Download 07.Morphology_II_(Lexical_categories)

Morphology II (Lexical categories)
Do you know grammar better than a 5th grader?
Quiz Time!
 1. How many morphemes does the word “pumpkin” have?
 2. How many morphemes does the word “sailor” have?
 3. Name all of the bound morpheme(s) in the word “sailor.”
 4. Name all of the free morpheme(s) in the word “sailor.”
 5. “A” is conventionally used as an article preceding words that begin with a consonant (a
banana). “An” is conventionally used as an article preceding words that begin with a
vowel (an apple). Are “a” and “an” allomorphs?
Affixes
An affix is a bound morpheme that attaches to a base (usually a free) morpheme.
 Prefix: (Affix+base) Attaches to the front of the base. Examples: Postmortem,
incomprehensible, propose, decode.
 Suffix: (base+affix) Attaches to the end of the base. Examples: cats, fluffy, lovable,
wizardry
 Infix: (base+affix+same base) Attaches within a morpheme. Uncommon in English, except
in expressive language. Example: kanga-bloody-roo, woopty-freaking-do
 Circumfix: (affix+base+same affix) A single morpheme that attaches on both sides of a
morpheme. English doesn’t have any of these.
Fix it up!
Engaged
En#gage#ed
Prefix+base+suffix
Fix it up! Break up the following and label
affixes
Disguise
Writing
Unreadable
Irrelevant
Beautified
Grammar Review
 What’s a noun?
 What’s a verb?
 What’s an adjective?
 What’s a preposition?
 What’s a pronoun?
 What’s an article?
 What’s a conjunction?
 What’s an adverb?
These are all lexical categories. Identifying the lexical (word) category of the base (and root)
morpheme and resulting word is necessary to understanding the structure of the word.
Word trees
Adjective
Affix
un
Adjective
happy
More Word Trees!
Derivation
The creation of a whole new word by adding an affix. It creates a meaning distinct from (but
related to) its base.
Examples: Sailor, writer, antithesis, redo, hospitalize
There are phonological rules that govern what affixes can be applied to what words. You
wouldn’t hear words like farmant or smallen, but farmer and shorten are perfectly ok. This is
because {-ant} tends to combine with Latin-origin words, and {-en} combines with
monosyllable words that end in an obstruent (stop, fricative, affricative).
Class 1 affixes change the form of a word (-y, -ion, -ity) (see p.127 for more examples) in terms
of stress, pronunciation, or spelling. Sanity, democracy, partial, productive
Class 2 affixes have no affect on the base. Selfish, worker, mindless
Compounding
Joining two free morphemes (whole words) to form a new word.
 Bluebird, textbook, chalkboard, outbid, breakdance, suitcase, eggnog
The lexical category of the final morpheme (called the head) in the word usually determines the
whole word’s lexical category. So, overgrow is a verb, overgrowth is a noun, overgrown is an
adjective.
Additionally, the head usually decides the meaning of the word. So, breakdance is a type of
dance, chalkboard is a type of board, bluebird is a type of bird…these are called endocentric
compounds.
Exocentric compounds are compounds that are NOT decided by the head (nor necessarily by the
other morpheme either): pickpocket, bigmouth, redneck.
Inflection
The modification of a word or the addition of affixes to convey grammatical information like tense
and case.
 -s, ’s, -ing, -ed, -er, –est
 My cat’s bowl is on the floor. (How many cats?)
 My cats’ bowl is on the floor. (How many cats?)
Tense refers to grammatical information about time. In English, tense affects verbs (walks, walked,
walking, will walk, had been walking…)
Case refers to grammatical information about the role the word plays in the sentence—direct
object, subject, indirect object… English has very limited case inflections. He/him, I/me,
who/whom, they/them. But, languages like Latin have many more (Latin has 7 cases). In
languages without many cases, word order is more important to determine the grammatical role
of words.
Review
 What is it called when you add an affix to a word to create a whole new word like
“inside”?
 What is the name of an affix that comes after the base?
 Are affixes usually bound or free morphemes?
 What is the name of an affix that occurs within a free morpheme?
 What lexical category is the word “but”? “green”? “Caramelize”?
 What is it called when you put two free morphemes together to form a whole new word
like “football”?
 Is “football” exocentric or endocentric?
 If I modify the word “go” to “going”