Chapter 1Word-Structure1. The definition of morpheme1.1 What is the smallest meaningful linguistic unit of language?- morphemeWhat are words composed of? - Words are formed by morphemes. A word is the smallest unit that stands alone to communicate meaning.1.2 What are the Chinese equivalents对应词of morpheme? 语素词素-形位2.1 Morphemes may be classified into free and bound.Free morphemes, also called content morphemes, may constitute words by themselves. These morphemes have complete meanings in themselves and can be used as free grammatical units in sentences. So we may say that free morphemes are free roots.Bound morphemes = Bound root + affixes, known as grammatical morphemes, must appear with at least one other morpheme, either free or bound. Bound morphemes are chiefly found in derived words, e.g. recollection, idealistic, ex-prisoner2.2 Morphemes may also be classified into roots (or root morphemes) and affixes (or affixational morphemes).Task:(1) Read the following words and find the root in each word.heart, hearten, dishearten, heartless, hearty, heartiness,sweetheart, heartbroken, kind-hearted, whole-heartedly.(2) What is your definition of root?A root is the part of the word-form which remains when all the affixes have been removed.(3) Is a root necessarily a free morpheme? Why?2.2.1 Two types of roots- Free rootIn English, many roots are free morphemes, such as black in black, blackboard, blacksmith.- Bound rootHowever, there are quite a number of roots which cannot exist on their own and thus belong to the class of bound morphemes. For example, ceive in receive, conceive, perceive, deceive; mit in permit, commit, submit; tain in retain, contain, maintain; cur in recur, occur, incur, etc.these roots cannot be used to form new words.2.2.2 Two types of affixesAffix is a collective term for the type of formative (构词成分) that can be used only when added to another morpheme.- Inflectional affixes (or inflectional morphemes) serve to expressthe following meanings:(1) plurality: e.g. -s in chairs, pens; -es in boxes, tomatoes;en in oxen.(2) the genitive case: e.g. ’s in boy’s, children’s.(3) the verbal endings: for example,a. -(e)s in words like eats, teaches shows the third personsingular present tense.b. -ing in words like eating, teaching shows the presentparticiple or gerund.c. -(e)d in words like worked, saved shows the past tense or pastparticiple.(4) the comparative and superlative degrees:e.g. -er in words like smaller, harder; -est in words like smallest,hardest.- Derivational affixes (or derivational morphemes)can be further divided into prefixes and suffixes.•(1) Prefixes are affixes before the root, e.g: unjust, rewrite.As a rule, most prefixes modify the meaning of roots, but not their parts of speech.task: list some prefixes that can modify the parts of speech.- en-(em-) as in words like embody, enrich- be- as in words like befriend, belittle- a- as in words like asleep, aside • (2) Suffixes are affixes after the root, e.g.: darkness, worker. By the addition of the suffix,the word is usually changed from one part ofspeech into another, e.g. liberation, modernize.2.3 Relationship between the two classifications of morphemesMorphemeIt is the minimal meaningful unit of language. Or it is the smallest functioning unit in the composition of words.a) Bound morphemes are morphemes which alone can be used as words .What is an allomorph?An allomorph is one of the variants of the same morpheme.语素/形位变体是同一个语素的不同形式。
● A morpheme may take various shapes or forms.2.4 Morpheme and Word-formationIn word-formation, morphemes are labeled root, stem, base and affix.在构词法中, 语素被分为词根、词干、词基和词缀。
Two types of affixes:Inflectional affixes and Derivational affixes 屈折词缀和派生词缀⏹ Inflectional affixes function as grammatical markers. 表示词的语法意义的是屈折词缀。
-s ,-es ,ing,-er ,or -(e)d,estDerivational affixes or derivational morphemesThey can be further divided into prefixes and suffixes.(1) Prefixes are affixes before the root.e.g.， unjust, rewrite.As a rule, most prefixes modify the meaning of roots, but not their parts of speech.(2) Suffixes are affixes after the rootBy the addition of the suffix, the word is usually changed from one part of speech into another, e.g. liberation, modernize.Root, stem, base 词根、词干、词基A root is that part of a word form that remains when all inflectional and derivational affixes have been removed. 词根是所有屈折词缀和派生词缀被去掉后所剩余的那部分。
A stem is that part of the word-form which remains when all inflectional affixes have been removed. 词干是所有屈折词缀被去掉后所剩余的那部分。