INTRODUCTION TO MORPHOLOGY

WHAT IS MORPHOLOGY?

It is the study of the structue of words, the

study of morphemes as the different

forms, and word formation

MORPHEMES

Morphemes are the minimal unit of world building in a language; they cannot be broken down any further into recognizable or meaningful parts.

MORPHEMES

FUNCTION

NATURE

POSITION

DERIVATIONAL

INFLECTIONAL

FREE BOUND

AFFIXES

SUFFIXES

PREFIXES

MORPHEMES

FREEBOUN

D

ALONE

AFFIXES

DERIVATIONAL

INFLECTIONAL

Cannot

stand they are

can stand

are or

CHANGE

BASEof

ten

CATEGORY

never

can be

the

of the

MORPHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS

INFLECTIONAL MORPHOLOGY: it deals with the differences between the shapes of the inflectional forms of variable lexemes. DERIVATIONAL MORPHOLOGY: it is the study of how affixes combines with stems to derive new words.

Inflectional Morphology

Noun Inflectional suffixes Plural maker –s

Girl-girls Possessive maker ‘s

Mary´s car Verbs Inflectional Suffixes

3rd. Person present singular marker bake-bakes

Past tense marker:-ed Wait-waited

Inflectional Morphology

Progressive marker –ing Sing-singing

Past Participle markers –en or ed Eat-eaten

Adjective inflectional suffixes Comparative maker –er

Fast-faster Superlative make-est

Fast-fastest

Derivational Morphology

Derivational affixes often changue the part of the speech of the base morpheme. Thus, read is a verb, but readable is an adjective.