MORPHOLOGY

In the following, I am going to present a basic set of terminology with concise explanations.

affix, prefix, suffix

Prefixes are affixes in front of a root; suffixes are affixes following the root.

agglutinating/isolating/inflectional language

We can distinguish between three morphological systems in languages:

• agglutinating: words are clearly set up out of derivational morphemes (Inuit language)
• isolating: each word is a single morpheme (Chinese)
• inflectional: words use inflectional morphemes to change their function (German, English, French)

allomorph

a morpheme can have different morphs (different realisations). These morphs are allomorphs of this morpheme.

bound root

No entry.

content word/functional word

• content words: words which refer to a concrete or abstract entity (dog, love)
function words: words which have a certain function (conjunctions, determiners)

grammatical word

The grammatical functions of a word-form.

lexeme

A lexeme is a dictionary word, an abstract vocabulary item, a unit in a lexicon. A lexeme is not the same as the root of a word. The root is a concrete morphological item which one can work with, whereas the lexeme is just an abstract concept.
If we have an item such as unthinkable, the root would be think. The lexeme, on the other hand, is unthinkable.
A lexeme does not know declination or conjugation. Thus in he runs and they run, runs/run do have nothing to do with the lexeme run, because they are concrete manifestations of the lexeme.

morph

Concrete realisation of morphemes.

morpheme

Smallest, indivisible unit of meaning in language (semantic content or grammatical function). Abstract!

• bound: a m. that cannot stand alone as a word (-ment).
• derivational: a m. that changes class or meaning of a word. (develop > development)
• free: a m. that can stand alone as a word (cardriver)
• inflectional: a m. that changes syntactic function fo a word. (develop > develops)

open/closed word classes

A Distinction which serves to describe the vocabulary of a language:

• open: nouns, verbs and adjectives > new words can easily be derived.
• closed: prepositions, pronouns, determiners > new words are hardly ever derived.

portmanteau morph

A p. is a single morph which realises a bundle of several different morphemes. For example, "cut" does not only realise the root-morpheme, but also the past-morpheme (which is a zero morph). "went" does not only realise the morpheme "go", but also the past-morpheme (which is also a zero-morph).

productivity/semi-productivity

No entry.

root/stem

If you take a word-form and remove all inflectional and derivational affixes, you get the root of a word-form. Stem is a synonym, but is only used when talking about inflectional affixes.

unique morph

No entry.

word-form

Concrete realisation of a lexeme.

word-formation

The way words come into being can be described according to the following mechanisms:

• back-formation: a new noun is reduced to a verb (internet browser > to browse)
• borrowing: turning a foreign word into a word of one's own language (doppelganger)
• compounding: putting existing words together (corn-flakes)
• conversion (= zero-derivation, functional shift): an existing word can be used in a new class without overt change (e-mail > to e-mail)
• derivation: adding derivational morphemes (cool > coolness)
• invention: coming up with completely new words (nerd)
• semantic shift: old words are used for new meanings (mouse > computer mouse)
• shortening
  
• clipping: cutting last parts of a word (feds)
• acronym: initials pronounced as one word (NASA)
• initialism: initials pronounced as series of letters (U.S.A.)
• blend: combining parts of existing words (motel)

zero morph

Occurs in certain past-forms of a verb, for example cut, cut, cut. A morpheme is realised as "nothing".