Morphology, Part 3: Word-Formation Processes

October 1, 2010

Problem Set Review• Esperanto

• Swahili

• Cree

The Relationship• A: Derivational affixes will always attach before inflectional affixes do.

• Remember: derivational affixes create new words;

• Inflectional affixes just create new word forms.

• Examples: blackened, governments, *neighborshood

Verb Noun

Verb Noun

Adj DAff. IAff. Verb DAff. IAff.

black -en -ed govern -ment -s

A Note on Word Forms• Morphologists use the term lexeme to refer to a group of related word forms.

• wait, waits, waited, waiting, etc.

• The canonical form of the lexeme is called the lemma.

• = the “headword” in a dictionary.

• Inflectional affixes relate a lexeme to its various forms.

• Derivational affixes relate one lexeme to another lexeme.

lemma

word forms

different lexeme

The Class System• In English, there are two types of derivational affixes:

1. Class 1 (or Level 1)

• Often cause phonological (sound) changes in the root

• Also cause more profound semantic (meaning) changes to the root

• Can combine with bound roots, too.

• Ex: -ity, -y, -ion

• For instance:

• Electric electricity; stupid stupidity

• democrat democracy; nation

The Class System• Class 2 (or Level 2)

• Don’t cause phonological changes in root.

• Less of a semantic effect, too.

• Ex: -ness, -less, -er, -ish

• Normally, Class 1 affixes attach to the root before Class 2 affixes.

• relational -ion (1), -al (1)

• divisiveness -ive (1), -ness (2)

• *fearlessity -less (2), -ity (1)

• fearlessness -less (2), -ness (2)

Productivity• Productivity = the extent to which a word-formation rule can be applied to new morphemes, to form new words

• Class 2 affixes tend to be more productive than Class 1 affixes.

• -ness vs. -ity

• both attach to: adjectives

• both form: nouns

• both mean: the quality of the adjective

blindness stupidity

happiness validity

goodness complexity

Productiveness• -ness is very productive, so it can expand its reach to other words:

• stupidness, validness, complexness

• The same is not true of -ity:

• *blindity, *happity, *goodity

• -ness is so productive, it can also be affixed to new words:

truthy + -ness truthiness

chair + -ness chairness

productive + -ness productiveness

Finiteness

• Note that “finitude” is the (awkward?) alternative.

• Another (formerly?) productive affix: -age

• wordage, sleepage, etc.

Unproductivity• -able is another very productive morpheme:

• make-fun-of-able

• Other morphemes are not so lucky:

• -th: warm + -th = warmth

wide + -th = width

deep + -th = depth

cool + -th = *coolth

• -en: moist + -en = moisten

red + -en = redden

cute + -en = ?cuten

abstract + -en = *abstracten

An Intermediate Case• -ify attached to adjectives to form verbs

• just + -ify = justify

pure + -ify = purify

• quick + -ify = ?quickify

smart + -ify = ?smartify

• An anecdotal case

busy + -ify = busify

ugly + -ify = uglify

• -ify has limited productivity

Blocking• Productivity can sometimes be limited by the existence of other words

• intelligent + -ness = *intelligentness

• “intelligence” gets in the way

• it blocks intelligentness from existence

• true + -ness = *trueness (truth)

• inhabit + -er= *inhabiter (inhabitant)

• guide + -er = *guider (guide)

• In other cases, a new word gets created anyway:

• pride + -ful = prideful (proud)

Content and Function Words• One last distinction: there are both content and function words.

• Content words =

• have some semantic content (meaning)

• nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs

• ex: politics, baseball, socks, green, create

• Function words =

• specify grammatical relations

• have little or no semantic content

• prepositions, pronouns, conjunctions

Content and Function Words• Content words are an “open class”--

• we can add new members anytime we want.

• Function words are a “closed class”--

• it’s not easy (or possible?) to add new members.

• When was the last time you heard a new pronoun? Or a new preposition?

• Our minds also process function words differently from content words.

• For instance, how many ‘F’s are in the following passage?…

Check This Out

FINISHED FILES ARE THE

RESULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC

STUDY COMBINED WITH THE

EXPERIENCE OF YEARS.

You might want to read through it again.

Gender-Free Quick Write• Is it feasible for speakers of English to create gender-free pronouns?

Gender-Free Quick Write• Is it feasible for speakers of English to create gender-free pronouns?

Gender-Free Quick Write• Is it feasible for speakers of English to create gender-free pronouns?

Gender-Free Quick Write• Is it feasible for speakers of English to create gender-free pronouns?

Find out more at:

http://www.bignewsday.com/story.asp?code=BZ345203T&news=yo_being_used_as_gender-neutral_pronoun

More Word Formation Processes• So far, we’ve only looked at one type of word-formation

process: affixation

• = concatenating morphemes in a row

• Prefixation, suffixation, infixation, circumfixation…

• There are many different ways to make new words without concatenating morphemes together.

• compounding

• internal change

• reduplication

• blending, etc.

Compounding• In compounding, two or more free morphemes combine to make a new word

• Ex: baseball, blackboard, lightbulb, podcast

• Compounding is very common in the world’s languages.

• German is particularly fond of compounding:

Donaudampfschiffahrtgesellschaft

Donau “danube”

Dampf “steam”

Schiff “ship”

Fahrt “excursion”

Gesellschaft “company”

Compounding Tests• Stress Shifts

blackbird vs. black bird

lightbulb vs. light bulb

• Adverbs can’t modify compound nouns:

*extremely gentleman vs. extremely gentle man

*the very White House vs. the very white house

• Note: it’s also possible to form verb and adjective compounds:

• Verbs: dropkick, spoonfeed, whitewash…

• Adjectives: nationwide, redhot…

Back Formations• Back formations: removal of an (incorrectly perceived) affix to form a new word

• Ex: “edit”

• “editor” perceived as /edit/ + /-er/

• Other examples:

peddle (from peddler) swindle (from swindler)

burgle (from burglar) pea (from pease)

laze (from lazy) liaise (from liaison)

• A “reverse” backformation:

Chinese (from Chinee + /-s/)

A Sipid Story of Requited Love

“It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my efforts to appear gruntled and consolate. I was furling my wieldy umbrella...when I saw her...She was a descript person...Her hair was kempt, her clothing shevelled, and she moved in a gainly way.”

--from “How I Met My Wife”, by Jack Winter

• Check out more at: http://www.matefl.org/_mgxroot/page_10679.html

• Or consider: