Morpheme
Morpheme
What is morpheme?
Morphemes are the smallest units of
meaning. This means that
morphemes cannot be broken down
further and remain meaningful.
two types of morpheme
are morphemes that
can stand alone as single words. For
example cloud, solitude, and bliss.
Free morphemes are divided into two:
a) Lexical moprheme (open class)
Lexical morphemes are the ordinary
nouns adjectives and verbs that we
think of the words which carry the
content of messages we convey. They
are called open class of words, since
we can add new lexical morphemes to
the language easily.
E.g. : follow, type, look, yellow, act,
pick, strange, sad, song
b) Functional morpheme (closed class)
Functional morphemes are the
functional words in the language such
as conjunctions, prepositions, articles
and pronouns. They are called close
class of words, since we almost never
add new functional morphemes to the
language.
Examples :
 Conjunctions : They are for, and, nor, but,
or, yet, and so, since, unless, because,
although, while.
 Prepositions : at, forin, off, on, over, under,
cross, behind, inside, outside, above,
below, before, after
 Articles : a, an, the
 Pronoun : I, you, we, they, he, she, it, me,
you, us, them, him, her, it
are morphemes that
cannot stand alone and must be attached
to another form. For example “un’ in
“unhealthy”, “dis” in “disembark”, and “im”
in “imbalance”. Bound morphemes are
divided into two :
a) Derivational morpheme
Derivational morphemes can make and
form new words and can change the
class of the word.. But derivational
morpheme doesn’t always cause the
changed of word class ; but in such a
case, the meaning of word will usually
be significantly different from the root.
Derivational morpheme can be prefix
and suffix. Prefix is an affix added to
the beginning of the word. And suffix is
an affix added to the end of the word.
Examples of suffix : ful, -ness, -less, -ly, -y, vocabulary
-ish, -ment, -ous

Meaning (n)  Meaningful (adj) A bound morpheme is a meaningful

Sad (adj)  Sadness (n)
Care (v)  Careless (adj)
Quick (adj)  Quickly (adv)
Beauty (n)  Beautify (v)
Yellow (n)  Yellowish (adj)
Establish (v)  Establishment (n)
Humor (n)  Humorous (adj)
Example of prefix : un, im, re
Touch (v)  Untouched (adj)
Build (v)  Rebuild (v)
Material (n)  Immaterial (adj)
grammatical unit that cannot occur
alone.
A free morpheme is a meaningful
grammatical unit that can stand
alone.
A root is a morpheme, usually but not
always a free morpheme, that serves
as a building block for other words
and carries the main meaning of
those words.

An affix is a bound morpheme that

can be added to a root.
b) Inflectional morpheme
A prefix is an affix added to the
Inflectional morpheme can make a different beginning of a root.
form of new words but doesn’t change the
meaning and the class of the words. A suffix is an affix added to the end
Inflectional morphemes influence the base of a root.
words to signal a change in quantity, person,
gender, or tense while leaving the base word's A compound is a word made up of
two or more roots.
class unchanged.

There are only 8 inflectional morphemes in

English :
1. -s plural (n) “Both chairs are broken”
2. . -’s possessive (n) “The chair’s leg is
broken”
3. -s 3rd person sg. Present (v) “He waits”
4. -ing progressive (v) “He is waiting”
5. -ed past tense (v) “He waited”
6. -en past participle (v) “I had eaten”
7. -er comparative (adj) “He was faster”
8. -est superlative (adv) “He was the fastest”
Allomorph
Allomorph and
and Allophone
What is Allomorph?
Allomorph is a variation of a morpheme.
Allomorphs of a morpheme are different  [s] If the sound of the end of the word
phonetic forms for the same meaning. is voiced or voiceless, then it will be
pronounced /s/. For example : Waits,
Looks, Laughs, Swims, Sits, Sleeps.
The allomorphs of a morpheme
 [ɪs] If the sound of the end of the
word is /s/, /z/, /tʃ/, /ʃ/, /dʒ/, and /ʒ/,
 [z] If the sound of the end of the word is then it will be pronounced /ɪs/. For
voiced, then it will be pronounced /z/. For example : Watches, Catches, Reaches,
example : Dogs, Boards, Spoons, Eggs, Rises, Matches.
 [ɪz] If the sound of the end of the word is
sibilant like /s/, /z/, /tʃ/, /ʃ/, /dʒ/, and /ʒ/, then
it will be pronounced /ɪz/. For example :
Glasses, Boxes, Beaches, Eyelashes.  a- : apolitical, asymetry
 [s] If the sound of the end of the word is  ab- : abnormal, abuse
voiceless, then it will be pronounced /s/. For  ex- : ex-husband, ex-wife
example : Grapes, Cats, Plates, Forks, Rabbits.
 anti- : antitrust, antiglare
 dis- : dislike, disagree, disadvantage
 il- : illegal, illegible
 [d] If the sound of the end of the word is  im- : impossible, immaterial
voiced, then it will be pronounced /d/. For  in- : inability, incorrect
example : Analyzed, Concerned, Deserved,
 un- : unclear, unbelievable, unfair
Exercised, Grabbed.
 ir- : irregular, irresponsible
 [t] If the sound of the end of the word is
 mal- : malfunction, malformed
voiceless, then it will be pronounced /t/. For
example : Clapped, Laughed, Attached,  mis- : misheard, misadvanture
Chased, Fixed.  non- : non-addictive, nonconformist
 [ɪd] If the sound of the end of the word
is /d/ or /t/, then it will be pronounced /ɪd/.
For example : Applauded, Appreciated,
Attracted, Attended, Avoided.

A simple example is the English word a. It
means something like “one of something, but
not any particular one”, like in these examples:
 a book
 a skirt
 a friend
 a phone call
But if the word following a begins with a vowel
and not a consonant, then the word a changes
its form:
 an apple
 an ice cream cone
 an iguana
 an idea
The two forms a and an are slightly different
in their form, but they clearly both have the
same meaning. And each one shows up in a
different predictable environment: a before
words that start with consonants
and an before words that begin with vowels.
What is allophone?
Allophone is a variant of the same phoneme.
Phoneme is rge smallest meaning-
distinguishing sound unit in a language.
Examples of Allophones
has 2 allophones : aspirated and non
aspirated
 Aspirated : if the first sound of a word
is voiceless stop consonant and
followed by stressed vowel. E.g. pen, pat,
pad, purple, taxi, tax, tape, cat, caught,
cool
 Non aspirated : If the voiceless stop
consonant sound is not in the beginning
of the word. It can be in the middle or
in the end of the word. Voiceless stops
are unaspirated at the beginning of an
unstressed syllable. E.g. mop, map, rat,
root, let, look, make, cake
 Voiced conosnant never aspirated, they
always unaspirated.
 The tables
Prefix and Suffix as “verb” Makers

Prefix Meaning Examples interact,

inter- between intermix,
restructure, interface
revisit,
again or pre-expose,
re- back
reappear,
rebuild, pre- before prejudge,
refinance pretest
disappear, under/belo subcontract,
reverses sub- w subdivide
disallow,
the
dis- meaning of
disarm,
disconnect, transform,
the verb trans- across, over transcribe,
discontinue
transplant
overbook,
over- too much oversleep, underfund,
overwork under not enough undersell,
undervalue,
- underdevelo
reverses
unbend, p
the
un- meaning of
uncouple,
unfasten
the verb
mislead, Suffix Example
badly or
mis- wrongly
misinform, stabilise, characterise,
misidentify -ise symbolise, visualise,
more or specialise
outperform,
out- better than
outbid differentiate, liquidate,
others -ate pollinate, duplicate,
make or befriend, fabricate
be- cause belittle classify, exemplify,
-fy simplify, justify
co-exist, co-
co- together operate, co- awaken, fasten, shorten,
own -en moisten
do the devalue,
de- opposite of deselect
Prefix + verb = verb
earlier, foreclose,
fore- before foresee