CHAPTER IV

MORPHOLOGY: WORD STRUCTURE

MORPHOLOGY: THE STUDY OF WORD STRUCTURE

MORPHOLOGY is the component of grammar devoted to the study of the internal structure of words.
It is concerned:
 with speakers' knowledge of the structure of existing;
 with the rules used to form or interpret new words.

WORDS HAVE INTERNAL STRUCTURE.

 New compound words can be formed by combining two existing full words (ex. ear-witness).
 A new word can be formed by combining the first letters of words in a phrase as in f.i.n.e.

MORPHOLOGY IS THE STUDY OF WORD STRUCTURE.

The problem is that it is difficult to give a definition of the a standard definition of a word is this:
word and to provide reliable criteria for recognizing words “a word is a minimum free form”.

the word not only is the smallest form

that can occur by itself as an utterance,
but it is also the smallest unit that
can be manipulated by syntax.

Some relatively new words in English:

CONTEXT AND SOURCE

An individual who hears an incident occur, I did not see what happened, I just
EARWITNESS, n. especially one who later gives a report on he or she heard. heard it. I guess I was an earwitness.
(Conversation)

IMHO, n. Acronym (In My Humble Opinion) Acronym used on the internet

We all know he's F.I.N,E, just like

F.I.N.E., adj. Acronym (Fucked up, Insecure, Neurotic, and Emotional)
those freaks he hangs out with.

An evangelist who conducts regular religious services Ole Anthony and his merry band
TELEVANGELIST, n
on television [blend of television and evangelist] take on the televangelists.

A person's vocabulary [blend of word and wardrobe] He has an extensive wordrobe.

WORDROBE, n. (a web page on the internet)

DISORIENT I felt like I was on the Disorient

A state of confusion [novel formation].
EXPRESS, n. Express for good this time.
SIMPLE AND COMPLEX WORDS
IS A WORD THE SMALLEST UNIT OF MORPHOLOGICAL STRUCTURE?
THE ANSWER HAS TO BE NO.

EXAMPLE: boys it contains two meaningful structural units:

1. Boy
2. -s (plural)

The minimal unit which has a meaning (boy) or grammatical function (-s)
is called a MORPHEME.

WHAT IS A WORD?
1) WORD-FORM is a shape that represents a word in speech or writing.

IN WRITTEN LANGUAGE IN THE SPOKEN LANGUAGE

we call word-forms orthographic words.
- Normally, an orthographic word is preceded we call word-form phonological word.
and followed by a space or a punctuation mark;
It is subject to various phonological constraints.
- sometimes a compound word is written with
white space surrounding each of its constituent
words (ex. disorient express)

2) LEXEME (or lexical item) is used when by “word” we mean vocabulary item,
ex. the word-forms speak, speaking, spoke and spoken are different manifestations of the lexeme speak.

3) GRAMMATICAL WORD are words viewed as syntactic units. In this case, we consider a lexeme
together with the morpho-syntactic properties associated with it.
ex. speaking is the progressive form of the verb speak.

We can distinguish between:

 SIMPLE WORDS => contain just one morpheme (ex. dog);
 COMPLEX WORDS => contain more than one morpheme (ex. child-ish).

MORPHEMES CAN BE CLASSIFIED AS:

FREE MORPHEMES BOUND MORPHEMES
can occur in isolation, as a word cannot occur in isolation
inflectional morphemes
root and base and
derivational morphemes

ALLOMORPHS are variants that realize morphemes in different contexts

ex. a / an => these two forms have exactly the same meaning, but they occur in different contexts
WORD STRUCTURE: A CLOSER LOOK
Various types of morpheme: ROOT, BASE and AFFIX.
1. a BASE is a unit to which elements can be added in word-formation (ex. write + -ing = writing).

2. an AFFIX is a bound morpheme attached to a base:

 if it precedes the base it is called a prefix;
 if it follows the base it is called a suffix;
 if it is inserted in the root itself is called infix.

3. the base of a word may be a ROOT.

The root is the rump of a word that remains when all the affixes have been stripped away.
ex. write is both a root and a base:
- we can take a root like write as the base and add to it the prefix re-
to obtain the word rewrite;

- rewrite, already containing a root and a prefix, can be used as a base to which
we add the suffix -ing to obtain the word rewriting.

We can also form a compound word by combining two bases (ex. earwitness).

LEXICAL MORPHEMES FUNCTIONAL MORPHEMES

content words
nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs (NAVA)
belong to an open class which can expand.
function words
they mostly signal syntactic relationships and
include prepositions, pronouns and determiners.
belong to a closed class (no admits new members).

INFLECTION VS DERIVATION
This leads us to the two broad classes of word-formation processes:
1) INFLECTION is syntactically motivated word- formation => (-s , ed, ing , -s/es, -er /-est , -‘s)

2) DERIVATION is not motivated by the syntax

It involves:
 creating a new lexical item with a different meaning from that of the original word

INPUT DERIVED WORD

possible impossible
tell retell

 changing the syntactic class of the input lexical item.

INPUT DERIVED WORD

faith (noun) faithful (adjective)
sing (verb) singer (noun)
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN INFLECTION AND DERIVATION
In forming a word, a lexical base to which inflectional morphemes are attached is called a STEM
(ex. sleep in sleep-s)
In a complex word containing a sequence of suffixes, the derivational suffix is normally part of the stem.

inflectional suffixes are on the outside, as sing-e-rs

where -er, the suffix deriving an agentive noun
derivational suffixes are nearer the root (one who does X), is next to the root and the
plural suffix is at the edge of the word.

derivational morphology tends to be sporadic inflectional morphology is for the most part regular

inflectional processes tend to be more productivc than derivational ones

1. DERIVATIONAL AFFIXES

2. INFLECTIONAL AFFIXES
MORPHOLOGICAL PROCESSES USED IN WORD-BUILDING

CONVERSION a new word is formed by assigning an existing word a new syntactic category
or WITHOUT CHANGING ITS FORM in any way.
ZERO Conversion is a very productive method of deriving words,
DERIVATION especially verbs from nouns and nouns from verbs.

is word-building involving the use of affixes (prefixes, infixes, suffixes).

AFFIXATION This is extremely common.

INTERNAL
CHANGE a type of inflection done by changing a vowel in the root.
or (ex. foot => feet or ride => rode)
APOPHONY

is the relationship between morphs and morpho-syntactic features.

SIMPLE EXPONENCE CUMULATIVE EXPONENCE

EXPONENCE one morph (form) realizes a single one morph realizes many morpho-
morpho-syntactic feature. syntactic features simultaneously.
ex. [s] in sweets realizes plural ex. [s] in she thinks

the use of two or more phonetically distinct roots for different forms of the same
word: bad and its suppletive comparative form worse.
SUPPLETION TOTAL: PARTIAL:
if a phonological relationship is totally when residual phonetic similarity
non-existent (ex. go => went) between allomorph can be detected
(ex. bring => brought)

SYNCRETISM two distinct morphosyntactic categories are expressed in the same way.
(ex. “you” => the two distinct meanings singular/plural expressed the same)

HAPLOLOGY When two identical or very similar syllables occur next to each other it's not
unusual for one to be deleted.

STRESS In a minority of cases, derivation is affected by changing stress placement.

PLACEMENT Nouns can be derived from verbs and verbs from nouns.

the creation of a new word by repetition of an existing word.

FULL REDUPLICATION PARTIAL REDUPLICATION

Repetition of the entire word only part of a word is repeated
ex. bye-bye ex. tip-top

RHYMING REDUPLICATION EXACT REDUPLICATION

REDUPLICATION
super-duper, airy-fairy, easy-peasy baby-talk : cho-cho, night-night, wee-wee,

ABLAUT REDUPLICATION SHM-REDUPLICATION

changing a vowel
zig-zag, flip-flop, criss-cross, chit-chat
Repeating the same word with SHM in
front, taking away first consonant
(uncomplimentary connotation)
chef –shmef = bad chef
car – shmar = bad car
DERIVATION
The processes used are of three types: affixation, conversion and compounding.
1. AFFIXATION
It is the most important method of derivation.
 WORD-BUILDING PROCESS INVOLVING THE USE OF AFFIXES;
 The set of derivational suffixes is large and it can have new members added to it.

2. CONVERSION
It is a very widely used method of forming words in English.

 CHANGING WORD CLASS, WITH NO FORMAL CHANGE;

 the syntactic context is the only indicator that word class has changed;
 conversion of N => V is very productive (ex. chair => to chair).

3. COMPOUNDING
Compounds are complex words containing at least two bases that are themselves words.
It has always been a highly productive process in English.

 Compounds always have a headword which assigns its syntactic properties to the word, and
thanks to the right-hand head role - the idea that the head is the right-hand-most element - it is
normally governed by the right-hand-word.

 Normally compounds are classified on the basis of the word class of their constituents and
the class of the entire resulting word.

COMPOSITIONAL COMPOUNDS:
Their meaning can be inferred from the meaning of words they contain.
The word on the left serves as a modifier of the headword on the right.

ENDOCENTRIC COMPOUNDS EXOCENTRIC COMPOUND

head on the right no head
its semantic category depends on no
it depends on his left constituent
constituents. It has to be memorised.
FURTHER SOURCES OF ENGLISH WORDS
Derivation using affixation, conversion and compounding are the principal methods used to create
vocabulary items. But there are also OTHER METHODS.

is the word manufacture without recycling existing words and morphemes.

COINAGE It is mostly found in names of corporations and their commercial products.
It is rare.

are new words created by widening the meaning of a personal name to refer to
EPONYMS
a place, concept or product associated with that person.
taking something away from the input.
BACKFORMATION An affix is removed, leaving behind the assumed root.
Reduction of nouns to form verbs (ex. donation => to donate)

Chunks of words may be blended (combined together) to form new words.

 less commonly, it is the initial chunks of two words that arc combined
BLENDING (ex. modulator + demodulator = modem);

 more commonly, the initial chunk of the first word is combined with the
final part of the second word (ex. brunch = breakfast lunch)

Shortening long words by dropping a part (ex. refrigerator = fridge)

Clipping may interact with compounding. Compounds can be clipped, for
example, pub from public house; and compounds can be created from clipped
words, for example, hi-fi (from high fidelity).

CLIPPING FORE CLIPPING: MIDDLE CLIPPING: BACK CLIPPING:

deleting the first part and deleting both the
keeping the final part first and last part and
keeping the middle part
ex. phone (telephone).
ex. flu (influenza).
deleting the second part
and keeping the first one
ex. exam (examination).
It is used with names
ex. Rich (Richard).

refers to words formed by suffixing –y or –ie to a monosyllabic root or after

HYPOCORISMS clipping has reduced a longer word to one syllable (ex. Vicky; movie)
It is used to create the familiar forms of names or common nouns
ABBREVIATION ACRONYMS
ACRONYMS the reduced form does not result in contraction delivers initial letters that
and well-formed syllables. So, the letters are constitute well-formed syllables and
ABBREVIATIONS sounded out independently the string forms a normal word

EU (European Union). NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization)

BORROWING English incorporates words from other languages into its vocabulary