the inflectional -s comes after the derivational -ize. When an inflectional
suffix is added to a verb, as with organizes, then we cannot add any further derivational
suffixes. It is impossible to have a form like organizesable, with inflectional -s after
derivational -able because inflectional morphemes occur outside derivational
morphemes and attach to the base or stem. For these reasons, Akmajian et al. (2010, p.
46) state that derivational morphemes show the “inner” layer of words, whilst
inflectional suffixes mark the “outer” layer of words.
A third point worth emphasizing is that certain derivational morphemes serve to create
new base forms or new stems to which we can attach other derivational or inflectional
affixes. For example, we use the derivational -atic to create adjectives from nouns, as
in words like systematic and problematic. Then, we can further add -al to these two
words to create systematical and problematical. Similarly, the derivational suffix -ize is
often added to create verbs from adjectives, as in modernize, and we can add the
inflectional suffix -s (modernizes) to such -ize verbs. To sum up, we can state that
93
certain derivational affixes produce new members for a given class of words, but
inflectional affixes are always added to available members of a given class of words.
Some Exceptions in English Morphology
As in many languages of the world, English also has some irregularities or exceptions
in its morphology. So far, we have only exemplified English words in which various
inflectional and derivational morphemes can be simply recognized as distinct minimal
units of meaning or grammatical function. The plural morpheme -s is attached to boy,
and the plural boys is created. Although the vast majority of nouns pluralize in English
by adding –s, some nouns form their plurals irregularly. Typical examples of such
irregular plurals in English are man-men, woman-women, foot-feet, mouse-mice, tooth-
teeth, sheep-sheep and deer-deer. There are also exceptions in the forms of the past
tense verbs in English, for example began, broke, went and ran. Both historical
influences and the effect of borrowed words play a role in accounting for such
irregularities. For pedagogical purposes, most grammar and writing textbooks include
long lists of these exceptions in English morphology.
Morphs, Allomorphs and Pronunciation of Morphemes

When studying English phonology (see Demirezen, Chapter 1 in this volume), we have
seen that phones represent the actual phonetic realization of phonemes. Similarly,
morphs are the actual forms that are used to realize morphemes. For example, the form
books contain two forms, book and –s, realizing a lexical morpheme and an inflectional
morpheme (plural). The form bags also include two morphs (bag + z), realizing a
lexical morpheme and an inflectional morpheme (plural). Third, the form brushes
consists of two morphs as well (brush + әz), again realizing a lexical morpheme and an
inflectional morpheme (plural). Thus, we can state that there are three different morphs
(-s, z and әz) that are used to realize the inflectional morpheme “plural” in English. Just
there are allophones of a particular phoneme, so there exist allomorphs of a particular
morpheme. By using the prefix allo-, we describe all versions or variants of a single
morpheme as allomorphs of that morpheme. To sum up, a morph is the phonetic
realization of a morpheme (cats, buses, flies), whereas an allomorph is one of two or
more complementary morphs which manifest a morpheme in its different phonological
or morphological environments.
Given the overall explanation of morphs and allomorphs for the English plural
morpheme, we can economically explain the rules or distribution of the allomorphs of
not only the English plural (-s) but also the English possessive” (-’s) and the third
person singular present tense (-s) morphemes at the same time. In general, we can state
that these allomorphs are all “phonologically conditioned” in addition to being
homophones.
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Allomorph Environment
1. Use [z] after voiced non-sibilant segments (b, d, g, v, ð, m, n, ŋ, l, r, a, ɔɪ)
2. Use [s] after voiceless nonsibilant segments (p, t, k, f, θ)
3. Use [әz] after sibilant segments (s, ʃ, z, ʒ, tʃ, dʒ)
Obviously, the distribution of the allomorphs in English is conditioned by the last
segment of the form. The phonetic properties of the conditioning segments have in
common the property of being sibilants, i.e., alveolar and palatal fricatives and
affricates in general (See Demirezen, Chapter 1 in this volume). Here diphthongs such
as [ɔɪ] are considered as single segments.
The regular past tense (-ed) and past participle (-ed) morphemes can be identified as
having another pattern of phonological conditioning. This morphphonological situation
may cause a fossilized pronunciation error for some learners and non-native teachers of
English (Demirezen, 2007). The two inflectional morphemes (also homophones) have
in common three allomorphs that are phonologically conditioned.
Allomorph Environment
1. Use [t] after voiceless consonant segments, as in asked, pushed, watched and
missed
2. Use [d] after voiced consonant segments, as in filled, judged, played and
believed
3. Use [әd] after “t” and “d” sounds, adding a whole syllable to a word, as in
wanted, waited, needed and loaded
Apparently, English morphemes may exhibit phonologically distinct variants called
allomorphs. However, phonologically distinct variants of the same morpheme are not
limited to inflectional morphemes as illustrated above. For example, the negative
derivational prefix in- in English (as in inconsiderate) is sometimes pronounced im-,
ir- or il- (impolite, irregular or illegal), as we see in English spelling. These three
morphs still mean ‘negative,’ so we can say that they are allomorphs of the negative
prefix in-. In many cases, which allomorph appears where is predictable (as in plural),
but sometimes it is phonologically unpredictable which allomorph appears with a
particular base (as in irregular past tense).
WORD FORMATION THROUGH DERIVATION

So far, we have dealt with different types of English morphemes and highlighted
numerous issues among them. We have also identified that derivational morphemes are
used to create or derive new words or to make words of a different grammatical class
from the stem. In fact, derivation is by far the most common word formation process in
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the creation of new English words. Thus, it deserves a more comprehensive study in
order to get better insights into the word formation process in English. For the most
part, the core of the derivational process is an already existing word, to which we
attach affixes. These affixes are usually described as prefixes and suffixes and they are
not usually listed separately in dictionaries. Such affixes usually apply to words of one
lexical category (part of speech) and change them into words of another such category.
Some common examples include un-, dis-, mis-, -ness, -ish, -ism, -ful and -less, as in
words like unkind, disagree, misunderstand, kindness, childish, behaviourism, useful
and useless. We call the word form created by the addition of a derivational morpheme
a derived word. Tables 2.3 and 2.4 contain typical examples of English derivational
pattern and their affixes.
Table 2.3 Common English derivational affixes that cause a change in

grammatical class
Noun to -ful (help → helpful), -al (recreation → recreational), -ish (boy → boyish), -ic
Adjective (alcohol → alcoholic)
Verb to Noun -ance (accept → acceptance), -ation (accuse → accusation), -er (play →
player), -ion (predict → prediction), -ist (reform → reformist)
Adjective to -ly (clear → clearly; exact → exactly)
Adverb
Noun to Verb -fy (glory → glorify), -ize (moral → moralize), -ate (vaccine → vaccinate)
Adjective to -ness (sad → sadness), -ity (specific → specificity), -ism (feudal → feudalism), -
Noun dom (free → freedom)
Verb to Adjective -able (drink → drinkable), -ive (act → active), -ory (migrate → migratory)
Adjective to Verb -ize (modern → modernize, or modernise in British English), -en (dark →
darken)
The derivational suffixes illustrated above change the grammatical category of the
words to which they are attached. In contrast, some derivational suffixes do not cause a
change in the grammatical class of words (Table 2.4), and prefixes never change the
category.
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Table 2.4 Common English derivational affixes that do not cause a change in
grammatical class
Noun to Noun -ship (friend → friendship), -ity (human → humanity), -dom (king → kingdom),
dis- (advantage → disadvantage), ex- (wife → ex-wife), auto- (biography →
autobiography)
Verb to Verb un- (do → undo), re- (write → rewrite), dis- (like → dislike), auto- (destruct →
autodestruct)
Adjective to -ish (yellow → yellowish), -like (red → redlike), a- (moral → amoral), il- (legal
Adjective → illegal), in- (expensive → inexpensive), un- (happy → unhappy), semi-
(annual → semiannual), dis- (agreeable → disagreeable), sub- (conscious →
subconscious)
These derivational morphemes are not words on their own. Like content words,
however, they obviously possess semantic content since every derivational morpheme
attached to a base adds meaning to the derived word. The derivational morpheme does
not necessarily change the grammatical category of the newly created word.
When words contain two or more affixes, they are also referred to as complex words,
as opposed to simple words that cannot be analyzed into meaningful parts. Such
morphologically complex words are composed of a morpheme root and one or more
affixes. Some examples of English roots are act in deactivation, system in
unsystematically, ceive in perceive, and cred in incredible. For practical purposes,
linguists sometimes use the word base to mean any root or stem to which an affix is
attached. Among the elements that can be stripped from deactivation are act, active,
activate, and deactivate, which are all bases. In brief, we can say that a root may or
may not stand alone as a word (Fromkin et al. 2011, p. 47). For example, the roots act
and system can stand alone, whilst cred and ceive cannot. Appendix contains a list of
common English prefixes, suffixes, and roots used to create new words.
OTHER WORD FORMATION PROCESSES

As in all the world languages, affixation is definitely the most common way of forming
new words in the English language. However, the capacity of human language is so
enormous and creative that it goes beyond affixation and provides new ways of
forming words. Speakers frequently use these new processes of creating new words,
also referred to as neologisms, and “under the right conditions these can be adopted by
the larger linguistic community and become part of the language” (Akmajian et al.
2010, p. 27). Consequently, in this part we will explore some of the basic processes
other than affixation by which new words are created.
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Coinage
Though not a very common word formation process, coinage refers to the creation of
entirely new, previously nonexistent words or terms in a language. It is simply that
speakers invent or coin new words to denote previously nonexistent objects or
concepts. The most common examples are invented trade names for commercial
products which gradually become general terms (mostly without using capital letters)
for any form of that product (Yule, 2010, p. 53; Fromkin et al. 2011, p. 501). Among
the common coinages found in everyday English are aspirin, nylon, vaseline, zipper,
granola, kleenex, teflon, quark, and xerox. Today some specific brand names such as
Xerox, Kleenex and Vaseline are occasionally used as the generic name (generification)
for different brands of these types of products.
The word google is currently the most noticeable example of coinage in English. As
the name of a company (Google), the word originated from a misspelling of googol,
which means the number represented by a 1 followed by one-hundred zeros, in the
creation of the word Googleplex. When used without the capital letter, the term google
has today become a commonly used expression meaning “to use the Internet to find
information about what you are searching.” Consequently, morphological awareness of
coinage will help learners better understand everyday uses of such words as ebaying,
xeroxing and googling.
Borrowing
Borrowing, which means the taking over of words from other languages, is one of the
most common processes of word formation in English. Due to the rapid advances in
technology and communication, languages have borrowed numerous words from one
another. Borrowed words, also known as loanwords though English does not give them
back), are common in English and other languages around the world. Throughout
history, English has borrowed a great number of words from other languages. Typical
examples of the words English has directly borrowed from other languages include
algebra (Arabic), yogurt, aslan, shish kebab, (Turkish), bergamot (from French
bergamote, from Italian bergamotta, ultimately from Turkish bey armudu, literally,
“the bey’s pear”), croissant (French), piano (Italian), lilac (Persian), shish kebab
(Turkish), sofa (Arabic), tattoo (Tahitian), tycoon (Japanese), zebra (Bantu).
Calque /kælk/, or loan-translation, is a special type of borrowing from another
language by literal, word-for-word translation. In this process of borrowing, the
borrowing language directly translates the elements of a word, term or phrase. An
interesting example is the English term skyscraper, from which many languages have
constructed their own calques: the Turkish gökdelen, which literally translates as “sky-
piercer,” the French gratte-ciel, which literally translates as “scrape-sky,” the Dutch
wolkenkrabber (“cloud scratcher”) or the German Wolkenkratzer (“cloud scraper”).
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The English “boyfriend” can be considered as a loan-word into Japanese as

boyifurendo, but it is indeed a calque into Turkish as “male friend” or erkek arkadaş.
Compounding
The joining of two or more separate words to produce a single form is technically
known as compounding and very common in such languages as English, Turkish and
German. Common examples of English compounds are notebook, textbook, bookcase,
girlfriend, footprint, fingerprint, wallpaper and waterbed. Some compound words
introduced recently into English are Facebook, YouTube, power nap, and carjack. In
English, The White House, school bus, and decision making are also compounds but
written as two words. These examples of English compounds are mostly nouns, but it
is also possible to produce compound adjectives (icy-cold, bittersweet) and compound
words consisting of noun (spoon) plus verb (feed) as in Start to spoonfeed your baby at
around six months.
As the following table of compounds words shows, English is pretty much flexible in
the types of compounds allowed. A variety of similar combinations can be generated
from the entries given in the table.
Table 2.1 Some types of compounds in English

Adjective Noun Verb Preposition
Adjective bittersweet blackboard highlight —
Noun headstrong homework breastfeed love-in
Verb — pickpocket sleepwalk breakup
Preposition over-ripe underworld underestimate without
The most salient characteristic of this word formation process is that when the two
words have the same grammatical category in common, the compound is also in the
this category (Akmajian, Demers, Farmer and Harnish, 2010, pp. 36-37; Fromkin et al.
2011, p. 61). For example, homework, girlfriend, landlord, paper clip and elevator-
operator are all nouns consisting of noun plus noun. Similarly, bittersweet, icy-cold,
worldly and red-hot are adjectives that have a systematic rule of adjective plus
adjective = adjective. In English, the rightmost member of a compound is the head of
the compound and governs its grammatical category and general meaning. Therefore, if
the two members of the compound are of different classes, then the grammatical
category of the compound is determined by the second or final word (e.g. noun plus
adjective = adjective, as in sky-blue; verb plus noun = noun, as in workroom). On the
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other hand, prepositions make up a closed-class category of words not readily
admitting new members. Consequently, English compounds with prepositions like
oversleep (verb), over-ripe (adjective) and sundown (noun) are in the class of the
nonprepositional part of the compound.
Blending
Blending is the word formation process in which parts of two separate forms combine
to produce a single new word whose meaning is often a combination of the original
words. Typically, two words are “blended” by taking the beginning of one word and
joining it to the end of the other word. Below are some common examples of everyday
“blended” words with their meaning.
Blends Words Meaninga

brunch breakfast + lunch a meal eaten in the late morning that is a
combination of breakfast and lunch
bit binary + digit a unit of information in a computer that must be
either 0 or 1
emoticon emotion + icon an image made up of symbols such as punctuation
marks, used in text messages, emails, etc. to
express a particular emotion
smog smoke + fog a mixture of smoke, gases, and chemicals,
especially in cities, that makes the atmosphere
difficult to breathe and harmful for health
motel motor + hotel a hotel by the side of a road, usually with spaces
for cars next to each room
telecast Television +
a programme that is broadcast on television
broadcast
edutainment education + the process of entertaining people at the same
entertainment time as you are teaching them something, and the
products, such as television programmes or
software, that do this
camcorder camera + recorder a small video camera that can be held easily in
one hand
netiquette network + etiquette the set of rules about behaviour that is acceptable
on the interne
a Meanings of the blended words are taken from Cambridge Dictionaries Online - http://dictionary.cambridge.org
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When blending two existing words, we can also combine the beginnings of the two
words (often terms from information technology, like modem (from modulator and
demodulator) and telex (from teleprinter and exchange), but this type is infrequent. In
summary, all these examples show that blending is a creative word formation process
in which two words are merged into one and a new term is produced on the basis of
sound structure.
Clipping
This process of word formation happens when a word of more than one syllable
(photograph) is reduced to a shorter form (photo). Similarly, everyday fax is the
clipped form for facsimile. Common examples of English clippings are bike for
bicycle, match for mathematics, gas for gasoline, phone for telephone, bus for
omnibus, van for caravan, prof for professor, fan for fanatic, ad for advertisement,
telly for television and gym for gymnasium. As Yule (2010, p. 56) states, particularly
educational environments encourage the process of clipping because so many of them
are reduced as in such examples ad chem, vocab, exam, gym, lab, math, phys-ed, poly-
sci, prof and typo. Orthographically, there are also some clipped abbreviations such as
Dr. (doctor), Mr. (mister) and GB (gigabyte) whose spellings have been shortened but
whose pronunciations are not essentially different. In English expressions such as the
baker’s (for the baker’s shop), a daily (for a daily newspaper) and white-collar (for
white-collar-worker) there is also a kind of clipping called ellipsis (Demirezen, 2002,
p. 215) in which a part of the structure or phrase is omitted “for reasons of economy,
emphasis, or style.”
Backformation
A very specialized type of word formation process is known as backformation in which
an actual or assumed derivational affix is removed from the base form of a word to
create a new word. A good English example of backformation is the process whereby
the verb televise was created from the noun television that was already in use. As in
this example of backformation, one type of word (often a noun) is created to form
another type of word (often a verb). Other common examples of words created by
backformation are edit from editor, donate from donation, enthuse from enthusiasm,
babysit from babysitter, opt from option, euthanase or euthanize from euthanasia,
sculpt from sculptor and liaise from liaison. Consequently, this process of word
formation seems to be an overgeneralization of derivational affixes because -ion and -
or are mistakenly considered derivational affixes in the above examples.
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Conversion
When a word of one grammatical category becomes a word of another grammatical
form without any changes to pronunciation or spelling, this process of word formation
is generally known as conversion. In English, numerous nouns like email, chair,
vacation, bottle, butter, and host have come to be used as verbs through conversion: I
will email you the document as soon as I finish revising it; Jessica chaired the meeting
yesterday; Sue and Robert are vacationing in Marmaris this summer. This common
process of word formation is also labeled as “category change” or “functional shift”
and sometimes referred to as ‘zero derivation’ or ‘null derivation’ because it is
assumed that the formal class alteration between words leads to the insertion of an
invisible morpheme. However, we assume that without going into detail it is a very
productive word formation process like clipping and the like.
In English conversion is particularly a productive process, with new uses occurring
commonly. It seems fair to state that the most productive form of conversion in English
is noun to verb conversion, as in the above examples. However, it can also include
verbs being converted to nouns (e.g., guess, must and spy as the sources of a guess, a
must and a spy) and phrasal verbs becoming nouns (e.g., to print out and take over as
the sources of a printout and takeover). As Yule (2010, p. 57) exemplifies, verbs (see
through, stand up) also become adjectives, as in see-through material or a stand-up
comedian. Similarly, adjectives, as in a dirty floor, an empty room, some crazy ideas
and those nasty people, can become the verbs to dirty and to empty, or the nouns a
crazy and the nasty. Consequently, it can sometimes be hard to figure out which word
category is the source of conversion, as in the example of host, but overall conversion
is a common creative way of word formation and it has the potential to facilitate
learners’ vocabulary acquisition.
Acronyms
Acronyms, also called initialisms, are new words produced from the initial letters of a
group of other words. For example, DVD is an acronym for digital video disk, ATM is
another acronym for automatic teller machine and VCR is likewise an acronym for
video cassette recorder where the pronunciation consists of saying each separate letter
(D-V-D, A-T-M and V-C-R). Other common examples of acronyms in English include
NATO /ˈneɪ.tәʊ/ from North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NASA /ˈnæs.ә/ from National
Aeronautics and Space Administration, UNESCO /juːˈnes.kәʊ/ from United Nations
Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization and UNICEF /ˈju:.nɪ.sef/ from
United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund. These acronyms are
typically pronounced as new single words and written in capital letters. In everyday
English, however, many acronyms have lost their capital letters and become everyday
terms, including scuba (self-contained underwater breathing apparatus), zip (zone
improvement plan) code, laser (light amplification by stimulated emission of
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radiation), and radar (radio detecting and ranging). Although these words are
originally produced as acronyms, people rapidly forget their origins and such acronyms
regularly become new independent words in languages. Finally, it seems that there are
tens of thousands of acronyms in the English-speaking world today, which precisely
shows the creative and changeable aspects of human language.
Eponyms – Words from Personal Names

Though not very common, an eponym refers to the word formation process in which a
new word is formed from a proper name. In other words, an eponym denotes the name
of an object or activity which is also the name of the person who first created the object
or did the activity. Some common examples of eponyms include:
 sandwich (from the eighteenth-century fourth Earl of Sandwich, who first
insisted on putting his meat between two slices of bread while gambling),
 jeans (from the Italian city of Genoa where the type of cloth was first made),
 robot (after the mechanical creatures in the Czech writer Karel Capek’s play
R.U.R., the initials standing for “Rossum’s Universal Robots.”),
 gargantuan (named for Gargantua, the creature with a huge appetite created by
Rabelais) and
 jumbo (after an elephant brought to the United States by P. T. Barnum).
Some eponyms include technical terms that are based on the names of those who first
discovered or invented things, such as volt (from the Italian, Alessandro Volta), watt
(from the Scottish inventor, James Watt), fahrenheit (from the German, Gabriel
Fahrenheit), boycott (from the name of Charles C. Boycott), and even behçet or
behçet’s disese (named in 1937 after the Turkish dermatologist Hulusi Behçet, who
first described the triple-symptom complex of recurrent oral aphthous ulcers, genital
ulcers, and uveitis). Fromkin et al. (2011) describe the word paparazzo, a relatively
recent but interesting example of eponyms. They say that paparazzo, “a freelance
photographer who doggedly pursues celebrities,” was a little-known word until the
death of Princess Diana in 1997, who was hounded by paparazzi (plural) before her
fatal automobile accident. This eponym comes from the news photographer character
Signor Paparazzo in the motion picture La Dolce Vita. Consequently, eponyms, like
other word formation processes, show a creative way that helps expand the vocabulary
of a language.
IMPLICATIONS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING

Learners of English today are faced with enormous challenges as they must not only
learn to communicate but also understand and study content presented in English.
Thus, it is important for teachers of English to understand the best ways to help
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students learn the language as fast as possible. One of the ways in which they could
achieve this, as suggested by authors such as Graves (2006), Kieffer (2009) and Kieffer
and Lesaux (2012a/2012b), is to enable learners to acquire morphological awareness
and help them recognize and manipulate new words. Reasonably, language learners
who recognize how English words are created, by combining prefixes, suffixes, and
roots, tend to have more words and comprehend texts better (Kieffer and DiFelice Box,
2013).
Morphological awareness is defined as “children’s conscious awareness of the
morphemic structure of words and their ability to reflect on and manipulate that
structure” Carlisle (1995, p. 194). In other words, it means learners’ understanding of
the structure of words as combinations of the smallest meaningful elements that we
refer to as morphemes. This definition includes learners’ knowledge of both
derivations and inflections in language at the same time. Derivational morphology
comprises our knowledge of prefixes (e.g., -un in undo or -dis in disconnect), suffixes
(e.g., -ation in specialization or formation), and compounding (e.g., homework and
highlight are both compound words). On the other hand, inflectional morphology deals
primarily with indicating grammatical changes in words (e.g., -s in boys or - ed in
wanted are both grammatical inflections). This awareness of both inflectional and
derivational morphology occurs when the learner understands relationships among
words and word forms and decomposes morphologically complex words into the
smallest meaningful units (Kieffer and Lesaux, 2012a, p. 25). To put it another way,
derivational morphological awareness is of particular interest for language teaching and
it plays a crucial role in understanding the language development of learners. This can
be manipulated when learners can manipulate derived word forms, to understand
connections between different morphological forms of a word, and to create new
derivations of known words.
How can we, then, take morphology into the language classroom? Building on
previous research in this area, some scholars such as Kieffer & Lesaux
(2007/2009/2012a) propose four main instructional principles that can also be used in
the language classrooms.
1. Teaching morphology explicitly and as a separate component of vocabulary
teaching.
2. Teaching students “as a cognitive strategy” with explicit steps. In order to break a
word down into morphemes, learners must complete the following four steps:
a. Recognize that they do not know the word or do not have a deep
understanding of the meaning of the word.
b. Analyze the word for recognizable morphemes in the roots, prefixes, and
suffixes.
c. Think of a possible meaning based upon the parts of the word.
d. Check the meaning of the word against the context.
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3. Teaching learners to understand the use of prefixes, suffixes, and roots, and how
words are transformed.
4. Teaching learners cognates – words with similar spelling and meanings in English
and the native language – to help their reading comprehension.
Given the importance of the aforementioned instructional principles, recent research
into morphological awareness suggests that there is a significant rate of achievement
among students who have been exposed to strategies for not only understanding the
meanings of words but also recognizing different morphological forms of the same
word in reading texts, as opposed to students who were not exposed to such strategies
(Kieffer, 2009; Kieffer & Lesaux, 2009; Kieffer & Lesaux, 2012a). Therefore,
vocabulary-rich lesson contents should be accompanied by teaching morphological
awareness in language teaching.
Language teachers can introduce their learners to strategies such as recognizing
morphemes in relatively common words. In this way, learners can apply their
knowledge to words that are not familiar to them or to words that are familiar but
presented in a different morphological form. Activities aimed at prompting
morphological awareness can be adjusted to suit each age group. For young language
learners, for example, morphology instruction can start with simple words and progress
slowly to more complex words. For adolescents and adult learners, such instruction
can start at morphologically more complex words. Group and pair work may work
well to help learners get deeper insights into English word formation processes.
In line with the above principles, a specific technique of promoting morphological
awareness among language learners is to use an affix card deck. Also referred to as
“multisensory-guided discovery” (Carreker, 2005), this approach requires the teacher
to read a series of derivative affixes that have a common feature (e.g., careful, graceful,
helpful, joyful, and cheerful). The learners ‘discover’ the similar sounds and then
visually discover the sound-symbol correspondence. The similar sounds and letters are
then identified as a prefix or suffix, and the student verbalizes these discoveries to
anchor the learning (Florida, 2007). As a last step, the teacher writes the affix on a card
which is added to the deck and it is regularly reviewed daily and weekly. This
technique could be very beneficial especially when used with young learners and early
adolescents.
In conclusion, there appears to be little doubt that teaching morphological awareness
has a highly beneficial effect on the language development of learners. The
implications for teaching and learning are significant, since the research conducted into
this area points that students who understand how words are formed by combining
prefixes, suffixes, and roots have larger lexicon and better reading comprehension than
those without such knowledge and skills.
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SUMMARY
Morphology is the study of the internal structure of words and the rules governing the
formation of words in a language. Often unconsciously, every speaker knows the rules
underlying the creation of words in their language. Thus, morphological knowledge is
part of our grammatical knowledge that allows us to understand the structure of words
and word formation processes. Developing morphological awareness enables language
teachers to help their learners recognize how words enter a language, what they consist
of and how they are formed by combining prefixes, suffixes, and roots. In fact, there is
empirical evidence that learners with an awareness of word-formation processes tend to
have larger vocabulary and better reading comprehension as well better writing in turn.
Given the significance of learning and teaching morphology, this chapter has attempted
to introduce the salient characteristics of words, morphemes, their types, word
formation through derivation and other processes and some pedagogical implications
for English language teaching.
We store words in our mental lexicon with several kinds of information. When we say
we know a word, we not only know the meaning or several meanings of a word and its
pronunciation, but we also distinguish its grammatical category such as noun or verb as
well as its spelling or orthography as educated people. When we loop up a word in an
average English dictionary, we can see at least lexical entry information that contains
spelling, standard pronunciation, definitions to represent one or more meanings of the
word, and parts of speech.
Morphemes are the minimal units of meaning or grammatical function that are used to
create new words. Some morphemes are free in that they can stand alone as an
independent, single word, for example open and visit. In contrast, other morphemes are
bound in that they cannot normally stand alone and must be typically attached to
another form. For example, the plural morpheme -s can only occur when it is attached
to nouns, or the past tense -ed morpheme must be attached to verbs. Free morphemes
can be lexical such as nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs that all transmit the content
of the messages speakers want to convey. However, other free morphemes are
functional in that they contain mainly the functional words in English such as articles,
prepositions, conjunctions, quantifiers and pronouns. We can understand the meaning
of lexical morphemes in and of themselves, but we can comprehend the meaning of
functional morphemes only when they occur with other words in a sentence.
Morphemes may be derivational or inflectional. Derivational bound morphemes are
used to create new words, while inflectional bound morphemes are used to show some
aspects of the grammatical function of a word. All English derivational morphemes are
ether prefixes attached to the beginning of words or suffixes added to the end of
words, but all English inflectional morphemes are suffixes. Inflectional morphemes
never change the grammatical category of a word. For example, both tall and taller are
adjectives. The inflectional morpheme -er (comparative marker) simply produces a
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different version of the adjective tall. However, derivational morphemes often change
the part of speech of a word. Thus, the verb read becomes the noun reader when we
add the derivational morpheme -er. However, such derivational morphemes as re- and
un- generally do not change the category of the word to which they are attached. Thus,
happy and unhappy are adjectives, and similarly fill and refill are verbs.
Morphemes can have different realizations called allomorphs depending on the
environment. For example, the plural morpheme –s has three different allomorphs (-s, z
and әz) whose pronunciations change according to the environments in which they
occur. Which allomorph appears where is often predictable, as in plural, so teaching
them explicitly will promote morphphonological awareness of learners.
Apart from word-formation through derivational affixes, English also employs other
word formation processes. Coinage is the creation of entirely new, previously
nonexistent words or terms in a language. Among the common coinages found in
everyday English are aspirin, nylon, vaseline, zipper, granola, kleenex, teflon, quark,
and xerox. Due to the rapid advances in technology and communication, languages also
borrow words from one another. Borrowed words, also known as loanwords, are
common in English and other languages around the world. Compounding, the joining
of two or more separate words to produce a single form, is a very common word-
formation process in English. Such words such as Facebook and YouTube are recent
examples introduced into English through this process. Blends or blended words are
similar to compounds but usually combine shortened forms of two or more morphemes
or words. Brunch means a late morning meal and is a blend of breakfast and lunch.
Clipping refers to the process of reducing a word of more than one syllable to a shorter
form (e.g. ad from advertisement). Orthographically, there are also some clipped
abbreviations such as Dr. (doctor), Mr. (mister) and GB (gigabyte) whose spellings are
shortened but whose pronunciations are not essentially different.
Backformation is a very specialized type of word formation process in which an
actual or assumed derivational affix is removed from the base form of a word to create
a new word. A good English example of backformation is the process whereby the verb
televise was created from the noun television that was already in use. When a word of
one grammatical category becomes a word of another grammatical form without any
changes to pronunciation or spelling, this process of word formation is generally
known as conversion. In English, numerous nouns like email, chair, vacation, bottle,
butter, and host have come to be used as verbs through this process. Acronyms, words
derived from the initials of several words like NATO, and eponyms, words derived
from proper names like boycott from the name of Charles C. Boycott, are the other
word-formation processes that add to the word stock of a language.
On the basis of the evidence currently available, it seems fair to suggest that teachers of
English should enable their learners to acquire morphological awareness and help them
recognize and manipulate new words. Defined as “children’s conscious awareness of
107
the morphemic structure of words and their ability to reflect on and manipulate that
structure” Carlisle (1995, p. 194), morphological awareness includes learners’
knowledge of both derivations and inflections in language at the same time.
Reasonably, language learners who recognize how English words are created, by
combining prefixes, suffixes, and roots, tend to acquire more words, comprehend texts
better, and by extension become more proficient in writing.
Teachers of English can take morphology in the language classroom by following
several instructional principles. First, they can teach derivational morphology explicitly
and make it a separate component of mainstream vocabulary teaching. Further, they
can turn morphological awareness into a “cognitive strategy” by asking learners to
break a word down into morphemes. A third instructional endeavor could be teaching
learners to understand the use of prefixes, suffixes, and roots, and how words are
transformed. Finally, teaching learners cognates – words with similar spelling and
meanings in English and the native language – to help their reading comprehension.
The implications for teaching and learning are significant, since the recent research
conducted into morphological awareness points that students who understand how
words are formed by combining prefixes, suffixes, and roots have larger lexicon and
better reading comprehension than those without such knowledge and skills. Therefore,
vocabulary-rich lesson contents should be accompanied by teaching morphological
awareness in language teaching.
108
References and Further Reading

Akmajian, A., Demers, R. A., Farmer, A. K., & Harnish, R. M. (2010). Linguistics: An
introduction to language and communication (6th ed.). Cambridge, MA: The
MIT Press.
Caglioti, C. (n.d.) Preparation for an American university program: Vocabulary
workshop Southampton College of Long Island University. Retrieved from:
http://www2.southampton.liu.edu/academic/pau/course/webesl.htm.
Carlisle, J. F. (1995). Morphological awareness and early reading achievement. In L.
B. Feldman (Ed), Morphological aspects of language processing (pp. 189–209).
Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Carreker, S. (2005). Teaching reading: Accurate decoding and fluency. In J. R. Birsh
(Ed.), Multisensory teaching of basic language skills (2nd ed., pp. 43-81).
Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes.
Celce-Murcia, M., & Larsen-Freeman, D. (1999). The Grammar book: An ESL/EFL
teacher’s course (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Newbury House.
Crystal, D. (1996). The Cambridge encyclopedia of the English language. Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press.
Çelik, M. (2007). Linguistics for students of English: Book I. Ankara: EDM.
Demirezen, M. (2002). The place of clipping, ellipsis, backformation acronymy, and
blending in morphology and ELT connections. In. C. Ertem (ed.), Littera:
Edebiyat Yazilari. Ortak Kitap (Journal for the Study and Research of World
Literatures), 11, 211-222.
Demirezen, M. (2007). The pronunciation of the regular past tense morpheme of
English: A fossilized pronunciation error for Turkish English teachers. Paper
presented at the Seventh International Language, Writing and Stylistics
Symposium. 02-05 May 2007, Selcuk University, Konya, Turkey.
Florida Center for Reading Research. (2007). An affix deck card – Advanced phonics.
Retrieved from: http://www.fcrr.org/FAIR_Search_Tool/PDFs/4-5AP_018.pdf.
Fromkin, V., Rodman, R., & Hyams, N. (2011). An introduction to language (9th ed.).
Wadsworth: Cengage Learning.
Graves, M.F. (2006). The vocabulary book: Learning and instruction. New York, NY:
Teachers College Press.
Haspelmath, M. (2002). Understanding morphology. London, UK: Arnold.
109
Kieffer, M. J., & DiFelice Box, C. (2013). Derivational morphological awareness,
academic vocabulary, and reading comprehension in linguistically diverse sixth
graders. Learning and Individual Differences, 24, 168–175.
Kieffer, M. J., & Lesaux, N. K. (2007). Breaking down words to build weaning:
Morphology, vocabulary, and reading comprehension in the urban classroom.
The Reading Teacher, 61(2), 134–144. DOI:10.1598/RT.61.2.3
Kieffer, M. J., & Lesaux, N. K. (2008). The role of derivational morphological
awareness in the reading comprehension of Spanish-speaking English language
learners. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 21, 783-804.
Kieffer, M. J., & Lesaux, N. K. (2009). Breaking down words to build meaning:
Morphology, vocabulary, and reading comprehension in the urban classroom. In
M. L. Graves (Ed.), Essential readings in vocabulary instruction (pp. 90-101).
Newark, DE: International Reading Association.
Kieffer, M. J., & Lesaux, N. K. (2012a). Development of morphological awareness and
vocabulary knowledge in Spanish-speaking language minority learners: A
parallel process latent growth curve model. Applied Psycholinguistics, 33, 23–
54.
Kieffer, M. J., & Lesaux, N. K. (2012b). Direct and Indirect Roles of Morphological
Awareness in the English Reading Comprehension of Native English, Spanish,
Filipino, and Vietnamese Speakers. Language Learning, 64(4), 1170-1204.
Lieber, R. (2009). Introducing morphology. Cambridge, England: Cambridge
University Press.
Pinker, S. (1999). Words and rules: The ingredients of language. New York, NY:
Basic Books.
Prince, R. E. C. (2009). Usable knowledge from Harvard Graduate School of
Education - Morphological analysis: New light on a vital reading skill, HGSE
Nonie Lesaux. Retrieved from
http://www.uknow.gse.harvard.edu/teaching/TC102-407.html
Templeton, S. (2012). Teaching and learning morphology: A reflection on generative
vocabulary instruction. Journal of Education, 192(2/3), 101-107.
Trask, L.R. (2000). The Penguin dictionary of English grammar. London, UK: Penguin
Books.
Yule, G. (2010). The study of language (4th ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press.
110
Appendix: A Reference List of English Prefixes, Suffixes and Roots

English Prefixes
Prefix Meaning Examples
ac-, ad-, af-, to, toward, aside (Adv): to or toward the side
ag-, al-, ap-, near, adjacent accompany (V): to go with someone as a companion
as-, at- to adjust (V): to correct, to move closer to a correct position
a-, an- not, without apolitical (Adj): not interested in or connected with politics
anarchy (N): without a ruler, absence of government
ab-, abs- away from, off abrupt (Adj): unexpected change
abnormal (Adj): not normal
ambi-, amphi both sides ambidextrous (Adj): able to use both hands equally well
amphibian (N): an animal with characteristics of both fish and
reptiles
ante- before anterior (Adj): before or near the front
anti- against antiwar (N): against war

arch- chief, archenemy (N): the principal enemy
principal,
extreme
audio- hearing, sound audiocasette (N): a cassette on which sound is recorded
auto- self autobiography (N): writing about yourself
automotive (Adj): related to self-propelled machines
bi- two bicycle (N): a vehicle with two wheels
biped (N): a two-footed animal
bibli-, biblio- book bibliography (N): a list of books referred to in a text
cat-, cata-, down, with category (N): a class or set to which a thing belongs
cath- catalogue (N): a book or pamphlet that lists and describes
circum- around circumvent (V): to manage to get around a situation
circumference (N): the distance around a circle
co-, cog-, col-, together, with cognate (Adj): related, similar in nature
com-, con-, collaborate (V): to work together
cor- correlation (N): a relation between two or more things
contra- against, opposite contradict (V) to state the opposite
cosmo- universe cosmopolitan (Adj): having a worldwide rather than a limited scope
de- to do the decrease (V): to grow smaller, to become less

opposite, to take desensitize (V): to take away sensitivity
away from
dent-, denti-, tooth dentist (N): a doctor specializing in teeth, jaws, and mouth
dento-
dia- through, across diameter (N): the distance across a cirle
diagonal (Adj): passing through two non-adjacent corners
di-, dif-, dis- apart, separate, divide (V): to separate into two or more parts
two, opposite of, differ (V): to be unlike
not, exclude distrust (V): to have no confidence or trust
disagree (V): to not agree with someone or something
e-, ex- out, out of, from emit (V) to send out
expel (V): to force out
exclude (V): to close out of, keep out
eco- habitat, environment ecology (N): the study of the environment
en-, em- put into enamor (V): to cause to love, to "put" someone "into" love
empower (V): to give power, to put into power
111
equa-, equi- equal equator (N): a line that divides the world into two equal halves
extra- beyond extraordinary (Adj): going beyond normal
for-, fore- before foresee (V): to see beforehand
ge-, geo- earth, ground, soilgeology (N): the study of the earth
hemi- half hemisphere (N): half of a sphere
hetero- different heterosexual (Adj): attracted to someone of the opposite sex
homo- same homogeneous (Adj): having a uniform structure of composition
hydr-, hydro- water hydroelectric (Adj): producing electricity using waterpower
hyper- above, beyond hyperactive (Adj): being excessively active
il-, im-, in-, ir, not, in illegible (Adj): cannot be read
inaction (N): lack of motion, idleness
in-, im-, il- in, into instead (Adv): in place of, an alternative
import (V): to bring into a country from another country
inter- between, among interject (V): to throw something between other things
international (Adj): between nations
mal- bad malfunction (N): when something does not work properly
micr-, micro- small microscope (N): an instrument used to see very small objects
mis- wrong misinterpret (V): to interpret incorrectly
mono one monolingual (Adj): using or knowing only one language
multi- many multiply (V): to increase in number
non- not, no nonsense (N): something with no meaning or no sense
ob-, oc-, of-, toward, against, obtain (V): to gain or get, to get a hold of
op- in the way oppose (V): to be against, to stand in the way of something
omni- all, universally omnivorous (Adj): eats both plants and animals
over- excessive, above overwork (V): to have too much work
pan- all, completely pandemic (Adj): occurring over a wide geographic area
para- beside paralegal (N): someone who works alongside a lawyer
per- through perform (V): to carry out an act
phot-, photo- light photography (N): producing an image by exposing film to light
post- after postpone (V): to put off to a later time, to delay
pre- before precede (V): to go before, to come in front of
pro- for, forward propel (V): to push forward
quadr- four quadrilateral (Adj): having four sides
re- back, again redo (V): to do again
retro- backward retrospect (N) to look back at past events
semi half semiannual (Adj): occurring twice a year
sub-, suc-, suf-, under, beneath, near, submarine (Adj): underwater
sup-, sur-, sus from below, support (V): to hold up, too keep up
secretly, above, up
super- over, above superimpose (V): to place on top of something else
syn-, sym- together, at the same sympathy (N): sharing another person's feelings
time
tele-, tel- distant, over telephone (N): a device to transmit sound over a distance
a distance
112
trans- across, transform (V): to change shape

beyond,
change
tri- three tripod (N): a three-legged stand
un- not, unceasing (Adj): never ending, continuous

against,
opposite
uni- one uniform (Adj): having the same form or consistency
util- use utility (N): something useful or designed for use
113
English Suffixes
Suffixes Used to Create Nouns
Suffix Meaning Examples
-acy, state or quality privacy: the state of being alone
-cy infancy: the state of being a baby or young child
-age activity, or result of action courage: having the spirit to overcome fear
-al action, result of action referral: the action of directing a person to another place
-an person artisan: a craftsperson
-ance, action, state, quality or resistance: the action of opposing something

-ence process independence: the state of not being under the control of others
-ancy, state, quality or capacity vacancy: an empty room or position
-ency agency: the capacity to exert power or influence, a position or person
that performs a function
-ant, an agent, something that disinfectant: something that cleans

-ent performs the action dependent: a thing supported or determined by another
-ate state, office, fuction candidate: a person nominated for an office or position
-ation action, resulting state specialization: the result of being distinguished by one quality or
ability
-dom place, state of being wisdom: possessing knowledge
-er, person or thing that does baker: a person who bakes

-or something collector: a person who collects or gathers things
-ful an amount or quanity that mouthful: an amount that fills the mouth
fills
-ian, related to, one that is politician: a person works in politics
-an
-ia names, diseases phobia: an illogical fear of something
-iatry art of healing psychiatry: branch of medicine dealing with the mind and emotions
-ic, related to the arts and arithmetic: a branch of math dealing with non-negative numbers
-ics sciences economics: the social science related to studying business
-ice act malice: the desire to do evil
-ing material made for, activity, swimming: the activity of swimming through water
result of an activity building: the result of making a structure
-ion condition or action abduction: the action of carrying someone away by force
-ism doctrine, belief, action or formalism: a belief in sticking to prescribed forms

conduct
-ist person or member podiatrist: a foot doctor
114
-ite product or part graphite: a black material used in making pencils
-ity, state or quality novelty: something new or unusual
-ive condition native: a person born in a specific place
-ment condition or result document: official paper showing proof or evidence of something
-ness state, condition, quality kindness: the quality of being kind or nice
-ology the study of biology: the study of life
-or condition or activity valor: bravery, courage
-ory place for, serves for territory: an area around a place
-ship status, condition friendship: the state of being a friend
-ure act, condition, process, exposure: the condition of being exposed or unprotected
f ti
-y state, condition, result of society: companionship
an activity
victory: the result of winning something
Suffixes Used to Create Verbs
-ate cause to be graduate: to give a degree to, to pass from one stage to the next
-en to cause to become moisten: to cause to become moist or damp
-er, -or action ponder: to think about

clamor: to make noise, to call for loudly
-ify cause specify: to name or indicate in detail
-ize cause fantasize: to create images in the mind
-ure act conjecture: to come to a conclusion by supposition or guesswork
115
Suffixes Used to Create Adjectives

-able, worth, ability solvable: able to be solved or explained
-ible incredible: not able to be believed, amazing
-al, quality, relation structural: related to the physical make up of a thing territorial:
-ial, related to nearby or local areas categorical: related to a category,
-ical absolute
-ant, indicating, being important: indicating value or worth
-ent, dependent: relying upon something else
-ient
-ar, resembling, related to spectacular: related to something that is eye-catching or amazing
-ary unitary: related to units or single groups representing quantities
-ate kind of state inviolate: not disturbed, pure
-en material silken: made from silk, a fiber produced by worms
-ful having, giving, marked by fanciful: marked by imagination
-ic quality, relation generic: related to a whole group
-ile having the qualities of projectile: something thrown with an outside force
-ing activity cohering: the act of sticking together
-ish having the character of, newish: modern, recent

about, almost
-ive, having the quality of festive: having the quality of a festival or party cooperative: being
-ative, able or willing to work together sensitive: easily felt, responsive to the
-itive senses
-less without, missing penniless: a person without any money
-ous, having the quality of, adventurous: characterized by the desire to seek adventures
-eous, relating to courageous: characterized by courage, brave
-ose, verbose: having more words than needed
-ious
-y marked by, having hungry: having hunger, marked by a desire
Suffixes Used to Create Adverbs

-fold in a manner of, marked by fourfold: being four times as great

-ly in the manner of fluently: marked by ease of movement, effortlessly smooth
-ward in a direction or manner homeward: toward home
-wise in the manner of, with regard to timewise: with regard to time
116
Roots
Root Meaning Example
act, ag do, act, drive (Latin) active (Adj): moving about
am, ami love, like (Latin) amorous (Adj): loving
anim mind, life, spirit, anger (Latin) animal (N): a living creature
annu, enni yearly (Latin) annual (Adj): yearly
auc, aug, aut to originate, to increase (Latin) augment (V): to increase, to add to
aud, audit, aur hear (Latin) audible (Adj): can be heard
bene, ben good, well, gentle (Latin) benefit (N): something that gives a good advantage
bio, bi life (Greek) biography (N): a book written about a person's life
bibli, biblio book (Greek) bibliophile (N): a person who likes or collects books
brev short (Latin) abbreviate (V): to shorten
cad, cap, cas, to take, to seize, to hold (Latin) receive (V): to take in, to acquire
ceiv, cept, cid
ceas, cede, ceed, go, yield (Latin) exceed (V): to go beyond a limit, to be greater than
cess
chron time (Greek) chronological (Adj): arranged in order of time or

sequence
clam, claim shout (Latin) clamor (V): to make noise
cogn, gnos know to know (Latin) recognize (V): to know, to identify
corp body (Latin) corporate (Adj): formed into a body or association,

united in one group
cre, cresc, cret grow (Latin) create (V): to originate, to produce through imagination
cred trust, believe (Latin) incredible (Adj): unbelievable
cour, cur, curr, run, course (Latin) occur (V): to happen, to come to mind
curs
dic, dict, dit say, speak (Latin) indicate (V): to show, to point out
doc, doct teach, prove (Latin) docile (Adj): obedient, easily taught
dog, dox thought, idea (Greek) dogma (N): an established opinion
dec, dign suitable (Latin) decent (Adj): conforming to standards, suitable, good
duc, duct lead (Latin) conduct (V): to lead or guide, (N) - a person's behavior
-ectomy surgical removal appendectomy (N): the surgical removal of the appendix
117

ev, et time, age (Latin) medieval (Adj): related to the Middle Ages (500 - 1500
AD)
fac, fact, fec, fic, make do, do (Latin) feasible (Adj): capable of being done
fas, fea
fer bear, carry (Latin) infer (V): to come to a conclusion from looking at facts,
to guess
fict, feign, fain shape, make, fashion (Latin) fiction (N): something produced from imagination, an
invented story
fid belief, faith (Latin) confide (V): to trust, to trust another person with a secret
fig shape, form (Latin) figure (N): shape, pattern, drawing (V) - decide, plan,
decipher
flu, fluct, flux flow (Latin) fluid (Adj): capable of flowing, a smooth easy style (N) - a
liquid
form shape (Latin) format (N): the shape and size of something
fract, frag, frai break (Latin) fracture (V): to break, like a bone
gen, gin to give birth, kind (Greek) generate (V): to produce, to create
geo earth (Greek) geography (N): a science that describes the earth's surface
gor to gather, to bring together category (N): a class or set in which a thing is placed
(Greek)
grad, gress, gree step, go, move (Latin) degree (N): a step or stage in a process
gram, graph, graf write, draw (Greek) graphic (Adj): written, drawn, vividly shown
her, hes to stick (Latin) adhere (V): to stick
itis disease or inflammation arthritis (N): inflammation of the joints
jac, ject, jet to throw (Latin) reject (V): to throw out, unwilling to accept
jug, junct, just to join (Latin) junction (N): a place at which two things join
lex, leag, leg law (Latin) legal (Adj): based on law
lect, leg, lig choose, gather, select, read collect (V): to gather, to bring together
(Latin)
loc place, area (Latin) location (N): a place, a position occupied
log say, speech, word, reason, study logic (N): the study of reason, reasoning
(Greek)
luc, lum, lust light (Latin) translucent (Adj): permitting some light to come through
man hand, make, do (Latin) manage (V): to handle with skill, to be able to do
mem recall, remember (Latin) memory (N): the ability to recall or to bring to mind
ment mind (Latin) mental (Adj): related to the mind
118
meter device for measuring hygrometer (N): a device for measuring humidity
min little, small (Latin) minor (Adj): less important, lesser
mit, miss send (Latin) admit (V): to accept, to allow entry
mob, mov, mot move (Latin) motion (N): act of moving, action
nasc, nat, gnant, to be born (Latin) native (Adj) - belonging to a particular place by birth
nai
nom, nym name (Latin) nominate (V): to name for office
nov new (Latin) novice (N): a beginner or newcomer
oper work (Latin) operate (V): to work, to perform
pact fasten or hold impact (V): to strike together forcefully compact (V): to
press together
pat, pass feel, suffer (Latin) passion (N): a strong feeling or emotion
path feel (Greek) sympathy (N): sharing another person's feelings
ped foot (Latin) impede (V): to hinder, to slow down
phobia fear (Greek) claustrophobia (N): fear of enclosed spaces
pod foot (Greek) podium (N): a platform, an area raised above the
surrounding ground
pel, puls drive, push (Latin) repel (V): to drive away or push back
pend, pond to hang, weigh (Latin) append (V): to add or correct
phan, phas, phen, show, make visible (Greek) phantom (N): something seen but having no physical
fan, phant, fant existence, a ghost
phil love (Greek) philosopher (N): a person who seeks (loves) wisdom
phon sound (Greek) phonetic (Adj): related to speech sounds
pict paint, show, draw (Latin) picture (V): to paint or draw
port carry (Latin) import (V): to bring in from a foreign country
pli, ply fold (Latin) reply (V): to respond, to answer
pon, pos put, place (Latin) postpone (V): to put off to a later time
psych mind (Greek) psychology (N): study of how the mind works
quir, quis, quest, seek, ask (Latin) query (V): to ask questions
quer
rupt break (Latin) rupture (V): to break or burst
sci, scio to know (Latin) conscious (Adj): aware, having knowledge of oneself
scrib, scrip write (Latin) script (N): handwriting, something written
119

sent, sens feel, think (Latin) sentiment (N): a thought prompted by feeling
sequ, secut, sue follow (Latin) sequence (N): a continuous series
sist to withstand, make up insist (V): to be firm about something needed, to demand
(Latin)
soci to join, companions sociable (Adj): inclined to seek friendship, companionship
(Latin)
sol alone (Latin) solitary (Adj): being alone
solv, solu, solut loosen, explain (Latin) solve (V): to find an answer
spec, spi, spic, spect look (Latin) spectator (N): a person who watches
spir breath, soul (Latin) respiration (N): breathing
stab, stat stand (Latin) stature (N) - height of a standing body, importance of position
strain, strict, string, bind, pull (Latin) constrict (V) - to squeeze, to make narrow
stige
stru, struct, stroy build (Latin) destroy (V): to ruin, to pull down
tact, tang, tig, ting touch (Latin) tactile (Adj): related to the sense of touch
tend, tens stretch (Latin) contend (V): to strive or reach for, to argue
tain, ten, tent, tin hold, keep, have (Latin) retain (V): to keep, to hold in place
term end, boundary, limit exterminate (V): to kill off, to get rid of
(Latin)
terr earth (Latin) territory (N): area of land
test see, witness (Latin) attest (V): to provide proof, to say something is true
therm heat (Greek) thermometer (N): a device for measuring heat
tor, tors, tort twist (Latin) torsion (N): twisting of the body
tract, trai, treat pull, draw (Latin) attract (V): to draw toward, to arouse interest
uni one (Latin) unite (V): to make one, to join together
vac empty (Latin) vacant (Adj): empty, not occupied
ven, vent come (Latin) convene (V): to assemble, to come together
ver true (Latin) verify (V): to confirm that something is true
verb, verv word (Latin) verbalize (V): to express in words, to put into words
vers, vert turn, change (Latin) versatile (Adj): capable of changing or adapting, useful
vid, vie, vis see (Latin) visible (Adj): able to be seen, divide (V): to separate
vit, viv live (Latin) vital (Adj) - necessary for life
voc, voke call (Latin) vocal (Adj): spoken or uttered by the voice
volv, volt, vol roll, turn (Latin) revolve (V): to turn around
Adapted from:
Caglioti, C. (n. d.) Preparation for an American university program: Vocabulary
workshop at Southampton College of Long Island University. Retrieved from:
http://www2.southampton.liu.edu/academic/pau/course/webesl.htm
120
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Morphology and Implications for English Language Teaching

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Language, Linguistics, Teaching

WORDS AND THEIR STRUCTURE

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Content Words and Function Words

Content Words Function Words

MORPHEMES AND THEIR COMPOSITIONS

One morpheme child

Free and Bound Morphemes

OPEN-CLASS CLOSED-CLASS AFFIXES BOUND CONTRACTED

Figure 1. Classification of English morphemes

Lexical and Functional Morphemes

Inflectional and Derivational Morphemes

Table 2.2 Inflectional Morphemes of English

Differences between Derivational and Inflectional Morphemes

Morphs, Allomorphs and Pronunciation of Morphemes

WORD FORMATION THROUGH DERIVATION

Table 2.3 Common English derivational affixes that cause a change in

OTHER WORD FORMATION PROCESSES

The English “boyfriend” can be considered as a loan-word into Japanese as

Table 2.1 Some types of compounds in English

Blends Words Meaninga

Eponyms – Words from Personal Names

IMPLICATIONS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING

References and Further Reading

Appendix: A Reference List of English Prefixes, Suffixes and Roots

anti- against antiwar (N): against war

de- to do the decrease (V): to grow smaller, to become less

Prefix Meaning Examples

trans- across, transform (V): to change shape

tri- three tripod (N): a three-legged stand

un- not, unceasing (Adj): never ending, continuous

uni- one uniform (Adj): having the same form or consistency

util- use utility (N): something useful or designed for use

-an person artisan: a craftsperson

-ance, action, state, quality or resistance: the action of opposing something

-ant, an agent, something that disinfectant: something that cleans

-er, person or thing that does baker: a person who bakes

-ice act malice: the desire to do evil

-ism doctrine, belief, action or formalism: a belief in sticking to prescribed forms

Suffix Meaning Examples

-ite product or part graphite: a black material used in making pencils

-ity, state or quality novelty: something new or unusual

-ive condition native: a person born in a specific place

-ology the study of biology: the study of life

-or condition or activity valor: bravery, courage

-ory place for, serves for territory: an area around a place

-ship status, condition friendship: the state of being a friend

Suffixes Used to Create Verbs

Suffix Meaning Examples

-en to cause to become moisten: to cause to become moist or damp

-er, -or action ponder: to think about

-ify cause specify: to name or indicate in detail

-ize cause fantasize: to create images in the mind

-ure act conjecture: to come to a conclusion by supposition or guesswork

Suffix Meaning Examples

-ful having, giving, marked by fanciful: marked by imagination