Test 2 Study Guide: Morphology and syntax

These flashcards cover key vocabulary and concepts in morpho-syntax, essential for understanding morphology and syntax.

Morphology

The study of the structure and formation of words.

Morpheme

The smallest grammatical unit in a language.

Free Morpheme

A morpheme that can stand alone as a word.

Bound Morpheme

A morpheme that cannot stand alone and must be attached to a free morpheme.

Derivational Morpheme

A morpheme that changes the meaning or grammatical category of a word.

Inflectional Morpheme

A morpheme that modifies a word's tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, and mood.

Etymology

The study of the origin of words and how their meanings have changed.

Root vs. Stem

A root is the base part of a word, while a stem is the base word to which affixes are attached.

Affix

A morpheme added to a word to alter its meaning or create a new word.

Suffix

An affix that is added at the end of a word.

Prefix

An affix that is added at the beginning of a word.

Circumfix

An affix that is added to both the beginning and the end of a word.

Infix

An affix inserted within a word.

Word Formation Process

The various methods used to create new words.

Borrowing

The process of taking words from one language and incorporating them into another.

Compounding

The process of combining two or more free morphemes to create a new word.

Blends

Words formed by merging parts of two words.

Clips

Words formed by shortening longer words.

Acronyms

Words formed from the initial letters of a phrase.

Reduplication

The process of repeating a word or part of a word.

Suppletion

A morphological phenomenon where an inflected form is phonetically unrelated to the base.

Conversion

The process by which a word changes from one grammatical category to another without any change in form.

Ablaut

A change in the vowel sound of a word to convey grammatical information.

Morphological Typology

The classification of languages based on their morphological structures.

Analytic Language

A language that uses separate words and minimal inflection to convey grammatical relationships.

Synthetic Language

A language that uses inflection or agglutination to convey grammatical relationships.

Agglutinating Language

A type of synthetic language where affixes are added in a linear fashion to convey meaning.

Fusional Language

A type of synthetic language where affixes express multiple grammatical features.

Polysynthetic Language

A language that forms complex words by combining multiple morphemes.

Syntax

The set of rules that govern the structure of sentences.

Grammaticality

The quality of a sentence being in accordance with the rules of syntax.

Constituent

A word or a group of words that function as a single unit within a hierarchical structure.

Constituency Tests

Methods used to determine whether a particular word or phrase can be considered a constituent.

Word Order

The arrangement of words in a sentence, typically Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) in English.

Argument

A necessary participant in the action of the verb.

Complement

A word or phrase that completes the meaning of the predicate.

Adjunct

An optional element that adds information to the sentence.

Agreement Features

The grammatical features that subjects and verbs must match in English.

Syntactic Categories

Classes of words that share similar grammatical properties.

Subcategorization Frame

A representation that shows the arguments that a verb can take.

Verb Transitivity

A classification of verbs based on whether they require direct objects.

Phrase Structure Rules

Formal rules that describe the structure of syntactic phrases.

Syntax Trees

Visual representations that illustrate the syntactic structure of sentences.

Types of Ambiguity

Different forms of ambiguity that occur in language, such as lexical and structural.

Sentence Derivation

The process of generating sentences using grammatical rules and transformations.

Coordination

A syntactic process that links words, phrases, or clauses of equal importance.

Movement

A syntactic process that changes the position of constituents in sentences.

Deletion

A syntactic process that involves the omission of certain elements within a sentence.

Recursion

The ability to embed clauses within clauses in a hierarchical manner.