Morphology I - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

Morphology I

Linguistics 101

Gareth Price

Duke UniversitySlide2

Morphology

Morph

+

ology

Morphe

= shape/form

Ology

= study, science of

Study of the formation (v, n) of words?Slide3

How many words in the English language?

Accidental gaps: words which follow the phonological rules of a language, but which don’t actually exist

How many words do you know?

Not easy to answer – linguists rarely agree.

College educated: 10,000 to 60,000

Why is it difficult to know?

Mental lexiconSlide4

plinkling

grimoulously

klints

twongier

pendy

thrustling

stangliness

centomer

splimly

centome

stribble

plinkleable

decentome

plinkler

stribbling

klintish

liggeted

pendierr

pentful

glosselstrop

thrustle

stromp

grimulous

acturously

ponymous

brimney

stang

parples

stribbled

klint

unplinkleableness

twength

parple

sloke

pendiest

fustered

twong

restribble

sloken

klintly

acturous

stangs

strissed

twongest

liggetsSlide5

Word Classes

Lexical Words

Nouns / Adjectives / Verbs / Adverbs

‘Open class’

Semantic content

Easily added to and modified

Most words are lexical words

Function Words

Determiners (a, the, an)

Pronouns (I, you, she, his, theirs)

Conjunctions (and, but)

Prepositions (to, in, without, for)

Intensifiers (very, too)

Auxiliary/Modal verbs (must, may, will)

‘Closed class’

Grammatical content

Tend not to be easily changed or added toSlide6

Morphemes

Smallest unit of words which have:

semantic content (meaning)

grammaticality (function)

un (semantic) + build (semantic)

magic (semantic) +

ician

(grammaticality)

cat (semantic) + s (grammaticality)

cat = four legged, furry, feline

s

= pluralSlide7

Morphemes

One

Two

Three

More than

three

a

and

dog

dog-s

write

write-r

pleasepleas-ingredred-derdoun-doun-do-ableun-do-able-nesscalibercalibr-atere-calibr-atere-calibr-at-ion

Words with one morpheme: simple

“ two or more morphemes: complexSlide8

Free vs. Bound Morphemes

birds

 bird / *-s

undo

 do / *un-

Hare (

Athapaskan

)

*

fi

‘head’ 

sefi

‘my head’*be ‘belly’  nebe ‘your belly’*dze ‘heart’  ?edze ‘someone’s heart / a heart’Thai:Boon thaan khaaw leewBoon eat rice – past tense marker‘Boon ate rice’ Slide9

Allomorphs

a / an

pot

s

pig

s

bridge

s

Turkish:

lokanta

‘a restaurant’ –

lokantada

‘in/at a restaurant’kapi ‘a door’ – kapida ‘in/at a door’kitap ‘a book’ – kitapta ‘in/at a book’koltuk ‘a chair’ – koltukta ‘in/at a chair’taraf ‘a side’ ?randevu ‘an appointment’  ?Note: the morphology of a word is the study of its shape and meaning – but shape can be writing or sound Slide10

Roots, Stems and Affixes

Root + affix

= complex word

Black + en = blacken

(root + suffix)

a

djective + suffix = verb

blacken +

ed

= blackened

verb + suffix = past tense verb

black =

root and stem for blackenblack = root & blacken = stem for blackenedunblackened = prefix + root + suffix + suffix but ... unhappiness?un + happy + ness?un + knowledge? / un + ability?Slide11

Infixes

Tagalog

:

takbuh

‘run’ – t-

um

-

akbuh

‘ran’

lakad

‘walk’ – l-

um-

akad ‘walked’Insertion of an affix within a base: in this case before the first vowel.Arabic:katab ‘write’ kutib ‘have been written’ aktub ‘be writing’ uktab ‘being written’Insertion of two vowels sounds among the three consonants which comprise the rootSlide12

Internal Change

Internal Change

Changes in an internal non-morphemic segment to illustrate grammatical contrast.

sing – sang – sung

sink – sank – sunk

foot – feet

goose – geese

In English, there is a vowel change (

ablaut

) to mark past tense.

Umlaut: ‘

fronting’ of vowel in response to front vowel in following syllable

go:s  go:iz  gi:iz  gi:s Not infixing, however, as not changing the base *gs or *sng or *ftno such morpheme as ‘oo’/‘ee’ or ‘i’/‘a’ Slide13

Suppletion

Can be completely different morph (sound):

French:

avoir

‘to have’



eu

‘had’

Spanish:

ir

‘to go’ 

fue

‘(he) went’German: ist ‘is’  sind ‘are’English: to be/is/are/we/were / to go/went Slide14

Suppletion or Internal Change?

But ...

think / thought

seek / sought

catch / caught

Probably extreme forms of internal change – sometimes called

partial

suppletionSlide15

Summary ...

How many words in a language? How many do you know?