CHAPTER TWO

INTRODUCTION TO WORD-STRUCTURE

Morphology: Is the study of internal structure in a word.

The word is divided into morphemes so by the combination of morphemes

we would have (word).

Lexeme: The abstract vocabulary item which is saved in our mind or in our
mental dictionary ( the form of the word which is regarded as a ‘’root’’)

 e.g: sleep (it is unchangeable word).

Word form: The physical representation of lexeme.

 e.g.: verb ( sleep, sleeping, slept, sleeps)

 e.g.: noun ( car, cars)
 e.g.: adj. ( tall, taller, tallest)

Q/ What is the difference between lexeme and word form?

 Lexeme is an abstract word and we can’t divided it in smaller. ( FLY)

 Word forms is the concrete and we can write several forms of the same
word. ( fly ,flying ….)

The grammatical words: we have in this branch to pay attention to each

position in a sentence ( morpho - syntactic) properties refers to the fact that there
be a relationship between morphology and syntax. The properties are (noun,
adjective, verb, tense, number, gender) morpho-syntactic properties. Sometimes
we have the same word and the same form which would have more than one
grammatical properties.

 e.g.: cut ( can take the different forms in the past and present without any
addition.
 e.g.: usually I cut the bread on the table.
 e.g.: yesterday I cut the bread in the sink.

1
First sentence is present and the second sentence in the past.(which explain the
grammatical properties). The word (cut) can be a noun or a verb, so the
grammatical properties’ means the different forms of the same word. All the
words in English has lexeme and word form, but for grammatical word just
some words are regarded as grammatical words such as ( cat, put,… )

Morpheme: Is the smallest unit of a language which has meaning or

grammatical function.

Morpheme can’t be divided into smaller parts.

 e.g.: unhappy (un) is a prefix morpheme with grammatical function the

grammatical function her is to make negative adjective.

There are some words that in the past were regarded as a morpheme but now in
modern English they lost their productivity such as ( helicopter ). Some
morpheme although they have productivity but they don’t have a constituent
meaning when they are added to different word.

 e.g.: The morpheme ( fer ) in ( prefer, infer, confer, defer ) they have
different meaning.

Morph: The physical representation of morpheme. when we say (un) this is a

morpheme but if we put it in word ( unhappy ) we will call it a morph.

 e.g.: I parked the car. her we have 5 morphs.

Allomorph: Different representation of the same morpheme.

 e.g.: The morpheme (s) can have different allomorphs of the same
morpheme such as /s/ in cats, /z/ in dogs, /iz/ in watches.

Assimilation: When two consonants sounds are beside each other one of them
takes the sound of the neighbor consonant.

 e.g.: walked in this word the last sound of the word is voiceless so when
we added (ed) the pronunciation of (ed) will be /t/.

Allomorph:

A- Morphology-phonology interaction.

2
Relationship between phonology and morphology when we want to justify some
morphological behaviors in a language we have to make relationship between
morphology and phonology in a way that some phonological rules be the
reason of some morphological behavior.

B- Morphology - syntax interaction

Relationship between morphology and syntax in a way will have grammatical

explanation to justify some morphological behavior. We have the different
allomorphs of the prefix in :-

1. impossible /im/
2. intangible / in /
3. incomplete /ing/

These are different allomorphs of the same morpheme in. with grammatical
function stated as negative adj.

a- Select [im] before a labial sound

 e.g.: impossible in patient , im morable (P,b,f,m)

b- Select [iŋ] before the velar consonant (k,g)

 e.g.: in complete , ingratitude

c- Select [in] elsewhere (alveolar) (t, d, s, z) vowels to

 e.g.: intolerable, inactive …….. etc.

This Type of Allomorph is Phonologically conditioned (this means that we

have phonological explanations to justify the Allomorph).

Grammatical conditioning :- In this case it's grammar which specify between

Lexically conditioning:- Any plural which is not based on the addition of plural
"s" (special words )

 e.g.: ox →oxen √
 e.g.: Ox →oxes X

Suppleion : When the allomorphs of one single morpheme are not phonetically
related.

 e.g.: good →better →best (phonetically unrelated )

3
Underlining representation : The base form of adding a morpheme to an adj.

 e.g.: im +possible → impossible

Derivation:- The stages which a form goes through when it is being convened
from an underlining representation to a phonetic representation.

a. select [im] before a labial consonant (e.g. p, b, f, m) as in [im]possible,

[im]patient, [im]movable.

b. select [iŋ] before the velar consonants [k] (here spelt with 'c')

and [g] as in [iŋ]compliance, [iŋ]compatible, [iŋ]gratitude.

c. select [m] elsewhere, i.e. before an alveolar consonant like [t, d, s, z, n], as in
[m]tolerable, [m]tangible and [m]decent or before a vowel as in [m]active,
[m]elegance.
The whole process is called " derivation "

How can we be certain that the base form is /m/ rather than lim/ or /iŋ/?

We have seen that the nasal assimilates to the place of articulation of the
consonant that follows it. The fact that when a vowel follows we still find [in]
appearing as in [ in-ɔ:dibl] inaudible, and [ in-evitəlbl] inevitable is very
revealing. From a phonetic point of view, vowels do not have definite places of
articulation, only consonants do. So, a consonant cannot assimilate to the place
of articulation of a vowel.

Q/ what is the difference between syllables and morphemes ?

Syllable refers to a group of sounds and it's for the purpose of articulation, while
morphemes are the smallest units which has meaning or grammatical function .

The relationship between morpheme and morph :-

One –one relationship :- Is the relationship between one morph to one

morpheme

(one pronunciation and morph and morpheme are the same) * this means that it
doesn't have any allomorphs.

One–multiple :- When we have one morpheme and different allomorph (which

are regarded as morph)

4
 Ex:- (in , "s")
1) Impossible 1) dogs
2) Incomplete 2) cats
3) Intangible 3) watches

* red circles represent different type of allomorphs

Homophones :- Pores which sound the same but differ in their meaning .

Ex:- right wright write rite

1. Multiple morph used to refer to when a single morph represents a bundle

of several different grammatical elements: -

e.g.: (was) it can be (verb to be, past tense, singular)

2. Multiple-one : when we have multiple morpheme and one morph

e.g.: fact + al → factual

Underlined letter (u) is not a part of fact nor al so it is regarded as empty

morph (morph which doesn't have any morpheme).

3. (Zero allomorph) Empty morph(formative) : It is a morph which doesn't

have any morpheme.

e.g.: cut (this word does not have allomorph)

CHAPTER THREE
TYPES OF MORPHEMES
3.1.1 Roots
A root is the irreducible core of a word, with absolutely nothing else attached
to it. For example, walk is a root and it appears in the set of word-forms that
instantiate the lexeme WALK such as walk, walks, walking and walked. In that
case, word-forms that represent the same morpheme do not share a common root
morpheme. Thus, although both the word-forms good and better realise the
5
lexeme GOOD, only good is phonetically similar to GOOD. Roots which are
capable of standing independently are called free morphemes occurring in
isolation. The free morphemes in [3.1] are examples of lexical morphemes.
They are nouns, adjectives, verbs, prepositions or adverbs. referring to
individuals (e.g. the nouns John, mother), attributing properties (e.g. the
adjectives kind, clever), describing actions, process or states (e.g. the verbs hit,
write, rest) etc., expressing relations (e.g. the prepositions in, on, under) and
describing circumstances like manner (e.g. kindly). function words. These differ
from lexical morphemes in that while the lexical morphemes carry most of the
'semantic content', the function words mainly (but not exclusively) signal
words include the following: [3.2] Function words
articles a, the
demonstratives This, that, these, those
pronouns I, you, we, they, them, my, your, his, hers, etc.
conjunctions And, yet, if, but, however, or, etc.
Distinguishing between lexical and grammatical morphemes is normally both
useful and straightforward. say, the article the. While only roots can be free
morphemes, not all roots are free. Many roots are incapable of occurring in
isolation. They always occur with some other word-building element attached to
them. Such roots are called bound morphemes. Examples of bound morphemes
are given below: [3.3]
a. –mit in permit, remit, commit, admit
b. -ceive as in perceive, receive, conceive
c. pred as in predator, predatory, predation, depredate
d. sedas as in sedan, sedate, sedent, sedentary, sediment

The bound roots -mit, -ceive, -pred and sed- co-occur with forms like de-, re-, -
ate, -ment which recur in numerous other words as prefixes or suffixes. None of
these roots could occur as an independent word. Roots tend to have a core
6
meaning which is in some way modified by the affix. But determining meaning
is sometimes tricky. Perhaps you are able to recognise the meaning 'prey' that
runs through the root pred- in the various words These roots are latinate, -mit
means 'send, do' and -ceive means 'take' without looking up -mit and -ceive in an
etymological dictionary. In present-day English none of these meanings is
recognisable. the crucial thing about morphemes is not that they are
independently meaningful, but that they are recognisable distributional units. we
can recognise a morpheme when we see a morph 'which can be connected to a
linguistic entity outside that string. What is important is not its meaning, but its
arbitrariness.

3.1.2 Affixes

An affix is a morpheme which only occurs when attached to some other

morpheme or morphemes such as a root or stem or base. No word may contain
only an affix standing on its own, like *-s or *-ed or *-a/ or even a number of
affixes strung together like *-al-s. There are three types of affixes.

(i) Prefixes

A prefix is an affix attached before a root or stem or base like re-, un- and in-:

[3.5] re-make un-kind in-decent

re-read un-tidy in-accurate

(ii) Suffixes

A suffix is an affix attached after a root (or stem or base) like-ly, -er, -ist, -s, -
ing and -ed.

[3.6] kind-ly wait-er book-s walk-ed

quick-ly play-er mat-s jump-ed

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(iii) Infixes

An infix is an affix inserted into the root itself. Infixes are very common in
Semitic languages like Arabic. But infix is somewhat rare in English. Sloat and
Taylor (1978) suggest that the only infix that occurs in English morphology is /-
n-/ which is inserted before the last consonant of the root in a few words of Latin
origin, on what appears to be an arbitrary basis. This infix undergoes place of
articulation assimilation. Thus, the root -cub- meaning 'lie in, on or upon'
occurs without [m] before the [b] in some words containing that root, e.g.
incubate, incubus, concubine and succubus. But [ m] is infixed before that
same root in some other words like incumbent, succumb, and decumbent. This
infix is a frozen historical relic from Latin.

b. kangaroo ~ kanga-bloody-roo

impossible ~ in-fuckin-possible

guarantee ~ guaran-friggin-tee

3.1.3 Roots, Stems and Bases

The stem is that part of a word that is in existence before any inflectional
affixes (i.e. those affixes whose presence is required by the syntax such as
markers of singular and plural number in nouns, tense in verbs etc.) have

b [3.8] Noun stem Plural

cat -s

worker -s

In the word-form cats, the plural inflectional suffix -s is attached to the simple
stem cat, which is a bare root, i.e. the irreducible core of the word. In workers
the same inflectional -s suffix comes after a slightly more complex stem
consisting of the root work plus the suffix -er which is used to form nouns from
8
verbs (with the meaning 'someone who does the action designated by the verb
(e.g. worker)'). Here work is the root, but worker is the stem to which -s is
attached. Finally, a base is any unit whatsoever to which affixes of any kind can
be added. The affixes attached to a base may be inflectional affixes selected for
syntactic reasons or derivational affixes which alter the meaning or
grammatical category of the base. An unadorned root like boy can be a base
since it can have attached to it inflectional affixes like -s to form the plural boys
or derivational affixes like -ish to turn the noun boy into the adjective boyish. In
other words, all roots are bases. Bases are called stems only in the context of
inflectional morphology.[3.10]

Inflectional Derivational Roots Stems Bases

Affixes Affixes faith faith faith
ed - un- frog frogmarch faithful
-s -ful march bookshop frogmarch
-ly clean window cleaner bookshop
-er hard hardship window-clean
-ness window cleaner hardship
-ship
It is clear from [3.10) that it is possible to form a complex word by adding
affixes to a form containing more than one root. For instance, the independent
words frog and march can be joined together to form the base (a stem, to be
precise) frog-march to which the suffix -ed may be added to yield [[frog]-
[march]-ed]. Similarly, window and clean can be joined to form the base
[[window]-[clean]] to which the derivational suffix -er can be added to produce
[[[window]-[clean]]er]. And [[[Window]-[cleaner]]] can serve as a stem to
which the inflectional plural ending -s is attached to give [[[[Window]-

9
[cleaner]]]s]. A word like this which contains more than one root is a called
compound word.

3.1.4 Stem Extenders

In English, empty formatives are interposed between the root, base or stem and
an affix. For instance, while the irregular plural allomorph -en is attached
directly to the stem ox to form ox-en, in the formation of child-rnen and breth-r-
en it can only be added after the stem has been extended by attaching -r- to
child- and breth-. Hence, the name stem extender for this type of formative. The
use of stem extenders may not be entirely arbitrary. There may be a good
historical reason for the use of particular stem extenders before certain affixes.
To some extent, current word-formation rules reflect the history of the language.
The history of stem extender -r- is instructive. A small number of nouns in Old
English formed their plural by adding -er. The word 'child' was cild in the
singular and cilder in the plural (a form that has survived in some conservative
North of England dialects, and is spelled childer). But later, -en was added as an
additional plural ending. Eventually -er lost its value as a marker of plural and it
simply became a stem extender.

3.2 INFLECTIONAL AND DERIVATIONAL MORPHEMES

This reflects a recognition of two principal word building processes: inflection

and derivation. While all morphologists accept this distinction in some form, it
is nevertheless one of the most contentious issues in morphological theory.
Inflectional and derivational morphemes form words in different ways.
Derivational morphemes form new words either:

(i) by changing the meaning of the base to which they are attached, e.g. kind vs
un-kind (both are adjectives but with opposite meanings); obey vs dis-obey (both
are verbs but with opposite meanings).

10
(ii) by changing the word-class that a base belongs to, e.g. the addition of -ly to
the adjectives kind and simple produces the adverbs kindly and simp-ly. As a
rule, it is possible to derive an adverb by adding the suffix -ly to an adjectival
base.

Sometimes the presence of a derivational affix causes a major grammatical

change, involving moving the base from one word-class into another as in
the case of -less which turns a noun into an adjective. In other cases, the
change caused by a derivational suffix may be minor. It may merely shift a
base to a different sub-class within the same broader word-class.

i. modifying significantly the meaning of the base to which they are

attached, without necessarily changing its grammatical category (see kind
and unkind above); or
ii. they bring about a shift in the grammatical class of a base as well as a
possible change in meaning (as in the case of hard (Adj) and hardship (N
(abs)); or
iii. they may cause a shift in the grammatical sub-class of a word without
moving it into a new word-class (as in the case of friend (N (cone)) and
friend-ship (N ( abs)). With that in mind, study the data below which
contain the derivational prefix en-.

[3.17] Base New word Base New word

cage en-cage noble en-noble

large en-large rich en-rich

robe en-robe rage en-rage

danger en-danger able en-able

(i) State the word-classes (e.g. noun, adjective, verb, etc.) of the bases to which
en- is prefixed.
11
(ii) What is the word-class of the new word resulting from the prefixation of en-
in each case?

(iii) What is the meaning (or meanings) of en- in these words? Consult a good
dictionary, if you are not sure. Is there reason to regard en as a homophonous
morph?

So, we conclude that there are two different prefixes here which happen be
homophones. The en- has a causative meaning (similar to 'make'). To enable is
to 'make able', to enlarge is to 'make large', etc.

Unlike derivational morphemes, inflectional morphemes do not change

referential or cognitive meaning. We have already seen that a derivational affix
like un- can change kind into un-kind. In this case, the derived word has a
meaning which is opposite to that of the input. The addition of an inflectional
affix will not do such a thing. Furthermore, while a derivational affix may
move a base into a new word-class (e.g., kind (adjective) but kind-ly (adverb), an
inflectional morpheme does not alter the word-class of the base to which it is
attached. Inflectional morphemes are only able to modify the form of a word so
that it can fit into a particular syntactic slot. Thus, book and books are both
nouns referring to the same kind of entity. [3.19]

Suffix Stem Function Examples

-s N plural book-s

-s v 3rd person, singular, present tense sleep-s

-ed v past tense walk-ed

-ing v progressive (incomplete action) walk-ing

-er Adj comparative degree tall-er

-est Adj superlative degree tall-est

12
Below I have presented an additional inflectional suffix. What is this suffix
called and what is its function in each example?

[3.20] a. Janet's book.

b. The Winter's Tale.

c. in two days' time.

The -s suffix in [3.20] is usually called the genitive suffix. Quirk and
Greenbaum (1973) list these, among others, as the uses of the genitive suffix in
English:

(i) marking the noun referring to the possessor of something (as in Janet's book),

(ii) marking a noun that describes something (as in The Winter's Tale),

(iii) marking a noun used as a measure (in two days' time). We will return this
and refine our analysis of genitive-s.

3.3 MULTIPLE AFFIXATION

Let us take the Latinate root -diet- meaning 'speak, say' which is found in
diction, dictate, dictatorial, contradict, benediction, etc. Starting with -diet-, we
can form complex words such as contradictory and contradictoriness by
attaching several affixes to the root, i.e. we can have multiple affixation. This
process can take place in a number of rounds,

However, performance difficulties in working out what exactly great-great

great- great grandson or re-re-re-make means do severely restrict the chances
of such words being used. But the point is that the grammar cannot exclude
them as ill-formed. Recursive rules are one of the devices that make morphology
open-ended. They make possible the creation of new words with the same
morphemes being used again and again. Re-attaching the same morpheme again
13
and again is permitted, but unusual. What is common is multiple affixation of
different affixes. It is such affixation that we will concentrate on. We have
already seen an example of it in contradict-ori-ness in.

[3.23] nation

nation-al
national-ise
denationalis-at-ion de-nationalise (but there is no *denationalisate)
anti-denationalisation
pre-antidenationalisation

Observe that where several prefixes or suffixes occur in a word, their place in
the sequence is normally rigidly fixed. Whereas there is usually some scope for
rearranging words in different orders in sentences

3.4 COMPOUNDING

compound word contains at least two bases which are both words, or at any rate,
root morphemes. Analyse the following compounds into their constituent
elements: teapot, week-end, hairdresser, kind-hearted. Compounding is a very
important way of adding to the word stock of English as we will see. Sometimes
it is bare roots that are combined in compounds and sometimes an input base
contains an affixed form.

3.5 CONVERSION

We have seen that complex words may be formed either by compounding or by

affixation, or by a combination of the two. Words may be formed without
modifying the form of the input word that serves as the base. Thus head can be a
noun or verb. This is called conversion. It is partly the morphological structure,
and partly the syntactic position that the word occupies that tells you whether it
is a noun or a verb. From a syntactic point of view, we know that in.

14
[3.26a] the head is a noun phrase. The key word in a noun phrase must be a
noun. As head occurs following the and is the key word in this construction,
head must be a noun.

But from a morphological point of view, we cannot tell whether head, is a

noun or verb when it occurs with no affixes. However, in the case of heads, the
presence of the -s morph which here realizes the plural in nouns gives us a
useful clue.

By contrast, in [3.26b] head must be a verb. It comes after the auxiliary verb
will in a slot that is typically filled by verbs. In the second example, head has
attached to it the -ed morph representing the past tense morpheme which is only
found in verbs.

Furthermore, from a syntactic point of view, we know that she is the subject
and that school is the object. The sentence must also have a verb. The verb
occurs between the subject and the object. (The order of sentence constituents in
English is Subject Verb Object.) So, headed must be the verb, since it occurs
between the subject and the object.

The use of zero in derivational morphology is controversial. Since neither the

original noun head, nor the derived verb head, has an overt suffix, if we assume
that zero suffixation takes place here, we end up with a somewhat absurd
situation where a zero suffix on the noun is said to contrast with a zero suffix
on the derived verb. It is more prudent to recognize conversion as a distinct
word-forming mechanism and to restrict zero morphs to inflectional
morphology where it is supported by the evidence. Universal Grammar which
determine the properties of rules that grammars of individual languages may
have. An integral part of the study of universals in language is the study of
differences between languages. This might look odd to begin with. But it turns
out that differences between the structural patterns found in different languages

15
appear to occur within a fairly restricted range. The study of the range of
patterns within which languages may vary is the domain of language typology.

3.6 MORPHOLOGICAL TYPOLOGY

Morphological typology: A system for classifying the world's languages based

on how their morphemes are used.

Typology: Is the classification of languages on the basis of shared formal

characteristics.

(i) Analytic (also called Isolating) languages.

(ii) Agglutinating (also called Agglutinative) languages.

(iii) Inflecting (also called synthetic or Fusional) languages.

(iv) Incorporating (also called Polysynthetic) languages.

(v) Infixing languages.

Two main morphological types: Analytic languages and Synthetic

languages.

1. Analytic or Isolating Languages: These are also known as isolating

languages because they're composed of isolated, or free, morphemes. Free
morphemes can be words on their own, such as cat or happy. Languages that are
purely analytic in structure don't use any prefixes or suffixes, ever. However, it's
rare to find a language that is purely analytic or synthetic since most languages
have characteristics of both.

e.g. Chinese

ta bu hui yong dao chi fan

he no can use knife eat rice

16
He cannot eat rice with a knife.

2.Agglutinating or Agglutinative languages: Have words which may consist

of more than one, and possibly many, morphemes. With these languages,
morphemes within words are usually clearly recognizable in a way that makes it
easy to tell where the morpheme boundaries are. Their affixes usually only have
a single meaning. Turkish, Korean, Hungarian, Japanese, and Finnish are all in
this group.(Agglutinative languages). Turkish is a classic example of an
agglutinating language. In this kind of language there tends to be a more or less
one-to-one matching of morphemes with morphs:

e.g. Turkish

 ev → house (nom. sg.)

 ev-ler → houses (nom. pl.)
 ev-i → his/her house (sg.+poss.)
 ev-ler-i → his/her houses (pl.+poss.)
 ev-den → in front of the house (sg.+abl.)
 ev-ler-den → in front of the houses (pl.+abl.)

3. Inflectional Synthetic or Fusional languages: inflecting language. Words

usually

consist of several morphemes. Differ from analytic languages because they do

use affixes, also known as bound morphemes.

Synthetic languages include three subcategories: agglutinative, fusional, and

polysynthetic.

 Fusional languages: Words are formed by adding bound morpheme to

the stem, the affix may not be easy to separate from the stem.

e.g. Spanish

17
  hablo==> I am speaking.
 habla==> she is speaking.
 hablé==> I spoke.

[ -o ] First person singular present tense.

[ -a ] Third person singular present tense.

[ -e ] First person singular past tense.

NOTE: Fusional language often differ from agglutinating languages in other

way as well: Agglutinating language usually have only one meaning indicate by
each affix, but in Fusional languages a single affix may convey several
meanings simultaneously.

4. Incorporating or Polysynthetic language: Highly complex words may be

formed by combining several stems and affixes. this is usually a matter of
making nouns ( subject, object, etc…)

e.g. You can express in Eskimo in one word (e.g. tuttusivuq), that may include a
verb and its object, what is said using a whole sentence containing several words
in English (and even more words in Chinese). Eskimo is a language with long
words (e.g. illuminiippuq) that tend to have very extensive agglutination and
inflection.

5. infixing language: Traditional typology neglected this morphological

processes typical of semitic languages like Arabic and Hebrew. Much of semitic
inflection involves infixing vowels in a root that consists entirely of consonants.
Thus, in Egyptian Arabic the three-consonant root ktb means 'write'. It provides
the skeleton which is fleshed out with a variety of vowels in the formation of
word-forms which belong to the lexeme KTB, such as:

[3.32] kitab 'book'

katab 'he wrote'
18
 katib 'writer'
The result or the basis of typology classification.

 If a language has between 1.00 and 1.99 morphemes per word it is

analytic (isolating). With 1.68 morphemes per word in Greenberg's
sample of sentences, English falls in the essentially isolating category. (It
is similar to Chinese)
 A language averaging between 2.00 and 2.99 morphemes per word, is
synthetic (inflecting) if the realisation of the different morphemes tends to
be simultaneous (as in Latin).
 A language averaging between 2.00 and 2.99 morphemes per word is
agglutinative if each morpheme tends to be realised by a separate morph
(as in Turkish).
 A language is incorporating if it averages 3.00 morphemes per word or
more (e.g. Eskimo).

(d) On the basis of these data, would you classify Swahili as an isolating,
agglutinating, synthetic or incorporating language?

nilipata 'I got' niliwapiga 'I hit them'

walipata 'they got' walitupiga 'they hit us'
nilipiga 'I hit' walikipiga 'they hit it'
nilikipata 'I got it' utatupiga 'you will hit us'
ulikipata 'you got it' ulipata 'you got'
nitakipata 'I will get it' watakupiga 'they will hit you'
ulipiga 'you hit' ulitupiga 'you hit us'
watakipiga 'they will hit it' nitakupata 'I will get you'
Note: Here the form 'hit' as in 'you hit' represents the past tense
form of the verb hit and 'you' stands for 'second person singular'.
3. (a) Make a morphological analysis of the following Latin data:
19
 Present tense Pluperfect

rego 'I rule' rekseram 'I had ruled'

regis 'you (sing.) rule' rekseras 'you (sing.) had ruled'

regit 'slhe rules' rekserat 's/he had ruled'

regimus 'we rule' rekseramus 'we had ruled'

regitis 'you (pl.) rule' rekseratis 'you (pl.) had ruled'

regunt 'they rule' rekserant 'they had ruled'

Future simple

regam 'I shall rule'

reges 'you (sing.) shall rule'

reget 'slhe will rule'

regemus 'we will rule'

regetis 'you (pl.) will rule'

regent 'they will rule'

reg when it is followed by a vowel and rek

when it is followed by a consonant the morphological process is assimilation. the type of

language is inflecting.

rekseram 3 morpheme.

CHAPTER FOUR

PRODUCTIVITY IN WORD-FORMATION

4.1 THE OPEN-ENDEDNESS OF THE LEXICON

It is true that a large percent of real words that occur in the dictionaries. But

 there are lots of words that are created at the moment of the speech
spontaneously!
 The language is spontaneously and creates fresh terms [Neologisms], the
creation of the new words based on the morphological rules through word
formation processes like:

e.g. email, snail-mail. e.g. pear / pair.

 Lexicon can be listed in a dictionary; but sentences could not.

No dictionary, however large, not every word in the English language. why is
this so?
20
The word formation rules-is passive to the question of analyzing the new words;
they actually are more interested in the old ones. the more such words we
recognize as part of the language the bigger and more open-ended will our
lexicon be. There is a problem with syntax.

To distinguish which combination of the words are compounds or syntactic

phrases is not a simple task.

e.g. lakeside grammar school former pupils. compound

nouns.

Is all the sentence a compound noun, too?

All the sentence seems to be a syntactic phrase, except if we consider that the
whole sentence above is the name of a team.

generality. The more general a word-formation process

It’s possible to add to the lexicon of a language by pillaging the vocabulary.

This is called borrowing.

Pillaging (borrowing) some words of another languages sometimes is possible

for some languages that has been in contact… the more general word formation
process is, the more productive it will assume to be.

1. Productivity is a matter of degree. some processes are relatively more

general.
2. Productivity is subject to the dimension of time. a very general process
may become a less general in other historical periods. list all the suffixes [
ist, id, er ] all of them are derivational. The Latinate suffix–ist may be add
to noun bases which can also take the derivational suffix-ism

Chart-Ism Chartist
Commun-Ism Communist
Racism Racist
Anarquism Anarchist
*Pianism Pianist
It can also be add to noun bases to form adjectives e.g. RACEN - RACISTADJ

1. [N] – IST meaning advocate of ( anarquist / communist );

2. [N] - IST: meaning 'practitioner of' (pianist, violinist, etc.);
3. [N] - ADJ-IST: meaning 'advocate of' (as in racist, sexist, etc.).
21
Finally, The native Germanic suffix -er is suffixed to verbs to create agentive
nouns (with the meaning 'someone who does whatever is designated by the
verb').

Productive: A process is considered if it is very general or affect a vast number

of forms and creates very many words. e.g. the agentive morpheme –er changes
verbs in nouns.

To work Worker
To write Writer
To dance Dancer
To teach Teacher
Did you find 5 new terms with id?

 I expect that you have had some difficulty in finding five more adjectives
which contain the derivational suffix-id.
 This morpheme is in the unproductive end of English morphology. It is
frozen.

4.1.2 Semi-Productivity

Mattheus ( 1972 ) recognized a special category which they call semi-

productivity to cover idiosyncratic affixes which inexplicably fail to attach to
apparently eligible forms. the meaning of the resulting word may be
unpredictable. – ant (suffix)

the suffix –ant turns a verbal base into an agentive nominal (similar to-er).

-ant suffix e.g. communicant defendant applicant Latinate word

dependant participant assistant Latinate word

* writ(e)ant *buildant *shoutant

The reason for the restriction of the use of this affix is historical;

This suffix is descendent of Latin present participle –antem / entem, so it

attaches to Latinate bases only. Semantically –ant has unpredictable effects.

22
 productivity

creativity

It is the capacity of all human people to produce an infinite number of words

and utterances. in the domain of morphology the creativity manifests in two
ways:

1. Rule govern creativity.

2. Rule bending creativity.

The majority of the words are formed by following rules, defined patterns,
however sometimes some words are created by creative processes that
necessarily do not follow any pattern.

e.g. redlegs – ( poor whites in Tobago ), deadline, Walkman, tallboy,

Constraint on Productivity

 Not even word that is produced is allow!

blocking. e.g. thieve *stealer blocking

Q/ Least effort principle?

Blocking may prevent the formation of words with existing synonyms,

particularly if the blocked form is morphologically complex and the existing
synonyms is morphologically simple.

e.g. Stealer which is blocked by the existing simple form thief.

Where there exist two semantic similar morphemes one of which is more
productive than the other. The more productive morpheme is less susceptible to
blocking. this can be seen with the behavior of the suffixes –ity and –ness.
Aronoff (1976) has shown that the suffixation of –ness is more productive than
the suffixation of –ity.

Pre-existing noun Noun (-ity ) Noun ( -ness )

Glory *glorisosity Gloriousness
23
 Fury *furiosity Furiousness
Space *spaciosity Spaciousness

Dimensions of Blocking

Phonological

Morphological

Semantic

Phonological Factors

(i) the base must be monosyllabic;

(ii) the base must end in an obstruent (i.e. stop, fricative or affricate),

Blocking can be motivated by phonological considerations. Let’s focus on –ly .

We have already seen that this derivational suffix is attached in a highly
predictable manner to adjectives to form adverb such as: [4.10]

Adjective Adverb Adjective Adverb

kind kindly elegant elegantly
fierce fiercely serious seriously
Note, the adverbs in [4.11] are disallowed, or at best awkward, even though they
might be listed in dictionaries. Suggest a phonological motivation for this
restriction. [4.11]
Adjective Adverb Adjective Adverb

24
 silly *sillily friendly *friendlily
miserly *miserlily sisterly *sisterlily
What [4.11] shows is that the segmental phonology of the base can determine
whether a form can undergo -ly suffixation. The -ly suffix tends to be avoided
where an adjective ends in -ly (/-h/). Suffixing -ly would result in a dispreferred
/-hh/ sequence in the derived adverb. But -ly is used freely where the adjective
does not end in –ly.
4.2.1.2 Morphological factors
The morphological properties of a base may prevent the application of
morphological rules. Often native morphemes behave differently from
foreign morphemes. Some affixes are typically added either to native bases
or to bases of foreign origin. For example, as we saw above in [4.5] -ant (as
in defendant) is suffixed to bases of French origin. Similarly, the rule of velar
softening which changes /k/ (usually spelled with the letter c) to [ s] is
essentially restricted to words of Latin and French origin:
[4.14] Velar Softenin
 /k/ ~ [s] before a suffix commencing with a nonlow vowel (e.g. i)

The effects of velar softening can be seen in [4.15]:

 cynic, cynical ~ cyni~ism
 critic, critical ~ criticism, criticise
 fanatic - ~ fanaticism –
 ascetic ~ asceticism
 scepti~ ~ scepti~ism
Velar softening only affects words with Romance roots. So, if a thinker
called Blake developed a new philosophy, we might call it Blakism
[bleikizm]. But we could not call it *Blacism [bleisizm], since Blake is not a
Romance root.
A. What is the meaning of -hood in [4.16]?
B. Show the relevance of the distinction between native and foreign bases in
the selection of bases to which -hood is suffixed.
Hint: Consult a good etymological dictionary. This exercise requires some
knowledge of the historical sources of English words. [4.16]
a. boy-hood brother-hood man-hood maiden-hood
girl-hood sister-hood woman-hood maid-hood
child-hood king-hood priest-hood knight-hood
b. *judge- *governor- *colonel-hood *minister -
hood hood hood
*director-hood *author-hood *prisoner- *general-
hood hood
4.2.1.3 Semantic factors

25
Semantic considerations too may impinge on the application of word formation
processes. This is seen in the way the otherwise general process of forming
compounds from Adjective plus past participle (Ved)

[4.19] short-sleeved (shirt) one-armed (bandit)

short-sighted (man) three-legged (stool)
green-roofed (house) red-nosed (reindeer)
blue-eyed (boy) red-haired (woman)
[4.20] *two-carred (family) (for 'a family with two cars')
*big-Alsatianed (woman) (for 'a woman with a big Alsatian')
Compound adjectives derived from the past participle (Ved) form of the verb are
most likely to be permitted where the root to which -ed is added is inalienably
possessed (i.e. obligatorily possessed) by the head noun that it modifies. The
compound words in [4.19] are permissible because someone's eyes are an
integral part of their body. Similarly, the legs of a stool, the sleeves of a shirt
and the roof of a building are an obligatorily possessed part of some piece of
furniture, garment or building. But it certainly is not the case that an Alsatian
dog or a car must necessarily be possessed by someone.

The negative prefix un- attaches to the positive adjective (see [4.22a]). If un- is
attached to the negative member of the pair as in [4.22b] the resulting word is
usually ill-formed. [4.22]

a. unwell b. *unill
unloved *unhated
unhappy *unsad
unwise *unfoolish
unclean *unfilthy, *undirty
unoptimistic *unpessimistic
As seen, if there are words representing the two poles of the same semantic
dimension, we tend to prefer treating the positive end as unmarked (i.e. as
normal). We are happier to derive the marked (i.e. 'unusual'), less favourable
meaning by prefixing the negative prefix to a positive base than doing the
reverse. That is why a happy person is not said to be *unsad.

4.2.1.4 Aesthetic factors and the adoption of words

In some cases word-formation is inhibited by vague aesthetic factors. There are

many examples of words that are in principle well-formed whose adoption has
nevertheless been resisted. stagflation In the 1970s, the word stagflation was
coined to refer to the combination of economic stagnation and a high level of

26
inflation that afflicted the world economy at that time. Other 'ugly' words which
raise hackles include talkathon, swimathon, knitathon, etc.

4.3 DOES PRODUCTIVITY SEPARATE INFLECTION FROM

DERIVATION?

Productivity is often taken as a criterion for distinguishing inflection from

derivation. Derivational processes are by and large much more unpredictable
than inflectional ones. While inflectional processes usually affect most of the
eligible forms in a regular manner, derivational rules tend to be capricious.

i. It is general. The addition of particular inflectional affixes is not subject to

various arbitrary restrictions. Stems that belong to a given class normally
receive all the affixes that belong to that class.
ii. The words resulting from the addition of inflectional affixes have regular
and predictable meanings.

Another way to put it is to say that typically inflectional morphology displays

lexemic paradigms but derivational morphology does not. Paradigms are
regular and predictable sets of word-forms belonging to the same set of lexemes.
They share morphological characteristics (e.g. prefixes, suffixes or infixes).
Such words belong to a particular word-class or sub-class. The selection of a
specific word-form is determined by the syntax.

[4.23] walk walks walked walking

love loves loved loving
Usually inflectional morphology exemplifies automatic productivity. Most
English verbs have these forms. So, if we encounter a new verb like the made-up
verb pockle (meaning perhaps 'to go (away in a huff)'), we can predict that it
will have the forms to pockle, pockles, pockled and pockling with the standard
meanings. By contrast, as a rule, paradigms cannot be set up for derivational
morphology. If we try to produce a paradigm with the derivational suffixes -ate,
-ant and -ation, we soon get thwarted.

Our putative paradigm in [4.24] is riddled with gaps:

[4.24] Verb (X) Noun (one who does Noun (act of X)

X)
communicate communicant communication
donate ---------- donation
27
 navigate ---------- navigation
rotate ---------- rotation
militate militant ---------
applicate applicant application
(obsolete) accountant ------------
----------- ------------ natation (art of
swimming)
 Assume that wherever paradigms can be recognised, one is dealing with
inflection. as in [4.23].
 If there is no regular paradigms exist, one is dealing with derivation. as in
[4.24].

There are derivational processes which appear to fall into very general
paradigm-like patterns:

There is a minority which are not marked for number. They belong to different
subclasses of non-count nouns referring to entities that are not individually
counted:

i. Some non-count nouns have a plural form but lack a plural meaning:

[4.25] *alm alms

*outskirt outskirts
*oat oats
*linguistic linguistics
*new news
Other non-count nouns lack a plural form altogether (they do not refer to
itemised individual entities which are counted in English:

[4.26] milk *milks

health *healths
equipment *equipments
courage *courages
4.4.1 Potential Words

knowing a language involves, among other things, knowing the rules of word-
formation. If we came across 'words' like grestifier and disperidate we would
recognise them as potential English words.

How do we know this?

The answer lies in the nature of our mental lexicon.

28
The lexicon has a set of phonotactic constraints which function as a filter
allowing entry only to phonologically well-formed words. Before any putative
word can enter the lexicon, it must have a combination of sounds that is
permissible in the language. So, 'words' like *ltarpment and *mpandy are
immediately rejected because the consonant combinations /lt/ and /mp/ are
disallowed at the beginning of a word in English.

4.4.2 Knowledge of Language and the Role of the Lexicon

The lexicon is a mechanism for capturing broad regularities involving words in a

language. For instance, using phonotactic constraints English speakers can
distinguishing very generally between, on the one hand, possible words (which
may not be instantiated in sentences and utterances, e.g. grestifier) and, on the
other hand, impossible words (e.g. *ltarpment).

Nonetheless, it is the case that the lexicon in a generative grammar must list
various kinds of information about words (and morphemes and idioms) which
have to be memorised. For example, speakers of English who know the word
aardvark need to memorise at least this information:

(i) Meaning: it refers to a Southern-African insectivorous quadruped

mammal.
(ii) Phonological properties: its pronunciation /a:dva:k/.
(iii) Grammatical properties: e.g. it is a count noun (you can have one
aardvark, two aardvarks).

CHAPTER FIVE

29
 INTRODUCING LEXICAL MORPHOLOGY

In this chapter we focus on a theory named lexical morphology . and sometimes

it is called lexical phonology .

Is an approach to phonology that accounts for the interactions of morphology

and phonology in the word building process.

This is a kind of model in which the application of different affixation would

be discussed .

Some important points of this model lexical morphology . and lexical

phonology model) :

1- The first thing is that it is the word rather than the morpheme which is
regarded as the unit of morphology .

2- There must be a bi-directional relationship between the morphological rules

and phonological rules. In other words in this model a kind of connection is
made between morphology and phonology .

In this case it is said that there is a kind of a mutual relationship between.

 The morphological rules which build or made structural of a word .

 The phonological rules which are responsible for the pronunciation of the
word . It is claimed that all of these rules are located in the lexicon .

3-In the lexicon we have some blocks which called strata (levels or layers) and
the way that these strata are arrange in a hierarchy arrangement.

We have two main parts :

 The first part which is called lexical .

30
  The second part called post-lexical which is (syntax and post lexical
phonology) .

The lexical part actually is the lexicon , in the lexicon we have a, (morphological
and phonological rules which are interrelated in the way that they are located in
the strata in a hierarchical arrangement ).

So when we want to analyze , affixation or morphological rules in the

framework of this model .at first we would have underived lexical entries (the
simple form of the words or the root ).

Then we have different strata (stratum1, stratum2 and stratum 3 ) The rule of
affixation for example would be applied in a way that we would have the
addition of different affixes in multiple affixation for example in (a stratum1at
first and then in a stratum 2 and then instruction 3 ) so we have the addition of
different affixes stage by stage each affix would belong to its own stratum .

In a stratum (1)

On the left hand: We have (+ boundary inflection and derivation ) it would

include irregular derivation and inflection).

On the right hand : We have example of (stress , shortening ) We have the

influence of these rules may be:

 The placement of the stress would be changed .

 The pronunciation would be change.

For example the long vowel would be changed to a short vowel .

Examples : Irregular inflection , see - saw (past tense)

Irregular derivation long - length (adj) to (noun)

In a stratum (2)

On the left hand: we have (boundary derivation and compounding) it would be

related to (regular derivation and compounding)

So if we have any affixation which is a the type of derivation which is regular it

is applied on stratum (2) , compounding is also applied on stratum (2 )

On the right hand : We have example of (compound stress ) when we have the
change of stress in a compound word .
31
Examples : Regular derivation kind - kindly (adj) to (adv)

Compounding

In a stratum (3)

On the left hand: We have (boundary inflection) all the regular inflections are
applied in stratum(3) .

You can write regular inflection. In this way we can have a systemic application
of morphological rules staged by stage ,level by level in a way that each kind of
them would belong to its own stratum.

On the right hand: The effect of stratum (3) rules would be for example laxing
.

Examples : Regular inflection walk - walked (past)

Here on the left hand we have the morphological rules and on the right hand
we have the phonological rules in this way, these two branches of linguistics are
interrelated in this model morphology and phenology .This is the general
explanation of lexical morphology model .

The important to mention here is that for explanation in this book by convention
we would have two strata not three. When we want to analyze any kind of
affixation , we would have two strata. In a way that all the irregular rules are
happening in stratum 1 other ones are happening in Stratum 2.

32
The different affixes and different classification of affixes based on the effect
that they would have on the root or not .( in affixation we have the addition of
any kind of prefix, infix or suffix to the root to create a new word , this is the
general definition of affixation)

Now we want to explain the affixation in the framework of this model (lexical
morphology ) At first we refer to different kinds of affixes in English .When we
focus on the affixes based on the effect that the affixes would have on the root.
they are divided into neutral and non-neutral .

 Neutral: When nothing happens to the root. It means that the affix doesn't
effect on the pronunciation of the root .
 Non-neutral: When in effects on the pronunciation of the root When the
affix is added to the root. The pronunciation of the root would be
changed.

When we review different types of affixes, we see that some affixes are neutral.
Means that when they are added to the root nothing happens to the
pronunciation of the root. The pronunciation of the root would remain as before.
They are not neutral but some affixes as they are added to the root they would
change the pronunciation of the root may be by changing the placement of the
stress or sometimes by changing the pronunciation of some sounds in the root
and they are called non-neutral.

a. 'abstract 'abstract-ness b. 'home 'home-less

'serious 'serious-ness 'power 'power-less

a'lert a'lert-ness 'paper 'paper-less
The placement of the stress is not changed as the affixed (ness) and (less) is
added to the root so here we have the kind of neutral affix both( ness and less )
are neutral because they don't change the pronunciation of the root. In this case
they don't change the placement of stress .

a. strategy strategic b. detain detainee

morpheme morphemic absent absentee
photograph photographic pay payee
democrat democratic employ employee

The suffix ( ic) is called a pre-accenting suffix. It means that The stress is going
to the syllable immediately preceding the suffix therefore when the suffix (ic) is

33
added to the root. The stress is moved to a syllable immediately preceding it and
we call it pre-accenting suffix and in this case it would be a kind of non-neutral
suffix.

The suffix (ee ) is called auto- stress surface . It means that the suffix would
take the stress from the base in to itself . It attracts the stress of the root and
again it is a kind of non-neutral suffix .

Both of them are non-neutral because they change the placement of the
Stress. They change the pronunciation of the base or the root .

In the model :

 Non-neutral affixes are added in the first stratum.

 Neutral affixes are added in the second stratum.

So one way of specifying the affixes to their own stratum is to classify them to
neutral and non-natural and to see whether it is neutral or not neutral.

 If it is non-neutral, it belongs to the first stratum.

 If it is neutral it belongs to the second stratum.

( B ) Is non-natural because the pronunciation is changed.

 (wide )in the root [au] is changed to [I] so it is non-natural.

 (long) ) in the root [o] is changed to [e] so it is non-natural.

(C) Is neutral because the pronunciation of the root is not changed.

 wide widely
 broad broadly

Therefore in the frame of this model we can justify the ill-formness of some
words because it is mentioned that stratum 1 affixes are nearer to the root. Than
stratum 2 affixes .

34
[5.4] a. [root]

b. [stratum 1 affix- root- stratum 1 affix]

c. [stratum 2 affix - stratum 1 affix - root - stratum 1 affix - stratum 2 affix]

Derivation in lexical morphology in number (5-4) you can see the formula
which explains derivation in lexical morphology .

5.5 a. [r] b. [[r]s1]

Mendel Mendel-ian
Mongol Mongol-ian
grammar grammar-ian
Skakespeare Skakespeare-an

(Shakespearian)
c.[[[r]s1 ]s2] d. [[[r]s2]s1]
Mendel-ian-ism *Mendel-ism-ian
Mongol-ian-ism *Mongol-ism-ian
grammar-ian-ism *grammar-ism-ian
Skakespeare-an-ism *Skakespeare-ism-(i)an
(Shakespearianism)

So based on this explanation we can just by the ill-formness of some words for
example words number (5_5) Section A B and C all of them are well- formed
but words in section D ill-formed . We do not have such forms in English and
the reason is that the affixes are not added in their own stratum . For example 1
affix belonging to the 2 stratum is added in the 1 stratum so the word would be
ill-formed.

For example :

Grammar-ian-ism:- here we have two affixes ian and ism,

 ian belongs to the first stratum because it is non-neutral.

 ism belongs to the second stratum because it is neutral.

So we have to obey the ordering of the levels at first ian is added to the word
and then ism the word is well-formed. but if we change the order *grammar-
ism-ian . this is ill-formed because the ordering of the levels or strata is not
obeyed .

[5.6] Suffix attach to Output

35
 -ionAdi [[erodev]- ionN] ~ [erosion]N

-iveAdi [[compete(t)v] - iveActd ~ [competitive ]Adi

-alAdj [[PopeN] - alAdj] ~ [papal]Adi

It doesn't change the placement of a stress 'but i it changes the pronunciation of

the base. All of these suffixes change the pronunciation of the base so all of
them are non-neutral and because they are non-neutral they belong to the first
stratum .

What is the difference between a and b

The difference is that sometimes the placement of stress is change and

sometimes the pronunciation is change but they are both non neutral.

All of them are non-neutral and they've belonged to the first strategy again in a
number (5-11) you can justify the ill-formness of the words . For example
section C the star shows that the word is ill-formed because the order of them
are not obeyed .

Lexical morphology: More examples for models.

36
Can you tell me whether these affixes belong to stratum1 or stratum2 and
why?

All of these affixes belong to the second stratum because two reasons:

1. They are neutral affixes, so they don’t cause any change in the pronunciation
of the base.

2. They are regular derivational affixes.

5.2.2 Inflection in Lexical Morphology

[5.18] Present tense Past tense

drive /dra1v/ drove /dr~uv/
write /ra1t/ wrote /r~ut/
rise /ra1z/ rose /r~uz/
strive /stra1v/ strove /str~uv/
dive /da1v/ /d~uv/ (American); /da1vd/ (British)

They are irregular and we have the change in the pronunciation of the word, so
they belong to first stratum. Change the diphthong (aI) to diphthong (əU) this
phonological process is called blocked.

Why the form "derived" is incorrect (is not made in the lexicon of
English)?

Because when we want to add (ed) to the verb it happens in stratum2 but (drive)
it is irregular and it belongs to stratum1 actually the word (drove) is made in
stratum1, so the derivational (drive) is blocked because it belongs to stratum2.
In the framework of this model you can justify why some words are not derived
and why some words are ill-formed.
37
[5.23] Singular Plural (Latin)
addendum addenda
erratum errata
stratum strata
datum data
medium media

What stratum these examples belong and why?

They belong to first stratum because they are irregular. We cannot add plural

(-s) because they are Latin.

5.3 LEXICAL RULES

When we want to describe or to explain the way that affixation is happening in

this model, there are some properties of words and base but we have to know
before we want to explain the process as in the book.

 The class of bases affected.

 (ii) The affix that is attached.
 Where exactly it is attached (is it a prefix or a suffix?).
 The class which the resulting word belongs to.
 The stratum to which the affix belongs (and hence its general properties
and the stratum at which it is attached).

Morphological rules that attach affixes to bases take this form:

(i) You should know the grammatical function or class of the base in
order to differentiate between inflection and derivation.
(ii) We should know the affix whether it is neutral or non-neutral.
(iii) Where exactly it is attached (is it a prefix or a suffix?
(iv) We should know the grammatical function of the resulting word, if the
grammatical function of the resulting word is as the same as the class
of the base it would be inflection, otherwise, it is derivation.
(v) These are the properties that we should know in any morphological
rule or in any word formation process like (affixation, compounding
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 conversion, etc.) so this formula is very important and it describes the
model.

[5.24] At stratum n
 Insert A in environment [Y __ Z)x
 Output: w
 (i.e. insert A in the environment of a preceding Y or following Z if
a given morphological property or complex of properties
symbolised
 as X is being represented; X, Y and Z are variables, and w is a
mnemonic standing for word.)
Some nouns, e.g. data, oxen and sheep, form their plural at stratum1. We need
the rules in [5.25] to deal with them:

[y] → suffix

[z] → prefix

[w] → word:

Means that the output of the affixation should be a word. This is a general
formula which explains affixation in this model.
[5.25] Stratum 1
Either a. Insert /-ə/ in environment [deIt] Noun + Plural
-a dat-
Output: /deitə / data
Or b. Insert /-ə/ in environment [ɒks_] Noun +Plural
-en ox
Output: /ɒksən/ oxen
Or c. Insert 0 in environment [ ʃi:p_]Noun + Plural
0 sheep
Output: /ʃi:p/ sheep
Or d. Insert Replace /u/ with /i:/ in [fut- )Noun + Plural

nouns subject to umlaut

(e.g. foot) /i:/
Output: /fi:t / feet

Here stratum1 because we have irregular (-a) means any kind of affix if the affix
is suffix the environment is [y] line, if the affixes prefix the environment would
be line [z].
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We have different kinds of irregular plurals in English. Now, we want to explain
these irregular plurality in English based on these formula.

For example when we have the word data we want to explain the derivational
data, insert A in environment dat- (a is a sign of plurality), this line shows the
place of (–a), the output is data so dat is changed to data.

Ox is irregular plural insert –en in the environment ox the output is oxen.

Sheep the singular and plural the same, so insert nothing in the environment is
sheep and the output is sheep.

Foot insert replace /u/ would /i:/ in the end there is nothing is added but /u/ is
changed to /i:/ and the output is feet.

If you want to explain the regular plurality for example; trees. How can you
explain in the framework of this formula trees?

It belongs to stratum2 because it is regular, should insert the plural –s and in

environment tree is line and the output is trees. In prefix we put the line before
the base.

e.g. impossible: im is prefix so should write insert im in environment line

possible and the output is impossible.

[5.26] Stratum2

Insert -s in environment [Y __ ]Noun + Plural

Output Y-s

Note: Y is a variable standing for any count noun whatsoever that is not
assigned plural at stratum 1. So, we can replace Y with /bed/ or /pet/ etc., and
the output will be /bed-z/, /pet-s/ etc., subject to the rules in [2.16].

We put the line ( ___ ) to show the place of plural affixes at the end of the word,
but for the word foot we don’t add anything just change the pronunciation of the
word, but in sheep the line shows the placement of affix or the generality of the
formula.

NOTE/ The question in the final exam about this subject, just explain
affixation (the derivational of the words), just explain the creation of the
words not sentences specially inside the lexicon. Inside the lexicon we have

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the creation of the words only not phrases not sentences and something like
that.

In this case we say that only lexical rules are cyclic, the rules which are applying
in the lexicon. In other words, when we talk about the rules in the lexicon parts
of the model we say that they are cyclic.

What does it mean cyclic?

Cyclic: means that the phonological rules are coupled with morphological rules
in the same stratum, it means that at the first the morphological rules apply to
make the new word.

For example by adding any suffix or prefix and then the phonological rule
would specify its pronunciation and they are coupled with each other in the
same stratum.

Morphological rules as well as phonological rules are coupled with each

other in the same stratum.

For example when you want to make a plural nouns like regular plurals you
know that based on morphological rules of English you could add (-s) at the end
of the word, (bed) then (beds) before you made the word (beds) it goes to the
phonological rules to specify its pronunciation as (s or z). The phonological
rules based on assimilation says that "the pronunciation of the plural s would be
z in this word" because there is a kind of assimilation in beds.

But for the word cat based on morphological rules add (-s) to the word cat and
make the word cats then it goes to the phonological rules to specify the
pronunciation as cats because [t] is voiceless and we have the pronunciation of
[s] in this way we say that both morphology and phonology are coupled with
each other, they are interrelated at the same stratum.

5.4 DIFFERENCES BETWEEN LEXICAL AND POSTLEXICAL RULES

In general this model have two general parts (lexical and post-lexical):

1. Post-lexical rules can apply across word boundaries: post-lexical model

is related to syntax and in syntax we have sentences, in the lexical rules

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 part of the model we have only the creation of the words we can see the
example:

[5.27] last trip /la:st trip/ [ /la:st trip] or [ la:s trip]

lost property /lɒst prɒpəi/ [lɒst prɒpəti) or [los prɒpəti]

Because we have word boundary here this phonological rule of deletion is

applied across the words (last) the first word, (trip) the second word. The
deletion of [t] is between two words [/la:s trIp/], but don’t have such deletion
within the word in the lexical part of the model.

When we are referring to the post-lexical rules actually they are named as
phrasal phonology it means that rules can apply with the words within a phrasal
phonology.

2. Lexical rules are cyclic: when morphology and phonology are interrelated
but post-lexical rules are not cyclic it means that there is no linkage between
syntactic rule and phonological rule.

3. Lexical rules must be structure-preserving: This means that the output of

each layer of derivation must be a word. A lexical rule may not produce a form
that could not be a phonologically well-formed word in the language. The output
must be based on the phonotactics of the language.

There are canonical phonological patterns (i.e. standard patterns) of segment

structure, syllable structure and prosodic structure that severely restrict the kinds
of morphemes and words that can appear in the lexicon of a language.
Examples:

(i) Obviously, there are restrictions on segments(sounds) that can appear

in words of a language.

Thus, the putative word /ɗasp/, which begins with an alveolar implosive /ɗ/, is
ruled out because implosives are not part of the phoneme inventory of English.

(ii) Lexical rules must not produce forms that violate phonotactic
constraints on the canonical syllable structure pattern in a language.

Thus *ltarpment /Ita:pmǝnt/and *tsem /tsem/ are not possible English words
since [It] and /ts/ are prohibited consonant sequences in syllable (and word)

42
initial position (though, of course, both are allowed syllable finally as in melt
/melt/ and sets /sets/).

(iii) Every lexical item must have one main stress. so, no lexical rule may
create a word like
*'presta'pping which has two main stresses. By contrast, post-lexical rules are
not subject to any structure-preserving constraint. They may have an output that
is at variance with the canonical.
Patterns of the language. For instance, though no word in the lexicon can begin
with [ts], this sequence may occur phonetically when two words come together
in utterances, in casual speech if vowels get elided, as in:
[5.28] [tsnɒt] 'it's not'
[tsbaut] 'it's about'
[tsꭁm] 'it's Sam'

(iv) Post-lexical rules are automatic but lexical rules are not automatic
(without exception).

It means that in lexical part we can see some exceptions for all the rules but for
post-lexical rules we don’t have any exception they are automatic. For example,
for plurality we have exceptions like (data, sheep, etc.) these are the exceptions,
but for post-lexical rules we don’t have any exceptions the process of
glottalisation [ʔ] is mentioned as in example for post lexical process in the book:

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