Dambi Dollo University

College of Social Sciences and Humanities

Department of English Language and
Literature

Course Title: Morphology and Syntax

Course Code: EnLa 303
Credit Hour: 3hr.
For: English Major Students 3rdYr, 1st
Semester
Compiled by:Instr.Semu T.

Ac.Year: Oct, 2015 E.C

 Chapter 1:
English Morphology
1.1 Introduction:
 Morphology is the branch of linguistics that is concerned with the
relation between meaning and form, within words and between words.
 Originated from the Greek language as morph (form) and logy (to
study).
 It is the study of the internal structure of words, how words are put
together, their relationships and their meaningful parts.
(Fasold, 2006).
 The component of grammar that deals with word formation, examines
the relationship between words, and analyzes their constituent elements.
• It is concerned with:
1. the speakers knowledge of words.
2. The rules used to interpret and form new words.
 What is a word?
• A word is the fundamental building block of language and
represents a concept, action, or feeling.

• Smallest independent unit of language, does not depend on

other words for meaning, and can change position in a
sentence (which may change the meaning of the sentence, but
not the meaning of the word itself).

• All languages have words, and those words can carry a little or
a lot of meaning.
Based on the number and types of
morpheme(s) that words have:
#3 different word categories:
i. Simple words: Words that consist of only one free
morpheme, such as the words in (1) giraffe, yellow,
tea, flower, elephant, etc. are morphemes.
ii. Complex words:
• Words that are made up of more than one morpheme,
e.g. prewash, goalkeeper, earthquakes, eraser and
classroom etc. are called complex words.
 iii. Compound words:
 Consist of 2 free morphemes.
 Often imply concepts that can be expressed by grammatical
constructions:
1. Subject + verb earthquake (when the earth quakes)
2. Verb+ object jumprope (a rope used to play jumping games)
3. Verb + adverb downpour (when something pours down)
4. Subject + adjective highchair (a chair that is high)

 Every word consists of at least one morpheme.

 Sometimes a word only has one morpheme.
 Every word in every language is composed of one or more
morphemes.
 Consider the following:
• The neighbor's dog disturbed the children. √
• The children were disturbed by the neighbor's dogs. √
• ‘s the children were disturb the ed by dogs the neighbor. x
• ‘s dog the neighbor disturbed burglar the children. x
• The neighbor's dogs children disturb the ed. X
• What do you learn from these?

 Word form: the shape that represent the word in speech or

writing.
In the written language word-forms are called Orthographic words.
 The aim of morphology is to make the subconscious knowledge of
words explicit.
 1.2 The concept of morpheme
 In English and in many other languages, many words
can be broken down into parts.
Example:
• unhappiness un-happi-ness
• horses horse-s
• walking walk-ing

• un - carries a negative meaning

• ness - expresses a state or quality
• s - expresses plurality
• ing - conveys a sense of duration
 Cont’d
• The smallest unit of a word, which has a meaning, lexical or grammatical, and
cannot be divided into smaller units.
Example: the word “unpreventable” consists of 3
morphemes- un + present + able.
Un is a prefix, which means "not" and is used in this example to negate the
adjective "presentable."

The suffix able is used to form adjectives and is usually placed at the end of a verb
(useable, loveable, deniable, etc.)

 A morpheme is the smallest part of a word that adds its own distinct bit of
meaning to the word.

kill-er, work-er, print-er

wash-able, laugh-able
re-paint-ing
 Cont’d
• English word forms such as talks, talker, talked and talking must consist of
one element talk, and a number of other elements such as -s, -er, -ed and -
ing.
• All these elements are described as morphemes.
• A morpheme is “a minimal unit of meaning or grammatical function.”
• Units of grammatical function include forms used to indicate past tense or
plural. Example:
 The police reopened the investigation, the word reopened consists of three
morphemes.
– open, re- (meaning “again”) and a minimal unit of grammatical
function is –ed (indicating past tense).
• The word tourists also contains three morphemes. tour, -ist (marking
“person who does something”), and a minimal unit of grammatical
function -s (indicating plural).
 In general,
• A morpheme is the smallest linguistic part of a word that can have a
meaning /meaningful part of a word. Example:
the parts "un-", "break", and "-able" in the word "unbreakable"
• The minimal unit which has a meaning or a grammatical function is called
morpheme.
• The smallest unit of meaning that a word can be divided into is called
morpheme. E.g.1. Boys!
Boy (has meaning)+ -s(pl.) (grammatical function)
2. Like: contains one morpheme but un-like-ly contains three morphemes.
• Linguists define a morpheme as the smallest unit of language that has its
own meaning. Simple words such as, giraffee, study, or yellow are
morphemes.
but prefixes like re- and pre- and suffixes like -ize and –er are also
morphemes.
 So, a word is one or more morphemes that can stand alone in a language.
 1.2.1 Form and occurrence of
morpheme
• Form of morphemes
• A morpheme is a form (a sequence of
sounds) with a recognizable meaning.

• Knowing a word's early history, or etymology,

may be useful in dividing it into morphemes ,
but the decisive factor is the form-meaning
link.
 Types of morphemes based on
freedom of occurrence:
1. Free Morpheme:
 A morpheme that can stand without any attachment
 Has lexical meaning. Example
 Read, talk, book, table etc
 All root words are free morphemes/independent morphemes
2.Bound Morpheme: symbolized by (-)
 Dependent morpheme, can’t stand without any root words.
 Has grammatical meaning (functional). Example
 -s,-es, un-, in- imp-, -less, dis-, ment, able, ly, tion, est, ies,
ing etc
 3. Zero morpheme

• Morphemes that have double grammatical significant

between words without having any attachment.
Example:

 Cut/cut/cut
 Put/put/put

 Hit/hit/ hit All form are used as present past and past participle
 Read/read/read
 Morpheme identification
• Criteria: Identifying Morphemes :
– It is a word or part of a word that has meaning.
– It cannot be divided into smaller meaningful parts without violation of its meaning or
without meaningless remainders.
– It occurs in different word environments with a relatively stable meaning. Example:
 EXAMPLES
1. repayment : re- payment
payment :  pay-ment re- pay -ment
  
prefix+ root+ suffix
2. instructions :  instruction-s
instruction :  instruct-ion
instruct : in-struct
in- struct -ion -s
   
prefix+ root+ suffix+ suffix
Why is it important to understand
morphemes?
• Understanding morphology helps a reader to determine
the meaning of an unfamiliar word by enabling the reader
to segment, or break down a word into its root word and
its affixes.
• This also helps readers better understand meaning spelling
and also pronunciation.
• Morpheme is important for English Language Learners
because it breaks down the word and creates different
meaning from its elements for speakers.
• Learning English isn't only about how to read the sentences
and the words, the speaker must be able to make meaning
of the elements of word.
 Activity:
 Write True/False for question 1-6.
1. Bound morpheme is a morpheme that can occur only when
attached to other morphemes.
2. Affixes are not the parts of morphemes.
3. The prefixes and suffixes have grammatical or lexical
meaning.
4. Lexical word class is a word that expresses the content of
the sentence (Noun, Verb, Adjective and Adverb).
5. The meaning of all morphemes will be lexical.
6. Simple words are examples of free morphemes.
7. Identify the list of morphemes from the word:
“internationalization” and Unbelievable .
 Variants of Morpheme
 Variants of a morpheme are called allomorphs;
• the -s, indicating plural in “cats,” “dogs,”
• the -es in “dishes,” and
• the -en of “oxen” are all allomorphs of the plural
morpheme.
• The word “walked” is represented by two
morphemes, “walk” and the past-tense
morpheme, here indicated by -ed.
 Allomorphs are variants of a morpheme that differ in
form but are semantically similar. Example
 English plural marker has three allomorphs:
 /-s/ (bats),
 /-z/ (eggs, dogs or
 /-ɪz, -əz/ (buses, horses.
 Conditioning of Allomorph
• Allomorph is said to be conditioned when
its form is dependent on the adjacent
or the next phonemes.
• The three allomorphs of the plural marker /–
s/ are:
– /-s/
– / -z/
– /-iz/,
• They are said to be phonological
conditioned since their occurrence is
dependent on the preceding phonemes.
 Cont’d
1. /-s/ occurs with morphs ending with voiceless

sounds: [p], [t], [k], [f], [θ]

Example: cats, hats, books, caps etc. (-s sound)

2. /-z/ occurs with morphs ending with voiced

sounds :
[b], [d], [ɡ], [m], [ɑ]
Example: birds, dogs, beds, songs etc. (-z sound)

3- /-iz/ or [əz] occurs with morphs ending

with :
[s], [z], [ ʃ ], [tʃ ], [dʒ]
 Cont’d
 Another example of phonological conditioning of
allomorphs can be seen in the past tense morpheme
in English (-ed).
 The three allomorphs of the past tense morpheme
in English (-ed) are / -t,-d,-id/.
 And the phonological conditioning of these allomorphs
can be as follows:
1. /-t/ occurs after voiceless sound except alveolar
stops /t, d/. Example: helped /helpt/, walked /
walkt/ etc.

2. /-d/ occurs after voiced sounds except alveolar

stops such as /t, d/
Example: killed, loved etc.

3. /-id/ occurs after morphs ending with alveolar

 Morphological Conditioning
 When the conditioning factor is not determined by any phonological feature
but it is determined by the specific morph to which it is attached.
 In pairs such as ‘man-men’, ‘child-children’, which seem to contain the
‘plural morpheme’, we cannot state the variation in terms of phonetic
environment.
 Instead, we must refer to each morpheme separately.
 This kind of variation among allomorphs is known as ‘morphological
conditioning’. Some other examples of morphological conditioning are:
– Ox – oxen
– Sheep – sheep
– Goose – geese
– Tooth -- teeth
 These words do not follow any specific rule, each one has to be learnt
separately.
 There is nothing phonological about it.

 These selections are specific to the words.

 Classification of morphemes
 As it was mentioned on the previous page
of this handout, morphemes based on
freedom of occurrence are classified in
to :Free, bound and zero (neutral)
morphemes .

 In addition to this, based on their functions

free morphemes can be divided into two:
– Inflectional and,
– Derivational morphemes
 A. Inflectional Morphemes
 These morphemes inflect for person, gender, number,
tense, and degree. Example
 boy and boys, are two different forms of the same word.
 Produce new form of the same word (more productive)
 Function change
 No class and meaning change. Example
 Book-books, read-reads
 Indicate both semantic and syntactic relationship between
words.
 Frequently appear with words. e.g.

 (S) can be attached with millions of words. More examples:

 -ed, -s, ’s, s’ -ing , -er, -est etc are
inflectionals
 B. Derivational Morpheme
 Make new words from former words, which changes the
words’ grammatical class (part of speech) and meaning.
Example:

 the word creation is formed from the word create by adding

a morpheme (-tion) the word create is a verb and the word
creation is a noun.
 Produce new word from the old one.
 Bring class change (grammatical change)
 Meaning change e.g.
Happy- unhappy, colour-colourless
 Indicate semantic relationship between words
 Less productive
 Selective to appear with words
 They are both prefixes and suffixes
Derivational morphemes based on
position:
1. prefix:
 Their pattern is prefix+stem
 Appears at the front of the stem
 Change meaning. Eg. Unhappy, mismatch
2. suffix:
 Their pattern is Stem + suffix
 Appears at the end of a word e.g. careless
3. Infix:
not normally used in English, but found in some other languages
Appears within in the stem e.g
• Their pattern is stem +infix
 Sulate (write) –simulate (to write)

English has no true infixes, but the plural suffix -s behaves

something like an infix in unusual plurals like: passers-by &
mothers-in-law.
4. Interfix
 Their pattern is stem+interfix
 Links two stems together in a cpd word e.g. Methodology
5. Duplifix
o Their pattern is steem + duplifix
o Incorporate reduplicated proportion of a word
Eg. Teeny weeny /teeny(very very small) weeny (very
small)/
6. Transfix
 Their pattern is stem+trasfix+ stem
 Insertion of vowel sounds between radical to bring
meaning and semantic change. Eg
 Ktb
 kitab: book
 Katabe: he wrote
 Katab: write
 7.Suprafix

 Change a supra segment of a phoneme of a

stem.
 Example:
 To promote a product in the market, we market it.
 Conversion of this type commonly leads to
noun/verb and noun/adjective pairs.

 Export (N) , Export (V)

 Conduct (N) , conduct (V)
 Convict (N) , Convict (V)
 Water (N) , Water (V)
 8. Circumfix
 An affix made up of two separate parts which surround and
attach to a root.
 So, unlike the “infix”, the “circumfix” occurs in two parts on
both outer edges of a root or a stem.

 In other words, not all morphological processes involve

prefixes, suffixes, or infixes.
• Probably some circumfixes in English are:
en- -en in enlighten
em- -en in embolden

• The Simulfix on the other hand replaces one or more

phonemes in the root or stem. Example: man + plural =
men
 Lexicon, lexemes and words
Lexicons:
 Are the speakers mental dictionary about a
morphemes and words
 Provides semantic, phonological, and
orthographical information
 Class part of speech information about
words and morphemes in our mind. e.g.
Car, house, book
So here, 1st it is processed in the mind and,
It is therefore, the information about
the word that we have in our mind.
 Lexemes
 Vocabulary items that we can set as an entry in a dictionary
 Written dictionary e.g.
Finish= lexeme: b/c it can be found in dictionary or a root word in a dictionary

• Finishes
• Finishing words
• Finished

Another examples: eat, book, break, see, write, etc.

Words: physical representation of lexemes E.g.

Have eats
Eat runner
Write can be lexemes and words writing words
Run wrote etc.
Get

All lexemes are words but all words are not lexemes.
 Root, base and stem

 Root:
 The basic, smaller or indivisible part of a word that contains the core
meaning (central)
 The nucleus of a word
 Free morpheme e.g.
Take, act, buy, write, speak, on, of etc.
 All lexemes are roots.
 Base:
 An element of a word that is ready to take any affixes (derivational
and inflectional affixes or morphemes) e.g.
 Runner—runners
 Run –runner, runners
 Writer—writers
 Write—writers, writer and writing
 Book—books
 Stem

 An element which is ready to take only inflectional affixes

and there is no class change e.g.
 Get: can be root, base, and stem
 Act: can be root, base, and stem
 Active: not root can be base, and stem
 Activate: not root, can be base and stem
 Wrote: not root, not base and not stem but it is a word:

 Activity:
• Identify the root, base and stem from the following words?
• A. deactivations B. Internationals
 Answer:

A. deactivations:

Root Base Stem

act act act
deact deact
active activate
deactive deactivate
activate activation
deactivate deactivation
activation
deactivation
 B. internationals

Root base stem

Nation nation nation

national national
inter
international

-Inter- derivational morpheme (prefix)

- nation- free morpheme
- al- Inflectional morpheme
-s inflectional morpheme

C. Impossible
Root Base Stem
Poss (Possible) possible possible
impossible
-Im-derivational
-Poss-free morpheme
-able derivational (suffix)
 The word classes
• A word class is a group of words that have the
same basic behavior. Example: nouns,
adjectives, or verbs.
• Classifications of words in a language based on
their grammatical behavior are known as word
classes or parts of speech in some contexts.

• The four parts of speech (Nouns, verbs,

adjectives, and adverbs) constitute the major
word classes,
 A. Major word classes
1. Nouns

 A noun is the name of any thing

like lists of concrete things Such as
house, boat , window, book, Ethiopia etc.
 In reality, many more words are that refer to
abstract concepts( nouns) like:
democracy, irritation, confusion, etc. are also
nouns.
 2. Verbs
 Verbs tell us something to be done.
E.g. To read, to count, to feed, sleep, or write etc.
 It only includes words from one class of
verbs/activities/ that are performed by individuals.
 A typical English verb has four different forms:

a. the base form (found in dictionary entries), e.g. clean

b. the 3rd person singular present tense form, e.g.
cleans
c. the -ed form (past and the past participle), e.g. cleaned
d. the -ing form, e.g. cleaning
 3. Adjectives

• Describes a things like a

handsome man or new house.
• A large number of adjectives that
are used in academic writing are
used to describe more abstract
concepts.
 4. Adverbs
• Often used to describe states and events
• Often formed from adjectives by means of the suffix -ly.
Example:
slow (adjective) - slowly (adverb)
•
• Adverbs tell how things are done, like : slowly, quickly, well,
soon, immediately etc.

• They may also be used to describe states and events in such

terms as:
– time (frequently, immediately, momentarily),
– degree (thoroughly, slightly, somewhat),
– contrast (alternatively, however),
– speaker attitude (surprisingly, unfortunately), and
many others.
 B. Minor word classes
A number of other words, like prepositions, pronouns, conjunctions,
interjections, and determiners make up the minor word classes.
I. Prepositions
 words which relate a noun or pronoun to the rest of the clause in the
sentence by providing information about time (at five o’clock, in the
morning), place (on the table, near the window) and other connections
(with a knife, without a thought) involving actions and things.
II. pronouns.
 These are words used in place of a noun like she, herself, they, it, you,
etc.
 They refer to people and things already known or previously discussed
in the sentence or paragraph. (She talks to herself. They said it
belonged to you.).
 Cont’d
III. Conjunctions:

• A word or group of words that connect/join

two or more words, phrases, clauses, or
sentences are called conjunctions/ joining
words.
• used to coordinate words in a sentence.
Examples:
• She is good at both cooking and dancing.
• Neither her friends nor relatives joined for
the party.
 Cont’d
 Coordinating Conjunctions (FANBOYS)
• For: He needs to find a job, for he is unemployed.
• And :Maria loves both ice cream and pizza.
• Nor: Neither Tuesday nor Wednesday is good for the party.
• But: She scored good marks but she is not satisfied.
• Or: Which fruit do you like: mango or apple?
• Yet: She dances well yet she hesitates to take part in the
competition.
• So: He is unwell so he will not come with us to the movie.
 Cont’d
 Subordinating Conjunctions:
• Instead of joining two independent clauses of equal
importance, Subordinating conjunctions make one clause less
important than another. Example
• She went to the park after lunch.
• Although the sun was shining, it wasn’t warm.
• He did the task because he felt it was his duty.
• The baby sleeps before the massage.
• She doesn’t want to give up even though she knows it won’t
better the relation.
• Though they were whispering, their voices echoed in the hall.
• He will not buy you a scooter unless you score good marks.
 Cont’d
 Correlative Conjunctions
• These work in pairs used to join two clauses or
sentences. Example:
a. Neither the children nor their parents attended the
school meeting.
b. Either you cook me lunch, or I leave.
c. Both the teams and their coaches worked hard.
d. Not only teachers but also students were responsible
for the school properties.
 IV. Interjections
• A word or phrase used to express a feeling or to request or
demand for something.
• A part of speech used to express sudden feelings and
emotions.
• There are no particular rules as to where interjections
should be placed in a sentence, but most often, they are
seen to appear in the beginning of a sentence.
• They are used to form exclamatory sentences.
• Common in everyday speech and informal writing.But,
• some interjections such as “well” and “indeed” are
acceptable in formal conversation, it’s best to avoid
interjections in formal or academic writing.
 Cont’d
Examples:
– Oh! I forgot to get gas.
– We’re not lost. We just need to go, um, this way.
– Um, can you explain it once more?
– Wow! I wasn’t expecting that.
– It was an interesting lecture, indeed.
– The project is, uh, going well.
– Wow! You did a really great job with that piece of furniture.
– Well, that is new!
– Bravo! That was a really brave thing to do.
– Oh my God! That was unexpected.
 V. Determiners
A word that modifies, describes, or introduces, specifies,

identifies, or quantifies the noun or noun phrase that follows it.

Kinds:
a. Articles (the, a, and an. )
• “the” is considered as a definite article because it refers to a particular
noun that is mentioned in the text.
• “a” and “an” are called indefinite articles because they point out to a
class of noun not mentioned in the sentence.

• a is used before words that begin with consonants.

– e.g. a bike; a book; a television
• an is used before words beginning with vowels or vowel sounds.
– e.g. an egg, an architect; an umbrella).

• Both of them have the same function, but they are not interchangeable.
 Cont’d.

Example:
• The mountain is very attractive.
• Jonny is studying to be an engineer.
• They were watching a Television at
night.
 b. Quantifiers
• used to express the quantity.
• answer the questions, “How much?”
or “How many?” Examples:
– a few, enough, many, a little, most,
some, any, and much.
• I have enough books.
• We have much time.
• She has few friends
 c. Demonstratives
• Demonstrates and functions as pointers of a particular noun.
• Indicate the position or location of a noun from the point of view of the speaker.
Example:
• this, these, that, and those.
– “this” is used for singular nouns that are near the speaker,
– “these” is for plural nouns that are also close by.
– “that” is for a singular noun that is further away,
– “those” is for plural nouns that are also far from the speaker.
Example:

• This is her laptop.

• That car is my uncle’s.
• These cookies taste great.
• Those students are our classmates.
 d. Possessives
• used to express possession or ownership of a noun.
• are different from possessive pronouns, because
possessive pronouns can be independent or can
stand alone. Example:
– my, his, mine, our, their, and her.
 Sample Sentences:
• This is my car.
• Is this his house?
• Her mom is very pretty.
• This is theirs/yours/hers/his/mine/ours.
 e. Interrogatives
• used for asking questions. Example: WH words
– what, whose, why and which etc.
 Sample Sentences:
• What topics do you want to read more?
• Which school do you prefer?
• Whose bag are you carrying? etc.
Analyzing and representing the internal
structure of English words
 Internal structure of complex words
 Complex words (those composed of more than one morpheme) are not
merely unstructured sequences of morphemes. Example:
 the plural –s suffix on dropouts must be added to the entire compound
dropout.

 Drop and out constitute a noun only after they have been brought together
in the compound.

 Then, the plural suffix may be attached to nouns, dropouts

 Alternatively, and equivalently, we can use tree diagrams to indicate the
parts of complex words and their structural relations:
 Cont’d

dropouts
N

N plu.

v Adv.

drop out s
 Cont’d
• Consider another example: unreadability.
N

Adj. suffix
Adj.
preix
V suffix
un read able ity
 Cont’d
• The suffix -able attaches to verbs to create adjectives.
• Besides readable, we have the adjectives:
– doable, manageable, and attachable, which are derived from the verbs
read, do, manage, and
attach, respectively.

The prefix un- attaches to adjectives, meaning “not” or “the converse

of.”
• Activity: Compare by using tree diagrams to indicate the parts of
complex words and their structural relations below:

unwise, unfair, ungrateful, uncomfortable, unmanageable and

unreadable.
 Classifying words by their
morphological
properties
• Nouns can be identified as those words that can be inflected for plural.

• Verbs are words that can be inflected for 3rd person singular present
tense, past tense, past participle, and progressive.
• Tense forms are often referred to as the principal parts of the verb.

• Adjectives and adverbs are words that can be inflected for comparative and
superlative.

• Derivational regularities can also be used to classify words. Example:

• Adverbs derived from adjectives by the addition of the suffix -ly, e.g.
quickly.
 Classifying words on the basis of their
internal morphological structure

 There are lots of words that are not internally complex and
cannot be classified more. Example,

 The preposition to has no internal morphological structure

and so it cannot be assigned to a grammatical class on that
basis. and,

 Adjectives such as hard or fast lack the characteristic of -ly

ending.
 1.6 Word formation processes in English
 Morphology is the science of word formation OR producing a new form from existing forms
1. Derivation (affixation)
 A process of a new word formation from the old one by adding derivational affixes
 Forming new word like a new class or new semantic change or both. E.g..

Power (N) === class change

Empower (V)

Happy (Adj) === class change

happiness (N)

Happy ==== Adj. Semantic change

unhappy

Care (V) === class and semantic change

Careless (Adj)
Generally, Some familiar examples are the elements: un-, mis-, pre-, -ful, -less, -ish, -ism and -ness
which appear in words like unhappy, misrepresent, prejudge, joyful, careless, boyish, terrorism
and sadness.
 2. Compounding
 Combination of two or more independent words to form a new word . e.g.
 Class room
 Text book
 whiteboard, heartfelt, brother-in-law are compound
words;
 They are made up of the roots (at the same time words themselves) black and
board, heart and felt, brother, in and law, respectively.

Structural dev’t of cpd words :

1. Compounds words behave grammatically and semantically as single words.
2. Inflectional suffixes can appear only after compound words.

Example, bathrooms, school buses, water sports. But,

Exceptions: passersby, brothers-in-law, courts-martial.
 Cont’d
3. Compound words can be written in three different ways:

a. Open, i.e. with a space between the parts of the compound; e.g.
toy store, diving board, flower pot, text book .
b. Hyphenated, i.e., with a hyphen (-) separating the elements of the compound;
e.g. flower-pot, air-brake, she-pony.
Good+looking= good-looking Low+paid=low-paid

C. Solid, e.g. without a space or hyphen between the component elements of the
compound; e.g. flowerpot, washrooms, pickpocket.
Which one is appropriate below?
o Textbook
o Text-book
o Text book
o Wall+paper =?
 3. Acronyms
• New words formed from the initial letters of a set of other words.
Example:
– CD (“compact disk”) or
– ATM (“automatic teller machine”)
– VCR (“video cassette recorder”) where the pronunciation consists of
saying each separate letter.
 But, more typically, acronyms are also pronounced as new single
words, as:
 in NATO, NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration)
 or UNESCO (United Nation Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization)
– RADAR (“radio detecting and ranging”)
– PIN (“personal identification number”)
– PDF ?
 4. Blending

• The combination of two separate forms to produce a single new term.

 Accomplished by taking only the beginning of one word and joining it to the end
of the other word. Example:

 Gasoline+alcohol = gasohol.
 Smoke+Fog = smog.
 Smoke + murk = smurk.
 Binary+digit = bit
 Breakfast+lunch = brunch
 Motor+hotel = motel
 Television+broadcast = telecast
 Information+entertainment = infotainment, etc.
 5. Backformation
• Typically, a word of one type (usually a noun) is
reduced to form a word of another type (usually a
verb). Example:

• A the process whereby the noun television first came

into use and then the verb televise was created from it.
Other examples:
– Donate from “donation”
– Emote from “emotion”
– Opt from “option” etc.
 6. Coinage
• Invention of totally new terms.
• The most typical sources are invented trade
names for commercial products that become
general terms (usually without capital letters)
for any version of that product.
Example:
 Nylon, Vaseline and Sonny etc.
 7. Borrowing
• The process where we borrow words from other languages.
(Technically, it’s more than just borrowing because English doesn’t give
them back.)
o Throughout its history, the English language has adopted a vast
number of words from other languages, including:

o Croissant- French Sofa- Arabic

o Dope- Dutch Tattoo- Tahitian,
o Lilac- Persian Tycoon- Japanese
o Piano- Italian Yogurt- Turkish
o Pretzel- German Zebra- Bantu, etc.

• Other languages, of course, borrow terms from English, as in the Japanese

use of suupaa or suupaamaaketto (“supermarket”) and taipuraitaa
(“typewriter”)
 8. Reduplication
 A special kind of compounding.
 A morphological process in which the root or stem of a word or part of it is
repeated exactly or with a minor change.
 used to show plurality, distribution, repetition, customary activity, increase of size,
added intensity, continuance etc.
 It is found in many languages, though its level linguistic productivity varies from
language to language.
 This is a process of repeating a syllable or the word as a whole (sometimes with
a vowel change) and putting it together to form a new word. Example:
 bye bye (exact reduplication),
 super-duper,
 chitchat,
 pitter-patter,
 zigzag,
 tick-tock,
 flipflop
 9. Clipping
• When a word of more than one syllable is reduced to a
shorter form, usually beginning in casual (unconcerned)
speech. Example:
– Gas-Gasoline
– Pub- public house
– Flu- influenza
– Ad- advertisement
– Microphone- ----- ?
– Laboratory -------?
– Gymnasium--------?
 10. Conversion
 A change in the function of a word. Example:
 when a noun comes to be used as a verb
(without any reduction), is known as conversion.
 A number of nouns such as bottle,
butter, chair and vacation have come to be used,
through conversion, as verbs:

1. They are vacationing in Florida.

2. We bottled the home-brew last night.
3. Have you buttered the sliced bread?
4. Someone has to chair the meeting.
Grammatical characterization of major
and minor word classes

• Verbs in English for instance, have a simple

form, such as “read”, “write”, “illustrate”,
called the base form.
• The verb agrees with its subject.
• Verbs typically signal the time when an action
or event occurs (tense) (a grammatical
construct).
 Cont’d
 Verbs such as sleep and hop that refer
to states or activities which are not directed towards
another entity.
 Therefore, such verbs cannot occur with objects and they are called
intransitive verbs.
 By contrast, verbs which do take objects are called
transitive verbs.
Example:
We stayed in the college.
Jack walked to school yesterday. And,
The children clean the window.

END---------------------- Chapter 1
 Chapter 2:
English Syntax
 Introduction:
• The word syntax derived originally from Greek, is made up of two
morphemes: “syn” and “tax”
• syn means “together”, and tax means “to arrange”,
• hence the literal meaning “a setting out together” or “arrangement”.

• In linguistics, it refers to the study of the rules governing the way words are
combined to form sentences in a language, /the study of the formation of
sentences.

• Syntax studies how words, phrases, and clauses are structured to form
complex sentences/ studies the structure of sentences
• Focus: on the way sentences are developed.
• A sentence is a group of words that communicate a complete idea.
 Phrase structure
 It is the arrangement of the constituents of a sentence.
 The smallest syntactic unit of a sentence is a word. Words are constituents
of phrases.
 Phrases are constituents of clauses and sentences. Since words are
smaller parts of phrases, they must also be smaller parts of sentences, so
words are constituents of sentences, too.
 These units are called constituents of a sentence.
 Each word is a constituent, each phrase is a constituent, and the sentence
itself is a constituent. E.g.
 [Mary] [saw] [the] [cat].
 [S[NP [N Mary]] [VP [V saw] [NP [Det [the] [N cat]] or
 [S[NP Mary] [VP saw [NP the cat]]

An alternative notation to bracketing notation is the syntactic tree (phrase

marker, or phrase structure tree). The phrase structure tree displays :
– how words are organized into phrases, and
– how phrases are related to one another in the sentence
 Phrase structure rules
• Break sentences down into their constituent parts. These constituents are often
represented as tree structures (diagrams). E.g.
• PSRs rules describe all the steps in the phrase structure tree:
• The child found the puppy in the garden.

• 1. Begin with rule 1

– create the node S
– one line below it, create the nodes NP and VP
– connect the NP and VP nodes to S

• 2. Then apply rule 2

– one line below VP, create three nodes V NP, and PrepP
– connect each of them to VP

• 3. Continue with rule 3

• one line below pp create a node Prep and its object NP node
• connect the NP node to pp

• 4. Finally, apply rule 4

– now, below each NP, create two nodes, Det and N
– connect each Det and each N to the NP node that immediately dominates it
•
Note:
– S – Sentence
– NP - Noun Phrase
– VP - Verb Phrase
– Det – Determiner
– N – Noun
– V – Verb
– PP - Prepositional Phrase
– P – Preposition
– A – Adjective
– Adv – Adverb
– Deg - Adverb of Degree
– Pro – Pronoun
– Aux - Auxiliary Verb
– M - Modal
 Example:
[Mary] [saw] [the] [cat] .

NP VP

N V NP

Mary saw det N

the cat
Activity: Write tree structures for the following sentences
below.

1. The art students looked at the very beautiful

painting.
2. The child found the puppy.
3. Jane saw the white car on the road.
4. We might win the lottery.
5. Jack went up a hill.
6. Jane bought a blue necklace.
7. The nurse fed the baby.
8. A rat in the house may eat the icecream.
How to determine phrase structure
The concept of a “head”
• The head of a phrase is the main word of that phrase.
• It is essentially what the entire phrase is about.
• The category of a phrase is directly determined from the category of its head.
Example

1. [The tiny woman] [went ] [to ] [the ] [ store ] ]

Sentence (S) = The tiny woman went to the store

Phrase 1 = the tiny woman

Phrase 2 = went to the store

Phrase 3 = to the store

Phrase 4 = the store

 Cont’d
• What is the head of Phrase 1 ?
• In other words, what is Phrase 1 mainly
about?
• What does it refer to in the real world ?
• It is essentially talking about a woman.
• The other words the and tiny give us more
information about the woman but this is
extra information.
• The main word in the phrase is woman.
 So, the head of Phrase 1 is woman.
 Phrasal Categories
• Phrases are also a combination of two or more words in a
sentence like clauses; however, unlike clauses, phrases do
not contain both a subject and a verb. E.g.

 The bright red ball bounced directly into a muddy

puddle.
• Just as morphemes have morpheme categories, and words
have word categories, phrases also have phrasal
categories.
• Phrasal categories, just like word categories, are ultimately
much more useful than just individual phrases, for the
study of sentence structure.
• A phrasal category is directly determined by the category of
the word which the phrase is about.

• Such a word is called the head of the phrase.

 Types: NP
• It consist of a noun and all of its modifiers.
• Modifiers can include adjectives, articles, participles, or
possessive nouns and pronouns, just to name a things.
It can function as any noun in the sentence, whether as
subjects, objects, or subject complements. E.g.

• Julie, my older sister, came to visit me the other day.

• The girl with red hair clutched the bright copper key.

• In the 2nd sentence, there are two noun phrases:

The 1st NP is the subject of the sentence: (the girl with red
hair).
The 2nd NP is the direct object, (the bright copper key.)
 VP
• Consist of the main verb and its auxiliaries,
or helping verbs.
• Unlike adjectives and noun phrases, adverbs
that modify the verb are not considered part
of the verb phrase. Example:
• The turtle was running quite quickly
considering the nature of his species.

• In the above sentence, the verb phrase

consists of only the main verb (running) and
helping verbs or auxiliaries (was).
 PP
• Consist of a preposition, its object,
and any articles or modifiers.
• As a unit, prepositional phrases can
be used to modify nouns or verbs by
acting like adjectives or adverbs
respectively. Example:

 The children played in the field.

 Adj.P:

 Created using an adjective or using an

adjective plus another adjective or an adjective
plus an adverb. E.g.
A tall tree, The bag is extremely expensive.
Adv.P:
 Constructed using an adverb or using an
adverb plus other words such as another
adverb or a noun phrase. E.g.
Slowly moving, He came after the meeting.
Internal structure of major phrase type

Deep structure:
 Any phrase structure tree is generated by the phrase structure
rules of transformational grammar
 The syntactic structure of a sentence:
 The internal organization of a linear string of words is called its
constituent structure or its phrase structure

 The phrase structure of a sentence is represented by a

phrase structure tree.
 The phrase structure tree shows that a sentence is both a
linear string of words and a hierarchical structure with phrases
nested in phrases. Example:
 The child found the puppy in the garden.
  (The child) (found) (the puppy) (in the garden)
  in the garden  (in) (the garden)
 Sentence
 Is the highest/ largest syntactic unit.
 words are the lowest/ smallest syntactic units.
 Phrases are the intermediate syntactic units.

 Phrase:
 a word or group of words functioning as a syntactic unit between the
level of individual words and the sentence as a whole.
 noun phrase (NP)
 verb phrase (VP)
 adjective phrase (AdjP)
 adverb phrase (AdvP)
 prepositional phrase (Prep P)
• The subject precedes the VP in English PSRs.

• In other words, the subject NP precedes the VP within S:

(S→NP,VP)
 Clausal categories in English
• A clause is “a group of words containing a subject
and predicate and functioning as a member of a
complex or compound sentence.
• It contains only one subject and one verb. The
subject of a clause can be mentioned or hidden,
but the verb must be apparent and
distinguishable. Example:
• I graduated last year. (One clause sentence)
• When I came here, I saw him. (Two clause
sentence)
• When I came here, I saw him, and he greeted me.
(Three clause sentence)
Types of clausal categories in English

1. Independent Clause
2. Dependent Clause
A. Adjective Clause
B. Noun Clause
C. Adverbial Clause
3. Conditional Clause
4. Coordinate Clause
5. Relative clause
 1. Independent Clause
• It gives its own meaning and looks like a
regular sentence. E.g.
– The dog ran across the street.
• Independent sentences /clauses can be
connected by the coordinators:
FANBOYS
Example:
• I want to buy a phone, but I don’t have
enough money.
• He went to London and visited the Lords.
 Dependent/ subordinate Clause
• Alone, it cannot form a complete sentence. The
subordinators do the work of connecting the
dependent clause to another clause to complete
the sentence.
• Subordinators include:
– relative pronouns,
– subordinating conjunctions, and
– noun clause markers etc.
Example:
– When I was dating Daina, I had an accident.
– I know the man who stole the watch.
– He bought a car which was too expensive.
– He does not know where he was born.
– He is a very talented player though he is out of form.
 Dependent Clauses: Three types:

 A. Adjective Clause: also called Relative Clauses .

• It is a dependent Clause that modifies a Noun.
• It has similar qualities as Adjectives that are
modifying Nouns.
Example:
• I’m looking for the red book that went missing last
week.
• Sara is asking for the shoes which used to belong to
her dad.
• You there, who is sitting quietly at the corner, come
here and lead the class out.
 B. Noun Clause
• These are Dependent Clauses acting as
Nouns in sentences.
• These often start with “how,” “that,” and
other WH-words. Example:
• I like what I hear.
• You need to express that it is crossing a
line for you.
• He knows how things work around here.
• You should ask what grandma adds to her
cake to make it so sweet.
 C. Adverbial Clause
 These are dependent clauses acting as adverbs.
i.e
 They modify Verbs, Adjectives and other
Adverbs.
 They answer questions like how, when, where,
why and to what extent, just like adverbs.
 Example:
 When Johnathan left the house, he forgot his
keys.
 After she graduated from college, Sandra got a
job as a nurse.
 I went through the book at a lightning speed.
 3. Conditional Clause
• It uses words like if or unless to show
something that is possible or probable
but not necessarily guaranteed. They
cannot stand alone without the rest of
the sentence, making them
dependent. Examples:
• If it starts to rain, we will have to go
inside.
• you will likely fail math unless you
start putting in more effort.
 4. Coordinate Clause

• Two or more similarly important

Independent Clauses joined
by Coordinating Conjunctions (and,
or, but etc.) in terms of Compound
Sentences. Example:
• You prefer flying but she always
wants to take a bus.
• He needs to find a job, for he is a new graduate.
• Rahel loves both English and Mathematics.
 5. Relative clause
• A relative clause starts with a relative pronoun,
such as that, who or which. It is a type of
adjective clause.
Example:
• She fell in love with Tom, who had a dashing
personality.
• The dog that shouted loudly was the one they
picked at the shelter.
 Types and classification of English
sentences
• A sentence is a string of words put together by the grammatical rules of a
language expressing a complete thought.

• Grammatically independent unit made up of a word or group of

words which can give a complete thought.
• A sentence is the basic unit of thought someone uses to express his/her idea.
 The subject and the predicate are two basic and necessary parts.

 The subject identifies the topic of the sentence and includes a noun, NP or a
clause that acts like a noun.

 The predicate provides information about the topic of the sentence and must
include a verb. Example:
• The school boys are playing football. (Includes subject and predicate)
 Sentence types based on purposes or
functions:
• Communicating with people varies the type of
sentence we use for communication will also vary.
1. Declarative sentences:
Tell us about any kind of information in a statement form.
Example
She does not respect her elder brother.
Hailu is a nurse.
2. Interrogative sentences:
Have a form of a question/ asks a question.
• The purpose is seeking information always with
question mark . Example:
• May I read this book, sir?
• Have you ever seen any park in Ethiopia?
 3. Imperative sentences:
• These are mainly of command or orders,
invitation, prohibition, advice, request,
or suggestion.
• The end mark is full stop, but sometimes an
exclamation mark is used for emphasis.
E.g.
• Shut the door. (command )
• Be good to your colleagues. (advice)
• Please, have a seat.(invitation)
• You, speak to me!
 4. Exclamation sentences:

These are mainly about admiration,

exaggeration, or appreciation of
something.
• Expresses strong emotion,
excitement or sudden feeling. E.g.
happiness, sorrow, wonder, surprise
etc. e.g.
– What a brave boy he is!
– How beautiful the flower!
– Oh! What a beautiful girl you are!
Structural Classification of Sentences

1. Simple Sentence:
• A sentence with one main clause or a
sentence with one subject and one
predicate.
• Both the subject and the predicate could
be simple, compound or complete.
E.g.
• All students of grade ten should not
play Tennis for this week. (Complete
subject and complete predicate)
 2. Compound Sentence

• Consist of two or more independent

clauses connected by coordinating
conjunction, or separated by a semi-
colon.
E.g.
• Derartu Tulu won the gold medal in the
Athens Olympic, but Birhanie Adere
won the Silver medal.
• The park was crowded, for Monday was
a holiday.
 3. Complex Sentence

• One independent clause and one or

more dependent/subordinate
clauses. E.g.

• Because I had lost my wallet, I had

no way to pay my fare.
• I would fly on the sky if I were a bird.
4. Compound –Complex Sentences

• Is a sentence with two or more main

clauses and one or more subordinate
clauses.
• Indicates compound sentence and a
complex sentence.
Example:
• Because I had been careless, my wallet had
disappeared, and I had no way to pay my fare.
• Unless we improve the quality of education,
unemployment will increase, or we will lack
skilled manpower.
 5. Complex-complex Sentences
 Has one or more independent clauses and
two or more dependent clauses.
 One of the dependent clauses depends on
the other dependent clause.
Eg.
• I like students who work hard when they are
told.
• Nelson Mandela, who had fought against
apartheid for a long time because he wanted
to make his people free, has gained immense
respect from the whole world.
 Summary:
• Free morpheme is a morpheme that can stand alone as a
word.
• Bound morpheme is a morpheme that can occur only when
attached to other morphemes.
• Root is a center of a word, which is not further analyzable; it is
what remains when all affixes are removed
• Lexical Class is a word class that expresses the content of the
sentence (Noun, Verb, Adjective and Adverb).
• Functional Class is a word class that does not bring the
content but contain the grammatical function in a sentence
(Preposition, Determiners, Conjunction, interjections etc.)
• Derivation is the process of creating a new lexeme from
another lexeme.
• Adverbs can be derived from adjectives by adding suffix – ly.
• Nouns can be derived from nouns by adding affixes such as , -
ess, -ship, -hood, -er, -ist, etc
 Cont’d
Word Formation is the study of how new complex words are built
on the basis of other words or morphemes.
Coinage is the creation of totally new words in a language.
Derivation is the process of adding affixes (can be prefix and/or
suffix) to a base word to form a new word (lexeme).
Blending is a process in which two separate terms are combined to
make a single new term in which the composite words are reduced.
Acronyms are new words that are formed by combining the first
letters of a group of other words
Compounding is the merging of two independent words might result
in a single form
Clipping is the process of creating a new word by omitting a part of
a longer word into a shorter on
Borrowing is the taking over of words from other languages.
Back-formation is a reduction process of a word of one type
(usually a noun) is reduced to form a word of another type (usually a
verb).
 Reference:

• Famala Eka Sanhadi Rahayu:(Sep,2021)

Introduction To English Morphology

• Plag, I. (2002). Word-formation in English. Cambridge University

Press.

• Ralph W. Fasold (2006). An Introduction to Language and

Linguistics Cambridge University Press

• Yule, G. (2010). The Study of Language (Fourth). Cambridge

University Press.

The End !
Dec, 2015 E.C