WORD FORMATION
PROCESS
HUMANITIES DEPARTMENT
INTERAMERICAN UNIVERSITY
FAJARDO, PUERTO RICO
Dr. Maritza Santana
Prof. Ivan Mundo
Prof. Javier Martinez
Word Formation Process
 How new words are being formed
in the language
 The process consists of a
combination of morphemes that are
rule-governed (a new word is
formed)
PROCESSES WHERE NEW WORDS
ARE FORMED
 Major Word Formation Processes
(Processes that are formed frequently or
commonly in the use of the English language)
AFFIXATION
 Process of forming words by adding affixes to
morphemes
 English uses only prefixes and suffixes
sing + er = singer
un + real
=
unreal
COMPOUNDING
 Process that forms new words from two or
more independent words
 Examples of words formed by the
compounding process:
girl + friend = girlfriend
text + book = textbook
REDUPLICATION
 Process of forming new words either by
doubling an entire word (total reduplication)
or part of a word (partial reduplication)
 English makes use of reduplication very
sporadically
 Total reduplication is extremely rare!
partial
reduplication
Humpty
hocus
-
dumpty
pocus
SUPPLETION
 A relationship between forms of a word
wherein one form cannot be phonologically or
morphologically derived from the other (this
process is rare).
am vs. was
go vs.
went
MINOR WORD FORMATION
PROCESSES
(Occur less frequently in the English
language)
BLENDING
 Process of creating a new word by combining
the parts of two different words, usually the
beginning of one word and the end of
another.
motor + hotel = motel
camera + recorder = camcorder
Acronyms
 Words created from the initial letters of
several words.
 The difference between an initialism and an
acronym is that an acronym can be
pronounced as a single word instead of being
spelled out by letter.
BBC Broadcasting corporation
WASP White anglo-saxon protestant
 Acronyms used by teenagers CUL - OMG
CLIPPING
 Process of creating new words by shortening
parts of a longer word.
doctor
doc
dormitory
dorm
Inflection
 This process consists of a variation in the
form of a word. The form of that word can be
inflected for person, number, gender,
tense,aspect, mode.





Nouns: Tooth - Teeth
Pronouns: He – His
Verb: Go – Goes
Adjectives: Low – Lower – Lowest
Adverbs: Late - Lately
Borrowing
 It is when two or more countries have contact
with one other. They exchange some words,
adopt them and use them as yours.
 Example:
 - Computer
 - Pizza
 - Photography (borrowed words from Greek are heavy in
the sciences and technology)
 - Ketchup
Blending
 Blending is a way to combine two stems of
two different words in order to create a new
word.
 Blending is divided into:
 Coalescence (it uses parts of each words)
 Ex: Smog=Smoke+fog
 Telescope(it uses the entire first word plus the
final part of the second word)
 Ex:Motorcade=motor+cavalcade
Flexibility
 It is the change of a word from one word
class to another.
Examples:
- This jacket is a really good buy!
- She has saved enough money to buy a car.
Clipping
 It is the shortening of a longer word.
 Examples:
 Photo- Photography
 TV- Television
 Net- Internet
Back formation
 It is a clipped form of a longer word that
changes from a noun to a verb.
 Examples:
 Inspection- Inspect
 Communication- Communicate
 Scanner- Scan
Derivation
 When a word named “root” is added by
affixes that can be in front of a word as a
prefix or in the end of a word as a suffix
 Example:
 Acknowledge: Ac-knowledge
 Knowledgeable: knowledge-able