chap 2 morphology: the words of L

Question 1

affix

Answer 1

A bound morpheme attached to a stem or root.

Question 2

back-formation

Answer 2

Creation of a new word by removing an affix from an old word: e.g., donate from donation; or by removing what is mistakenly considered an affix: e.g., edit from editor.

Question 3

base

Answer 3

Any root or stem to which an affix is attached.

Question 4

blocked

Answer 4

A derivation that is prevented by a prior application of morphological rules: e.g., when Commun + ist entered the language, words such as Commun + ite (as in Trotsky + ite) or Commun + ian (as in grammar + ian) were not needed and were not formed.

Question 5

bound morpheme

Answer 5

A morpheme that must be attached to other morphemes: e.g., -ly, -ed, non-. Bound morphemes are prefixes, suffixes, infixes, circumfixes, and some roots such as cran in cranberry.

Question 6

case morphology

Answer 6

The process of inflectional morphemes combining with nouns to indicate the grammatical relation of the noun in its sentence: e.g., in Russian, the inflectional suffix -a added to a noun indicates that the noun is an object.

Question 7

circumfix

Answer 7

A bound morpheme, parts of which occur in a word both before and after the root: e.g., ge—t in German geliebt, ‘loved,’ from the root lieb

Question 8

closed class

Answer 8

A category, generally a functional category, that rarely has new words added to it: e.g., prepositions, conjunctions.

Question 9

compound

Answer 9

word composed of two or more words, which may be written as a single word or as words separated by spaces or hyphens: e.g., dogcatcher, dog biscuit, dog-tired

Question 10

content words

Answer 10

The nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs that constitute the major part of the vocabulary.

Question 11

derivational affix

Answer 11

A morpheme added to a stem or root to form a new stem or word, possibly, but not necessarily, resulting in a change in syntactic category: e.g., -er added to a verb like kick to give the noun kicker.

Question 12

derived word

Answer 12

The form that results from the addition of a derivational morpheme: e.g., firmly from firm + ly.

Question 13

discontinuous morphemes

Answer 13

morpheme with multiple parts that occur in more than one place in a word or sentence: e.g., ge and t in German geliebt, ‘loved.’

Question 14

form

Answer 14

The phonological or gestural representation of a morpheme or word.

Question 15

free morpheme

Answer 15

A single morpheme that constitutes a word: e.g., dog.

Question 16

function word

Answer 16

A word that does not always have a clear lexical meaning but has a grammatical function; function words include conjunctions, prepositions, articles, auxiliaries, complementizers, and pronouns.

Question 17

grammatical category

Answer 17

Traditionally called “parts of speech”; also called syntactic categories; expressions of the same grammatical category can generally substitute for one another without loss of grammaticality: e.g., noun phrase, verb phrase, adjective, auxiliary verb.

Question 18

head (of a compound)

Answer 18

The rightmost word: e.g., house in doghouse. It generally indicates the category and general meaning of the compound.

Question 19

infix

Answer 19

A bound morpheme that is inserted in the middle of another morpheme: e.g., Tagalog sulat ‘writing’ but sumulat ‘to write’ after insertion of the infix um.

Question 20

inflectional affix

Answer 20

A bound grammatical morpheme that is affixed to a word according to rules of syntax: e.g., third-person singular verbal suffix -s.

Question 21

lexical gap

Answer 21

A possible but nonoccurring word; a form that obeys the phonotactic constraints of a language yet has no meaning: e.g., blick in English.

Question 22

linguistic performance

Answer 22

The use of linguistic competence in the production and comprehension of language; behavior as distinguished from linguistic knowledge: e.g., linguistic competence permits one-million-word sentences, but linguistic performance prevents this from happening.

Question 23

linguistic sign

Answer 23

sound or gesture, typically a morpheme in a spoken language and a sign in a sign language, that has a form bound to a meaning in a single unit: e.g., dog is a linguistic sign whose form is its pronunciation [dag] and whose meaning is Canis familiaris (or however we define “dog”).

Question 24

meaning

Answer 24

The conceptual or semantic aspect of a sign or utterance that permits us to comprehend the message being conveyed. Expressions in language generally have both form—pronunciation or gesture—and meaning.

Question 25

monomorphemic word

Answer 25

A word that consists of one morpheme.

Question 26

morpheme

Answer 26

Smallest unit of linguistic meaning or function: e.g., sheepdogs contains three morphemes, sheep, dog, and the function morpheme for plural, s.

Question 27

morphological rules

Answer 27

Rules for combining morphemes to form stems and words.

Question 28

morphology

Answer 28

The study of the structure of words; the component of the grammar that includes the rules of word formation

Question 29

open class

Answer 29

The class of lexical content words; a category of words that commonly adds new words: e.g., nouns, verbs

Question 30

orthography

Answer 30

The written form of a language; spelling.

Question 31

prefix

Answer 31

An affix that is attached to the beginning of a morpheme or stem: e.g., in- in inoperable.

Question 32

productive

Answer 32

Refers to morphological rules that can be used freely and apply to all forms to create new words: e.g., the addition to an adjective of -ish meaning ‘having somewhat of the quality,’ such as newish, tallish, incredible-ish.

Question 33

reduplication

Answer 33

A morphological process that repeats or copies all or part of a word to produce a new word: e.g., wishy-washy, teensy-weensy, hurly-burly. Also used in some languages as an inflectional process: e.g., Samoan manao/mananao, ‘he wishes/they wish.’

Question 34

root

Answer 34

The morpheme that remains when all affixes are stripped from a complex word: e.g., system from un + system + atic + ally.

Question 35

sign languages

Answer 35

The languages used by deaf people in which linguistic units such as morphemes and words as well as grammatical relations are formed by manual and other body movements.

Question 36

slip of the tongue

Answer 36

An involuntary deviation of an intended utterance. Also called a speech error.

Question 37

stem

Answer 37

The base to which an affix is attached to create a more complex form that may be another stem or a word.

Question 38

suffix

Answer 38

An affix that is attached to the end of a morpheme or stem: e.g., -er in Lew is taller than Bill.

Question 39

syntactic class

Answer 39

Traditionally called “parts of speech”; also called syntactic categories; expressions of the same grammatical category can generally substitute for one another without loss of grammaticality: e.g., noun phrase, verb phrase, adjective, auxiliary verb.

Question 40

tree diagram

Answer 40

A graphical representation of the linear and hierarchical structure of a phrase or sentence. A phrase structure tree.