MORPHOLOGY

Definitions

• Morph: A morph is a constituent element of a word form. Or is the realization of a morpheme (or sometimes of more than one). It is a physically (phonological and orthographical) identifiable segment of a language.

• A word such as invariables /inve WriWblz / contains four morphs.

• Free morphemes: are those that can stand alone in English phrases, clauses, and sentences, such as man, boy, work, nice, fast, etc. •

Bound morphemes: are those morphemes that cannot stand alone by themselves, as in-, un-, dis-, pre-, post, -ity, -ness, -dom, -ic, -able, etc.

• Morphology is the study of the ways in which lexemes and word forms are built up from smaller elements and the changes that are made to those smaller elements in the process of building lexemes and word-forms.

• Lexeme : lexeme is a unit of lexical meaning that can take a set of inflectional endings, such as show , shows, showing, showed.

• lexeme is a dictionary word, an abstract unit of vocabulary. It is realized by word forms , in such a way, that the word form represents the lexeme and any inflectional endings that are required. For example, small, smaller, and smallest are all word forms that can realize the lexeme SMALL. Similarly, dance, dances danced, dancing are word forms based on the lexeme DANCE. Conventionally lexemes are written in capital letters.

•

Zero morph

• When there is not overt phonological and orthographical realization of a morpheme, so the morph is zero. For example, the past forms of the verbs shut, cut, hit, cost, etc. are the same as their present forms. This means that there is no overt orthographical or phonological change.

•

Portmanteau morph

• It is a togetherness of more than one morpheme in one morph. Portmanteau morph: is a morph which represents a togetherness of two or more morphemes in one word.

• Consider the morph is, which contains the following morphemes: • 1. verb to be, • 2. Tense: simple present, • 3. number: singular, • 4. person: third person.

• Root: A root is that part of the word which remains after all inflectional and derivational affixes have been removed. Or it is irreducible core of the word. For example, the root of the word decentralizations is centre which is remained after removing inflectional morpheme {-s of pl} and all derivational prefixes and suffixes {de-, -al, -ize, -ation}.

• Stem: • A Stem is that part of the word which remains after removing all inflectional suffixes. Or • The stem is that part of a word that is in existence before any inflectional affixes (i.e grammatical morphemes) have been added.

• Examples are

cat

is the stem of

cats , worker

is the stem of

workers

• Walk is the stem for walked , victimize is the stem of victimized . • Cheap is the stem of cheaper .

• Base: A base is that part of the word to which an affix of any kind is added.

• A base is any unit whatsoever to which affixes of any kind can be added. For instance,

duck

is the base of

duckling

and also

duckling

is the base of

ducklings .

• Affixes: • Affixes are bound morphemes that can be attached to the initial or the final part of a word so as to form either a new from or a new word. All English prefixes and suffixes are kinds of affixes, such as in-, anti-, mini-, dis-, de-, un-, pre-, post-, maxi-, -ance, -ment, -able, -age, -less, -ness, -er, -ous, etc.

• Classification of affixes according to their position in the host word: • Prefixes: • Prefixes are bound morphemes that can be added to the beginning part of the base. They mostly change the meaning of the root or base to which they are added, few numbers of the prefixes change the word class of the host word. Examples are unhappy, disappointed, misplaced, prewar, postmodern, antisocialist, encage, impersonal etc.

Suffixes

They are bound morphemes that are added to the terminal part of words to form a new form or a new lexeme. They either change the meaning of the base to which they are added or they only change the word class of the base or they do both, for instance,

colourless , singer , depth , happiness , purify , etc.

Affixes in English are divided into either class-changing or class maintaining affixes. Classs-changing affixes: are bound morphemes that are added to the word and they change the meaning and the word class of the host word. In English most, but not all, derivational suffixes are class changing suffixes, e.g., happiness, penniless, dependent, carriage, admirable, attractive, etc .

Class- maintaining affixes: are those dependent bound morphemes that are added to the word and they never change the word class of the host word, e.g., all inflectional suffixes, mountain eer, lion ess , book let , king dom , friend ship , etc,

Differences between affixes and roots:

Roots Affixes 1.They can stand alone i.e. they are free morphemes 2. They are in the central part of the words.

1.They cannot stand alone by themselves i.e. they are bound morphemes 2. They are on the margins (peripheries) of the words.

3.Their number somehow is open and bigger than that of affixes 3. Their number is limited and fixed.

4. They can be divided into nouns, verbs, adjective and adverbs etc.

4. They Can be divided into prefixes, suffixes, and infixes .

Inflectional VS. Derivational Affixes

Inflectional

1. Never change the part of speech of the base to which they are added.

2. They are related to syntax.

3. Inflectional affixes have a regular meaning.

4. They are farther to the root than derivationals.

5. They close off the word 6. They can only be added to the stems.

7. Inflection uses a close set of suffixes and their number is quite smaller than derivationals 8. By adding an inflectional suffix, a new form of the same morpheme will be obtained.

9. Only one suffix can occur within a word

Derivational

1. They may change the part of speech of the words to which they are added.

2. They are related to semantics.

3. Their meaning is irregular.

4. They are nearer to the root.

5. They never close off the word 6. The can be added to the base.

7. Derivation uses an open set of affixes i.e, their number is much bigger that that of inflectionals.

8.By adding aa derivational suffix, a new word (lexeme) will be obtained.

9. More than one affix can occur within one word.

Replacive allomorph: sometimes a morpheme can be realized by replacing one medial vowel sound by another. For example, the past form of the verb give which is gave is formed by Changing one vowel sound to another, i.e., the vowel sound /i/ is replaced by /ei/ .

Other examples include: Tooth + {-spl}= teeth

/ t

i:Q

/ = / t

u:Q

/ +

i:

>

u: Take + {-ed past} = took

/tuk/= /teik/ + u >ei

• Allomorphs or Positional Variants: • Simply, allomorphs mean (an)other shapes of the same morpheme. Allomorphs are the alternative realizations of a morpheme. • Two or more morphs are said to be allomorphs of the same morpheme if • 1. They have the same grammatical function or the same meaning.

• 2. They must be in complementary distribution, i.e., they must be in mutually exclusive relation.

• An allomorph is a variant form of a morpheme which differs only in sound not in meaning. It is an alternative manifestation of a morpheme which varies in pronunciation according to phonological conditions.

• Allomorphs are either regular, rule-governed phonological alternation,(a situation where the choice between alternative allomorphs is regulated in quite predictable ways by the phonological properties of the different morphs that occur near each other), or morphologically (lexically) conditioned. This means that

• Choice of an allomorph is obligatory and it is dependent on the presence of the specific lexeme or word. This can be done by our identification for that lexeme. For example, by adding the plural morpheme to the noun ox we know the plural form of the word is oxen.

• In Phonologically Conditioned allomorph, the phonological environment determines the shape of the morpheme. Consider the realization of {-s of pl } in English: • cups / k Ups / the noun is ended with a voiceless consonant • Watches / wotSi s / the noun is ended with a sibilant consonant • Rooms / ru:mz /the noun is ended with a voiced consonant • The {-s of pl} is realized by three different phonological shapes depending on the final sound of the host word with which the plural morpheme is combined. All these forms are in complementary distribution. This means that they never occur in the same enivronmet, the presence of one of them will exclude the other forms.

• Suppletive forms: when there is no direct phonological relation between the stem and the new form after adding inflectional morphemes to the stem, the new form is suppletive form. For example, the phonological form of the stem of the verb go has no phonological relation with the past form went after adding the morpheme of {-ed of past}. Other examples are good –better, bad worse, etc.

•

Truncation: In some cases, a part of the base is dropped before a derivational suffix is added to the final part of the base. As in, philosophy > philosopher

•

Humanity > humanitarian

•

Nominate > nominee

• Inflectional paradigm: • It is a set of related forms having the same stem with different inflectional suffixes. Examples: • Walk, walks, walking, walked.

• Give, gives, giving, gave, given.

• Be, being, been, is , am, are, was, were.

• Small, smaller, smallest.

• Girl, girls, girl’s, girls’.

• Derivational paradigm: • It is a set of related words(lexemes) having the same root with different derivational affixes. Examples are: human, inhuman, humanity, inhumanly, antihuman, etc.

• Happy, happiness, happily, unhappy, unhappily.

IMMEDIATE CONSTITUENT ANALYSIS

•

It is the process of drawing a diagram to show the layers of structure by which the word has been composed down to the ultimate constituents.

•

Immediate constituents of a unit are the smaller units into which it is directly analysed.

• Anti- nationalists • Anti- nationalist {-s of pl.} • anti • (aganist) National Nation root nationalist -ist noun-forming suffix - deadjectival -al denominal – adjective forming suffix

• When we draw a diagram to show the structure of the words , the following points must be taken in our consideration: • 1. the first division must be between the inflectional morpheme (if there is and the rest of the word.

• 2. one of the constituents must be a free morpheme. This means that it has its own meaning and can stand alone.

• 3. The meaning of the constituents must be related or have connection to the original word.