MORPHEMES

⁃ smallest unit of a word

⁃ has a meaning/ a grammatical function
⁃ 1 syllable/ more than 1 syllable
+ ex: car, cat, cow, music, ...

⁃ identifiable
⁃ contribute to the meaning

⁃ free morphemes: can be uttered alone with meaning

+ ex: yellow, green, land, elephant, ...

⁃ bound morphemes: cannot be uttered alone with meaning/ need to attach to

other morphemes to make a word
+ ex: we'll, can't, ...

⁃ lexical morphemes:
⁃ make new lexemes
⁃ mono-morphemic content words (finger, cat, ...)
⁃ bound roots (ceive, dict, ...)
⁃ combining forms (-ology, bio-, ...)
⁃ derivational affixes (-ment, un-)
+ ex: un-, -ise, -dom, -less, ...

⁃ grammatical morphemes:
⁃ grammatical relationship
⁃ no meaning
⁃ function words (and, not, ...)
⁃ contracted forms (n't, 'll)
⁃ inflectional morphemes (-ed, -ing)
+ ex: -s, -ing, -ed, function words, ...

⁃ cranberry morpheme: occurs in OLNY ONE word (no meaning/

grammatical function)
+ ex: reckless, twilight, ...

⁃ root
+ the part of a word which carries the principal meaning
+ constitute the nuclei/ core of all words
+ mostly free, some bound

⁃ combining forms
+ bound roots
⁃ affixes
+ derivational morpheme/ affixes
• create new lexemes
-> change meaning
-> change word class

+ inflectional morpheme/ affixes

• does not create new lexemes
• produce different forms of the same lexeme
-> giving extra grammatical information to fit into its context

⁃ base: any unit whatsover to which affixes of ANY KIND (inflectional/

derivational) can be added.

⁃ stem: is that part of a word that is in existence before any inflectional affixes
have been added.

⁃ morph:
+ is a physical form representing a morpheme in a language
+ a sound/ group of sounds

⁃ allomorphs
+ the various phonemic shapes that represent the SAME morpheme

INFLECTIONAL MORPHEME
⁃ inflectional morphemes add grammatical information to a word
⁃ words be inflected -> still retains core meaning, category stays the same
⁃ inflectional morpheme do not create new lexemes
⁃ all inflectional affixes are suffixes
⁃ a word can contain only ONE inflectional affix
⁃ 8 inflectional suffixes:
+ plural marker: -s
+ possessive marker: -'s
+ 3rd person present singular: -s
+ progressive marker: -ing
+ past tense marker: -ed
+ past participle: -en/ -ed
+ comparative marker: -er
+ superlative marker: -est

⁃ pronouns:
+ nominative: I, we, you
+ accusative: me, us, you
+ genitive: my, our, your
IRREGULAR CASES
⁃ ablaut:
+ sing - sang - sung
+ mouse - mice

⁃ suppletive:
+ go - went - gone
+ good - better - best
+ bad - worse - worst

⁃ additive:
+ ox - oxen
+ child - children
+ person - people
+ cactus - cacti

⁃ zero allomorph:
+ deer (sing. & plu.)
+ cut - cut - cut
+ sheep (sing. & plu.)
+ fish (sing. & plu.)

⁃ perispherical forms: grammatical meaning is expressed by 1 or more

separate free morphemes
+ more instead of -er
+ most instead of -est
+ of instead of -'s

⁃ defective: words do not display all the rules

+ ex: trousers, glasses, scissors, can - could, ...

⁃ no inflectional suffixes: Vietnamese, Chinese, ...

⁃ few inflectional suffixes: English, Korean, ...
⁃ rich in inflections: Spanish, Greek, Latin, ...

DERIVATIONAL MORPHEME
⁃ derivation is a process in word formation
⁃ derivational morphemes create new lexemes
+ change the meaning
+ change the word class

+ denominal
+ deverbal
+ deadjectival

⁃ conversion vs homonym
+ conversion: connection in meaning
+ homonym: no connection in meaning

MORPHEMES
inflectional

+ plural: bikes, cars, trucks, ...

+ possessive: boy's, girl's, ...
+ tense: cooked, played, marked, ...
+ comparison: faster, slower, quicker, ...
+ superlative: fastest, slowest, tallest, ...

derivational
-ful: beautiful, wonderful, cheerful, ...
-able: walkable, loveable, understandable, ...
-ment: government, agreement, ...
-ness: kindness, happiness, sadness, ...
-ly: happily, kindly, sadly, ...