Types of morphemes

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 468.

In English there are 3 types of morphemes:

1. free (root)
2. bound (affixes)
   E.g. table – tables; deer – deer Ø
3. word morphemes

Affixes are subdivided into prefixes & suffixes. Prefixes are always word-building ones. As for suffixes, they may be both lexical & grammatical.

E.g. worker – lexical; works – grammatical

Lexical suffixes are lexical grammatical morphemes.

E.g. to teach – teacher

Grammatical suffixes are called inflexions.

On the basis of this classification of morphemes a general structure of a word may be given like this:

in – just – ice – s

prefix – root – suffix – inflexion

Any morpheme or a combination of morphemes to which an inflexion can be added is called a stem. In English, besides free & bound morphemes an intermediate type of morphemes may be singled out. These morphemes function as affixes, but they are not found in the root. They are grammatical word morphemes.

E.g. He has done it.

He gave up smoking.

Lexico-grammatical word morpheme.

Word form is the unity of the stem & the inflexion.

E.g. smiles – smiled – smiling

Word forms have patterns of derivation depending on the types of grammatical morphemes, which constitute them.

1. affixation

2. sound alternation

3. suppletive formation

4. analytical formation

Affixation is found in the so called synthetic forms. Synthetic forms are built up with the help of inflexion. The number of inflexions is 8, besides among them there are many homonyms.

1. Z₁ – the category of number (plurality).
   E.g. cats, dogs, watches
2. Z₂ – the Present Simple of the third person singular.
   E.g. translates, opens, watches
3. Z₃ – genitive case.
   E.g. a cat's tail, baby's toys, Charles's article
4. D₁ – the Past Simple of regular verbs.
   E.g. played, dressed, translated
5. D₂ – Participle 2 of regular verbs
   E.g. played, dressed, translated
6. Ving – participle 1 or gerund
7. er – comparative degree of adjectives
8. est – superlative degree