Morphology
Morphology
Morphology
Definition:
the analysis of word
structure.
Inflectional vs
Morphology
studies the
ways in
which
morphemes
are used to
express
grammatical
contrasts in
sentences
Derivational
Morphology
studies the
principles/rules
governing the
construction of
new words
Inflectional Morphology
Morpheme - unit of meaning which may be
represented by one or more allomorphs
Examples: cat-s
sing-ing
good-ness
un-happi-ly
act
act-ive
act-iv-ity
in-act-ive
in-act-iv-ity
Kinds of Morphemes
1. Roots/stems/Free Morphemes
1. Affixes/Bound Morphemes
Affixes/Bound Morphemes
Represent grammatical or relational meanings
Types of Affixes
Prefixes - come before the stem
Un-happy
Suffixes - come after the stem
Happi-ness
Infixes - come within the stem (English doesn't use these)
Tagalog (Philippine language) examples of infixes
Stem: -basa- which means "read"
/bumasa ako nan libro/
read I the book
I read the book. (past tense)
/binasa an libro/
was read the book
The book was read.
Bontoc (Philippine language) examples of infixes
/fikas/ "strong" /fumikas/ "He is becoming strong"
/bato/ "stone" /bumato/ "He is becoming stone"
/fusul/ "enemy" /fumusul/ "He is becoming enemy
Allomorphs
Definition:
alternative forms which
carry the same meaning
but have different
phonological shape.
Allomorphs
•
•
•
•
Examples from English
/-iz/ class/classes (following sibilants s,c,z,j)
/-s/ cat/cats (following nonsibilant voiceless
consonants)
/-z/ tub/tubs (following nonsibilant voiced
consonants)
/-z/ bee/bees (following vowels)
Allomorphs in “Plural” Morpheme
(/-iz/, /-s/, /-z/)
Morphologically
Characterized Language
Types
Isolating Languages
Agglutinating Languages
Fusional Languages
Polysynthetic Languages
Two Questions Used to
Classify Languages
Morphologically
1. Does a word divide into smaller
meaningful parts?
2. Does each component express a
single meaning?
Isolating Languages
Question 1 = NO
Languages that use undividable words,
but have strict rules of word order to
keep the grammatical meanings of
things clear.
Also know as “analytic languages “
Included are Chinese, Indonesian,
Pidgins and Creoles.
Isolating languages
Mandarin Chinese examples
/wo gang yao gei ni na
yi bei
cha/
I
just want for you bring one cup tea
"I am about to bring you a cup of tea."
/xia yu/
down rain
"It was/is/will be raining"
Agglutinating Languages
Questions 1 = Yes, 3=Yes
• Words can be divided into morphemes
• Each morpheme expresses a separate
grammatical meaning
Included are Finnish, Turkish,
Japanese, Tamil, etc.
Agglutinating Languages
Turkish example
from the stem /ol-/ meaning die
ol-mek
"to die"
stem + infinitive
ol-dur-mek
"to kill"
st+Cause+infinitive
ol-dur-me-mek "to not kill" st+cause+neg+infin
ol-dur-ul-mek "to be killed" st+cause+Pass+infi
ol-dur-ul-me-mek "to not be killed"
st+cau+pas+neg+inf
oldurebilemeseydim
"I wish I hadn't been able to kill"
ol -dur -ebil -eme -sey -d -im
die cause able not wish past I
Fusional Languages
Questions 1 = Yes, 3=No
• Words can be divided into
morphemes,
• Morphemes can express more than one
grammatical meaning
Also know as “inflectional languages “
Included are Indo-European and AfroAsiatic languages. .
Fusional Languages
Latin Example
Declensions -- variations on nouns (e.g.
man, men, man’s, men’s).
Conjugations -- variations on verbs (e.g.
sing, sang, sung).
e pluribus unum
pluribus
pluribus
many – plural/dative case
“Out of many, one”
Systems of Inflectional
Morphology
Verb tenses - mark time and person
English example: 6 persons and past, present, future,etc
Noun tenses - mark time on nouns
Japanese example: shiroi(white), shirokatta(was white), and
shirkute(being white)
Noun cases - mark gramatical role in sentence
Finnish example: fifteen cases
nominative (subject)
ablative (from)
allative (to)
essive (as)
partitive (part of)
translative (change to)
abessive (without)
accusative (object)
instructive (by)
inessive (in)
comitative (with)
elative (out of)
genitive (possessive)
illative (into)
adessive (on)
Latin Declension of
“Friend” and “Field”
Case
Singular
Plural
Singular
Plural
Nominative
amicus
amici
ager
agri
(uh-mee-kus)
(uh-mee-kee)
(uh-gehr)
(uh-gree)
Genitive
amici
amicorum
agri
agrorum
(possessive)
(uh-mee-kee)
(uh-mee-korum)
(uh-gree)
(uh-gro-rum)
Dative
amico
amicis
agro
agris
(uh-mee-ko)
(uh-meekees)
(uh-gro)
(uh-grees)
amicum
amicos
agrum
agros
(uh-meekoom)
(uh-mee-kos)
(uh-grum)
(uh-gros)
amico
amicis
agro
agris
(uh-meekees)
(uh-gro)
(uh-grees)
(subjective)
(indirect
object)
Accusative
(direct
object)
Ablative
(from the . . (uh-mee-ko)
=adverb)
Polysynthetic Languages
A small group of languages that have
complex multi-morpheme words that carry a
sentence-worth of information.
Included are Basque and many Amerindian
languages.
Also know as “amalgamating languages”
These languages are usually very difficult to
learn, unless you are brought up with
them. The Basques joke that they are
immune to the Devil because he couldn't
learn their language!
Polysynthetic Languages
Chukchi Example
1st person-
big-
head- aching
I have a bad headache.
Ojibwe Example
•baataanitaaanishinaabemong =
"being able to speak Ojibwe."
•ngiinitaaozhibii'amaadimin =
"we used to write to each other."
Derivational
Morphology
Processes of New Word
Formation
• Prefixation "disobey“
• Suffixation "kindness"
• Conversion - a word changes its class
without changing its form "carpet (n.)"
becomes "carpet (v.)"
• Compounding - two free bases/stems are
added together “blackbird"
• Reduplication - "goody-goody" "wishywashy" "teeny-weeny"
• Clippings - "ad" "telly" "flu"
• Acronyms - "NATO" "DJ" "VIP"
• Blends - "Brunch" from Breakfast and
Lunch "Telex" from teleprinter and
exchange
Defining “Word”
Five ways to identify a word
1. Potential Pauses - consistent pauses in speech
when sentence spoken slowly.
2. Indivisibility - where are additional words
added? They will be added between words, not
within them.
3. Minimal Free Forms - Bloomfield defined as: the
smallest units of speech that can meaningfully stand
on their own.
4. Phonetic Boundaries - in languages with
consistent and uniform stress (for example Welsh on
the last syllable) can identify the end of each word
by stress.
5. Semantic Units - in some sentences, words
constitute units of meaning (Dog bites man.)
However, in other sentences, words are not clearly
separate units of meaning (I switched on the light.)
"the" doesn't have a clear separate meaning, and
"switched on" requires two words to convey meaning.
Word Classes
Definition: groups based on the way
words are used/behave in language
Example from English
nouns
pronouns
adjectives
verbs
prepositions
conjunctions
adverbs
interjections
boy, machine, beauty
she, it, who
happy, three, both
go, frighten, be
in, under, with
and, because, if
happily, soon, often
gosh, wow, alas
also sometimes
participles
articles
looking, taken
a, the, an
Criteria for Word Classes
Example of adjective criteria from English
Five criteria for "adjectiveness"
A. occurs after form of to be - he's sad.
B. occurs after articles and before nouns –
the big car.
C. occurs after very - very nice.
D. occurs in the comparative or superlative
- sadder/saddest, more/most important.
E. occurs before -ly to form adverbs - quickly
Gradience
Words will not always fit neatly in one particular
class
Example from English - "round“
Adjective
Preposition
Verb
soon.
Adverb
Noun
Mary bought a round table.
The car went round the corner.
The yacht will round the buoy
We walked round to the shop.
It's your round. I'll have a beer.
Adjective Gradience
in Six Words
A. occurs after form of to be he's sad.
B. occurs after articles and
before nouns –
the big car.
C. occurs after very - very nice.
D. occurs in the comparative
or superlative sadder/saddest, more/most
important.
E. occurs before -ly to form
adverbs - quickly