ENGLISH II
� Module Title: Introduction to English
Morphology;
� I Semester: Tuesday-Thursday 15:00-16:30;
� Prof. Stefano Mochi;
E-mail: [email protected];� E-mail: [email protected];
� Office Hours: Tuesday-Thursday 16:30-17:15;
Room 207
� Further material to be decided during the course
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INGLESE II - PRESENTAZIONE
� Il modulo esamina le nozioni di base e i processi
fondamentali della morfologia inglese quali la differenza
tra morfologia flessiva e morfologia derivativa, le varie
definizioni di parola, i processi di formazione con cui le
parole vengono costruite partendo da unità più piccole e la
loro produttività.loro produttività.
� Vengono inoltre approfonditi alcuni fenomeni morfologici
più specifici quali i tratti interni delle parole, il modo con il
quale esse influenzano la costruzione delle frasi, la
differenza tra parole lessicali e parole funzionali, il legame
tra morfologia e fonologia, la produttività e l'organizzazione
mentale del lessico.
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INGLESE II - OBIETTIVI
� -conoscere, comprendere e analizzare la struttura
delle parole, la loro produttività, le loro proprietà
morfologiche, sintattiche, semantiche, fonetiche e
fonologiche;
� -conoscere, comprendere e analizzare il modo in � -conoscere, comprendere e analizzare il modo in
cui si costruisce e si interpreta la definizione di
parola;
� -applicare, sintetizzare e valutare le conoscenze
di cui ai precedenti punti nell' analisi di parole,
frasi e testi in inglese.
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INGLESE II - BIBLIOGRAFIA
� Modulo 12 crediti
-Plag, Ingo (2003) Word Formation in English,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Tutti i
capitoli);
-McCarthy, A.C. (2002) An Introduction to -McCarthy, A.C. (2002) An Introduction to
English Morphology Words and Their Structure,
Edimburgh:Edinburgh University Press
� -Aronoff , M. and Fudeman, K.(2011), What is
morphology?, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
(Capitoli 6-7-8, pp.159-253)
� Eventuali testi ad integrazione4
INGLESE II - BIBLIOGRAFIA
� Modulo 6 crediti
� -Plag, Ingo (2003) Word Formation in English,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Tutti i
capitoli);
-Aronoff , M. and Fudeman, K.(2011), What is -Aronoff , M. and Fudeman, K.(2011), What is
morphology?, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
(Capitoli 6-7-8, pp.159-253)
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WHAT IS A WORD?
� 1.Words are units of the writing system (i.e.
ortographic criterion): ‘a word is an
uninterrupted string of letters which is preceded
by a blank space and followed by either a blank
space or a punctuation mark’;space or a punctuation mark’;
� Consider: how many words are there in the
sentence below?
� ‘Students love studying English morphology.’
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WHAT IS A WORD?
� How many words are there in the sentence
below?
� The housekeeper’s wife lived in a five-room flat in a
five-storey building.
� Is the ortographic criterion reliable?� Is the ortographic criterion reliable?
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WHAT IS A WORD
� Words are units of the sound system
(i.e.phonological criterion): ‘a word is a unit of
speech sorrounded by pauses’;
� Consider: how would you utter the sentences
below?below?
� 1.Whatdidyousay?
� 2.What did YOU say?
� 2.That’s really a-ma-zing!
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WHAT IS A WORD?
• Phonological criterion: stress;
• Words have a primary (/΄/) and a secondary (/ˌ/)
stress;
• If spoken in isolation words have only one main
stress: /ˈglæmərəs/; /ˈhaʊsˌkiːpəʳ/; /ˈbɪldɪŋ/stress: /ˈglæmərəs/; /ˈhaʊsˌkiːpəʳ/; /ˈbɪldɪŋ/
• The main stressed syllable is the most prominent
syllble in a word;
• Prominence of a syllable is a function of
loudness, pitch and duration;
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WHAT IS A WORD?
• Longer words also have secondary stress/es:
• Consider:
– /ˌmænəˈtobə/; /ˈfotəˌɡɹæf/; /ˈdɛləˌɡet/;
• Does the ortographic criterion match with the
phonological criterion?phonological criterion?
• Compare:
– ‘Five-room’: how many words? How many main
stresses?
– ‘Housekeeper’s:’ how many words? How many
stresses?
– ‘Building site’: how many words? How many
stresses? 10
WHAT IS A WORD?
� Not all words bear stress: function words, for
example, don’t;
� Consider the words below:
� /ðə/; /æt/; /hæv/;
Is the phonological criterion reliable?� Is the phonological criterion reliable?
11
WHAT IS A WORD?
• Words are indivisible: (i.e. integrity crieterion):
words are indivisible units into which
intervening material may not be inserted’;
• Any modification occurs at the edge of words,
never inside words:never inside words:
• Consider:
• ‘usual’ vs ‘unusual’ vs *’usunual’; ‘normal’ vs
‘normalize’ vs *’normizeal’; ‘student’ vs ‘students’
vs *’studenst’
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WHAT IS A WORD?
� Yet, consider the following words:
� ‘Sons in love’;
� ‘Absobloodylutely’;
� ‘Absobloominglutely;’
� ‘Theojollylogical’;� ‘Theojollylogical’;
� ‘Beawfullyware;’
� Is the integrity criterion reliable?
13
WHAT IS A WORD?
� Words are expressions of meaning (i.e. semantic
criterion): ‘a word expresses a unified semantic
concept’;
� However, not every unified semantic concept
corresponds to one word in a given language:corresponds to one word in a given language:
� Consider the following phrases:
� ‘the man whom you saw’; the student in the next room’; ‘the
woman who lived twice’
� The phrases above refer to a specific person. Hence,
according to the semantic criterion, they express a
unified concept. Yet, such a concept is expressed by
more than one word; 14
WHAT IS A WORD?
�Words are syntactic atoms (i.e. syntactic
criterion): ‘words are considered to be the
smallest elements in a sentence’;
�Words belong to certain syntactic classes
which are called ‘parts of speech’; ‘word
classes’ or ‘syntactic categories’: i.e. nouns,
adjectives, prepositions and so on);
�The position of given words in a sentence
depends on the syntactic rules of the
language; 15
WHAT IS A WORD?
� For example, a word like ‘the’ belongs to the
word-class ‘articles’ (or ‘determiners’) and there
are rules that determine where such words occur
in a sentence: articles are usually placed before a
noun and its modifier;noun and its modifier;
� We can test, then, if a morphological unit is a
word by checking if it belongs to a such a word
class;
� Also, only words can be moved to different
positions in a sentence. Smaller units can’t;
� Compare; ‘The train comes’ vs ‘There comes the
train’ vs *‘The comes train’. 16
WHAT IS A WORD?
� Words are ambiguous: the same form may refer
to different words:
� ‘go’: bare infinitive;
� ‘go’: 3rd pers. sing. simple present
� ‘go’: subjunctive� ‘go’: subjunctive
� Hence, the word form ‘go’ is used to express
three different grammatical words: 3° pers.
sing. simple present, subjunctive;
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WORD-FORMATION
What is the difference among the words in the
lists below?
� Addressee
� Actor
� Useless
• Parking lot
• Wardrobe
• Steam-engine
Redskin
7A 7B7A
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� Useless
� Madness
� Unreliable
� Depauperization
• Redskin
• Father-in-law
7C
• Desk
• Eye
• Mind
• Arrive
WORD-FORMATION
� All the words in colums 7A and 7B are complex
words: that is to say, words composed of smaller
units that have more complex meanings;
� What smaller units constitute the complex words
in columns 7A and 7b?in columns 7A and 7b?
� The samller units the words in colums 7A and 7B
are made up of are called morphemes;
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WORD-FORMATION
• The words in colums 7C are, instead, simple
words; that is to say, words that cannot be
divided into smaller units. They are, in fact,
mono-morphemic words;
• Consider again the words in columns 7A and 7B. • Consider again the words in columns 7A and 7B.
Which units within them can occur alone and
which need be attached to other words?
• The units that occur alone are called ‘free
morphemes’ while those which need be
attached to other words are called ‘bound
morphemes’;20
WORD-FORMATION
• Look again at columns 7A and 7B. Which boundmorphemes must be attached before the centralmeaningful element of the word?
• Which bound morphemes, instead, must be attachedafter the central meaningful element of the word?
• The bound morphemes that are attached before the • The bound morphemes that are attached before the central meaningful element are called ‘pre-fixes’;those attached after the central meaningful elementare called ‘suffixes’; finally, those inserted into othermorphems are called ‘infixes’;
• Pre-fixes, suffixes and infixes belong to the superordinate category ‘affixes’. The centralmeaningful elements are instead called ‘roots’, ‘stems’ or ‘bases’; 21
WORD-FORMATION
� A Base: the part of a word an affix is attached to;
� A Root: a base that cannot be divided into
further morphemes. The indivisible central part
of a complex word;
� A Stem: a base for inflectional and sometimes� A Stem: a base for inflectional and sometimes
also for derivational affixes;
� The derived word is often called a ‘derivative’;
� Consider the complex word ‘untouchables’: which
part is the root, which the base and which the
stem?
22
WORD-FORMATION
� ‘touch’= root (it cannot be divided into further morphemes.
Remember: all roots are bases, but bases cannot be roots
because they are divisible);
� ‘touchable’ = base (it can be divided into ‘touch’ + ‘able’).
� ‘untouchable’= stem (a stem is a base for inflectional
suffixes). Remember: all stems are bases because they can suffixes). Remember: all stems are bases because they can
attach inflectional morphemes, but bases are not
necessarily stems, because they can also attach non
inflectional morphemes. See below:
� 1.‘touchable’=stem + ‘-s’ inflectional morpheme.
� 2.‘touchable’=base + ‘un-’ non inflectional prefix.
� Conclusione: according to the type of morpheme we attach
to it, ‘touchable’ can function either as a base or a stem, as
examples 1 and 2 above show.23
WORD-FORMATION
� Pre-fixes and suffixes are very common in
English, while infixes are not;
� Compare the morphemes ‘bloody’ and ‘al’ in the
complex words below:
� ‘Absobloodylutely’;� ‘Absobloodylutely’;
� ‘Decolonialization’;
� They both appear within words:, why, however,
the former is an infix and the latter is not?
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WORD-FORMATION
• Words are not made up of only bases, roots and affixes. Another way of combining words is also throughcompounding;
• The words below, for example, consist of two bases:– Greenhouse; girlfriend; pickpocket;
• All word-formation processes seen so far are were realizedthrough concatenation, that is to say, by linking basesthrough concatenation, that is to say, by linking basesand affixes in a sequential order;
• There are, however, also other processes that are non-concatenative;
• Examples of non-concatenative processes are realized byturning nouns into verbs without adding any furtherelement: e.g. water (N) vs water (V); fast (Adj) vs fast (Adv); go (v) vs have a go (N)
• The process above is called conversion or zero-affixationor transposition;
25
WORD-FORMATION
• Another case of non-concatenative morphology is
deletion;
• Deletion occurs when a word is shortened by
deleting parts of the base word. Consider the
words below:words below:
– Demonstration vs Demo ; Laboratory vs Lab
• This morphological process of deletion is called
truncation or clipping;
• When truncation and affixation occur we have
diminutives:
– Andy= And(rew) + y
– Patty= Pat(ricia) +ty26
WORD-FORMATION
� Blends, which occur when parts of two different words are mixed into
one:
� Smog= smoke+fog;
� Modem=modulator + demodulator;
� Brunch= breakfast + lunch;
� Acronyms, which occur when the initial letters of different words are
combined to form a new word but the word is pronounced as if it were a combined to form a new word but the word is pronounced as if it were a
whole word:
� Nato= North Atlantic Treaty Organization;
� Unesco: United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization;
� Initialism: when an abbreviated word is pronounced letter by letter:
U.K.=United Kingdom; U.S.A= Unitied States of America;
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WORD-FORMATION
� 2A
� Student + s =
Students;
� Eat + ing= Eating
� Play + s= Plays;
� 2B
� Work + er= Worker;
� Use + less= Useless;
� Truth + full=
Truthfull;
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� Play + s= Plays;
� Arrive+d= Arrived;
� Are the derivatives
above new words?
Truthfull;
� Real + ity= Reality;
� Are the derivatives
above new words?
WORD-FORMATION
• Suffixes like participial ‘-ing’, plural ‘–s’ or thirdperson singular ‘–s’ create new word-forms;
• Suffixes like ‘–er’, ‘-ee’, ‘-ity’, ‘-full’ create newlexemes;
• On the bases of the criterion above a distinctionis made in morphology between inflection and On the bases of the criterion above a distinctionis made in morphology between inflection and derivation.
• We can speak, thus, of inflectional and derivational morphology;
• The former mainly consists of word-formationrealized through those processes that in traditional grammar are called conjugation or declension. The latter through compounding; 29
WORD-FORMATION
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN INFLECTIONAL AND
DERIVATIONAL MORPHOLOGY
• Derivation:
• Encode lexical meaning;
• Is not syntacticallyrelevant;
• Can occur inside derivation;
• Inflection:
• Encodes grammaticalcategories;
• Is syntactically relevant;
• Occurs outside allderivation;
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derivation;
• Often changes the part of speeh;
• Is often semanticallyopaque;
• Is often restricted in itsproductivity;
• Is not restricted tosuffixation;
derivation;
• Does not change part ofspeech;
• Is rarely semanticallyopaque;
• Is fully productive;
• Always suffixational (in English);