word-structure; morphemic analysis and the derivational or word-formation analysis PDF

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word-structure; morphemic analysis and the derivational or word-formation analysis...

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Seminar 3 When studying word-structure there are two levels of approach: the level of the morphemic analysis and the derivational or word-formation analysis. For the purposes of this seminar, we will focus on the derivational analysis. However, in what follows you are given some information on the morphemic analysis as well. Morphemic analysis Morpheme = the smallest meaningful unit in a language that cannot be further divided = the basic unit of the morphemic level = not independent and are found in speech only as integral parts of the word Types of morphemes: a) root-morpheme = the lexical nucleus of the word; it has a very general and abstract lexical meaning common to a set of semantically related words constituting one word-cluster (e.g. (to) teach, teacher, teaching) - do not possess the part-of-speech meaning which is not found in roots - roots are what remains of a word after all affixes have been removed and their fundamental characteristic is that they are not further divisible into other constituent parts that should have meaning affixational morpheme = include inflectional affixes or inflections and derivational affixes -

Inflections carry only grammatical meaning and are thus relevant only for the formation of word-forms Derivational affixes are relevant for building various types of words (this is the concern of Lexicology) o Lexically always dependent on the root which they modify o Most of them have the part-of-speech meaning which makes them structurally the important part of the word as they condition the lexicogrammatical class the word belongs to (classified into affixes building different parts of speech: nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs)

e.g. helpless, handy, blackness, Londoner  the root-morphemes help-, hand-, black-, London- are understood as the lexical centres of the words; and –less, -y, -ness, -er are felt as morphemes dependent on these roots. b) free morphemes  coincide with word-forms of independently functioning words  can be found only among roots  the morpheme boy- in the word boy is a free morpheme; in the word undesirable there is only one free morpheme desire-; pen-holder has two free morphemes pen- and hold-; fancy-dress-maker has three free morphemes.

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bound morphemes  do not coincide with separate word-forms, consequently all derivational morphemes such as –ness; -able; -er are bound morphemes. [root-morphemes may be both free and bound  theor- in theory, theoretical; or horr- in horror, horrible; Angl- in Anglo-Saxon; Afr- in Afro-Asian are all bound roots as there are no identical wordforms]  the morphological analysis of word-structure on the morphemic level aims at splitting the word into its constituent morphemes and at determining their number and types  According to the number of morphemes a word can be classified into monomorphic (= rootwords consisting of only one root-morpheme – small; dog; make etc.) or polymorphic – they fall into two categories  derived words  composed of one root-morpheme and one or more derivational morphemes (acceptable; outdo; disagreeable)  compound words  contain at least two root-morphemes, the number of derivational morphemes being insignificant  there can be both root- and derivational morphemes in compounds as in pen-holder, light-mindedness; or only root-morphemes as in lamp-shade; eye -ball Derivational analysis - concerned with the description of typical derivative relations between morphemes within the word and derivative correlation between different types of words - the basic unit at the derivational level is the stem - the stem = that part of it from which one can obtain the given word by adding one more affix to it or that part of the word which remains unchanged throughout its paradigm (a set of all the inflectional forms of a word or of one of its grammatical categories) (the stem which appears in the paradigm (to) ask, asks, asked, asking is ask-) - the stem of the word takes the inflections which shape the word grammatically as one or another part of speech Types of stems a) simple stems  generally monomorphic and phonetically identical with the root-morpheme of the word b) derived stems  mostly polymorphic and are formed from the root + one or more affixes (e.g. girlishis a derived stem girl- + -ish (girlishness  suf. –ness is added to the derived stem girlish-) c) compound stems  made up of two constituents both of which are themselves stems (e.g. match-box; driving-suit; pen-holder) Analysis of words  the formulas show the derivational structure of the stem and the consecutive stages of its formation

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1) unbearable  un(v stem + -able) 2) horsemanship  (n stem + n stem) + -ship 3) headliner  (n stem + n stem) + -er 4) wedding-ring  (v stem + -ing) + n 5) aircraft-carrier  [(n stem + n stem) + (v stem + -er)] 6) peacefulness  (n stem + -ful) + -ness

Word-formation: Affixation Word-formation = the process of creating new words from the material available in the language after certain structural and semantic formulas and patterns 1) Affixation = the process of forming new words by adding affixes to stems Stems = the part of the word that remains unchanged throughout its paradigm (ask- in ask, asking, asked) and it carries lexical meaning and a definite part-of-speech - are characterised by a certain combinatory valence  they can be added at least one more affix in order to form a new word; - can be homonymous to words already existing in the language  free stems; if [homonymous] they = bound stems; - they are simple stems (consist of a root only  pianist (n stem + -ist); derived stems (root + one or more affixes  friendliness [(n stem + -ly) + -ness]) or compound stems  craftsmanship [(n stem + n stem) + -ship])  Affix = a morpheme which is characterised by derivational meaning, by functional meaning or both, and which is added to a stem in order to form a new word  affixes can be added before a stem  prefixes, or after a stem  suffixes [Affixes are not autonomous  they only occur as constituent parts of words  affixes = bound forms; a free form = a form which can stand alone without changing its meaning]

Suffixation  a suffix is added after the stem  Suffixes generally determine the morpho-syntactic class to which a word belongs  Compound-suffixes  chain suffixes -ably =-able + -ly; -ically =-ic + -al + -ly; -ation= ate + -ion [Chain suffixes are generally analysed individually, except when the word they form does not exist in the language  e.g. nationalisation = [(n stem + -al) + -ise] + -ation  ation is not separated into –ate and –ion since ‘nationalisate’ does not exist in the language]  The easiest classification of suffixes is according to what part of speech they form  Suffixes can also be classified according to origin, frequency, productivity and meaning

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According to the part of speech they generate we have the following subclasses of suffixes: - Nominal suffixes / Noun suffixes  Doer of the action (-er/-or/-ar; -ent/-ant; -eer/-ier; -ist)  Feminine suffixes (-ess; -ette – kitchenette; -euse – chauffeuse)  Suffixes denoting nationality (-an/-ian; -ese; -ard)  Derogatory and diminutive suffixes (-ster/-aster – gangster; -ling – darling, duckling, weakling; -ton – simpleton; -ard/-art; -et/-ette; -kin/-kins - Munchkin)  Abstract noun-forming suffixes (-ing; -age – coverage; -ance/-ence – experience, assistance; -ancy/-ency – tendency; vacancy; -ism/-icism – criticism; -hood; -ion/-sion/tion/-ation/-ition – creation, mutation; -dom; -ment; -ness/-ess; -ship; -ty – honesty; -th – forsm de-adjectival nouns length, truth) - Adjectival suffixes / Adjective suffixes (-ed; -ing; -able/-ible; -ary/-ery – revolutionary; ant/-ent – hesitant; -ate/-ete; -ic/-ical; -ive; -ous/-ious; -some; -y/-ly; -ful/-less; -like) - Verbal suffixes / Verb suffixes (-ate/-itate – facilitate; -ise/-ize; -fy/-ify; -er – flicker; -en; ish) - Adverbial suffixes / Adverb suffixes (-ly; -wise; -ward/-wards) - Numeral suffixes (-teen; -ty)

Prefixation  a prefix is inserted before the stem  Prefixes are more independent semantically than suffixes since in most cases they do not carry functional meaning (they do not change the morpho-syntactic status of the word they precede  semantic criteria)  they are not specialized to a certain morpho-syntactic category (they can appear with different parts of speech)

According to the meaning they add to the stem we can have the following categories: -

Negative prefixes (de-/dis-; in-/im- (before [p,m])/ir- (before [r])/il- (before [l]); non-; mis-; un-; anti-; ex-.) Prefixes denoting reversal or repetition of an action (un-  unfasten; dis-  disconnect; (the iterative prefix) re-  re-write) Spatial and directional prefixes (in-, out-; over- (overspread), under-; up-, under-; up-, down-; a- (amoral); fore- (foresee); for-); counter-/contraTemporal prefixes  they come from the corresponding prepositions denoting time (ante-; pre- (pre-historic); fore-/afore-; post-; up-/out-) Prefixes denoting numbers /amounts (bi-, tri-, quadric-, multi- etc....