Word formation processes

Etymology:
has its origins in Greek [etymon “original form”
+ logia “study of”)
So Etymology is the study of the history of
words, their origin, and how their form and
meaning changed over time.
Etymology enables us to discover that there are
many different ways in which new words can
enter the language:
Below is a brief discussion of each of these processes
together with examples.
1. Coinage
The invention of new terms which become general
terms. New products and concepts and new activities
are the usual sources of coinage.
e.g. asprin, vasline, kodak, nylon, xerox, kleenex,
google, ebay, cell phone, television, lab top … etc.
Google: to use the internet and to find information.
Ebay: a new concept of selling and buying products
e.g. have you tried ebaying it?
E-cruitment: online recruitment of employee, online
submission of resumes and cover letters.
A sub-division of coinage is Eponym which is a new
word based on the name of a person or a place e.g.
Hoover (the person who produced the first machine
called a ‘hoover’)
Sandwich (Earl Sandwich who first insisted on his
bread and meat together)

More Examples on Eponyms

1. America
The word America is named after Italian Map maker, Amerigo Vespucci.
2. Caesar Salad
Restaurateur Caesar Cardini created the salad that now bears his name.
3. Boycott (reject or refuse)
This word is named for an Irish land agent, Captain Charles C. Boycott.
4. Fahrenheit
Gabriel Daniel Fahrenheit is the physicist for whom this temperature
measurement is named.
5. Cardigan
This is named after the 7th Earl of Cardigan. He led troops who wore this
garment into battle.
6. Nicotine
Jean Nicot sent powdered tobacco leaves and seeds back to France when he
visited Portugal as an ambassador.
7. Diesel
This field, used in trucks and other equipment is named after Rudolph Diesel.

2. Borrowing
Taking over words from other languages.
e.g. French - croissant, café, bureau, abattoir,
chauffeur, etc.
Greek: panorama, psychology, psychoanalysis,
pneumonia, etc.
Latin – interim, memorandum, agenda, p.m/a.m,
sponsor.
Hindi – avatar, jungle, bungalow, karma, pajamas,
verandah, shampoo, yoga, cheetah
Turkish – yogurt; Arabic – sofa
Tahitian – tattoo; Japanese – tycoon
Tamil – cash, curry

3. Calque /kælk/.
A special type of borrowing is described as loan-
translation or calque.
It means word for word translation of a phrase into
the borrowing language.
For example: from Spanish to English:
perros calientes (dog hot) – hot dog
Interesting examples are the French term gratte-ciel,
which literally translates as “scrape-sky,” the Dutch
wolkenkrabber (“cloud scratcher”) or the German
Wolkenkratzer (“cloud scraper”), all of which were
calques for the English skyscraper.

4. Compounding
Compounds are made up of more than one word
element [more than one root]. They are written in
three ways:
a) solid: written as one word, e.g. bedroom,
b) hyphenated: linked by a hyphen, e.g. tax-
free,
c) open: written as separate words, e.g. reading
material.
e.g., Home + work → homework
Pick + pocket → pickpocket
More Examples: bookcase, fingerprint, textbook,
wallpaper, sunburn (nouns)
 low- paid, good-looking (adjectives)

American English (AmE) tends not to use

hyphenated compounds. In AmE, a new compound
remains open until it is commonly used, in which
case it becomes solid or written as one word.

Note: The meaning of a compound is not always the

sum of the meanings of its parts [constituents]. For
example,
Olive oil → oil made from olives.
Baby oil → Not oil made from babies
It is oil for babies
Hotdog cannot be predicted from the parts forming it:
hot or dog. Similar examples are:
• wildgoose in ‘a wildgoose chase’, meaning a chase
getting nowhere, dogfight in ‘the two fighter jets
were locked up in a dogfight’, meaning they were
trying to shoot down each other.

5. Derivation
1. Derivation by affixation
creating new words by adding endings and
prefixes to more basic forms of the word.
English uses this method frequently for coining
words.
Some examples are:
a) Prefixes: un- (unacceptable), im- (improper)
inter- (intercontinental), pan- (pan-Arab), anti-
(anti-clockwise), re- (reassure).
 b) Suffixes: -ist (industrialist), -hood
(childhood), -less (careless), -ism (realism), -ify
(classify), -some (troublesome).
Some rules concerning affixation:
(a) adjective + -ify ----- verb
e.g., purify, simplify, amplify, falsify
(b) Noun + ify ------- verb
e.g. objectify, glorify, personify.
(c) Verb + ation ------- noun
e.g. purification, activation, pronunciation,
simplification.
(d) Noun + atic ------ adjective (systematic)
(e) Un + adjective ------ adjective (unhappy,
unusual)
(f) Adjective + al ------ adjective (classical,
fantastical, astronomical)
 (g) Adjective + ly ------ adverb (hopefully, lazily,
angrily)
2. Derivation without affixation
Consider the following pairs of sentences:
- This is a major oversight.
- she graduated with a major in geography.
- she majored in geography.
- My account is overdrawn.
- I can’t account for where the money went.
- It’s no trouble at all
- don’t trouble yourself.
- They gave aid and comfort to the enemy.
- they comforted the enemy.
- We don’t have any doubt it’s correct.
- we don’t doubt that it’s correct
Exercise 1
What is the meaning of the underlined prefix?
 1.restart
2.unjust
3.inactive
4.misinterpretation
5.co-exist
6.overestimate
7.underestimate
8.anti-racism
9.pro-Arab (expert-)
10. subway
11. pre-school
12. postgraduate
13. monotone
14. auto-drive

Exercise 2
Add a suffix to the following words. Notice that
some words have different suffixes.
1.hope
2.man
3.relation
4.king
5.China (language)
6.Kuwait (citizen)
7.work (person)
8.state (noun)
9.happy (adverb)
10. clock (adverb)

6. Clipping
Clipping means removing one or more parts of a
word. It is a shortening or reduction of a poly-
syllabic word. In a word like phone, the removed (or
clipped) part is (tele-) which stands at the beginning
of the original word telephone. However, in an
example like lab, the clipped part is at the end of
laboratory. In some special cases, clipping is made of
the first and last parts of a word, e.g.
• fridge in which the clipped parts are re- and -
rator from the original word refrigerator.
Clipping also reduces formality. Examination is a
word that would be used by a teacher or in official
language on a school’s policy page, while exam is the
word all the students would use. Other examples are:
net for internet

Types of Clipping

Clipping comes in four basic varieties:

1. Back Clipping: As we have seen
in exam and examination, back clipping is when
the back half of a word is deleted. Another
example is memo, the back-clipped form
of memorandum.

2. Fore Clipping: The process can be reversed,

deleting the beginning of a word, as in varsity,
which is a fore-clipped (and slightly modified)
version of university.

3. Mid Clipping: More rare is when the beginning

and end of a word is clipped to form a new word.
A good example is flu, clipped out of influenza.

4.Compound Clipping: Much rarer, this involves

clipping more than one word to form a new word.
The best example is cablegram, taken from the
phrase cable telegram.
More Examples of Clipping:
abdominal
abbreviation– abs
example – My abs look huge in this vest.
• administrator/administration
abbreviation – admin
example – I need an admin day; my finances are
in a mess.
• advertisement
abbreviation – ad(s)
example – Shall we record Breaking Bad? Then
we can skip the ads later?
• aeroplane
abbreviation – plane
example – My plane is due to land around 6.
7. Backformation
A word of one type (noun) is reduced to form a word
of another type (verb).
e.g. donate from donation
babysit form babysitter
edit which was derived from the noun 'editor
Back-formation is also a word creation process in
which prefixes or suffixes are removed from existing
words. This word formation can also be referred to as
back-derivation, as the process is simply taking the
existing word and breaking it down into a simpler
form. For example, the word ''examine'' was created
by removing the ''-ation'' from ''examination.''

Back-formation linguistics is an important part of

English grammar that allows its users to create new
words quickly and easily. It can provide the
opportunity to express ideas more concisely or to
describe something that did not exist before.
Additionally, it can help with the understanding of a
word's meaning, as it allows people to break down
words and see their component parts.

Back-formation should also be differentiated from

clipping, which is the process of creating a shorter
form of a word by removing its beginning or end
portion. The main difference between the two is that
the process of back-formation typically results in a
new meaning as well as a new word class. Clipping,
on the other hand, typically results in no change in
meaning or word class. Clipping is often used in
informal language and slang. For example, the terms
''bro'' or ''sis'' are derived from the words ''brother''
and ''sister,'' respectively.
Here are some common examples.
Back Formation Word Source Word
Artist Art
Architect Architecture
Actor/Actress Act
Creator Create
Beggar Beg
Kidnapper Kidnap
Bird-watcher Bird-watching/ Bird
Caretaker Care-taking/care

8. Conversion
1. A change in the function of a word (without any
reduction). e.g.,
Nouns: Bottle – Butter – Vacation – Chair
Verbs: Bottle – Butter – Vacation – Chair
Examples:
- We bottled the home-beverage last night.
- Have you buttered the toast?
 - They are vacationing in Florida.
- Someone has to chair the meeting.
Verbs: Guess – Spy – printout
Nouns: Guess – Spy – printout

Examples:
- I guessed she was your sister
- Both teams made some wild guesses
2. Shift of stress:
Verb – noun
e.g. - Present – present
- Subject – subject
- Contest – contest

9. Blending
Blending is achieved when two words are merged
together (or blended) in order to coin a new word.
This is normally done by using a part of each word.
Here are some examples:
• smog is made up of the two words smoke and fog.
• brunch is a blend of breakfast and lunch.

Examples
Here are some examples of word blends and their roots:
Blended Root word Root word 2
word 1
agitprop agitation propaganda
bash bat mash
biopic biography picture
Breathalyzerbreath analyzer
clash clap crash
docudrama documentarydrama
electrocute electricity execute
emoticon emotion icon
fanzine fan magazine
frenemy friend enemy
Globish global English
infotainmentinformation entertainment
moped motor pedal
pulsar pulse quasar
sitcom situation comedy
sportscast sports broadcast
staycation stay vacation
telegenic television photogenic
workaholic work alcoholic

10. Acronyms
Acronyms are words formed from the initials of two
or more words such as:
• VIP which is made up of the initial letters of the
words: very important person.
• CD (compact disk)
• VCR (video cassette recorder)
• laser (light amplification by stimulated
emission of radiation)

Acronyms are classified into two types according to

how they are pronounced:
1. The acronym is pronounced as one word: e.g.
• UNESCO (United Nations Educational,
Scientific, and Cultural Organization)
 • ALECSO (Arab League Educational, Cultural,
and Scientific Organization)

2. The acronym is pronounced letter by letter, e.g.

• IMF (International Monetary Fund) pronounced
as: /aɪemef/
• GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) pronounced as:
/dʒi: si: si:/

There are many types of acronyms for different

specializations.

Some Examples of Acronyms

anno Domini [after

AD
Christ]
 ante meridiem
AM
[before noon]

ASAP As soon as possible

BA Bachelor of Arts

British Broadcasting
BBC
Corporation

BC Before Christ

BS Bachelor of Science

C Celsius (centigrade)

CV Curriculum Vitae

Frequently Asked
FAQ
Questions

MA Master of Arts

MD Medicinae Doctor
 [Doctor of Medicine]

References
• Yule, J. (2010) The study of language: 4th edition.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
• Plag, I. (2003). Word formation in English. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
• McCarthy, C.A. (2002). An introduction to English
morphology: word and their structure. Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press
• Harley, H. (2006). English words: linguistics introduction.
Oxford: Blackwell Publishing
• Stockwell, R. & Minkova, D. (2001). English words:
history and structure. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press
• Fromkin, V., Rodman, R., Hyams, N., Collins, P. &
Amberber, M. (2005). An introduction to language: 5th
edition. Merlbourne: Nelson Thomson Learning Pty