Morphology Flashcards
Morphology
The study of words and phrases
Compound
When you put two or more words together, such as truck + driver = truck driver
Mobile phone, police chief
Secondary (verbal) compound
[weight lifter, wood chipper]
Phrasal words
Units that looks like a phrase but behaves morpho-syntactically like word.
[know-it-aller, has-been, Jack in the box]
Head
the central component of a word or phrase
Abbreviation
word formed by initial letters and pronounced letter by letter (SU, CIA)
Acronym
A word formed by initial letters and pronounced as as a word (NATO)
Example: PIN ‘personal identification number’
Blend
Combination of roots, which at least one is truncated (smoke + fog = smog)
Examples:
Motel is a blend constructed from ‘motor’ + ‘hotel’
breakfast + lunch = brunch
friend + enemy = frenemy
Lexeme
representation of a set of related word forms that share a common meaning
Lemma
Every word in its base form
Formally general
Can generally be attached to any potential base to create a new word (wide range of available bases)
Formally regular
Can be attached to a specified group of words with definable morphological/phonetic properties (potential base clearly defined)
Semantically regular
Morphological process produces new lexemes with the basic meaning
Polymorphemic
Words with more than one morpheme (contracted words
Semantic blocking
Inhibits a lexeme’s morphological derivation when there already is a word with the same meaning
Example: cowlet -> calf
Explain what it means if an affix is productive or not productive
An affix may be considered productive if it can currently be used to produce new lexemes. For examples, a productive affix such as-ness can be used to create a noun from an adjective, however are no longer used create new words
Explain what it means if an affix is formally general. Illustrate with examples
An affix may be considered formally general if it can attach to a large number of potential bases. For example, the suffix-ly can be added to to many adjectives to create adverbs
silent > silently
cautious > cautiously
Explain what it means if an affix is formally regular. Illustrate with examples
Follows consistent rues when attaching to base words like -ed in walked or talked
Explain that it means if an affix is semantically regular. Illustrate with examples
If it consistently adds the same meaning to every word it attaches to.
For example the prefix ‘un’ consistently means ‘not’ in words like unhappy or uncertain
Headless compounds
These compounds lack a clear head that determines the grammatical category and core meaning
(offscreen)
Exocentric Compounds
These compounds do not have a clear head that defines the compounds grammatical category and meaning. Instead the meaning of the compound is not directly reflected by either component
Pick pocket
