Slide 1
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch4 – Features
Consider the following data from Mokilese
Can you identify complementary distribution?
If so, write a rule in feature to capture the overall process (not
specific rules for specific sounds but for natural classes)
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 2
Ch4 – Features
Consider the following data from Mokilese
High vowels become voiceless between voiceless consonants
+syllabic
+dorsal
+high

[–voice]
/
- sonorant
- voice
___
- sonorant
- voice
Slide 3
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 The part of the grammar that is concerned with words and word formation
 Lexicon - your mental dictionary - the filing cabinet drawer for how words
are put together and what the meanings of this different parts are
 Word - the smallest free form found in language (it does not have to occur
in fixed position with respect to other forms)
Slide 4
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Morpheme - the smallest unit of language that carries information about
meaning or function (builder has 2 morphemes: build and -er)
 Simple words - contain only 1 morpheme
 Complex words - contain more than 1 morpheme
 Free morpheme - a morpheme that can be a word by itself
 Bound morpheme - a morpheme that must be attached to another element
Slide 5
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Allomorphs - the variant forms of a morpheme
 English indefinite article has 2 allomorphs: a and an
English plural has 3 allomorphs - what are they? cats, dogs, horses
Slide 6
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Word structure
 Root - the core of the word and carries the major component of meaning
 Lexical category - Noun (N), Adjective (A), Verb (V), Preposition (P)
 Affixes - general term for a morpheme that does not have a lexical category,
and is always bound
Base is the form to which an affix is attached (most cases it is the root)
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 7
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Word trees - (Af) means Affix
 Base is the thing that an affix affixes to (sometimes the root, sometimes not)

kindness
1) Identify the root
A
kindness
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 8
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Word trees - (Af) means Affix
 Base is the thing that an affix affixes to (sometimes the root, sometimes not)

kindness
2) Attach the suffix and determine lexical category of the word
N
A
Af
kindness
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 9
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Word trees - (Af) means Affix
 Base is the thing that an affix affixes to (sometimes the root, sometimes not)

kindnesses
1) Identify the root
A
kindnesses
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 10
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Word trees - (Af) means Affix
 Base is the thing that an affix affixes to (sometimes the root, sometimes not)

kindness
2) Attach the 1st affix and determine lexical category of the word
N
A
Af
kindnesses
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 11
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Word trees - (Af) means Affix
 Base is the thing that an affix affixes to (sometimes the root, sometimes not)

kindness
3) Attach the 2nd affix to the new base and determine lexical category of the
N
resulting word
N
A
Af
Af
kindnesses
[[[[ kind ]A ness]N es]N
Slide 12
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Affixes can be suffixes, prefixes or infixes
Infixes must be morphemes inserted into the root of the word, and not just
adding another prefix or suffix to an existing one
freakin’ as an infix: abso-freakin-lutely not *absolute-freakin-ly
a true English infix?
 Problems: some words that have an affix no longer allow the root to be a
free form - unkempt, inept, overwhelmed - any others?
 Some words appear to have affixes but are considered one morpheme receive, submit, permit (still formed with other affixes like they do have affixes
though - permission, reception)
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 13
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Derivation - an affixational process that forms a word with a meaning
and/or category distinct from its base
Complex derivations - when there are multiple affixes
 Structurally ambiguous words - unlockable
A
V
A
Af
Af V
unlockable
Af
A
V
Af
unlockable
Slide 14
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Constraints on derivation - suffix -ant cannot affix to native English
words, only borrowed words from Latin
Sometimes constraint is phonological - -en can only attach as a suffix to a
monosyllabic base ending in an obstruent.
Slide 15
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 2 different classes of affixes:
 Class 1 affix - triggers phonological changes in consonants or vowels of the
base - stress shifts (not talking about spelling)
 Class 2 affix - phonologically neutral, having no effect on base or stress of
resulting word (not talking about spelling)
 Usually, Class 2 affixes cannot come between Class 1 affixes and the root.
 *fearlessity, but ok fearlessness, relational, divisiveness
Slide 16
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
On p. 110, un- is a prefix that attaches to
an adjective and here it attaches to a noun
Slide 17
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Compounding - compound word is the combination of two already existing
words
 The right-most word determines the lexical category of the new compound
word (greenhouse is a noun because house is a noun although green is an
adjective) - the morpheme that determines the category is called the head
 Spelling is not consistent with how compounds are represented - high school,
high-school, highschool
Pronunciation differences between compound and A + N sequence blackbird versus black bird
 Inflectional suffixes can only be added to second form in compound (tense or
plural) so drop kicked but not *dropped kick
Slide 18
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Inflection - the modification of a word’s form to indicate grammatical
information of various sorts
 The base that inflectional forms are added to is sometimes called a stem
(like root for derivational affixation)
 This is different from derivation
Includes Tense, Aspect, Number, person/number agreement, case
Slide 19
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 There are many irregular forms in English that don’t use the affixation of
inflection as discussed. (go + PAST = goed? no, went)
 Inflection versus Derivation
Inflection does not change the grammatical category or the meaning of the word
to which it is affixed
 Derivation can change the category and does change the meaning (although still
related) (All English prefixes are derivation even though they do not change the
lexical category of the word)
 Derivational affixes have to occur closest to base. neighborhoods but not
*neighborshood
 Inflectional affixes can combine with nearly every possible word (plural -s) but
derivational affixes can combine with a more limited set (-ment)
Slide 20
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Inflection versus Derivation
 Special case of -ing: There are 3 -ing affixes!
 1) Derivational: Verb + -ing = Noun - I watched the dancing in the room.
 2) Derivational: Verb + -ing = Adjective - The dancing frog
 3) Inflectional: Verb + -ing = Verb - The frog is dancing
Slide 21
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
 Inflection - in English is usually marked with affixes (suffixes)
 Can also be marked through Internal Change - a process that substitutes
one nonmorphemic segment for another to mark a grammatical contrast
 Ablaut (vowel alterations): sing, sink, drive - sang, sank, drove OR feet and
geese from foot and goose - what about dive?
 Suppletion - replaces a morpheme with an entirely different morpheme in
order to indicate a grammatical contrast
 to be in English is made up of a few different forms not related to each other
through affixation or internal change: is, was, were, are, am, be
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 22
Ch 5 - Morphology
INFLECTION
Reduplication - total or partial - the repetition of all or part of a word to
indicate a grammatical or semantic contrast
 Tone placement - different pitch to indicate different tense (Spanish has an
inflectional stress to indicate tense and person - hablo versus habló)
 Agreement – when one word is inflected to match a certain grammatical
properties of another word – number, person (Eng. 3rd Sing Present –s: he speaks
 Case - is a change in a word’s form to indicate its grammatical role (subject,
direct object, indirect object, etc.)
 He/his/him, I/mine/me
Slide 23
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
Conversions - changing one word from one category to another without the
use of affixes (zero derivation or zero affixation)
Also, productivity – still can write rules for non-productive morphology
(like –en plural oxen)
Slide 24
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 25
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 26
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
In order to figure out the morphemes, must find morphological minimal pairs
(2 words that differ with only 1 morpheme) then figure out what the diffs in
meaning are and you can figure out the morphemes.
atanipenda vs. atakupenda = he will like me vs. he will like you
So we know that –ni- must be me (Obj) and –ku- must be you (Obj)
Figure out with the data that the order of the morphemes is:
SUBJECT + TENSE + OBJECT + ROOT
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 27
Ch 5 - Morphology
Morphological rules to derive the correct forms. Since there are 3 prefixes
attaching to root, we start with the one closest to root.
1.)Object Marking
X  OP + X in [+Verb]
Where OP is selected from:
 ni- [+me-object]
 ku- [+you-object]
 m- [+him-object]
 tu- [+us-object]
 wa- [+them-object]
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 28
Ch 5 - Morphology
Morphological rules to derive the correct forms. Since there are 3 prefixes
attaching to root, we start with the one closest to root.
2.)Tense Marking
X  Tense + X in [+Verb]
Where TENSE is selected from:
 ta- [+future]
 na- [+present]
 me- [+past]
Ch 5 - Morphology
Slide 29

Ch 5 - Morphology
Morphological rules to derive the correct forms. Since there are 3
prefixes attaching to root, we start with the one closest to root.
3.)Subject Marking
 X  SP + X in [+Verb]
 Where SP is selected from:




a- [+he-subject]
ni- [+I-subject]
u- [+you-subject]
tu- [+we-subject]
1.
2.
3.
penda
nipenda
tanipenda
atanipenda
atanipenda
root
Object Marking
Tense Marking
Subject Marking
Output of morphology
Slide 30
Ch 5 - Morphology
Ch 5 - Morphology
Questions about morphological rules?