English LexicologyMorphological Processes (I): Derivation and Conversion

Week 5

Instructor: Liu Hongyong

Review: Classification of Morphemes

A morpheme is the most elemental unit of a form-meaning pair. Derivational morphemes are used to create new lexical items

(lexemes). Inflectional morphemes only contribute to the inflectional paradigm

of the lexemes, which lists all the word-forms of the lexeme.

morpheme

Free

(自由 )

free root (自由词根 )

Bound

(粘着 )

bound root (粘着词根 ) (-ceive, -mit, -fer)

inflectional affixes (语法性后缀 )

derivational affixes (词汇性后缀 )

affixes (-ing, -er, -s, -est, -er, -’s, -ed)

(pre-, un-, re-, -ly, -ist, -ment)

Morphology (形态学 )

Morphology is the study of the internal structure of words

(morphological structure of words)

& processes of word formation

(morphological processes of word-formation)

Morphological Structure of words: Root, stem & affix

naturenatural naturalist

naturalistic

naturalism

unnatural

Stem: a root plus affixes

Affixes: bound morphemes which attach to roots or stems.

Root: the basic morpheme which provides the central meaning in a word

simple word

Complex Word

nature + al = natural

un + nature + al = unnatural

Base

Linguists sometimes use the word “Base” to mean any root or stem to which an affix is attached. In this example, nature, natural, and unnatural would all be considered bases.

nature + al = natural

un + nature + al = unnatural

un + nature + al + ly = unnaturally

Root/base affix

Stem/base

complex word

Stem/base

affix

..

..

..

..

nature -al -ist

affix

Morphological Structure: Root & Stem

When a root morpheme is combined with an affix, it forms a stem, which may or may not be a word (painter is both a word and a stem).

painter+s=painters (painter is a stem)

Base?

paint & painter

Internal structure of a word

The internal structure of a word is hierarchical rather than flat.

unbelievable un+believe+able

*[[un+believe] +able]

[un + [believe +able]]

Morphological Complexity

regionalize: region+al+ize

[[[region] al] ize]

regionalizeV

regionalA izeV

regionN alA

This tree shows the internal morphological structure of the word

Morphological Complexity

reunification

reunificationN

reunifyV ationN

re unifyV

This tree represents the application of two morphological rules:

1. re+VV2. V+ationN

Word structure: which is correct?

Prefix un- can mean ‘to do the reverse of’ and combine with a verb to form a new verb.

unloadableA

unloadV ableA

un loadV

unloadableA

un loadableA

loadV ableA

1. un+VV

2. V+ableA

1. V+ableA

2. un+AA

Morphological Analysis

Look at the following data from Paku, which was invented by a linguist for an old 1970s TV series called Land of the Lost. This was the language used by the monkey people called Pakuni. Suppose you found yourself in this strange land and attempted to find out what the morphemes of Paku were.

Paku Data Analysis

me “I” meni “we”

ye “you (singular)”

yeni “you (plural)”

we “he” weni “they (masculine)”

wa “she” wani “they (feminine)”

abuma “girl abumani “girls”

adusa “boy” adusani “boys”

abu “child” abuni “children”

Paku “one Paku” Pakuni “more than one Paku

Answer

By examining these words you find that the plural forms end in –in, and the singular forms do not. You therefore conclude that –ni is a separate morpheme meaning “plural” that is attached as a suffix to a noun.

Plural morpheme: -ni

Major word-formation processes

Affixation (Derivation) Conversion Compounding

Endocentric compounds Exocentric compounds

Derivational affixes can create new words (lexemes), but inflectional affixes can only produce different word forms of the same lexeme. Therefore, inflection is not a word-formation process.

Affixation

Affixation involves adding affixes to a root morpheme (or a stem) to- derive a new word

(derivation: teach-er)- to realize certain grammatical function

(inflection: boy-s)

An affix is a bound morpheme. There are four types of affixes: prefix, suffix, infix, and circumfix.

Prefix

Language Prefix

Mandarin 老友 , 老師 , 老兄可怕 , 可喜，可愛

Cantonese 阿嫲，阿 Dean, 阿 Sir

細佬，細妹鬼婆，鬼佬

English re-name, in-correct

un-tidy, co-author

Suffix Language Suffix

Mandarin 桌子石頭花兒

Cantonese 我哋碗仔香港仔

English kindly

test-ed

Jingpo ( 景颇语 ) ning31-shi31 “small knife”

knife-suffix

Nuosu Yi ( 诺苏彝语 )

si21-du33: knowledge

mu33-du33: task

Infix

Language Infix

Mandarin 吃得飽吃不完

Cantonese 邊鬼度擔咩心好咩鬼鷄

English im-frigging-possible

Jingpo mu33-mi33-mu33 “all the delicious food”

Nuosu Yi no21-a21-bo21 “not working”

Circumfix

In some cases, a prefix and a suffix act together to surround a base. The two realize a single morpheme, and they are classed together as a circumfix.

Data from German

film.en ‘to film’ ge.film.t ‘filmed’frag.en ‘to ask’ ge.frag.t ‘asked’ The circumfix ge…t is taken to be a single affix, and it is a d

iscontinuous morph.

Sum up: Inflection & Derivation

Inflection is a process which combines words and affixes (always suffixes in English) to produce different word forms of the same lexeme.

e.g. talk-talked, cat-cats

Derivation is a lexical process which actually forms a new word out of an existing one by the addition of a derivational affix.

e.g. kind-kindly, kind-kindness

The Lexicon: An analogy

rootroot derivational affixderivational affix idiomidiom functional affixfunctional affix

Inflection and Derivation

Inflection DerivationCompounding

Inflection and Derivation

Sum up, inflection is a process which produces different word forms of the same lexeme; whereas derivation creates new words (lexemes). Therefore, inflection is not a word-formation process.

Both inflection and derivation occur in the lexicon. Therefore, both of them are morphological processes.

Inflection and Derivation

If derivation and inflection co-occurs, derivations are inner, closer to the stem, and inflections are outer, furthest from the stem.

Example Base +Derivation +Inflection

frightened fright -en -ed

activating act -ate -ing

payments pay -ment -s

resignations resign -ation -s

pays-mentpayment-s

Types of derivational affixes

Derivational affixes are of two kinds: word-class changing and word-class maintaining. Nominalizers are used to from nouns Verbalizers are used to form verbs Adjectivizers are used to form adjectives Adverbializers are used to form adverbs

Nominalizer

VerbVerb AffixAffix NounNoun Adj.Adj. AffixAffix NounNoun

leak -age leakage accurate -y accuracy

govern -ment government social -ist socialist

Betray -al betrayal pure -ity purity

resign -ation Resignation free -dom freedom

defend -ce defence good -ness goodness

Attend -ance attendance true -th truth

attend -ant attendant

Refer -ee Referee

Depart -ure departure

farm -er Farmer

inquire -y inquiry

Morphological Rule:

V+ageN

A+yN

Verbalizer

NounNoun AffixAffix VerbVerb Adj.Adj. AffixAffix VerbVerb

fright -en frighten soft -en soften

computer -ize computerize able en- enable

friend be- befriend pure -ify purify

glory -fy glorify legal -ize legalize

earth un- unearth

danger en- endanger

Morphological Rule:

N+enV

A+enV

Adjectivizer

NounNoun AffixAffix AdjectiveAdjective VerbVerb AffixAffix AdjectiveAdjective

season -al seasonal negotiate -able negotiable

rag -ed ragged create -ive creative

care -less careless depend -ent dependent

suburb -an suburban tire -some tiresome

gold -en golden sense -ory sensory

clock -like clocklike

hope -ful Hopeful

friend -ly friendly

fame -ous famous

child -ish childish

Morphological Rule:

N+alA

V+ableA

Adverbializer

AdjectiveAdjective AffixAffix AdverbAdverb NounNoun AffixAffix AdverbAdverb

quick -ly quickly home -ward homeward

lone a- alone clock -wise clockwise

sky -wards skywards

shore a- ashore

Morphological Rule:

A+lyAdv

N+wardAdv

Word-class maintaining derivational affixes

N Affix N V Affix V

scholar -ship scholarship

join ad- adjoin

child -hood childhood agree dis- disagree

king -dom kingdom open re- reopen

wife ex- ex-wife judge pre- prejudge

worker co- co-worker tie un- unite

A Affix A

possible im- impossible

green -ish greenish

Conversion

Conversion is also referred to as Zero Derivation. It is a process that can transfer a word belonging to

one word class to another word class without any change of form, either in pronunciation or spelling.

The head of the village has arrived.

She headed that school.

Conversion

It can be assumed that zero morphs are used as affixes in derivational morphology as well. For instance, the verb ‘head’ may be said to have derived by suffixing a zero morph to the noun ‘head’. This is done by analogy to the derivation of a verb like ‘victim-ise’.

V V

N V N V

victim -ise head Ø

Conversion

The head of the village has arrived. She headed that school.

Head: – n. Occurred around 1150; developed from Old English, e.g. ‘heafod top of the body’ (about 725). –v. Appeared around 1230; from the noun.

(Adopted from The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology)

Conversion

Major kinds of conversion NounVerb VerbNoun AdjectiveNoun AdjectiveVerb

NounVerb

to bottle one’s emotion to book a ticket to xerox a book to finger the soft silk to mother the orphan to cash a cheque to tailor one’s remarks

VerbNoun

doubt; need; surprise; desire; guess; answer to give a call/a hug/a smile/a cry; to have a swim/a look/a try/a drink;

AdjectiveVerb

to better the situation to dirty one’s reputation to dry the clothes to clean the table to empty the room to wrong somebody

AdjectiveNoun

Partial conversionthe poor; the wounded; the old; the young; the rich

Complete conversionnative: a native; two natives; the native’s languageHe is a progressive. Tom is one of our regulars (regular customers).

These converted nouns do not take plural and genitive inflections, nor can they be preceded by determiners like a, this, my, etc.