Introduction to Morphology
Prof. Julia Nee
Comparative Linguistics
Spring 2014, LaSalle University
Words, Words, Words
• Chapter 5 of “The Language Instinct”
• Please read Chapter 5 
What is morphology?
• Study of morphemes
• Morphemes = smallest meaningful unit of
language
• Ex: teachers = teach-er-s
– Teach = verb (action of teaching)
– -er = derivational morpheme (one who does the
action X)
– -s = inflectional morpheme (‘plural’)
Derivational vs. Inflectional
• Derivational morphemes change the part of
speech of the word
– -er (teach-er, bake-er, sing-er, etc.)
– -ness (good-ness, bright-ness, happy-ness, etc.)
• Inflectional morphemes add grammatical
meaning but do not change the part of speech
of the word
– -ing (walk-ing, sing-ing, dance-ing, etc.)
– -s (dog-s, bike-s, sock-s, etc.)
Derivational or inflectional?
• From Kivunjo: Näïkí´mlyíïá
– N-: Marker indicating that the word is the focus of that point in
the conversation
– -ä-: A subject agreement marker
– -ï-: Present tense
– -kí-: Object agreement marker (tells what is being eaten)
– -m-: Benefactive marker (indicates for whose benefit the action
is taking place)
– -lyí-: “to eat” (verb)
– -ï-: applicative marker, indicating that there’s one additional
player
– -á: indicative mood
• “He is eating it for her.”
Derivational or inflectional?
• Learnable
– Learn: verb
– X-able: quality indicating ability to do X
• Unmicrowaveability
– Un-X: not X
– Microwave: noun
– X-able: quality indicating ability to do X
– X-ity: noun indicating the quality of X
Structure of Words
• Morphemes can be added in a structured way
N
Nstem Ninflection
Dog
-s
• N  Nstem Ninflection
• “A noun can consist of a noun stem followed by a
noun inflection.”
Structure of Words
• Why is it important to have the concept of
Noun = Nounstem + inflection?
• We can apply the rule of inflection to all
nouns!
• Don’t need to memorize 1 cat, 2 cats and 1
dog, 2 dogs, etc.
• Memorize 1 nounstem, 2 nounstem +
inflection (-s)
Compound Nouns
• Two nstems can be combined to form a new
word: Book Report
• Nstem  Nstem Nstem
• “A noun stem can consist of a noun stem
followed by another noun stem.”
• In a compound noun, the first noun is NOT an
adjective:
– This report is interesting.
– *This report is book.
Derivational Affixes
• New stems can be formed by adding
derivational affixes
• Astem  Stem Astemaffix
• -able: adjective stem affix, means “capable of
being X’d”, attach me to a verb stem
Astem
Vstem
Crunch
Astemaffix
-able
Derivational Affixes
• We can figure out the meaning of the word
based on the affix:
– Crunch-ability means capable of being crunched
– Wug-ability means capable of being “wugged”
• Words with morphemes have a “head,” which
is the main element in the word
– In English, the “head” is the rightmost morpheme
– Describes the essence of the word
Deriving Words
• Words can only be derived in certain ways
• Smallest part of a word (not a morpheme) =
root
• Certain morphemes can only attach to a root,
like –ism
– Darwin-ism
– *Darwins-ism
Irregularity
• Why do some words not take their predicted
irregular forms?
– Fly out to center field > flied out
– Maple Leaf > Maple Leafs
– Walkman > Walkmans
• …especially when others do?
– Snowman > snowmen
– Blow him away > blew him away
Irregularity
• When larger words are created out of smaller
words, the new word gets its properties from
the head
• Compounded words get their meaning from
their head:
– A snowman is a type of ‘man’  gets its
properties from ‘man’
– ‘man’ has an irregular plural ‘men’, so snowman
has the same irregular plural form
Irregularity
• But what about compounded words that don’t
have a head?
– A Walkman isn’t a type of ‘man’
– It doesn’t inherit the irregularity of ‘man’ > ‘men’
Allomorphs
• Allomorphs = phonological shapes that a
morpheme can have
• Ex: /t/, /d/, and /ɪd/ for the “ed” form of
English verbs
• Usually phonologically, lexically, or
grammatically conditioned
Allomorphs
• Phonologically conditioned:
– [-ed] > t / [-voice]_
– [-ed] > d / [+voice]_
– [-ed] > ɪd / (t,d)_
• Lexically conditioned:
– Cat > cats
– Mouse > mice
– Ox > oxen
Allomorphs
• Grammatically conditioned
– La mesa blanca
– El sillón blanco
– Los tapetes blancos
Loss of Allomorphs
• Results from:
– Sound change
– Analogical change
• Sound change  makes two allomorphs
sound the same
• Analogical change  words take on the
patters of similar words
– Ex: strive : strove : striven > strive : strived :
strived, like arrive : arrived : arrived
Boundary Changes
• Boundary loss = the boundary separating two
morphemes disappears so that the two
morphemes are seen as one
– English ‘a’ meaning ‘on’ as in abroad, alive, aloud,
around, aware, away
• Boundary shift = the boundary moves
– A nuncle > an uncle
– An ewte > a newt
Boundary Changes
• New boundary creation = insert boundaries
where there weren’t any before
– Usually related to ‘folk etymology’
– Ex: hamburger
• Hamburg-er
• Ham-burger  cheese-burger, fishburger, burger
• Change in type of boundary = independent words
can become a clitic or an affix, or vice versa
– Ex: ex-girlfriend, ex-husband  ‘ex’
“One Form, One Meaning”
• Also known as “Humboldt’s Universal” or
“Principle of Isomorphism”
• Tendency that languages change to maximize the
one-to-one relationship between form and
meaning
• If you have two morphemes that sound the same
(-s of plural and ‘s of possessive), the language
will differentiate them if possible
• If you have multiple allomorphs of a morpheme,
they’ll become one allomorph
What is a word?
• Multiple definitions
– “Linguistic object that, even if build out of parts by
the rules of morphology, behaves as the
indivisible, smallest unit with respect to the rules
of syntax.” (pg. 142)
• The monster eats mice. What does the monster eat?
Mice!
• The monster is a mice-eater. What is the monster an –
eater? *Mice!
– “String of linguistic stuff that is arbitrarily
associated with a particular meaning.” (Listeme)