LL223 Lecture Notes - Pragmatics, Reduplication, Smog
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Linguistics Study Guide
Morphology – the study of word structure and word formation
Lexicon – a speaker‟s mental dictionary which contains information about the syntactic
properties, meaning and phonological representation of a language‟s words
Word - the smallest freeform found in any language
Free form – an element that can occur in isolation and/or whose position with respect to
neighbouring elements is not entirely fixed
Ex. Dinosaurs are extinct
*Dinosaur are –s extinct
Morpheme – the smallest unit of language that carries information about meaning or function
Ex. Books has two morphemes
Book + s
Simple Words – a word that consists of a simple morpheme
Ex. Horse
Complex Words – a word that consists of two or more morphemes
Ex. Unemployment
Free Morpheme – a morpheme that can be a word by itself
Ex. Fear
Bound Morpheme – a morpheme that must be attached to another element (the past tense
marker –ed)
Ex. Book + s
Free Bound
Allomorphs – variant forms of a morpheme
Ex. A/An
Analyzing word structure
-Complex words contain a root morpheme and one or more affixes
-Root morphemes belong to a lexical category (V, N, A, Av)
-Affixes (Af) do not belong to a lexical category and are always bound morphemes
Affixation
-Prefix: attached to the front of the base ex. Replay
-Suffix: attached to the end of the base ex. Vividly
-Infix: occurs within the base
ex. Tagalog: Bili „buy‟ Binili „bought‟
Infixes in Arabic
Katab
Kutib
Aktub
Uktab
What is the main verb „write‟ based on what you can infer from the data?
„k t b‟
Infixes in English?
Some expletives in colloquial expressions ex. “fan - *(&!^@# - tás – tic”
Not random, expletive precedes main stress of word
Infixes must be inserted inside another morpheme, not between
-“un- *(&!^@# - believe – able” is not evidence of infixation
English Derivational Affixes
Derivation: an affixational process that forms a word with a meaning and/or category distinct
from that of its base.
Ex. Unkind, Modernize, Destroyed, Books, Blacken, Blackened.
Derivation & Word Structure
Un + A: unable, unkind, unhurt
Un + N: unknowledgable, unhealth, uninjury *** (wrong)
Phonology in morphology
Phonological constraints on derivation
morpheme -en can attach to monosyllabic adjectives that end in obstruents (all stops, affricates,
and fricatives).
Soften *bluen
Madden *angryen
Quicken *slowen
Liven *greenen
Class 1 affixes
Affixes which cause a change in the consonant or vowel segments (phonological sound change)
-ive, -ize, -y, etc. product-productive, public-publicize, democrat-democracy
Class 2 affixes
Affixes which cause no change in the consonant or vowel segments (phonological sound change)
-ness, -ful, etc. prompt-promptness, hope-hopeful
Compounding - the combination of two already existent words
Resulting compound word is a noun, verb, or adjective.
Rightmost category determines the category of the word
This word is the ‘head’
Ex. Bluebird, Underestimate, redhot, greenhouse
Properties of compounds
A + N compounds are more prominent
Phonological constraints in compounds
Stress on first component - Greénhouse vs. green house, Wét suit vs. wet suit
Tense and plural markers cannot typically be attached to the first element
* [dropped kick] vs. [dropkick]ed
* [Fridays night] vs. [Friday night]s
Endocentric compounds
Compound denoting a subtype of the concept denoted by its head.
Steamboat = boat powered by steam
Air hose = hose that carries air
Airfield = a field where planes land
Other examples: Policemen, oak leaves
Exocentric compounds
The meaning of the compound does not follow from the head.
Redhead
Redneck
Other examples: Walkman, Maple Leafs
Incorporation
The combination of a word (usually a noun) with a verb to form a compound verb.
English: babysitting, housecleaning
Inflection
The modification of a word‟s form to indicate the grammatical subclass to which it belongs.
This can be done by:
Affixation
Internal change
Reduplication
Suppletion
-English has eight inflectional affixes. These are found on nouns, verbs, and adjectives, and
provide the following grammatical information: plural (-s) and possessive (-„s); third person
singular non-past tense (-s), past tense (-ed), progressive (-ing) and past participate (-enl –ed);
comparative (-er) and superlative (-est).