Word Structure

Part 1

The Structure of Words:

Morphology
Fundamental concepts in how words are
composed out of smaller parts
The nature of these parts
The nature of the rules that combine these
parts into larger units
What it might mean to be a word

Today
I.

Morphemes

II.

Types of Morphemes

III. Putting Morphemes together into larger

structures

Words with internal structure

Interesting properties of compounds

I. Morphemes
Remember that in phonology the basic
distinctive units of sound are phonemes
In morphology, the basic unit is the
morpheme
Basic definition: A morpheme is a minimal
unit of sound and meaning
(this can be modified in various ways; see
below)

Some Examples
Many words can be divided into smaller parts,
where the parts also occur in other words:
dogs

walking

blackens

player-hater

dog-s

walk-ing

black-en-s

play-er hat-er

Compare: cat-s; runn-ing; dark-en-s; eat-er

(note: in some cases there are spelling changes
when we add morphemes; ignore this)

Parts, cont.
The smaller parts occur consistently with
many words:
-s: forms the plural consistently
-ing: forms a noun from a verb
-en: forms a verb meaning become ADJ from an
adjective ADJ
-er: forms an agentive nominal from a verb, a
person or thing who does that activity

Consistent Sound/Meaning
Notice that this is not the only way we can
divide up words into smaller parts; consider
Tank, plank, flank, drank, rank, etc.

In these words, we could easily identify a

component -ank
However, this is not a morpheme
There is no consistent meaning with this -ank
The leftover pieces t-, pl-, fl-, dr-, r- are not
morphemes either

Connections between Sound and

Meaning
Remember that a phoneme sometimes has
more than one sound form, while being the
same abstract unit: /p/ with [p] and [p h]
A related thing happens with morphemes as
well
In order to see this, we have to look at slightly
more complex cases

Morphemes and Allomorphs

We will say in some cases that a morpheme has
more than one allomorph
This happens when the same meaning unit like [past]
for past tense or [pl] for plural has more than one
sound form
Past: one feature [past]

kick / kick-ed
leave / lef-t
hit / hit-
The last example shows a case in which the
phonological form of the morpheme past is zero, i.e.
it is not pronounced

Allomorphy, cont.
In the case of phonology, we said that the different
allophones of a phoneme are part of the same phoneme,
but are found in particular contexts
The same is true of the different allomorphs of a
morpheme
Which allomorph of a morpheme is found depends on its
context; in this case, what it is attached to:
Example: consider [pl] for English plural. It normally has the
pronunciation s (i.e. /z/), but

moose / moose-
ox / ox-en
box/*box-en/box-es
So, the special allomorphs depend on the noun

An Additional Point: Regular and

Irregular
In the examples above, the different allomorphs have a
distinct status. One of them is regular.
This is the default form that appears when speakers are using e.g.
new words (one blork, two blorks)
For other allomorphs, speakers simply have to memorize the fact
that the allomorph is what it is
Example: It cannot be predicted from other facts that the plural of
ox is ox-en
Demonstration: The regular plural is /z/; consider one box, two boxes.

Default cases like the /z/ plural are called regular.

Allomorphs that have to be memorized are called irregular.
Irregular allomorphs block regular allomorphs from
occurring (ox-en, not *ox-es or *ox-en-s).

Two types
There are in fact two types of allomorphy. Think
back to phonology
The Plural morpheme in English has different soundforms: dog-s/cat-s/church-es
These are predictable, based on the phonological
context
In the case of Past Tense allomorphy, it is not
predictable from the phonology which affix appears
We can find verbs with the same (or similar)
sound form, but with different allomorphs:
break/broke, not stake/*stoke
If you think about this case for a while, though,
you will notice some patterns; more on this later

II. Morpheme Types

Well now set out some further distinctions
among morpheme types
Our working definition of morpheme was
minimal unit of sound and meaning
A further division among morphemes involves
whether they can occur on their own or
not:
No: -s in dog-s; -ed in kick-ed; cran- in cran-berry
Yes: dog, kick, berry

Some Definitions
Bound Morphemes: Those that cannot
appear on their own
Free Morphemes: Those that can appear on
their own
In a complex word:
The root or stem is the basic or core morpheme
The things added to this are the affixes
Example: in dark-en the root or stem is dark,
while the affix in this case a suffix is -en

Further points
In some cases, works will use root and stem
in slightly different ways
Affixes are divided into prefixes and suffixes
depending on whether they occur before or
after the thing they attach to. Infixes-- middle
of a word (e.g. fan-f*ing-tastic)
For the most part, prefixes and suffixes are
always bound, except for isolated instances

Content and Function Words

Another distinction:
Content Morphemes: morphemes that have a
referential function that is independent of
grammatical structure; e.g. dog, kick, etc.
Sometimes these are called open-class because speakers
can add to this class at will

Function morphemes: morphemes that are bits of

syntactic structure e.g. prepositions, or morphemes
that express grammatical notions like [past] for past
tense.
Sometimes called closed-class because speakers cannot
add to this class

Cross-Classification
The bound/free and content/function
distinctions are not the same. Some
examples:
Content

Function

Bound

cran-

-ed

Free

dog

the

Aside: Non-Affixal Morphology

In the cases above, we have seen many affixes
associated with some morphological function
In other cases, there are additional changes; e.g.,
changes to the stem vowel:
sing/sang
goose/geese

Examples of this type are not obviously affixal, as

there is no (overt) added piece (prefix or suffix).
Rather, the phonology of the stem/root has changed

Some examples
Stem changing:
Present

Past

Participle

sing

sang

sung

begin

began

begun

sit

sat

sat

come

came

come

Another pattern
While in many cases the stem change does
not co-occur with an affix, in some cases it
does:
Examples:
break

broke

brok-en

tell

tol-d

tol-d

freeze

froze

froz-en

Use of stem changing patterns

In some languages, stem-changing is much
more important than it is in e.g. English
In Semitic languages, extensive use is made
of different templatic patterns, that is, abstract
patterns of consonants and vowels:
Arabic noun plurals:

kitaab book; kutub books

nafs soul; nufus souls

III. Internal structure of words

Words have an internal structure that requires
analysis into constituents (much like syntactic
structure does)
For example:
Unusable contains three pieces: un-, use, -able

Question: If we are thinking about the

procedures for building words, is the order
derive use-able, then add un-; or
derive un-use, then add -able

Word Structure
Possibilities:
Structure 1

Structure 2

un use able

un use able

Word Structure, Cont.

Consider:
With able, we create adjectives meaning capable
of being V-ed, from verbs V

Break/break-able; kick/kick-able
There is no verb un-use
This is an argument that Structure 1 is correct:

[un [use able]]

This analysis fits well with what the word means
as well: not capable of being used. Structure two
would mean some thing like capable of not being
used

Another example
Consider another word (from the first class):
unlockable. Focus on un Note that in addition to applying to adjectives
(clear/unclear) to give a contrary meaning, unapplies to some verbs to give a kind of undoing or
reversing meaning:
do, undo
zip, unzip
tie, untie
Note now that unlockable has two meanings

The Unlockable example

Two meanings:
1)
2)

Not capable of being locked

Capable of being unlocked

These meanings correspond to distinct structures:

1) 2)

un lock

able

un lock able

Unlockable, cont.
The second structure is one in which able
applies to the verb unlock
This verb is itself created from un- and lock
The meaning goes with this: capable of being
unlocked
In structure 1, there is no verb unlock
So the meaning is not capable of being
locked

Some General Points

The system for analyzing words applies in
many cases that are created on the fly
Complex words and their meanings are not
simply stored; rather, the parts are assembled
to create complex meanings
Another example of the same principle
applies in the process of compounding

Introduction to Compounding
A compound is a complex word that is formed out of a
combination of stems (as opposed to stem + affix)
These function in a certain sense as one word, and
have distinctive phonological patterns
Examples:

olive oil
shop talk
shoe polish
truck driver
Note that the different elements in these compounds
relate to each other in different ways...

Internal structure

Like with other complex words, the internal

structure of compounds is crucial

There are cases of ambiguities like that with

unlockable

Example: obscure document shredder

1) Person who shreds obscure documents

[[obscure document] shredder]

2) Obscure person who shreds documents
[obscure [document shredder]]

Compounding, cont.

An interesting property of compounds is that although they are words,

they form a productive system, without limits (as far as grammar is
concerned, not memory).

Note also that compounds have special accentual (stress) properties:

judge
trial judge
murder trial judge
murder trial judge reporter
murder trial judge reporter killer
murder trial judge reporter killer catcher
murder trial judge reporter killer catcher biographer
murder trial judge reporter killer catcher biographer pencil set