2. Introduction
• Words: important part of linguistic knowledge &
constitute components of mental grammars
• Without words we are unable to convey
thoughts through lg or understand others’
thoughts
• Without knowledge of lg, it’s impossible to tell
how many words are in utterances
• Knowing a word = knowing a meaning &
pronunciation in mental lexicon
• Sound-meaning relation is arbitrary, e.g.,
homophone (bear vs. bare; 新/心/欣/馨/薪/辛/
芯), synonyms (sofa vs. couch; 拍手/鼓掌)
3. Mental Lexicon
• Mental dictionary lists unique phonological
representation, including spelling or
orthography, parts of speech (grammatical
categories, syntactic class)
• We can form grammatical S & distinguish
ill-formed S from well-formed S
4. Content Words &
Function Words
• Content words: N (objects: children), V (actions:
build), Adj (attributes: beautiful), Adv (ideas we
think about: seldom)
• Open class words: new words are addable, e.g.,
facebook, blog, online
• Function words: specify grammatical relations &
have little or no semantic content, including
possession (prepositions: in, of), articles (definite:
the, indefinite: a/an), conjunctions (and, or, but),
pronouns (it, them)
• Closed class words: hard to add new words
5. Empirical Evidences
• Brain-damaged patients & SLI have difficulty on
function words (in, which) rather than contents
words (inn, witch)
• Slips of the tongue has been observed on content
words but not function words, e.g., the journal of
the editor => the editor of the journal
• Children omit function words in acquisition, e.g.,
doggie (is) barking
• Content words vs. function words play diff roles
• Content words bear meanings
• Function words connect content words into larger
grammatical context
6. Morphemes
• The minimal units of meaning or the most
elemental unit of grammatical form (morpho-
/morph- means “form”)
• Morphology: study of internal structures of words &
rules by which words are formed (morph- + -ology:
branch of knowledge); refers to internal
grammatical knowledge concerning word forms
• Un- means “not” (see examples on p.37)
• Phon- means “pertaining to sound” (p. 37)
ㄨph- or pho-
• Words have rule-governed internal structures
e.g., uneaten *eatenun “not eaten”
• Un- must be prefixed, not suffixed, as im-
7. Formation of Words
• A single word may be composed of one or more
morphemes (see p. 38)
• A morpheme could be a single sound, atypical;
a single syllable, childish; two syllables, lady;
three syllables, crocodile; four syllables,
helicopter
• Morpheme: arbitrary union of sound & meaning
• Morpheme: cannot be analyzed into smaller
unit
• Linguistic sign: sound vs. meaning
8. Discreteness of Morphemes
• Monomorphemic words: words represent a single
morpheme, finger (ㄨ fing + er)
• Meaning of morphemes are constant
• Identical form represents two morphemes (same
form & diff meanings): singer, painter, worker, taller,
nicer, prettier
• Two morphemes have same meaning but diff
forms: singer, songster, youngster (monster!)
• Discreteness: decomposition of words into
morphemes; fundamental properties of human lg;
sounds=>morphemes=>words=>phrases=>S; diff
from animal communication; important part of
linguistic creativity, writable, (un)rewritable
9. Bound & Free Morphemes
• Morphological knowledge = knowledge of
individual morphemes + knowledge of rules
to combine them
• Free morpheme: morphemes that can stand
alone, boy, desire, gentle, man
• Bound morpheme: morphemes attached to a
base morpheme, -ish, -ness, -ly, pre-, un-,
trans-
• Affixes: bound morphemes attach at the
beginning, the end, in the middle, or both
beginning & end
10. Prefixes & Suffixes
• Prefix: affixes precede other morphemes, un-,
pre-, bi-
• Suffix: affixes follow other morphemes, -er, -ist,
-ing, -ly
• Languages differ in how they deploy affixation,
e.g., English plural form: -s, -es (suffix); Isthmus
Zapotec in Maxico: ka- (prefix) (p. 40)
• Languages differ in what meanings they
express through affixation, e.g., verb-to-noun in
English (dance); suffix –ak in Turkish (p. 40);
each other in English, -sh in Turkish (p. 40)p.41
11. Infixes & Circumfixes
• Infixes: morphemes insert into other
morphemes, e.g., Bontoc in Philippines, -um
inserted after 1st consonant (p. 41)
• Circumfixes (discontinuous morphemes):
morphemes are attached to a base morpheme
initially & finally, e.g., Chickasaw in Oklahoma,
ik- + -o to indicate a negative morpheme (p. 42);
German, ge- + -t to mean past participle of
verbs, lieb ‘love’ => geliebt ‘loved’ or ‘beloved’
12. Roots & Stems
• Morphological complex words = root + affix(es)
• Root: may or may not stand alone as a word,
(1) painter, reread, conceive, linguist
(2) the form around which circumfix attaches,
ikchokmo
(3) the form into which infix is inserted, fumikas ‘to
be strong’
• Hebrew & Arabic vary patterns of vowels &
syllables on nouns & verbs, e.g., infixing vowels in
ktb ‘write’ (p. 42)
• Stem = root + affix (p. 42)
• Base = any root or stem to which an affix is
attached, system, systematic, unsystematic,
unsystematical vs. unsystematically
13. Bound Roots
• Do not occur in isolation
• Acquire meaning only in combination with other
morphemes, receive, perceive, deceive, conceive;
permit, submit, admit, transmit
• For English speakers, Latinate morphemes have
no independent meaning
• Their meaning depends on entire words in which
they occur
• Prefix + bound root morpheme: nonplussed,
discern
• Bound morphemes convey meaning only in
combination, huckleberry (small, round, purplish
blue), lukewarm (somewhat)
14. Rules of Word Formation
• Pure + ify = purify
• Simple + ify = simplify
• False + ify = falsify
• Adjective + ify = Verb
‘to make adjective”
• Purify + cation = purification
• Simplify + cation = simplification
• Falsify + cation = falsification
• Verb +cation = Noun
‘the process of making adjective”
• How about ugly?
• Ugly + ify = uglify?
• Uglify + cation =
uglification?
• Morphological rules
of English in
combining words
15. Exercise 4: P. 67
Write the one proper description
from the list under B for the
italicized part of each world in A
16. Derivational Morphology
• When bound morphemes are attached to a base, a
new word with a new meaning is derived
e.g., pure + ify = purify ‘to make pure’
purify + cation = purification ‘the process of making
pure’
• In mental lexicon, derivational morphemes & rules
determine how we add to roots or stems
• Derived words: forms resulted from addition of
derivational morphemes, pouzy + ify = pouzify +
cation = pouzification (static electricity on hair)
• Derivational morphemes have clear semantic
contents & may result in different grammatical
classes
17. Derivational Affixes
• Desire + able = desirable (V to A)
• Dark + en = darken (A to V)
• Sweet + ie = sweetie (A to N) (p. 45)
• Application of morphological rules may be blocked
when a new word enters lexicon, e.g., communist
ㄨcommuian (grammarian) or communite
(Trotskyite); Chomskyan, Chomskyist, Chomskyite
(followers of Chomsky’s views of linguistics);
semanticist, semanticianㄨsemantite
• Two classes of derivational affixes: (1) trigger
sound change in pronunciation (-ity, -ive, -ize), (2)
without affecting pronunciation (-ness, -er) p. 46
18. Inflectional Morphology
• Bound morphemes for grammatical function,
e.g., tense, person, number
• Never change grammatical category of stems to
which they are attached, e.g., sail, sails, sailed,
has sailed (require syntactic rules), is sailing
• Inflectional morphemes does not add lexical
meaning; closely connected to syntax &
semantics of S
• Eight bound inflectional affixes in Modern
English (p. 47)
• Derivational morpheme + inflectional
morpheme, commit + ment + s
19. Inflectional Morphemes
• Apply freely to every appropriate base, very
productive, plural –s (unlike derivational
morphemes, idolize *picturize
• English has relatively little inflectional
morphology vs. Swahili in eastern Africa,
European lgs, Romans lgs from Latin (p. 47)
• Case morphology: grammatical relation of
nouns (case of nouns), Russian has rich
system of inflectional suffixes for grammatical
relations of nouns (p. 48)
20. Rich Inflectional
Processes
• German circumfixes: geliebt, ‘loved’ ‘beloved’
• Arabic infixes: kitáab ‘book’, kútub ‘books’
• Samoan reduplication: savali ‘he travels’,
savavali, ‘they travel’
• Malay reduplication: orang, ‘person’,
orangorang ‘people’
• Finnish have extraordinarily complex case
morphology; Chinese lack it entirely
• Distinctions bet inflectional vs. derivational(p.48)
21. Exercise 2: P. 66
Divide the following words by
placing a + between their
morphemes
22. Hierarchical Structure
of Words• Morphemes added in fixed orders reflect
hierarchical organization of words
• Hierarchical structure is essential property of
human lg
• Words & Ss relate to each other in specific & rule-
governed ways
• Words have internal structures but not simple
sequences
• Representations in tree diagrams, e.g.,
unsystematic (p. 49) + morphological rules
• -atic is closer than un- to system,ㄨunsystem
23. Morphological Rules
• Adjective + al = adjective (p. 50)
egotistical + al = egotistical
fantastical + al = fantastical
astronomic + astronomical
• Adjective + ly = adverb
happy + ly = happily
lazy + ly = lazily
hopeful + ly = hopefully
unsystematically (p. 50)
• Un- + noun = adjective (p . 51)
unemployment, unacceptance, *uncola!
• Part of linguistic
competence
includes ability to
recognize possible
vs. impossible words
24. Tree Diagrams
• Make explicit way that speakers represent
internal structure of morphologically complex
words in lgs
• Tree diagrams show that mental representation
of words is hierarchical & linear
• Inflectional morphemes are equally well
represented, refinalizes (p. 51)
• Ambiguous words show two clear hierarchical
structures based on meanings, unlockable (p.
51, 52), i.e., structure is important to
determining meaning
25. Rule Productivity I
• Some morphological rules are productive, e.g.,
verb + able = ‘able to be’, acceptable, laughable,
passable, changeable, breathable, adaptable,
downloadable, faxable
• Un- derives opposite meaning, unafraid, unfit, un-
American
• un-Rule is productive for adjectives derived from
verbs, unbelievable, unpickupable, unsimplified,
unauthorized, undistinguished
• Most un- words have polysyllabic bases, unfit,
uncool, unread, unclean, unhappy, uncrowdly;
most unacceptable un-forms are monosyllabic
stems, *unsad, *ungreat, *unred
26. Rule Productivity II
• Verb + -er = ‘one who does’, examiner, analyzer,
hunter; comparative –er ‘more’, greedier, nicer,
prettier, more beautiful
• Other productivity rules: sincere + ity = sincerity,
curious + ity = curiosity; warm + th = warmth,
wide + th = width; moist + en = moisten, ripe +
en = ripen
• Meanings can be predicted by attached prefixes,
unhappy ‘not happy’, acceptable ‘fit to be
accepted’; some are unpredictable (p. 53)
• Unpredictable words are listed individually in
the mental lexicon
27. Exceptions & Suppletions
• Children learn regular rules first, plural rule, past
tense rule
• Irregular rules (suppletions) are learned later, child
(children), man (men), foot (feet), mouse (mice),
go (went), sing (sang), bring (brought), run (run),
know (knew)
• Children’s speech errors in acquisition evidenced
existence of regular rules, goed, mans
• Suppletive forms are treated separately in
grammar, went, worse
• Regular forms + rules are listed in mental lexicon,
walked, taller
28. Zero Phonological Shape
• Hit + past tense = hit, Yesterday you hit the ball
• Sheep + plural form = sheep, The sheep are in the
meadow
• Derived verbs from nouns apply regular rules, ring
(encircle), The police ringed the bank with armed
menㄨrang; flied out (from fly ball),ㄨflew out
• Nouns lose meanings in compounds, flatfoot ‘cop’,
flatfoots,ㄨflatfeet
• Mothers-in-law, mother-in-law’s; courts-martial,
attorneys-general (legal setting)/ attorney-generals
(popular call); rightmost acts, footman, footmen,
ㄨfeetman, feetmen, footmans
29. Lexical Gaps
• Accidental caps = well-formed non-existing
words
• Words are not presented but could be added in
lexicon with permissible sound sequence, *blick,
*slarm, *krobe
• Phonotactic constraints should be considered,
*bnick for impossible English initials
• Mental grammar with morphological
components make us create & understand new
words & recognize possible & impossible words,
*magnificenter, more magnificent; *disobvious,
nonobvious
30. Back-Formations
• New words enter lg because of incorrect
morphological analyses, peddler => peddle
(p.56)
• Delibrately miscast back-formations, bikini (two)
from Marshall islands => monokini (one,
topless), tankini (tank top); martini (wine) =>
appletini, chocotini, mintini; action => act,
revision = > revise, television => televise,
resurrection => resurrect
• Lgs can be adaptable & changeable but not
corrupted
31. Compounds
• Flexible combinations in English (p. 57)
• When two words in same grammatical category,
compound will be in this category
noun + noun = noun, boyfriend, mailman
adj. + adj. = adj., icy-cold, red-hot, wordly-wise
• Compound head: the part of a word or phrase that
determines grammatical category of compounds
noun + adj. = adj., headstrong
verb + noun = noun, pickpocket
• Prepositions can be in compounds, overtake, sundown
• No compounding limit, four-dimensional space-time
(p.58)
• Compounds have internal structures, tophatrack (p. 58)
32. Meaning of Compounds
• Is not always sum of its parts, blackboard (green?
white?), Redcoat (English soldiers? red coat)
• Jumping beans, falling star, magnifying glass, but
how about looking glass? eating apple?
• Peanut oil, olive oil, how about baby oil?
• Horse meat (meat from horses), dog meat (meat
for dogs)
• Opaque compounds are unrelated to meanings of
parts, jack-in-a-box, turncoat, highbrow, bigwig,
egghead, flatfoot
• Stressed the first syllables of compounds
33. Universality of
Compounding
• Common & frequent process enlarging
vocabulary of all lgs, French, German, Russian,
Spanish, Native American lg Tohono, Twi (p.
59), Thai (p. 60)
• Pullet Surprises? Pulitzer Prizes?
• Errors reveal knowledge of morphology
longevity, ‘being very tall’
homogeneous, ‘devoted to home life’
34. Exercise 3: P. 67
Match each expression under
A with the one statement
under B that characterizes it
35. Morphological Analysis
• Case study 1: English (p. 61)
• Case study 2: Paku (p. 62)
• Case study 3: Michoacan Aztec (p. 63)
• Case study 4: Slavic examples (p. 63)
