MODUL PERKULIAHAN
Mata Kuliah Morphology
Modul 2:
Morphemes
Membedakan tipe-tipe morphemes terikat, menerangkan affixation, dan
membedakan root, stem dan base.
Fakultas Program Studi Tatap Muka Kode MK Disusun Oleh
Bahasa Program 01 190741102 Tim Dosen
Studi Bahasa
Inggris S1
Abstract Kompetensi
Bab ini memaparkan tentang tipe- Mahasiswa mampu membedakan
tipe morphemes terikat, affixation, tipe-tipe morphemes terikat,
root, stem, base, menerangkan affixation,
membedakan root, stem dan base.
Chapter 4
Inflectional Morphology
Function words like to, it, and be are free morphemes. Many languages, including
English, also have bound morphemes that have a strictly grammatical function. They
mark properties such as tense, number, person, and so forth. Such bound morphemes are
called inflectional morphemes. Unlike derivational morphemes, they never change the
grammatical category of the stems to which they are attached.
Inflectional morphemes represent relationships between different parts of a sentence. For
example, -s expresses the relationship between the verb and the third-person singular subject;
-ed expresses the relationship between the time the utterance is spoken (e.g., now) and the
time of the event (past).
English Inflectional Morphemes Examples
-s third-person singular present She wait-s at home.
-ed past tense She wait-ed at home.
-ing progressive She is eat-ing the donut.
-en past participle Mary has eat-en the donuts.
-s plural She ate the donut-s.
-’s possessive Disa‟s hair is short.
-er comparative Disa has short-er hair than Karin.
-est superlative Disa has the short-est hair.
Inflectional morphemes in English follow the derivational morphemes in a word.
Thus, to the derivationally complex word commit + ment one can add a plural ending to form
commit + ment + s, but the order of affixes may not be reversed to derive the impossible
commit + s + ment = *commitsment.
Yet another distinction between inflectional and derivational morphemes is that inflectional
morphemes are productive: they apply freely to nearly every appropriate base (except
“irregular” forms such as feet, not *foots). Most nouns take an -s inflectional suffix to form a
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plural, but only some nouns take the derivational suffix -ize to form a verb: idolize, but not
*picturize.
Some languages are highly inflected. In Swahili, which is widely spoken in eastern
Africa, verbs can be inflected with multiple morphemes, as in kimeanguka (ki + me +
anguka), meaning „it has fallen.‟ Here the verb root anguka meaning „fall‟ has two
inflectional prefixes: ki- meaning „it‟ and me meaning „completed action.‟
Derivational Morphology
Bound morphemes like -ify, -cation and -arian are called derivational morphemes.
When they are added to a base, a new word with a new meaning is derived. The addition of -
ify to pure—purify—means „to make pure,‟ and the addition of -cation—purification—means
„the process of making pure.‟ The form that results from the addition of a derivational
morpheme is called a derived word. Derivational morphemes have clear semantic content. In
this sense they are like content words, except that they are not words. As we have seen, when
a derivational morpheme is added to a base, it adds meaning.
The derived word may also be of a different grammatical class than the original word,
as shown by suffixes such as -able and -ly. When a verb is suffixed with -able, the result is an
adjective, as in desire + able. When the suffix -en is added to an adjective, a verb is derived,
as in dark + en. One may form a noun from an adjective, as in sweet + ie. Other examples are:
Noun to Adjective Verb to Noun Adjective to Adverb
boy + -ish acquitt + -al exact + -ly
virtu + -ous clear + -ance
Elizabeth + -an accus + -ation
pictur + -esque sing + -er
affection + -ate conform + -ist
health + -ful predict + -ion
alcohol + -ic
Noun to Verb Adjective to Noun Verb to Adjective
moral + -ize tall + -ness read + -able
vaccin + -ate specific + -ity creat + -ive
hast + -en feudal + -ism migrat + -ory
im- + prison free + -dom run(n) + -y
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be- + friend
en- + joy
in- + habit
Adjective to Verb
en + large
en + dear
en + rich
Some derivational affixes do not cause a change in grammatical class.
Noun to Noun Verb to Verb Adjective to Adjective
friend + -ship un- + do pink + -ish
human + -ity re- + cover red + -like
king + -dom dis- + believe a- + moral
New Jersey + -ite auto- + destruct il- + legal
vicar + -age in- + accurate
Paul + -ine un- + happy
America + -n semi- + annual
libr(ary) + -arian dis- + agreeable
mono- + theism sub- + minimal
dis- + advantage
ex- + wife
auto- + biography
un- + employment
In distinguishing inflectional from derivational morphemes in Modern English we may
summarize in the table below:
Inflectional Derivational
Grammatical function Lexical function
No word class change May cause word class change
Small or no meaning change Some meaning change
Often required by rules of grammar Never required by rules of grammar
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Follow derivational morphemes in Precede inflectional morphemes in
a word a word
Productive Some productive, many nonproductive
Three criteria are commonly used to help distinguish between inflectional and
derivational affixes. First, inflection does not change either the grammatical category or the
type of meaning found in the word to which it applies.
A second property of inflectional affixes has to do with the order in which they are
combined with a base relative to derivational affixes.
Third criterion for distinguishing between inflectional and derivational affixes is
productivity, the relative freedom with which they can combine with bases of the appropriate
category.
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Chapter 5
An extremely common morphological process in language is affixation, the addition
of an affix. Normally, linguists distinguish among three types of affixes. An affix that is
attached to the front of its base is called a prefix whereas an affix that is attached to the end of
its base is termed a suffix.
Prefixes and Suffixes
We know whether an affix precedes or follows other morphemes, for example that un-
, pre- (premeditate, prejudge), and bi- (bipolar, bisexual) are prefixes. They occur before
other morphemes. Some morphemes occur only as suffixes, following other morphemes.
English examples of suffix morphemes are -ing (sleeping, eating, running, climbing), -er
(singer, performer, reader), -ist (typist, pianist, novelist, linguist), and -ly (manly, sickly,
friendly), to mention only a few.
Many languages have prefixes and suffixes, but languages may differ in how they deploy
these morphemes. A morpheme that is a prefix in one language may be a suffix in another and
vice versa. In English the plural morphemes –s and -es are suffixes (boys, lasses). In Isthmus
Zapotec, spoken in Mexico, the plural morpheme ka- is a prefix:
zigi „chin‟ kazigi „chins‟
zike „shoulder‟ kazike „shoulders‟
diaga „ear‟ kadiaga „ears‟
To express reciprocal action in English we use the phrase each other, as in understand each
other, love each other. In Turkish a morpheme is added to the verb:
anla „understand‟ anlash „understand each other‟
sev „love‟ sevish „love each other‟
In Piro, an Arawakan language spoken in Peru, a single morpheme, -kaka, can be added to a
verb to express the meaning „cause to‟: cokoruha „to harpoon‟ cokoruhakaka „cause to
harpoon‟ salwa „to visit‟ salwakaka „cause to visit‟.
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Infixes
Some languages also have infixes, morphemes that are inserted into other morphemes.
Bontoc, spoken in the Philippines, is such a language, as illustrated by the following:
Nouns/Adjectives Verbs
fikas „strong‟ fumikas „to be strong‟
kilad „red‟ kumilad „to be red‟
fusul „enemy‟ fumusul „to be an enemy‟
Some Tagalog infixes
Base Infixed form
takbuh 'run' t-um-akbuh 'ran‟
lakad 'walk' 1-um-akad 'walked'
pili? 'choose' p-in-ili? 'chose'
A very special type of infixing system is found in Semitic languages such as Arabic, in which
a typical root consists simply of three consonants. Affixes consisting of two vowels are then
inserted into this root in a manner that intersperses the vowels among the consonants. (In the
examples that follow, the segments of the root are written in boldface.)
katab kutib aktub uktab
'write' 'have been written' 'be writing' 'being written'
Simulfix
In linguistics, simulfix is a type of affix that changes one or more existing phonemes in order
to modify the meaning of a morpheme. Examples of simulfix in English are generally
considered irregularities, all of which left over from pluralization rules that existed before the
great vowel shift. They include:
mouse mice
man men
tooth teeth
louse lice
Circumfixes
Some languages have circumfixes, morphemes that are attached to a base morpheme both
initially and finally. These are sometimes called discontinuous morphemes. In Chickasaw, a
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Muskogean language spoken in Oklahoma, the negative is formed by surrounding the
affirmative form with both a preceding ik- and a following -o working together as a single
negative morpheme. The final vowel of the affirmative is dropped before the negative part -o
is added. Examples of this circumfixing are:
Affirmative Negative
chokma „he is good‟ ik + chokm + o „he isn‟t good‟
lakna „it is yellow‟ ik + lakn + o „it isn‟t yellow‟
palli „it is hot‟ ik + pall + o „it isn‟t hot‟
tiwwi „he opens (it)‟ ik + tiww + o „he doesn‟t open (it)‟
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Chapter 6
Roots and Stems
Morphologically complex words consist of a morpheme root and one or more affixes. Some
examples of English roots are paint in painter, read in reread, ceive in conceive, and ling in
linguist. A root may or may not stand alone as a word (paint and read do; ceive and ling
don‟t).
When a root morpheme is combined with an affix, it forms a stem. Other affixes can be added
to a stem to form a more complex stem, as shown in the following:
root Chomsky (proper) noun
stem Chomsky + ite noun + suffix
word Chomsky + ite + s noun + suffix + suffix
root believe verb
stem believe + able verb + suffix
word un + believe + able prefix + verb + suffix
root system noun
stem system + atic noun + suffix
stem un + system + atic prefix + noun + suffix
stem un + system + atic + al prefix + noun + suffix + suffix
word un + system + atic + al + ly prefix + noun + suffix + suffix + suffix
Bound roots do not occur in isolation and they acquire meaning only in combination with
other morphemes. For example, words of Latin origin such as receive, conceive, perceive, and
deceive share a common root, -ceive; and the words remit, permit, commit, submit, transmit,
and admit share the root -mit. For the original Latin speakers, the morphemes corresponding
to ceive and mit had clear meanings, but for modern English speakers, Latinate morphemes
such as ceive and mit have no independent meaning. Their meaning depends on the entire
word in which they occur.
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A similar class of words is composed of a prefix affixed to a bound root morpheme. Examples
are ungainly, but no *gainly; discern, but no *cern; nonplussed, but no *plussed;
downhearted but no *hearted, and others to be seen in this section‟s epigraph.
The morpheme huckle, when joined with berry, has the meaning of a berry that is small,
round, and purplish blue; luke when combined with warm has the meaning „somewhat.‟ Both
these morphemes and others like them (cran, boysen) are bound morphemes that convey
meaning only in combination.
Base
A base is the element to which an affix is added. In many cases, the base is also the root. In
books, for example, the element to which the affix -s is added corresponds to the word's root.
In other cases, however, an affix can be added to a unit larger than a root. This happens in
words such as blackened, in which the past tense affix -ed is added to the verbal base blacken-
a unit consisting of the root adjective black and the suffix -en.