Morphology (2) Dr. Ansa Hameed

Previously…. Morphology Word Morpheme Word and Morpheme Phoneme and Morpheme Lexeme and Morpheme

Today’s Lecture Morpheme Free and Bound Morpheme Types of Free Morpheme: Lexical and Functional Types of Bound Morphemes: Inflectional and Derivational Item and Arrangement Morphological Analysis and Problems Morphs and Allomorphs Aspects of Morphology

Types of Morphemes Morphemes are of two types: Free Morpheme: Morphemes that can occur on their own are free morphemes The basic or core morpheme in such cases is referred to as the stem, root, or base Bound Morpheme: Morphemes that cannot occur on their own are bound morphemes Referred as the add-ons or affixes

Types of Morphemes Tourists Tour ist s (free) (bound) (bound)

Types of Morphemes truthfulness truth ful ness (free) (bound) (bound)

Types of Morphemes Unknowingly Un know ing ly (Bound) (Free) (Bound) (Bound)

Types of Morphemes Bound and free morphemes: Free morphemes can occur on their own: Root words: happy, change, select, green, house, … Bound morphemes can occur only if they are attached to other morphemes: Affixes : un-, -ness, -able, de-, -ive, -er, …

Types of Morphemes Morpheme Free Bound (root) (affix)

Types of Morphemes Free Morphemes Roots and Stems A root is a lexical content morpheme that cannot be analyzed in to smaller parts Read in reread, ling in linguist, paint in painter… When a root word is combined with an affix, it forms a stem Believe (root): Believe + able (stem) System (root): system + atic (stem)

Types of Morphemes Roots and Stems for Semitic Languages: Semitic languages (Hebrew & Arabic) have a unique morphological system. Nouns and verbs are built on foundation of three consonants and one derives related words by varying the pattern of vowels and syllables. Example: root word for ‘write’ is ‘ktb’ katab ‘he wrote’ kaatib ‘writer’ Kitaab ‘book’ kutub ‘books’

Types of Morphemes Bound Morpheme Affix Bound morphemes or affixes are always part of other words and don not stand alone. Affixes are the add ons. Affixes can be divided in to sub categories: Prefixes Suffixes Infixes (found in few languages) Circumfixes (found in few languages)

Types of Morphemes Types of Bound Morphemes (Affixes): Prefixes: Affixes that precede the stem are prefixes e.g. rewrite, illegal, uneducated, bipolar 2. Suffixes: while those affixes that follow the stem are suffixes e.g. played, player, older, knitting

Types of Morphemes Types of Bound Morphemes (Affixes): 3. Infixes: Morphemes can also be infixes, which are inserted within another form. English doesn't really have any infixes, except perhaps for certain expletives in expressions like un-effing-believable. Some languages of the world often have infixes like Bontoc (a language in Philippines) Example: Nouns/Adj Verbs fikas (strong) fumikas (to be strong) kilad (red) kumilad (to be red) fusul (enemy) fumusul (to be an enemy)

Types of Morphemes Types of Bound Morphemes (Affixes): 4. Circumfixes: Morphemes that can be attached to a base morpheme both initially and finally. Some languages have cirumfixes as well. Example: Muskogean language (spoken in Oklahoma): Negative is formed with both prefix (ik) and suffix (o) Affirmative Negative Chokma (he is good) ik+chokm+o (he isn’t good) Lakna (it is yellow) ik+lakn+o (it isn’t yellow) Palli (it is hot) ik+pall+o (it isn’t hot)

Morphemes: Some problems Huckles and Ceives A morpheme was defined as the basic element of meaning, a phonological form that is arbitrarily united with particular meaning and that cannot be analyzed into simpler elements. This definition holds true for majority of morphemes but problematic with few ones Example: Cranberry, huckleberry and boseynberry Berry part is ok but huckle and boseyn occur only with berry and do not stand alone. Such words like huckle, boseyn require a redfinition on the concept of morpheme.

Problem case: Verbs of Latin origin receive deceive conceive perceive revert convert pervert relate collate translate reduce deduce conduce Should these be considered to be composed of a single morpheme? Or prefix + bound morpheme?

General Tendency The core vocabulary of English is generally composed of words of Anglo-Saxon origin There is a general tendency for core elements to be free morphemes E.g. Hand Hand-y, hand-le, hand-ful, mis-hand-le,

Morphemes: Further Sub Types Morpheme Free Bound (root) (affix) Lexical functional Derivational inflectional

Types of Free Morpheme Free morphemes fall into two categories: Lexical Morpheme: set of ordinary nouns, adjectives and verbs (almost same as content words as they carry the content of message we convey) Examples: sincere, open, follow, boy, sad Functional Morphemes: set of conjunctions, prepositions, articles and pronouns(almost same as functional words) Examples: near, in, the, that, and, but

Types of Bound Morphemes What is the difference between these two sets of complex words???? Fair-ly Fast-er Sing-ing Open-ed Car-s Write-s Big-gest Treat-ment Rude-ness Un-kind Fam-ous Use-less Help-ful Ir-regular Red-dish

Types of Bound Morphemes Fast-er, Sing-ing, Open-ed, Car-s, Write-s, Big-gest These affixes do not change the word class, but rather contribute to meeting grammatical constraints. These are called: Inflectional morphemes

Types of Bound Morphemes Treat-ment Rude-ness Un-kind Red-dish Fam-ous Use-less Help-ful Ir-regular These affixes mostly change the class of the word, but this is normally the case, e.g. fame (n.)> famous (adj.) Furthermore, the semantic element is notably higher. These morphemes are called: Derivational morphemes

Types of Bound Morphemes Bound morphemes are of two types: Derivational Morpheme: used to make words of different grammatical category deals with morphemes that change the lexical category of the word they are added to. Inflectional Morpheme: used to indicate aspects of grammatical function of a word deals with changes that don’t affect the lexical category of a the word they apply to (e.g., pluralization, tense on verbs, noun case, and adjectival comparison).

Derivational vs. Inflectional Example: wicked (adj.) + -er = wickeder (adj.) speak (v.) + -er = speaker (n.) Though the suffix has the same sound, it’s performing two different functions in these two examples. ‘er’ that keeps the class same (adj to adj) is inflectional ‘er’ that changes the class (v to n) is derivational

Morphological Description The girl-s want-ed party. Functional lexical inflectional lexical inflectional lexical

Item & Arrangement Morphology This traditional view of morphology presented thus far is known as Item and Arrangement Morphology (IA). The basic idea behind IA is that meaning is achieved by stringing morphemes together, and combining their meanings. in- escape -able -ity = “inescapability” A question to think about: Is language really this simple?

Item and Arrangement Morphology: Problems For the time being, let’s pretend that language is that simple. Meaning in language is nothing more than the combination of meaningful bits (i.e., morphemes) and the meanings associated with those bits.

Item and Arrangement Morphology: Problems First, there are some theoretical problems… “fish” = FISH, singular “fish” = FISH, plural Where’s the plural morpheme? “fish”-Ø, where “-Ø” = plural. How do we know it’s a suffix?

Item and Arrangement Morphology: Problems And further theoretical problems… “take” = present tense “took” = past tense How do you add something to “take” to cause its vowel to change? “took” = “take”-Ø (where “-Ø” also causes the vowel to change from [e] to [])

Item and Arrangement Morphology: Problems And even more theoretical problems… “berry” = a free morpheme “blueberry” = a compound “cranberry” = ? If we accept that “cranberry” is “cran-” plus “berry”, what does “cran-” mean? “Rasp-”? “Boysen-”? “Huckle-”?

Item and Arrangement Morphology: Problems These problems are unresolved, some alternative ideas are presented (WP and Conlanging*, Morphophonemic Alternations**) *In WP, there are just a few patterns to state, and the conlanger only needs to decide which nouns are going to fall into which classes. ** For details read Hockett, Charles, “A course in Modern Linguistics’”, Mac Millian, 1958

Morphs & Allomorphs Morphs are the actual forms used to realize morphemes (just like phones of phonemes) Example: The form ‘cat’ has one morph The form ‘cats’ has two morphs ‘cat’ (lexical) and ‘s’ (inflectional) Allomorphs: (related most often to oral language) a single morpheme with more than one phonological realization. say/sez. a/an. Play/playz (z of sound) Test/testid (id of sound) Sheep + 0 morph= sheep

Aspects of Morphology Morphology has 3 aspects: Inflectional (discussed earlier) Derivational (discussed earlier) Compounding When two are more words are joined together to make a compound word For example: Sociolinguistics, bedroom, book review, playground etc.

Recap Morpheme Free and Bound Morpheme Types of Free Morpheme: Lexical and Functional Types of Bound Morphemes: Inflectional and Derivational Item and Arrangement Morphological Analysis and Problems Morphs and Allomorphs Aspects of Morphology

References Bybee, Joan. 1985. Morphology: a study of the relation between meaning and form. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Falk, Julia. Linguistics and Language. 1978. Fromkin, Rodman & Hymas. 2007. Language: Nature, Psychology and Grammatical Aspects. Us: Wadsworth. Parsad, Tarni, A Course in Linguistics, 2012, New Dehli: PHI Rajimwale, Sharad, Elements of General Linguistics, 2006. Strang, Barbara. Modern English Structure. Edward Arnold. 1968. Ouhalla, Jamal. Introducing Transformational Grammar. 1999. Parsad, Tarni. A Course in Linguistics. 2012. Yule, George. The Study of Language. 1996.