Preface

In Chinese, we have lexical items like:

.. What is the meaning of the lexical item ?

In English, we see words like:

Boys, girls, friends, teachers, students, apples, books, trees, flowers, subjects, pictures.. (What does the shared s mean?)

In English, we also see words like:

ability, creativity, simplicity, familiarity, specificity, clarity, purity, .. (What does the shared ity mean?)

Is Word the smallest unit?

The longest word in English:
Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
(from Websters 7th International Dictionary)

Another very long word in English:

Antidisestablishmentarianism

How to segment this word?

Anti/ dis/ establish/ ment/ ari/ an/ ism

I. Introduction
A. Definition

1. The study of word formation and the internal structure of words is called morphology.
2. The most elemental grammatical units in a language are morphemes. Morphemes are the smallest units of meaning.

B. In the mental dictionary, each word must include information on

1.pronunciation:phonological representation
2.meaning:semantic properties

3.syntactic class: category specification

e.g. book

[bk] noun

C. Ferdinand de Saussure:
The sounds and the meaning of a word are
inseparable. There is an arbitrary union between the sounds and meaning of the linguistic sign.
Whats in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet. (Shakespeare)

II. Dictionaries
A. History of published dictionaries
1499 Latin-English Promptuorium parvulorum 1538 Latin-English (published by Sir Thomas Elyot) 1755 Dictionary of the English Language (by Samuel Johnson) 1828 An American Dictionary of the English Language (by Noah Webster 1758-1843) (with 70,000 entries)

B. Oxford English Dictionary (OED): the greatest lexicographic work C. Jargon / slang Dictionary :
special terms for experts in various fields.

C. All dictionaries provide

1. spelling
2. pronunciation 3. definition 4. parts of speech

III . Classes of Words

A. Lexical Content Words
1. Definition: Content words makes up the major word classes-nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs in English.

2.Open class words: New words keep adding in and some old unused words are dying out.

B. Function Words
1. Definition: Function Words include conjunctions, prepositions, articles, pronouns, and part of determiners and auxiliaries. 2. Closed class words: Seldom to see the addition of new words or the dropping out of old words.

IV. Word Sets

Most wonderful of all are words, and how they make friends one with each other. -- O. Henry

A. Definition: A morpheme is the smallest linguistic sign in which there is an arbitrary union of a sound and a meaning that cannot be further analyzed.

B. Properties
1.Every word in every language is composed of one or more morphemes. 2.A morpheme may be represented by a. a single sound, such as a b. a single syllable, such aschild c. more than one syllable, such asberry 3.A morpheme must have a consistent meaning.

V. Morphemes
Words and Word Structure Morpheme: The smallest unit of language that carries information about meaning or function. (e.g. book, dog, -s, -ing) Free morphemes: boy, girl, pen, tree Bound morphemes: -s, -ed, -ing

Simple words: and, boy, act, man, hunt, easy Complex words: boy-s, hunt-er, hunt-er-s gentle-man-li-ness, easi-ly Compound words: boyfriend, bedroom, sit-up oversleep, washing machine Allomorphs: Variants of a morpheme (e.g. [-s],[-z], and [-z] are allomorphs of the English plural morpheme).

Morpheme Classification
1.Bound morphemes: Morphemes that cannot occur unattached are bound morphemes.

2. Free morphemes: Morphemes that can constitute words by themselves are called free morphemes, such asman,sick.

Bound morpheme categories:

a. Prefixes:morphemes that occur only before other morphemes, such as, dis-in dishonest, bi-inbicycle
b. Suffixes: morphemes that occur only after other morphemes, such as, er in worker ist inpianist

c. Infixes: morphemes that are inserted into other morphemes, such as, -um-inserted into fikas, which becomesfumikasin the language, Bontoc d. Circumfixes:morphemes that are attached to a stem morpheme both initially and finally.

D. Problems of classification and definition

1.huckles: Some are not meaningful in isolation but acquire meaning by connection with other morphemes in words, such as huckle- , boysen-, cran- in huckleberry cranberry and boysenberry

2. ceives: Some morphemes may occur in many words, but it is very difficult to find constant meanings for them, such as -ceives and -mits in
receive conceive perceive deceive permit submit admit commit

Word Structure: order of morphemes

Root: The morpheme in a word that carries that major component of the words meaning and belongs to a lexical category. It cannot be analyzed into smaller parts. (collect in the word collections). Affix: A morpheme that does not belong to a lexical category and is always bound (e.g. -ing, -un). An affix is attached to a stem, which can stand alone.

Base: The form to which an affix is added (e.g. bookbooks, modernize modernized). Tree structures: N V Af Af

A
A

teach

er

un

kind

V Stem for ed-------------- V

Root and Stem for en--- A

Af

Af

black

en

ed

Problematic cases: A Af in B ept B salv N Af ation

Figure 1: The internal structure of words built around a bound root.

Inter-relation of morpheme natures and types:

Free
house, boy, teacher, sentence, type, cut, clear, at, yesterday, patiently, cold.

Bound
(per)ceive, (ad)mit, huckle(berry), (in)ept, (and less than a hundread more)

Root

Affix

none

(girl)s, (cook)ed, (hunt)ing, (teach)er, un(happy), dis(agree), (arriv)al, (cav)ity, (danger)ous, re(do), (scholar)ship,..

Morphological Structure of Words:

Affixation:

re-play, il-legal, vivid-ly, kind-ness Im leaving now. Theyre here now.

Cliticization:

Internal

change: sing, sang, sung foot, feet drive, drove, driven sleep, slept

Suppletion:

go, went be, was, were good, better, best

Stress

and tone placement: import (V), import present (V), present

(N) (N)

Reduplication:

tabuk quickly tabuk tabuk very quickly(in Turkish) takbuh run tatakbuh will run (in Tagalog) Compounding: streetlight, bluebird, washcloth, overload

VI. Rules of word Formation

A. Morphological rules: Determine how morphemes combine to form new words.

B. Derivational Morphology: When derivational morphemes are conjoined to other morphemes, a new word is formed or derived. Derivational morphemes include prefixes and suffixes (or infixes for some people) in English.

1. Derivation: A process that forms a word with a meaning and/or category distinct from that of its base through the addition of an affix (e.g. helphelper; createcreation nature natural arm disarm healthy unhealthy).

a. English Derivational Affixes Suffixes: -able (fixable), -er (worker) -ive (assertive), -ment (treatment) -ful (hopeful), -ize (hospitalize) -ity (priority), -ness (sadness). Prefixes: anti- (antipollution), re- (rethink) de- (deactivate), in- (incomplete) un- (unhappy), dis- (dislike)

Complex derivations: N V A V act

Af
ive

Af
ate

Af
ion

Figure 2 A word with a multilayered internal structure

a. V

b.

A
A

Af
un

V
lock

Af
able

Af un

Af

lock able

Figure 3 Two possible structures for the word unlockable

Different structures (derivational processes) indicate the word (with the same spelling) is ambiguous and has two meanings.

Two classes of derivational affixes:

Class 1:-ity, -y, -ive, -(i)al, -ize, -ious, -ion Class 2:-ness, -less, -ful, -ly, -er, -ish
The addition of the Class 1 suffixes will alter the position of the word stress while the addition of the Class 2 suffixes wont. creativecreativity colonycolonial Colorcolorful carelesscarelessness

2. The derivational word may have a different meaning than the original word and possibly be in a different grammatical class. a. Noun to Adjective: boy + ish health + ful alcohol + ic pink + y
b. Verb to Noun: accus + ation sing + er confer + ence

c. Adjective to Adverb: exact + ly quiet + ly swift + ly d. Noun to Verb: moral + ize vaccin + ate haste + n
V N Adv V A A N V A

N N

V A

3. Not all derivational morphemes cause a change in the grammatical class. a. Prefixes : re + print a + moral semi + annual ex + wife
b. Suffixes : music + ian pun + ster vicar + age fadd + ist

C. Some morphological rules are quite productive.

1. VERB + able =able to be VERB-ed ex: acceptable, adaptable, comprehensible 2. un + ADJECTIVE = not- ADJECTIVE (antonyms) ex: unbelievable, unacceptable, unchangeable, unsimplified

3.VERB +er = one who performs an action ex: lover, hunter

VII. Lexical gaps

A. There are gaps in the lexicon such as googol, wordswhich are not in the dictionary but which can be added.

B. Two facts cause them:

1. A permissible sound sequence has no meaning attached to it ( like blick, slark).
2. Possible combinations of morphemes have not been made (like uglyify, unsad, unbrave, untall).

C. The morphological rules can help us guess the meaning of a word we dont know, but sometimes we guess wrong.
ex: gullibleto do with sea birds () longevitybeing very tall() homogeneousdevoted to home life() bibliographyholy geography()

NOTE:
When someone uses such words as coolth (like warmth), fullen (like weaken), usually it is either an error or an attempt at humor. Our knowledge of the related pairs, may permit us to use these examples in forming new words, by analogy with the existing lexical items.

Play on words/morphemes to create humor: (comic strips)

This is very strange.

If a vegetarian is someone who eats vegetables.

What does that make a humanitarian?

3. Meaning is not always transcendental:

a. predictable ex. girlfriend; post office b. partially predictable ex. blackboard; c. completely unpredictable ex. cathouse; jack-in-a-box; redcoat

4. Universality of compounding: This process can be applied to many languages to enlarge vocabulary.

VIII. Word Coinage

A. Compounds: to string words together B. Acronym: initials of several words C. Blends: words that are less than compounds D. Back-formations: to subtract an affix E. Abbreviations: short forms by clipping F. Eponyms: words from Names

A. Compounding: to string words together 1. Category combination n+n: n mailman a+a: a icycold n+a: a watertight v+n: n pickpocket
(vs. ) (vs. )

2. number of words: no definite answer Mary-go-around; matter-of-fact

3.Properties of Compounds (1) A-N compounds are characterized by a more prominent stress on their first component (e.g. greenhouse an indoor garden, green house a house painted green) (2) In English, tense and plural markers can typically not be attached to the first element (e.g. foxes hunterfox hunters).

4. Types of Compounds
Endocentric

compound: A compound whose rightmost component (in English) identifies the general class to which the meaning of the entire word belongs (e.g. dumptruck is a type of truck).

Exocentric

compound: A compound whose meaning does not follow from the meaning of its parts ( e.g. redneck, since its referent is not a type of neck)

B. Acronyms: initials of several words

ex. TGIF: Thank God Its Friday ASAP: As Soon As Possible IOU: I Owe You AIDS: Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome OPEC: ? DINK: ?

C. Blends: words that are less than compounds; mixture of parts of words. ex. smog: smoke + fog motel: motor + hotel brunch: breakfast + lunch Chinglish: Chinese + English
Portmanteau: two meanings packed up into one word or one morpheme. crocogator: crocodile + alligator girls high school

D. Back-formations: to subtract an affix

ex. Peddle peddler edit editor typewrite typewriter

Extending word formation rule: from existing words which appear to be analyzable
ex. bikini bi (two) act/action monokini mono(one) televise/television resurrect/resurrection

E. Abbreviations: short forms by clipping

ex. ad: advertisement doc: doctor gym: gymnasium lab: laboratory bus: omnibus gas: gasoline phone: telephone math: mathematics

Other examples: dorm (dormitory) vet (veterinarian) pro (professional)

F. Eponyms: words from names

ex. sandwich: the Earl of Sandwich gargantuan: Gargantuan, the creature with a huge appetite jumbo: an elephant brought to the US lazy susan: the turntable in a restaurant

IX. Grammatical Morphemes

A. In the discussion of derivational morphology, we see that certain aspects of morphology have syntactic implications in that nouns can be derived from verbs, verbs from adjectives, adjectives from nouns, and so on.

B.Some morphemes do not derive a meaning until combined with others in a sentence. For example, what is the meaning of it in the sentence It takes me five hours to finish my work. or in We found it too difficult to lie. What is the meaning of to in He wanted her to go? To has a grammatical meaning as an infinitive marker, and it is also a morpheme required by the syntactic, sentence-formation rules of the language.

Similarly for have in I have lived here for ten years, which is a grammatical marker for the present perfect; and for the different forms of be in both The dog is running. and The screen of the window was changed., which function, respectively, as a progressive marker and a passive voice marker.

C. Inflectional Morphemes
1. Many languages, including English to some extent, contain bound morphemes that, like to, are for the most part purely grammatical markers, representing such concepts as tense, number, gender, case, etc.. Such bound grammatical morphemes are called inflectional morphemes: they never change the syntactic category of the words or morphemes to which they are attached. They are always attached to complete words.

2. English Inflectional Morphemes:

At the present stage of English history, there are a total of eight bound inflectional affixes:

a. s

third person singular present:He plays basketball. b. ed past tense: He played basketball. c. ing progressive: He is playing mahjong. d. en past participle: He has played mahjong. e. s plural: He has two students. f s possessive: Georgias hair is long. g er comparative:Georgia is taller than Disa. h est superlative:Georgia has the longest hair.

3. Inflection vs. Derivation Morpheme

(1) Category change

(2) Order
(3) Productivity

(4) Semantic property

(5) Number in a word (6) Types (7) Affix position

4. Further Examples of Inflection

Number: Chinese: () Noun class: Spanish: nina-nino Case: Japanese: hon-o English: she--her Person and number agreement:
English: I am; you are; he is

Tense: English: cooked, stayed, added

X. Do Morphological Analysis
Look for recurring forms: Make sure the recurring forms are morphemes: Figure out the meaning of these morphemes and be sure that the meanings are constant. The same morpheme could be realized in different allomorphs. (e.g. English: past tense morpheme [t] [d] [id]) Pay attention to the position and order of how multiple morphemes are arranged in a word.

Morphological Analysis: Example from Michoacan Aztec

nokali my house nokalimes my houses mokali your house ikali his house kalimes houses
1. morpheme of house is mopelo your dog mopelomes your dogs ipelo his dog nokwahmili my cornfield mokwahmili your cornfield ikwahmili his cornfield kali

2. morpheme of cornfields is kwahmilimes 3. morpheme of his dog is ipelomes 4. morpheme of dog is pelo 5. If friend is mahkwa, then my friends should be nomahk