Affixation in modern english

If the analysis is limited to stating the number and type of morphemes that make up the word, it is referred to as morphemic. For: instance, the word girlishness may be analysed into three morphemes: the root – girl – and two suffixes – ish and – ness. The morphemic classification of words is as follows: one root morpheme– a root word (girl), one root morpheme plus one or more affixes – a deriv

ed word (girlish, girlishness), two or more stems– a compound word (girl-friend), two or more stems and a common affix – a compound derivative (old-maidish). The morphemic analysis establishes only the ultimate constituents that make up the word.

A structural word-formation analysis proceeds further; it studies the structural correlation with other words, the structural patterns or rules on which words are built.

This is done with the help of the principle of oppositions, i.e. by studying the partly similar elements, the differences between which are functionally relevant; in our case this difference is sufficient to create a new word. Girl and girlish are members of a morphemic opposition. They are similar as the root morpheme – girl – is the same. Their distinctive feature is the suffix – ish. Due to this suffix the second member of the opposition is a different word belonging to a different part of speech. This binary opposition comprises two elements.

A correlation is a set of binary oppositions. It is composed of two subsets formed by the first and the second elements of each couple, i.e. opposition. Each element of the first set is coupled with exactly one element of the second set and vice versa. Each second element may be derived from the corresponding first element by a general rule valid for all members of the relation.1

Observing the proportional opposition:

child = woman = monkey = spinster = book

childish womanish monkeyish spinsterish bookish

it is possible to conclude that there is in English a type of derived adjectives consisting of a noun stem and the suffix – ish. Observation also shows that the stems are mostly those of animate nouns, and permits us to define the relationship between the structural pattern of the word and its meaning. Any one word built according to this pattern contains a semantic component common to the whole group, namely: 'typical of, or having the bad qualities of.

In the above example the results of morphemic analysis and the structural word-formation analysis practically coincide. There are other cases, however, where they are of necessity separated. The morphemic analysis is, for instance, insufficient in showing the difference between the structure of inconvenience v and impatience n; it classifies both as derivatives. From the point of view of word-formation pattern, however, they are fundamentally different. It is only the second that is formed by derivation. Compare:

impatience n = patience n = corpulence n

impatient a patient a corpulent a

The correlation that can be established for the verb inconvenience is different, namely:

inconvenience v = pain v = disgust v = anger v = delight v

inconvenience n pain n disgust n anger n delight n

Here nouns denoting some feeling or state are correlated with verbs causing this feeling or state, there being no difference in stems between the members of each separate opposition. Whether different pairs in the correlation are structured similarly or differently is irrelevant. Some of them are simple root-words, others are derivatives; they might be compounds as well. In terms of word-formation we state that the verb inconvenience when compared with the noun inconvenience shows relationships characteristic of the process of conversion. Cf. to position where the suffix – tion does not classify this word as an abstract noun but shows it is derived from one. This approach also affords a possibility to distinguish between compound words formed by composition and those formed by other processes. The words honeymoon n and honeymoon v are both compounds, containing two free stems, yet the first is formed by composition: honey n+moon n=honeymoon n, and the second by conversion: honeymoon n>honeymoon v. The treatment remains synchronic because it is not the origin of the word that is established but its present correlations in the vocabulary and the patterns productive in present-day English.

The analysis into immediate constituents described below permits us to obtain the morphemic structure and provides the basis for further word-formation analysis.

Analysis into immediate constitute

A synchronic morphological analysis is most effectively accomplished by the procedure known as the analysis into immediate constituents1 (IC's). First suggested by L. Bloomfield2 it was later developed by many linguists.3 The main opposition dealt with is the opposition of stem and affix. It is a kind of segmentation revealing not the history of the word but its motivation, i.e. the data the listener has to go by in understanding it. It goes without saying that unmotivated words and words with faded motivation have to be remembered and understood as separate signs, not as combinations of other signs.

The method is based on the fact that a word characterized by morphological divisibility (analysable into morphemes) is involved in certain structural correlations. This means that, as Z. Harris puts it, «the morpheme boundaries in an utterance are determined not on the basis of considerations interior to the utterance, but on the basis of comparison with other utterances. The comparisons are controlled, i.e. we do not merely scan various random utterances but seek utterances which differ from our original one only in stated portions. The final test is in utterances which are only minimally different from ours. «1

A sample analysis which has become almost classical, being repeated many times by many authors, is Bloomfield's analysis of the word ungentlemanly. As the word is convenient we take the same example. Comparing this word with other utterances the listener recognizes the morpheme un-as a negative prefix because he has often come across words built on the pattern un-adjective stem: uncertain, unconscious, uneasy, unfortunate, unmistakable, unnatural. Some of the cases resembled the word even more closely; these were: unearthly, unsightly, untimely, unwomanly and the like. One can also come across the adjective gentlemanly. Thus, at the first cut we obtain the following immediate constituents: un + gentlemanly. If we continue our analysis we see that although gent occurs as a free form in low colloquial usage, no such word as lemanly may be found either as a free or as a bound constituent, so this time we have to separate the final morpheme. We are justified in so doing as there are many adjectives following the pattern noun stem+ly, such as womanly, masterly, scholarly, soldierly with the same semantic relationship of 'having the quality of the person denoted by the stem'; we also have come across the noun gentleman in other utterances, The two first stages of analysis resulted in separating a free and a bound form: 1) un + gentlemanly, 2) gentleman + ly. The third cut has its peculiarities. The division into gent-+-leman is obviously impossible as no such patterns exist in English, so the cut is gentle+man. A similar pattern is observed in nobleman, and so we state adjective stem + – man. Now, the element man may be differently classified as a semi – affix or as a variant of the free form man. The word gentle is open to discussion. It is obviously divisible from the etymological viewpoint: gentle<.0Fr gentil<Lat gentilis permits to discern the root or rather the radical element gens – and the suffix – il. But since we are only concerned with synchronic analysis this division is not relevant.

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