"I never heard of 'Uglification'," Alice ventured to say. "What is it?" The Gryphon lifted up both its paws in surprise. "Never heard of uglifying!" it exclaimed. "You know what to beautify is, I suppose?" "Yes," Said Alice doubtfully: "it means --to make-- prettier." "Well then, " the Gryphon went on, "if you don't know what to uglify is, you are a simpleton."
— Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in the Wonderland, 1865
beauty n. ➡️ beautiful adj. ➡️ beautify v. v beautification n.
ugly adj. ➡️ uglify v. ➡️ uglification n.
As demonstrated in the highlighted words in the excerpt, derivational morphemes (or affixes) are added to a base word to create a new word which differs from the base word in meaning or part of speech (or both). This process of forming words is called affixation or derivation. Complex words are derived from affixation. Words created in this way are called derivatives (complex words).
Affixation is the most common way of making new words in English. The two primary kinds of affixations are
prefixation (the addition of a prefix) and
suffixation (the addition of a suffix), while clusters of affixes can be used to form complex words.
Prefixation (Most prefixes do not change the part of speech (POS) of the original word. But some do.)
a). POS maintaining:
indefinite adj. -- adj.
hyperactive adj. -- adj.
co-author n. -- n.
multimedia n. -- n.
review v. -- v.
e-mail, e-commerce, e-dating
iPhone, iPad, iPod
biology, biochemical, biofuel
b). POS altering:
asleep v. → adj.
bewitch n. → v.
outsmart adj.→ v.
2. Suffixation (Most suffixes change the part of speech of the original words. Others make concrete nouns abstract.)
a) POS altering:
beauty → beautiful → beautifully (n. → adj. → adv.)
pore → porous (n. → adj.)
discuss → discussable (v. → adj.)
social → socialist (adj. → n.)
assist → assistant (v. → n.)
b) POS maintaining:
woman womanhood
(noun-concrete) → (noun-abstract)
friend friendship
(noun-concrete) → (noun-abstract)
profit profiteer
(noun-abstract) → (noun-concrete)
3. Infixation: Uncommon in English
speed-o-meter, women
4. circumfixation:
chokma 'he is good'
ik chokm o 'hi isn't good'
lakna 'it's yellow'
ik lakn o 'it's not yellow"
5. Multiple affixations:
Some words contain more than one affix. Take the word 'industrialization' as an example. It has three suffixes: -al, -ize, and -tion. They are added in the root word 'industry' in order, as shown in the tree diagram.
You can find more examples on morphological analysis by clicking the linked words below:
1. Watch this mini lecture from Prof. Handkle explaining how to do morphological analysis of the derivative word 'carelessness'.
2. Watch this mini lecture from Prof. Handkle explaining how to do morphological analysis of the derivative word 'overgeneralization'.
3. Diagram the words 'underestimate' 'deconstructivism' and 'antiestablishmentarianism' on a piece of paper or in an electronic file. Then upload a copy of your diagram to your e-portfolio on the course website. (This is counted as a in-class activity).
Check out this YouTube lecture by Prof. Birte Bos and Prof. Handke to learn more about derivation.
Check out this YouTube lecture by Prof. Birte Bos and Prof. Handke to learn more about morphological operations.