Unit 1: Morphology

morphology

the study of the internal structure of words and how they are formed from smaller units of meaning

morpheme

The smallest units of language that carry meaning or a grammatical function

allomorph

an alternative phonetic or written realization of a single morpheme that changes its sound or shape depending on its environment without altering its core meaning

derivational

the process of forming a new word from an existing base word or root, usually by adding a prefix or a suffix

inflectional

Adds grammatical information such as tense, number, case, or comparison to a word.

word-formation process

the ways languages create new words or alter existing ones to expand vocabulary

affixation

a morphological process where a bound morpheme (an affix) attaches to a root, stem, or base word to alter its meaning, create a new word class, or express grammatical functions

reduplication

a morphological process where all or part of a word's root or stem is repeated to change its meaning or grammatical function

compounding

a word-formation process in morphology that combines two or more free morphemes (roots or stems) to create a new lexeme with a distinct meaning

function shift/conversion

a word-formation process in morphology where a word changes its part of speech (syntactic category) without any change to its spelling, pronunciation, or form

semantic shift

the evolution of a words meaning over time

blending

a word-formation process that creates a new lexeme by merging parts of two or more existing source words

clipping

word-formation process that shortens a polysyllabic word by dropping one or more syllables while keeping the same core meaning and word class (part of speech)

acronyms

non-morphematic word-formation processes where initial letters or sounds of a multi-word phrase are combined into a new lexical item

back formation

a word-formation process in morphology where a new word (a neologism) is created by removing a real or imagined affix (prefix or suffix) from an existing word, often changing its part of speech

morpheme-internal change

where a grammatical contrast—such as tense, aspect, or number—is signaled by altering an internal sound (usually a vowel) inside a root morpheme rather than by adding an affix

suppletion

a morphological process where an inflected form of a word is replaced by an unrelated, non-cognate word to fill a gap in a paradigm

borrowing

the transfer of bound grammatical formatives (such as affixes, clitics, or classifiers) or abstract structural patterns (such as reduplication) from one language to another due to language contact

compositionality

the meaning of a complex word is determined by the combined meanings of its smaller parts (morphemes like roots, prefixes, and suffixes) and the rules used to join them.

free/bound

Free morphemes can stand alone as complete words (e.g., dog, happy, run). Bound morphemes cannot stand alone and must attach to other word parts, such as prefixes (un-) or suffixes (-s, -ness)

affix

bound linguistic element or a physical attachment

prefix

Attached to the front of a root

suffix

Attached to the end of a root

infix

Inserted inside a root word

Circumfix

Attached around both ends of a root