Lexical morphology

1. LEXICAL MORPHOLOGY

Exploring the means by
which existing words have
been constructed and by
wich neologisms might be
constructed.
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2. WORDS

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Simple
words: cannot be
analysed into smaller units of
meaning
ex. teach, happy
Complex
words: can be
subdivided into smaller units of
meaning
ex. teach-er, un-happy

3. WORD FORMATION

Main
concepts and terms
Word
formation strategies
Word
formation and
neologisms
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4. MAIN CONCEPTS AND TERMS

Simple
words: CAT,
WOMAN, PREFER
Complex
words: UNHAPPY,
PLAYER
Compound words:
PLAYBOY, BODY GUARD,
DRY-CLEAN
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5. MAIN CONCEPTS AND TERMS

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Productivity
productive
strategies
CAREFUL, BEAUTIFUL, USEFUL,
SINFUL, POWERFUL…
*UNCEARE, *UNBEAUTY,
*UNUSE, *UNSIN, *UNPOWER

6. MAIN CONCEPTS AND TERMS

Potential
productivity: ability to
succeed (not systematic
regularity):
* UNHEALTH (ILLNESS)
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7. WORD FORMATION STRATEGIES

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English generates new words in three
different manners:
by making use of its own resources =
INTERNAL METHOD (ex: happiness)
by making use of external resources =
EXTERNAL METHOD (ex: pizza)
mixture of both internal and external
resources = MIXED METHOD (ex: spaghetti
junction)

8. THE INTERNAL METHOD

A) affixation
B) compounding
C) conversion
D) back-formation
E) less productive strategies
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9. AFFIXATION

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AFFIXATION
Word-initially prefix
Word-finally –> suffix
[word-medially infix]
More than one prefix/suffix:
ex.: uncarefulness, disorganization

10. Affixation by prefix

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Examples:
UNable, DISagree
Prefixes
are normally classpreserving
(But: slave enslave, horse to unhorse)

11. Affixation by suffix

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Examples:
drivER, kingDOM,
useFUL, childISH, washABLE, widEN,
careLESS
Suffixes are normally classchanging

12. Nomina agentis

-ER: driver, singer, employer, teacher….
-ANT: assistant, inhabitant, servant,
participant..
-AR: beggar, burglar, liar…
-EE: employee, nominee, divorcee, refugee…
-ENT: adherent, president…
-ESS: actress, hostess, waitress…
-OR: actor, supervisor, author, doctor,
editor…
[ZERO]: flirt, spy…
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13. B) COMPOUNDING

The
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process by which 2 (or more)
words are joined together to form a
new word.

14. COMPOUNDING

Very common and productive
Compounds and ‘strings’ (double/multiple
compounds), very frequent in ESP:
Ex:
-sudden infant death syndrome
-policy-maker
-peace-keaper
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15. Grammatical function of compounds

Compounds can be grouped
according to their grammatical
function
The HEAD of a compound: is the
last element; determines the
grammatical function and
category nominal, adjectival
and verbal compounds
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16. nominal compounds

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N+N N: baby sitter, birthday, bookshop, haircut, lipstick,
safety belt, weekend
V+N N: playboy, drawbridge
Ving+N N: boxing gloves, swimming pool, washing
machine, drinking water, chewing gum
A+N N: blackboard, Englishman, fast food, greenhouse
(Pr+N) she-devil

17. adjectival compounds

A+A A: Anglo-Saxon, bitter-sweet,
deaf-mute, light blue, red-hot
N+A A: duty-free, homesick, lifelong,
user-friendly
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18. verbal compounds

A+V V: to deep-freeze
Av+V V: to outlive, to oversleep,
to underpay, to upset
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19. Compounds and lexical stress

Compound
words, particularly
nouns, are usually stressed on the
first base:
ex.: BOOK-shop
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20. Compounds and lexical stress

The
first base (determinant)
specifies the second one
(determinatum): a GREENhouse vs a GREEN HOUSE, a
DARK-room vs a DARK ROOM
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21. A ‘green ‘house vs A ‘greenhouse

A green house
A greenhouse

22. A ‘dark ‘room vs A ‘dark-room

A dark room
A dark-room

23. Compounds and spelling

Solid
form ,open form and
form with hyphen:
bookshop
book review
book-case
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24. Compounds and meaning

Compounds can be paraphrased:
tea-cup a cup for drinking tea
bedroom a room with a bed in it
Washing machine?... Swimming pool?
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25. C) CONVERSION

The process by which a new word is created by
changing the class of an existing word, i.e. by
using a word as a member of a different
wordclass.
It’s a very easy and productive process (only) in
English (since most words have no morphological
differentiation): cfr. love / to love vs amore /
amare
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26. CONVERSION

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V N: answer, call, cheat, command,
cover, desire, disgust, doubt, fall, guess, lift,
murder, spit, spy, turn, walk;
N V: to ape, to bottle, to chair, to duel, to
dust, to fish, to land, to mail, to mask, to
peel, to sugar, to witness;
A V: to better, to calm, to dirty, to dry, to
empty, to open.

27. CONVERSION: problems

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Black to black (conversion) or to blacken
(derivation);
Quiet to quiet (conversion) or to quieten
(derivation)

28. CONVERSION : borderline, special cases

CONVERSION : borderline, special
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cases
Conversion and phonemes: house /s/ - to
house /z/, use – to use, advice – to advise,
belief – to believe, grief – to grieve, shelf – to
shelve
Conversion and word stress: CONflict – to
conFLICT, EXport – to exPORT, REbel – to
reBEL, FREquent – to freQUENT

29. CONVERSION : special cases

Conversion and meaning:
A1) photograph: fotografia
A2) to photograph: fotografare
ma…..
B1) sugar: zucchero, lusinghe
B2) to sugar: zuccherare, addolcire (to
sugar the pill)
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30. CONVERSION : special cases

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C1) bottle: bottiglia
C2) to bottle: imbottigliare, conservare
sotto vetro
D1) shadow: ombra
D2) to shadow: ombreggiare, pedinare

31. CONVERSION : special cases

E1) STONE: E2) TO STONE:
- sasso
- colpire a sassate, lapidare
- pietra
- pavimentare in pietra, lastricare
- pietra per affilare
- affilare
- pietra preziosa
- ???
- gemma
- ???
- pietra tombale
- ???
- calcolo renale
- ???
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32. D) BACKFORMATION

Is
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the process in which an affix is
removed from an existing word, so that
the resulting word belongs to a
different word class

33. BACKFORMATION

Examples:
greedy greed
television to televize
editor to edit
babysitter to babysit
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34. LESS PRODUCTIVE STRATEGIES

CLIPPING
or SHORTENING:
- ad, exam, lab, pub, dino;
- bus, cello, phone, plane;
- flu, fridge, Liz;
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35. LESS PRODUCTIVE STRATEGIES

ACRONYM
(formed by initial letters or
syllables; pronounced as words): radar
(radio detecting and ranging), sitcom
(situation comedy)
INITIALISM
BBC, VIP
(pronounced letter by letter):
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36. LESS PRODUCTIVE STRATEGIES

BLEND (or PORTMANTEAU WORD): similar to
compound but base words are not joined in
their entirety
Ex.: smog (smoke+fog),
bit (binary+digit),
brunch (breakfast+lunch),
Chunnel (Channel+tunnel),
heliport,
oxbridge…
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37. LESS PRODUCTIVE STRATEGIES

REDUPLICATION:
goody-goody (ipocrita), wishy-washy
(acquoso, blando: vowel variation)
EPONYMS:
sandwich, hoover, boycott
.
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38. THE EXTERNAL METHOD

Borrowings
or loanwords,
which are the result of
languages in contact
Contact
causes
interference
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39. BORROWINGS or LOANWORDS

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A loanword is a word which is brought wholesale
(i.e. form + meaning) into one language from
another
Interlinguistic borrowing vs intralinguistic borrowing
(dialect words or technical terms in standard
language)
Why? motivation
How? adaptation

40. LOANWORDS FROM?

Pizza
Banana
Hamburger
Curry
Kangaroo
Totem
Robot
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41. LOANWORDS FROM…

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-
LATIN: gospel, interrogate,
-
FRENCH: question, guard, rouge
-
ITALIAN: violin, opera, balcony, pizza,
mafia, spaghetti
-
SPANISH: banana, cannibal, guitar,
hammock
-
DUTCH: cruise, landscape
-
GERMAN: hamburger, blitz

42. LOANWORDS FROM…

-
OTHER: robot (Czech), glasnost
(Russian), assassin (North Africa),
safari (Central Africa), curry, tea
(Asia), totem (North America),
kangaroo, taboo, tattoo (Oceania)
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43. LOANOWORS

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Necessity:
- lexical gap: stiletto/ topless, bestseller,
- new extralinguistic reality:
chiaroscuro / bar, mouse
- foreign reality: Risorgimento / Tory

44. LOANWORDS

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Loanwords
make the receiving
language richer; its communicative
potential gets greater (controversial)
Some
loanwords are for everybody
(bar, film, sport), some are for specific
groups of speakers (dribbling)
Some
loanwords last (bar / mafia),
some do not ( imboscata)

45. LOANWORDS: the adaptation process

Phonological
adaptations ( It.):
- tunnel, jazz
- (hypercorrectness) self control,
privacy
Orthographical
adaptations:
- goal gol (It.)
- dispaccio (It.) dispatch
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46. LOANWORDS: the adaptation process

Morphosyntactical
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adaptations:
- natural gender: cowboy un
cowboy, hostess una hostess
- grammatical gender: jungle la
giungla (-a); beef-steak la
bistecca(-a)
- plurals: gli opinion maker, gli
anchormen, i leader, i floppy disk
(viceversa: trattoria trattorias)

47. LOANWORDS: the adaptation process

Morphosyntactical adaptations:
- word classes may change: i big della
musica, gli optional dell’auto
- foreign words + native morphemes:
It.: barista, golfino, revolverata
Ing.: Chiantishire
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48. LOANWORDS: the adaptation process

Semantic
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adaptations:
- restriction in the number of
acceptations: mouse (It.: solo for
computer), allegro (Ing.: only for
music)
- difference in meaning: pepperoni in
English refers to a type of sausage.

49. THE MIXED METHOD

Mixing
(native) form and
(foreign) meaning:
CALQUES
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50. THE MIXED METHOD

Calques imply a deeper bilingualism in
speakers than loanwords:
- chewing gum chewing-gum
(loanword)
gomma da masticare
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51. CALQUE

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Compound or complex loanwords in which
speakers analyse the parts and replace them
with corresponding native forms:
Sky-scraper grattacielo
- High fidelity alta fedeltà
- Honey-moon luna di miele,
- Head hunters cacciatori di teste
-

52. CALQUE

-
From Ita. to Eng.:
Pizzeria pizza-place (BrE), pizza-house (BrE/AmE), pizza parlor (AmE)
-
Partial calques
generation gap gap generazionale
pop music musica pop,
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53.

Take the language awareness
challenge!!!!
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54.

Exercises
For each of the following terms, choose a suitable
example among those provided:
1. ...................
A. switch off
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
B. ...................
C. fast food
D. bow
E. ...................
nominal compound
phrasal verb
...................
...................
homograph

55.

Exercises
Say whether each of the following statements is
TRUE (mark A as an answer) or FALSE (mark B as
an answer):
13. Prefixes are word class changing A B
14. ...................
A B
15. ...................
A B
16. ...................
A B
17. ...................
A B

56.

Exercises
Match up the lexical units belonging to the same
category:
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
unhappy
...................
...................
...................
body guard
kangaroo
A. ...................
B. washing machine
C. pizza
D. player
E. ...................
F. ...................