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    Lesson 2 19.10.11 WORD FORMATION Official

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    Dragana Meda Lalošević
    The document discusses different aspects of word formation in the English language, including inflection, derivation, and conversion. It defines inflection as morphological rules that create different forms of the same lexeme, like pluralization, while derivation forms new lexemes through processes like compounding, affixation, and conversion. Compounding combines words or parts of words, affixation adds prefixes or suffixes, and conversion changes a word's grammatical category without altering its form. Examples of each process are provided to illustrate how new words can be created in English.

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    Lesson 2 19.10.11 WORD FORMATION Official

    Uploaded by

    Dragana Meda Lalošević
    108 views5 pages
    The document discusses different aspects of word formation in the English language, including inflection, derivation, and conversion. It defines inflection as morphological rules that create different forms of the same lexeme, like pluralization, while derivation forms new lexemes through processes like compounding, affixation, and conversion. Compounding combines words or parts of words, affixation adds prefixes or suffixes, and conversion changes a word's grammatical category without altering its form. Examples of each process are provided to illustrate how new words can be created in English.

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    The document discusses different aspects of word formation in the English language, including inflection, derivation, and conversion. It defines inflection as morphological rules that create different forms of the same lexeme, like pluralization, while derivation forms new lexemes through processes like compounding, affixation, and conversion. Compounding combines words or parts of words, affixation adds prefixes or suffixes, and conversion changes a word's grammatical category without altering its form. Examples of each process are provided to illustrate how new words can be created in English.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as doc, pdf, or txt
    108 views5 pages

    Lesson 2 19.10.11 WORD FORMATION Official

    Uploaded by

    Dragana Meda Lalošević
    The document discusses different aspects of word formation in the English language, including inflection, derivation, and conversion. It defines inflection as morphological rules that create different forms of the same lexeme, like pluralization, while derivation forms new lexemes through processes like compounding, affixation, and conversion. Compounding combines words or parts of words, affixation adds prefixes or suffixes, and conversion changes a word's grammatical category without altering its form. Examples of each process are provided to illustrate how new words can be created in English.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    of 5

    A linguistic system is composed of:

    SOUNDS: Phonetics
    FORMS: Morphology (e.g. the form of the words, how a word is written)
    Syntax (e.g. how forms are linked together)
    WORDS: Lexicon
    MEANING OF THE WORD: Semantics (e.g. the meaning of a word, the idea it expresses)

    TWO MORPHOLOGIES

    It is possible to distinguish two kinds of morphological rules. Some morphological rules relate to
    different forms of the same lexeme; while other rules relate to different lexemes. Rules of the first
    kind are called inflectional rules, while those of the second kind are called word formation.
    The English plural, as illustrated by dog and dogs, is an inflectional rule; compounds like dog
    catcher or dishwasher provide an example of a word formation rule. Informally, word formation
    rules form "new words" (that is, new lexemes), while inflection rules yield variant forms of the
    "same" word (lexeme).

    WORD FORMATION

    Word formation is a great resource of English language. It encompasses different mechanisms


    through which lexical units can be created:

    - Compounding: A combination of words or parts of them.


    - Affixation: Adding affixes or suffixes to the base.
    - Conversion: Linguistic elements changing their grammatical category, e.g. the use of verbs
    as nouns and vice versa, etc.

    COMPOUNDING
    Units forming compounds can be solid (“trademark”), hyphenated (“shop-lifting”) and open (“sales
    manager”).
    Compounding involves all the grammar categories: nouns, adverbs, adjectives, etc.
    -noun+noun: “jobhunter”; “wineglass” (hyponym of “glass”), “skinhead”;
    -noun+verb: “windfall”, “sunshine”;
    -noun+adverb: “environment-friendly”, “consumer-friendly”;
    -noun+adjective: “cost-efficient”; “fat-free”;
    -verb+ noun: “pass-book”, “pickpocket”;
    -verb+verb: “make-believe”;
    -preposition+noun: “afternoon”; “after-hour”;
    -adjective+noun: “redskin”, “fast-food”, “software”.

    AFFIXATION
    New words can be created through the use of prefixes (which are placed before the base) and
    suffixes (which follow the base, thus changing the grammatical category of a word, e.g. from noun
    to adjective: nation > national).

    Prefixes Meaning Part of discourse Examples


    a- Not, without Adjective amoral
    dis- Negation, reversal Noun, verb disagreement, disagree

    un- Opposite, reversal Adjective, verb unexpected, unhappy, unfold,


    unchain

    ir- Not, without Adjective irresponsible, irrelevant

    in- Not, without Adjective insignificant

    mis- Wrongly, badly Noun, verb misbehaviour, misadventure, misbehave

    mal- Wrongly, badly Noun, verb maladministration, maltreat

    pseudo- False, sham Noun pseudocode

    counter- Counter, Noun counter-revolution, counterpart


    in opposition to Verb counter-balance

    over- Excessively Noun overcharge


    Adjective overconfident
    Past participle overestimated
    Verb overspend, overprotect

    under- Insufficiently Noun undersatement


    Adjective underdeveloped
    Past participle underestimated
    Verb underpay

    Suffixes Meaning Transformation Examples

    -ment State, action, the result of Verb to noun development


    reinforcement

    -ful Full of, characterised by Noun to Adjective meaningful


    useful

    -able Able to Verb to Adjective acceptable

    -ship Condition, status Noun to Noun membership


    ownership

    -less Without, lacking Noun to Adjective homeless


    useless

    -ness Status, condition, quality Adjective to Noun blindness, sadness

    -er Agent performing the action Verb to Noun publisher, employer


    -or mediator, arbitrator

    -ee Addressee, recipient of the action Verb to Noun employee,addressee


    trainee

    -ly Manner, degree Adjective to adverb directly, naturally

    -ing Activity, the result of s.t. Verb to Noun dancing, teaching,learning


    Verb to Adjective disgusting, interesting

    -ish Typical of Noun to Adjective childish, foolish


    About, approzimation Adjective to Adjective oldish, tallish

    -like Similarity Noun to Adjective childlike, dreamlike

    -al Relating to Noun to Adjective accidental, classical, logical

    -y Characterised by Noun to Adjective bloody, cloudy, sandy

    CONVERSION
    Convertion implies no variation in the form (the morphology remains the same, i.e. the change is
    transparent).
    E.g. WALK (noun) > TO WALK (verb)

    Noun to Verb
    Brake > to brake, mail > to mail, taste > to taste. In these cases, the passage is transparent.
    Exception: table > to table, book > to book

    Adjective to Verb
    Dirty > to dirty, empty > to empty, e-mail > to e-mail s.o.

    Verb to Noun
    To call > a call, to command > a command, to spy > a spy

    Adjective to Noun
    Daily newspaper: a daily; creative: a creative; fool: a fool

    Sometimes, in the passage, some phonological (e.g. Rebel > to rebel) or morphological (practice: to
    practise) changes may occur.

    Bibliographical references:
    BAUER, Laurie 1983. English Word Formation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
    Prefixes
    Decide which of the prefixes from the first box can be used to make opposites of the
    adjectives in the second box:

    Verbs to Nouns

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