Affixation in modern english

An English word does not necessarily contain formatives indicating to what part of speech it belongs. This holds true even with respect to inflexible parts of speech, i.e. nouns, verbs, adjectives. Not all roots are free forms, but productive roots, i.e. roots capable of producing new words, usually are. The semantic realization of an English word is therefore very specific. Its dependence on d

istribution is further enhanced by the widespread occurrence of homonymy both among root morphemes and affixes. Note how many words in the following statement might be ambiguous if taken in isolation: A change of work is as good as a rest.

The above treatment of the root is purely synchronic, as we have taken into consideration only the facts of present-day English. But the same problem of the morpheme serving as the main signal of a given lexical meaning is studied in etymology, i.e. in that branch of linguistics which deals with the origin and development of words tracing them back to their earliest determinable source. When approached thus historically or diachronically the word heart will be classified as Common Germanic. One will look for cognates, i.e. words descended from a common ancestor. The cognates of heart are the Latin cor, whence cordial 'hearty', 'sincere', and so cordially and cordiality; also the Greek kardia, whence English cardiac condition. The cognates outside the English vocabulary are the Russian сердце, the German Herzt the Spanish corazon and somе other words.

To emphasize the difference between the synchronic and the diachronic treatment, we shall call the common element of cognate words in different languages not their root but their radical element. An interesting example of historical treatment may be found in Potter's book.1 Potter shows that the same radical element s-d is to be recognized in the English monosyllables sit, seat, soot and nest. The radical element is s-d, the vowels may be different. Potter distinguishes five grades: (1) – sed – as in Latin sedere, whence the English sedentary 'requiring much sitting', 'physically inactive' (sedentary work, sedentary person) and sediment 'the part that settles to the bottom of a liquid'. From sedare, sedat (the causative of sedere) the English vocabulary has sedate 'quiet', 'calm' and its derivatives: sedately, sedateness, sedative; supersede is 'to sit above', hence 'to replace'. This meaning developed, as Potter explains, at the time when seats at schools were assigned by quality of work, so if a pupil surpassed another he superseded him. The verb sit belongs to this group also, being developed from Common Germanic setjan. (2) The variant – – sod – is represented by the Past Tense sat, (3) [-se:d] – is observed in Mode seat<old Norse sǽti<; Common Germanic sǽt. (4) [-so:d-l as in English soot with its Northern pronunciation [su:t]<OE and ON sot 'that which sits or settles in the chimney’. (5) From the vanishing grade E-sad‑1 combined with the adverb ni-'down' which is cognate with the German nieder, the Indo-European noun ni-sd-os 'place where the bird sits down' is formed, whence both the English nest and the Russian гнездо. The Latin cognate is nidus, which is used in English as a scientific term 'place in which insects deposit eggs'; nidiflcation means 'nest building’.

These two types of approach, synchronic and diachronic, give rise to two different principles of arranging morphologically related words into groups. In the first case series of words with a common root morpheme in which derivatives are opposable to their unsuffixed and unprefixed bases, are combined cf. heart, hearty, etc The second grouping results in families of historically cognate words, cf. heart, cor (Lat), etc.

Unlike roots, affixes are always bound forms. The difference between suffixes and prefixes, it will be remembered, is not confined to their respective position, suffixes being «fixed after» and prefixes «fixed before» the stem. It also concerns their function and meaning.

A suffix is a derivational morpheme following the stem and forming a new derivative in a different part of speech or a different word class, cf. – en, – y, – less in hearten, hearty, heartless. When both the underlying and the resultant forms belong to the same part of speech, the suffix serves to differentiate between Lexico-grammatical classes by rendering some very general lexico-grammatical meaning. For instance, both – ify and – er are verb suffixes, but the first characterizes causative verbs, such as horrify, purify, whereas the second is mostly typical of frequentative verbs: flicker, shimmer, twitter and the like.

If we realize that suffixes render the most general semantic component of the word's lexical meaning by marking the general class of phenomena to which the referent of the word belongs, the reason why suffixes are as a rule semantically fused with the stem stands explained.

A prefix is a derivational morpheme standing before the root and modifying meaning, cf. to hearten – to dishearten. It is only with verbs and statives that a prefix may serve to distinguish one part of speech from another, like in earth n–unearth v, sleep n – asleep (stative).

Preceding a verb stem, some prefixes express the difference between a transitive and an intransitive verb: stay v and outstay (smb) v t. With a few exceptions prefixes modify the stem for time (pre-t post-), place (in-, ad-), negation (un-, dis-) and remain semantically rather independent of the stem.

An infix is an affix placed with in the word, like – n – in stand. The type is not productive.

An affix should not be confused with a combining form. A combining form is also a bound form but it can be distinguished from an affix historically by the fact that it is always borrowed from another language, namely, from Latin or Greek, in which it existed as a free form, i.e. a separate word, or also as a combining form. Thus, the combining form cyclo – and its variant cycl – are derived from the Greek word kuklos 'circle', giving the English word cyclic. The French adjective mat 'bad' gives the English combining form mat-, as in malnutrition. The same mean ing we observe in the Greek combining form kako – derived homkakos 'bad' (cacophony 'ill sound', cacoepy 'bad pronunciation’). They differ from all other borrowings in that they occur in compounds and derivatives that did not exist in their original language but were formed only in modern times in English, Russian, French, etc. Cf. polyclinic, polymer; stereophonic, stereoscopic, telemechanics, television. Combining forms are mostly international. Descriptively a combining form differs from an affix because it can occur as one constituent of a form whose only other constituent is an affix, as in cyclic1.

1.2 Aims and principles of morphemic and word-formation analysis

A synchronic description of the English vocabulary deals with its present-day system and its patterns of word-formation by comparing words simultaneously existing in it.

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