WORD FORMATION 25102022 050217pm

WORD FORMATION
& LEXICAL
RELATIONS
Samra Saghir
Content, Function And Form Words
 Content Words; Main Verbs, Nouns, Adjectives, Adverbs
 Function Words; Articles, Pronouns, Prepositions, Quantifiers and Qualifiers,
Conjunctions, Question words, Auxiliary, Linking and Modal Verbs
 Form Words; words with different content word forms
Main Verbs Nouns Adjectives Adverbs

Act Action Active Actively
Decide Decision Decisive Decisively
Activity
Make three more content word from the following words;
 Hate
 Protection
 Successful
 Strongly
Stress Patterns
 Word form changes based on the stress pattern
‘Content Con’tent
‘Progress Pro’gress
‘Rebel Re’bel
‘Contrast Con’trast
‘Conduct Con’duct
‘Entrance En’trance
‘Record Re’cord
‘Subject Sub’ject
‘Conflict Con’flict
Derivation
 A process accomplished by means of a large number of small “bits” of the English language
that are not usually given separate listings in dictionaries.
 These small “bits” are generally described as affixes.
 Examples include un-, mis-, pre-, -ful, -less, -ish, -ism and -ness which appear in words like
unhappy, mistrust, prejudge, joyful, careless, boyish, terrorism and sadness.
 Prefixes
Affixes added to the beginning of the word (e.g. un-, mis-) are called prefixes.
 Suffixes
Affixes added to the end of the word (e.g. -less, -ish) are called suffixes.
 Some more examples include;
 mislead has a prefix,
 disrespectful has both a prefix and a suffix,
 foolishness has two suffixes.
 English has about 200 derivational affixes, divided into 90 prefixes and 110 suffixes.
Activity
Write three words using each of the following affixes
 un-,
 mis-,
 pre-,
 -ful,
 -less,
 -ish,
 -ism
 -ness
Conversion
 A change in the function of a word, i.e., when a noun comes to be used as a
verb (without any reduction), is known as conversion.
 Nouns such as bottle, butter, chair and vacation have come to be used, through
conversion, as verbs:
 We bottled the home-brew last night;
 Have you buttered the toast?;
 Someone has to chair the meeting;
 They’re vacationing in Florida.
 Very productive process in Modern English, with new uses occurring

frequently.
…
 The conversion can involve verbs becoming nouns,

 Examples include;
 guess, must and spy becoming a guess, a must and a spy.
 Phrasal verbs (to print out, to take over) also become nouns (a printout, a
takeover).
 One complex verb combination (want to be) has become a new noun, as in
He isn’t in the group, he’s just a wannabe.
Activity
 Use the following Nouns as Verbs and Verbs as Nouns.
Noun→Verb Verb → Noun

dust to cheat
glue to doubt
Lexical Relations
 Words can have “relationships” with each other.
 In everyday talk, we often explain the meanings of words in terms of their relationships
 Examples; conceal, - “It’s the same as hide,” or
shallow - “the opposite of deep,”
 This approach is treated as the analysis of lexical relations.
Synonyms
 Two or more words with very closely related meanings are called synonyms.
 They can often, though not always, be substituted for each other in sentences.
 What was his answer? or What was his reply?
 Other common examples of synonyms are the following pairs:
almost/nearly big/large broad/wide buy/purchase

cab/taxi car/automobile couch/sofa doctor/physician
freedom/liberty handbag/purse hard/difficult sweat/perspire
…
 We should keep in mind that the idea of “sameness” of meaning used in discussing synonymy
is not necessarily “total sameness,”
 There are many occasions when one word is appropriate in a sentence, but its synonym would
be odd.
 For example,
 Answer and Reply : Sandy had only one answer correct on the test (not reply)
 broad and wide : a broad street, a wide street
in broad agreement (not wide)
in the whole wide world (not broad).
 Regional differences in the use of synonymous pairs,
 candy, chips, diaper and gasoline in American English
 sweets, crisps, nappy and petrol in British English.
 Formal versus Informal uses.

 My father purchased a large automobile
 My dad bought a big car,
Antonyms
 Two forms with opposite meanings are called antonyms.
 Some common examples are the pairs:

alive/dead big/small buy/sell enter/exit fast/slow
happy/sad hot/cold long/short male/female married/single
old/new raise/lower rich/poor smart/stupid true/false
Types of Antonyms
 “gradable” (opposites along a scale), comparative constructions
 I’m smaller than you and slower, sadder, colder, shorter and older, but luckily quite a bit richer
 the negative of one member of a gradable pair does not necessarily imply the other. For example, the
sentence My car isn’t old doesn’t have to mean My car is new
 “non-gradable” (direct opposites and “complementary pairs”), comparative constructions are
not normally used.
 the negative of one member of a non-gradable pair does imply the other member.
 My grandparents aren’t alive does indeed mean My grandparents are dead.
 Other non-gradable antonyms are the pairs: male/female, married/single and true/false.
 “reversives” (one is the reverse action of the other).

 While unpack can be treated as the opposite of pack, it does not mean “not pack.” It actually means
“do the reverse of pack.”
 Other examples include enter/exit, lengthen/shorten, raise/lower, tie/untie.
Homophones
 When two or more different (written) forms have the same pronunciation, they
are described as homophones.
 Words that sound the same but are different
 Common English examples are:

bare/bear meat/meet pail/pale
pair/pear right/write to/too/two
Homographs
 When two words are spelled the same but differ in both pronunciation and
meaning
 Words that are spelled the same but are different

Live; We live in London Live; She was singing live
Bass (class); fish Bass (ace); Instrument
Minute; Give me a minute Minute; She wanted to work on the minute details
Homonyms
 We use the term homonyms when one form (written or spoken) has two or
more unrelated meanings, as in these examples:
 Can be homophones, homographs or both

bat (flying creature) – bat (used in sports)
mole (on skin) – mole (small animal)
race (contest of speed) – race (ethnic group)
sole (single) – sole (part of foot or shoe)
Collocations
 The whole linguistic knowledge of the mature speakers of a language is organized on the basis
of collocation, which means ‘words frequently occurring together’.
 We all know which words tend to occur with other words.
 Examples;
 If you ask a thousand people what they think of when you say hammer, more than half will
say nail.
 If you say table, they’ll mostly say chair, and butter elicits bread, needle elicits thread and
salt elicits pepper.
 Some of the most common collocations are actually everyday phrases which may consist of
several words used together, i.e.,
 I don’t know what to do (six words),
 you know what I mean (five words)
 they don’t want to (four words).

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WORD FORMATION

Main Verbs Nouns Adjectives Adverbs

 Very productive process in Modern English, with new uses occurring

 The conversion can involve verbs becoming nouns,

Noun→Verb Verb → Noun

almost/nearly big/large broad/wide buy/purchase

 Formal versus Informal uses.

 Some common examples are the pairs:

 “reversives” (one is the reverse action of the other).

 Common English examples are:

 Common English examples are:

 Common English examples are:

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