Morphology
A. Consider the following nouns in Zulu and proceed to look for recurring
forms.
Umfazi married woman abafazi married women
umfani boy abafani boys
umzali parent abazali parents
umfundisi teacher abafundisi teachers
umbazi carver ababazi carvers
umlimi farmer abalimi farmers
umdlali player abadlali players
umfundi reader abafundi readers
a. What is the morpheme meaning “singular” in Zulu?
b. What is the morpheme meaning “plural” in Zulu?
c. List the Zulu stems to which the singular and plural morphemes are
attached, and give their meanings.
B. The following Zulu verbs are derived from noun stems by adding a
verbal suffix.
Fundisa to teach funda to read
lima to cultivate baza to carve
d. Compare these words to the words in section A that are related in
meaning, for example, umfundisi ‘the teacher,’abafundisi ‘teachers,’
fundisa ‘to teach.’ What is the derivational suffix that specifies the
category verb?
e. What is the nominal suffix (i.e., the suffix that forms nouns)? –
f. State the morphological noun formation rule in Zulu.
g. What is the stem morpheme meaning ‘read’?
h. What is the stem morpheme meaning ‘carve’?
C. Sweden has given the word rock group ABBA, the automobile Volvo,
and the great film director Ingmar Bergman. The Swedish language
offers us a noun morphology that you can analyze with the knowledge
gained. Consider these Swedish nouns forms:
en lampa a lamp en bil a car
en stol a chair en soffa a sofa
en tidning a newspaper en katt a cat
lampor lamps bilar cars
stolar chairs soffor sofas
tidningar newspapers kattar cats
lampan the lamp bilen the car
stolen the chair soffan the soffa
tidningaren the newspaper katten the cat
lamporna the lamps bilarna the cars
stolarna the chairs sofforna the sofas
tidningarna the newspapers kattarna the cats
a. What is the Swedish word for the indefinite article a (or an)?
b. What are the two forms of the plural morpheme in these data? How
can you tell which plural form applies?
c. What are the two forms of the morpheme that make a singular word
definite, that is, correspond to the English article the? How can you
tell which form applies?
d. What is the morpheme that makes a plural word definite?
e. In what order do the various suffixes occur when there is more than
one?
f. If en flicka is ‘a girl,’ what are the forms for ‘girls,’ ‘the girl,’ and ‘the
girls’?
g. If bussarna is ‘the houses,’ what are the forms for ‘buses’ and ‘the
bus’?
D. Here are some nouns from the Philippine language Cebuano.
Sibwano A Cebuano binisaja the Visayan
language
ilokano An Ilocano ininglis the English
language
tagalog a Tagalog tinagalog the Tagalog
person language
inglis an Englishman inilokano the Ilocano
language
bisaja A Visayan sinibwano the Cebuano
language
a. What is the exact rule for deriving languages names from ethnic
group names?
b. What type of affixation is represented here?
c. If suwid meant ‘a Swede’ and italo meant ‘an Italian,’ what would be
the words for the Swedish language and the Italian language?
d. If finuranso meant ‘the French language’ and inunagari meant ‘the
Hungarian language,’ what would be the words for a Frenchman
and a Hungarian?
E. The following infinitive and past participle verb forms are found in
Dutch.
Root Infinitive Past Participle
wandel wandelen gewandeld walk
duw duwen geduwd push
stofzuig stofzuigen gestofzuigd Vacuum-clean
With reference to the morphological processes of prefixing, suffixing,
infixing, and circumfixing and the specific morphemes involved:
a. State the morphological rule for forming an infinitive in Dutch.
b. State the morphological rule for forming the Dutch past participle
form.