Morphology: Word Structure and Classification

Morphology

• Concerned with the internal organization of words and studies the minimal units of meaning and word-formation processes.

Lexical Words

• Include nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.
• Carry semantic content.
• Can stand alone in a sentence.
• Are open class words.

Function Words

• Include prepositions, conjunctions, determiners, pronouns, and auxiliary verbs.
• Carry grammatical information rather than meaning.
• Help to construct the grammatical framework of a sentence.
• Are closed class words.

Difference between Lexical and Function Words

• Lexical words carry significant meaning and contribute to the content of the sentence.
• Function words provide grammatical structure and relational meaning.

Open and Closed Class Systems

• Open class words: categories that regularly accept new members.
• Closed class words: categories that do not readily accept new members.

Word Formation Processes

• Compounding: combining two or more words (e.g., toothbrush).
• Derivation: adding prefixes or suffixes to a base word (e.g., unhappy, happiness).
• Inflection: modifying a word to express different grammatical categories (e.g., walked, cats).
• Clipping: shortening a longer word (e.g., exam from examination).
• Blending: combining parts of two words to create a new word (e.g., brunch from breakfast and lunch).
• Acronyms and Initialisms: forming words from the initial letters of a phrase (e.g., NASA, FBI).
• Conversion: changing the word class without changing the form (e.g., to text, from a noun to a verb).

Prefixes and Suffixes

• Prefixes: added to the beginning of a word (e.g., "un-", "re-").
• Suffixes: added to the end of a word (e.g., "-ness", "-able").
• Affixes that change the word class: suffixes like "-ness" (noun from adjective), "-ment" (noun from verb), and "-ly" (adverb from adjective).

Typical Suffixes for Nouns, Adjectives, Adverbs, and Verbs

• Nouns: -ness, -ment, -tion, -ity
• Adjectives: -ful, -less, -able, -ous
• Adverbs: -ly, -wise
• Verbs: -ize, -ify

Acronyms, Initialisms, and Abbreviations

• Acronyms: pronounced as a word and formed from initial letters (e.g., NASA).
• Initialisms: pronounced as individual letters (e.g., FBI).
• Abbreviations: shortened forms of words (e.g., "Dr." for "Doctor").

Present Perfect Simple and Present Perfect Continuous

• Present perfect simple: focuses on the result or completion of an action (e.g., "I have finished my homework.").
• Present perfect continuous: emphasizes the duration or ongoing nature of an action (e.g., "I have been studying for three hours.").

Narrative Tenses

• Include past simple, past continuous, past perfect, and past perfect continuous.
• Each tense has a different use in storytelling:
  • Past simple: describes completed actions.
  • Past continuous: describes ongoing actions in the past.
  • Past perfect: describes actions completed before another action in the past.
  • Past perfect continuous: emphasizes the duration of an action before another action in the past.

State Verbs and Dynamic Verbs

• State verbs: describe states or conditions.
• Dynamic verbs: describe actions or processes.

Demonstrative Pronouns and Determiners

• Demonstrative pronouns: replace nouns (e.g., "This is mine.").
• Demonstrative determiners: modify nouns (e.g., "This book...").

Explore the world of words! Learn about the internal organization of words, lexical and function words, and their main characteristics in this linguistics quiz.