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Study of Meanings in Language
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Module 5
The Meaningful Units
of a Language
LE the last two modules, you read up on the
significant sounds of English, the basic units of
the language. You learned to tell the difference
between what is phonetic and what is phonemic.
You also found out that the significant sounds or
phonemes of a language are made up of distinct
sound segments or segmentals—either
consonants or vowels—and other significant
sounds over and above the segments, namely,
stress, intonation and juncture, which are
referred to as suprasegmentals.
In the first module of this course, it was pointed
out that although the basic units of a language
are its significant sounds or phonemes, these
distinct sounds in themselves carry no meanings.
In the final analysis, language is used as a means
of transferring meanings from the sender of the
message or encoder to the receiver of the message
or decoder,
Modules 3 and 4 underscored the fact that
un the sounds in themselves carry no
eaning, they combine to form meaningful units.
These meanii i
i meaning-bearing units are the concern of
this module.
—_—
Objectives |
After working on this
module, you should be able
to:
1. Discuss the different
types of meaning and
how these are signaled;.
2. Distinguish between
morphs, allomorphs,
and morphemes;
3. Discuss and cite
examples of the different
types
of morphemes—bound
(inflectional and
derivational) and free
(function
words and content |
words); and
Show how insights from |
morphology may be
utilized by the language
teacher in the classroom.
‘Scanned with CamScannerve re does Meaning reside? Is it in the term or in the context of 4,
uation? Is it the intended meaning of the encoder or the meaning
perceived by the decoder? What kinds of meaning are there? What for,
do these meaning-bearing units take? These are some of the question:
that this module will answer.
Types of Meaning
Why does communication breakdown oc: ur? Why is the intended meaning
of a speaker sometimes misconstrued by the listener? Why do decoders of
a message sometimes put meaning where there is none? Is it because there
are many variables that affect meaning?
Actually, linguistics is concerned with two areas phonetics or the study
of sounds of a language, and semantics, the study of its meanings Fora
while, the structural linguists were wary of describing language with
meaning, in mind because of the many variables that affect meaning, In
fact, it took some time for structural grammar to give way to semantic
grammar.
SAQ 5-1
Charles Fries, an applied linguist, cites four different types of
meaning based on the linguistic item that signals the meaning
The first of these is intonational meaning, As the term goes, ts
the intonation that signals the change in meaning,
Read these sentences which have been marked with lines to show
the rise and fall in the pitch of the voice. Note that the utterances:
make use of the same words but differ in the intonation.
Write the letter of the utterance that answers the question about
each set of utterances.
a. Realy
b. Beal
1. Which one expresses surprise?
2 Which one shows that the speaker does not put too
much importance on what was said?
‘Scanned with CamScannerUnit | Module 5 103
SAQ 5-1 cont'd.
c. heard himsa “Fire!” |
d. Lheard him sayl “fire
e. Leas im syl "Fe"
3. In which sentence is fire
captain of a firing squad?
given as a command by the
4. In which sentence is fire mentioned as a response to
the question, “What did he say?
5. In which sentence is fire uttered as a warning that |
something has caught fire?
f£, WWat?
swe |
6. What question is uttered when someone calls your |
name and you respond to find out what he wants?
7. Which utterance shows disbelief? |
h. Is thal so?
i. AW thal so?
—— 8. Which utterance shows disbelief?
—___ 9 i
Which utterance seeks information?
‘Scanned with CamScanner104
EDL 201 Applied Linguistics for Communication Arts
ASAQ 5-1
As was mentioned in Module 4, intonation is a suprasegmental
phoneme because a change in the intonation results in a change in
meaning, Find out if you pinpointed the correct meaning signaled
by the intonation used in the sentences you have just read.
a_i.
b_ 2.
e. 3.
The answer is a surprise because of the extra high
intonation used. You learned in Module 4 that the extra
high intonation indicates strong emotions.
. The rising-falling intonation shows that the speaker
considers what was said earlier as inconsequential so he
uses the ordinary rising-falling intonation.
‘The extra-high rising-falling intonation is used to mark
the utterance as a command in contrast to the rising-falling,
intonation which is the normal matter-of-fact way of
saying, things.
. The utterance is a casual response to a question so the
ordinary rising-falling intonation is used
Since the utterance is a warning, that something is on fire,
the extra-high rising intonation is used to convey strong
feelings.
_ The one-word utterance would actually be, if written out
in full, “What do you want?” An ellipsis has been done,
deleting the last three words and leaving only the question
word what. Since this is the shortened form of a wh-
question, the normal rising-falling intonation is used
. This time the extra-high rising intonation is used to signal
strong feelings of disbelief, surprise and even shock.
Since the sentence is not a yes-no question the rising
intonation is not used. Rather, the sentence is said within
a final rising-falling intonation.
. This time the sentence is a yes-no question, so the final
rising intonation is used.
‘Scanned with CamScannerUnit I Module 5 105
Still another type of meaning according to Charles Fries is morphological
meaning, which refers to the added meaning given by affixes to a root
word. From the form of the word, the root word is evident but the affixes
indicate added meaning, In the examples that follow, note that the plural-
marking affixes give the added meaning that there are “more than one”
of the object mentioned in the root word. The past tense-marking affix, on
the other hand, gives the added meaning that the action mentioned in the
root word took place in the past.
book + s = books (more than one book)
child + en = children (more than one child)
want + ed = wanted (I wanted it sometime in the past)
run + (vowel change) = ran (Iran sometime in the past)
SAQ 5-2
Here is a list of words with affixes that give added meaning to the
root word. Group together all the words whose affixes signal the
same added meaning. Then, write on top of each group the
additional meaning signaled by those affixes. How mar
y groups
did you come up with?
act - actor fox - foxes legitimate- sing - song
illegitimate -
| Beg - beggar genus - genocide — modest-immodest stand - stood
| brook - brooklet goose - geese mouse - mice statue-statuette
creep - crept hero - heroine opera - operetta steward - stewardess
Decide - decided homo-homicide ox - oxen stop - non-stop
suck - ducks infant - infanticide pest - pesticide study - studies,
direct - indirect insect - insecticide play - playlet tie - untie
duke - duchess, Island - istet prince - princess violin - violinist
electric - electrician janitor -janitress refuge - refugee wolf - wolverine
figure - fi
igure - figurine keep - kept regular - irregular write ~ writer
‘Scanned with CamScannerASAQ 5-2
Did
ider
Vou come up with seven groupings? And were you able to
atify the meaning signaled by the affixes in each group? Here is
the words should be grouped
how
Group A Group 8 Group
Ploval-Marking Affixes Past Timo-Marking Affixes Actor-Marking Affixes
ro ducks creep crept act actor
tox mores keep kept bea beggar
OOse decide decided write writer
mouse study ~ studied electric electrician
o sing = sang refuge ~ refugee
stand — stood violin. — violinist
GroupD GroupE
Negative-Marking Affixes Gender-Marking Affixes
direct ~ indirect duke = duchess
legitimate ~ illegitimate janitor - _janitress
modest - immodest prince princess
regular - irregular steward - stewardess
te — untie hero — heroine
stop ~ non-stop wolf = wolverine
GroupF GroupG
Diminutive Size-Marking Affixes Affix Indicating “To Slay”
brook - — brooklet genus ~ genocide
istand - islet homo — homicide
play - _ playlet infant’ - infanticide
statue - statuette insect - insecticide
opera — operetta pest - pesticide
figure - figurine
A. The plural-marking affixes are the final s morpheme, the change
in vowel or en
The past time-marking, affixes are final ed, vowel change and a
change in vowel + the addition of t.
Phe actor-marking, affixes are er, or, or ar, ian, ist, ee,
fhe negative-marking, affixes are un, non and in, iin, ih
depending on the initial phoneme of the reat word to whieh it
is affixed.
The yender-marking, affixes are ess or ine.
‘The affixes el, effe, we indicate a small size version of the ebject
mentioned in the root word
The affix cide indicates “to slay.”
‘Scanned with CamScannerUnit | Moauie 9 wr
tt might be pointed out that the different meaning-bearing,
morphs in each group are by no means exhaustive
other morphs signaling the same meaning as the
group,
affixes or
You may want to add
other morphs in the
A third type of meaning as pointed out by Charles | ties is lexical meaning.
‘This refers to the meaning, of the root word or word base. In this respect,
however, Fries underscores the fact that a word may take on several
meanings depending on the context in which it is used. Do you recall
Tram Module | how Malinowski, an anthropologist, indicated that meaning
resides in the context of the situation?
Look at this sentence and try to guess what the underlined word would
refer to in the situations
ed after the sentence:
He finally got the chair.
4. referring to a convict found guilty of a heinous crime
death
b. concerning a prof
punishable by
sor who was awarded a grant in recognition of
his expertise in the field and to enable him to conduct a research project
and give a scholarly talk on it
c. about a person shopping for furniture
for his house
Well, in the first situation, the chair ref
erred to must be the electric chair
becauee of the words in the context: convict, guilty of a heinous crime and
punishable by death.
In the second situation, the chair referred to is a
hinted at in the clue words profe
conduct a research project and give a
professorial chair
sor, a grant, recognition of his expertise,
ccholarly talk on it.
In the “ e, in
B the last example, the expression shopping for furniture gives us a clue
is time that the chair in this situation must be a piece of fur
intended for persons to sit on.
ture
Now, look at these s
Now, look at hese sentences where you have the word run used in different
aie i i has different meanings depending, on the context
J How many meanings of run can you guess? You
check
your yuess against the n
dictionary. Le wainst the different meanings of wan give ,
ee given in any
\ Ste has a rar in her stockings.
3. There is a run in the bank 3
fur product is still on a trial ran.
‘Scanned with CamScannerae
the colors of this cloth will not run?
any post this coming, election?
a riat for your money,
J seasons,
4. Are you sure
5. De you intend to rv for
6. Your opponent may give you
Some stage plays ria tor seyera
How fast can you mat ?
c
SAQ 5-3
Here are other expressions whose underlined words have different
meanings depending on the context in which they are used.
ven in Column B that suit the
Tene,
Write the letter of the meaning
underlined word in the expressions given in Column A in each
set
Set I
A B
___ 1. ahead of cabbage a, leader
—__2. a clear head b. intellectual inclination
and ability
____3._ the head of our team c. mind
____ 4. come to a head d. part of the body that
contains the brain
____5. ahead wound e. be the first or be at the top
~~ 6. ahead for business f. a unit of measure of a
leafy vegetable rolled up
in the shape of a ball
____7. head for shore g. point of convergence
____ 8. head the list h. to move towards a place
Set I
A B
a mark of good taste a. target
a high mark in the test b. sign
c. starting point
aniss the marl
On your mark,
Get Set. d, Prints
_13. leave marks on the floor e, pay attention to a
warning
Mark my word {legacy
Leave your mark
on sociely core
‘Scanned with CamScannerASAQ 5-3
Were these your
the context to pick out the |
use your knowledge of the world
as a source
Nn
6.
f
answers in the matching exercise? Did you use
exical meaning of the term? Did you
and your background experience
of information as to the meaning of the word?
You probably matched the word cabbage with the
expressions leafy vegetable and rolled up in the shape of a
ball to come up with the conclusion that in this context
the word head means a unit of measure.
The word clear tells you that in this case head means
mind.
Because of the phrase of our feam you can tell that head
means leader.
The verb phrase come fo tells you that head, this time,
must mean point of convergence.
The word wound tells you that in this case, head refers
to the part of the body containing the brain.
might have chosen mind to stand for head in the
expression “a head for business”. However, the
expression intellectual inclination and ability is better suited
to head in “a head for business”.
Because of the phrase for shore you can tell that head in
this instance means to move towards a place.
The word list gives you a clue that head in this phrase
must mean be at te top or be the first.
The phrase of good taste tells you that mark means sigit.
Because of the phrase in the fest, you can tell that mark
must mean score since score is associated with fest.
The word miss tells you that mark in this case means
target.
You know for a fact that the whole utterance is the
Ret ae You also know that runners
that in this meas ima ee eee ahaa ia
s ance, mark must mean starting point.
The word mark, this time, must mean prints because of
the clue on the floor,
The phrase my word tells
you that mark means pay
attention to the warning which you give, oe
Because of the clues
es ause of the clues in society and leave, you can tell
hat mark in this instance means legacy.
‘Scanned with CamScannerA ormuninatian ALS
Ho OL got Applied Ene tor Hon
f ?
that which 4
nd
the meaning,
po oF meaning acorns to Charles Pries |
the arden ot position of the words ina sentence |
yes orale
Thonan the geanimiar oF ny BETS ofa langue
(hin the sentence bs called syntactical
The fourth ty cane ¥
siggnatedt by
careter ds retertes
Fatecd by the paasition Ob (ne we
ke note af theag two sentences
meaning. ba
‘a. The huntor killed the tion
by. The tlon killed the huntor
are identical, Thus, liken separately,
ther, in
AM the words dn the fwo sentence
the words have the same fexical meaning, However, pat tog,
sentence a itis the fon who died and the hunter who killed it, On the
other hand, insentence bit bs the hanter who died and the lion who killed
him. This change in meaning, was due toa shift in the position of the
Words in the bwo sentences where the doer of the action comes before the
verb and the receiver of the action comes after the verb
Itis not only word order, however, that signals syntac tical meaning, The
propertios of the verb do, too, since these are considered part of grammar
Hence, these three sentences, although they do not observe the same order,
siynal the same meaning,
Tho judgos voted Nepomuceno Athlete of the Year
4. Nepomuceno was voted by the judges Athlete of the Year
©. Nepomuceno was voted Athlete of the Year by the judges
One of the properties of the verb is voice, Sentence ¢ has the doer of the
action in subject position since the verb voted is in the active voice, In
contrast, sentences dand ¢ have the receiver of the action before the verb
because the verb was coled is in the passive voice
For one to Know the syntactical meaning, one has to be aware of the
syntactical structures ofa sentence, This would be the concern of the next
module.
Selet trom the four types of meaning, given by Charles Fries, there are
other sc eaning: The 5
other Kinds of meaning, The meaning of words given in the dictionary is
called denotative meaning since it gives what the word is supposed to
stand for or denote. In contrast te this is the eee
to adword, These are other meanings
shit takes place and the word tak
domain of its reference.”
connotative meaning attached
i associated with the word. A semantic
A ord takes on new meanings, “extending the
hese associated me, 3s are if
determinedt and metaphorical Meanings are usually culturally
‘Scanned with CamScannerUnit 1 Module5 111
A dive, for example, is denotatively a bird that aoe cooing sound and
is usually white. Connotatively, dove stands for peace and for love. This is
why doves are used in wedding receptions. The word red names a primary
ise that resembles blood. Connotatively, it stands for courage since a
courageous man does not mind shedding his blood as dying ee
country. It could also connote anger because a bull gets angry w “ it see
a red flag. In fact, the expression “saw red” means to get enraged.
How about trying your hand at guessing the connotative meaning. of these
colors? Some may have more than one connotative meaning:
1. white 5. black
2. green 6. pink
3. blue 7. brown
4. yellow 8. purple
One connotative meaning, of white is purity because it has no stain. But in
these sentences white would mean something else
1.
2
ler face was white as a sheet
Her hair turned y
© out of fright
‘The color green, on the other hand, would have both positive and negative
connotations, Because green plants sprout up in springtime, two positive
connotative meanings of green are life and youth. However, in these
expressions the connotative meanings of green are negative.
3. “the green-eyed monster” (referring, to jealousy)
A. “turned green with envy” (referring to envy)
Like green, the color blue also h:
: as both positive and negative connotations,
Puta plus sign (+) before the expression if it gives
‘ 4 positive connotation
of blue and puta minus (-) sign if the connotative meaning is negative.
5. bluebird of happiness
6. blue skies
7. true blue
—— 8. blue-blooded royalty
—— 9. blue Monday ~~
——10. black and blue marks
1. feel blue
—_12
sing the blues
‘Scanned with CamScannerIF you marked numbers 5 to 8 with a plus sign and numbers 9 to 12, with
a minus sign, then you are correct, The word happiness in number 5 tells,
you that the bluebird is welcome. When skies are blue with no clouds at
all as indicated in number 6, then there
is no trouble in sight. In numbers
7 and 8 blue refers to the &
traordinary, to kings and queens, to nobility, It
ie said that whereas the common man has red blood, royalty are blue
blooded, So blue in numbers 7 and 8 would have pesitive connotations
In contrast, blue in numbers 9, 10, 11 and 12 refers
on Monday because it marks the start of five d
are sad songs sung by Negroes w
blue, one is
to sadness, We are sad
ays of hard work. The blues
hen they were slaves; when one feels
and downeast, Black and blue marks are a sign of internal
bleeding under the skin when one is hit. The word blue, therefore, in
numbers 9 to 12 would have negative connotations.
In our country, when do we display our flag with the blue field up? When
do we display it with the red field up?
The color yellow connotes: cowardice. Cowards are said to have a yell
ow
streak running dow
n their back. In our country, however, the color yellow
took on a different meaning during the EDSA revolution, Would you say
it acquired a positive or a negative connotation?
We usually associate black with deatlt and hopelessness but lately, black
has come to be considered beautifirl and elegant. The color pink is associated
with baby girls, and since babies have pink skin, the color pink is a sign of
good health, as in the expression “in the pink of health.”
Since leaves turn brown before falling from the tree in autumn or as they
wither, then brown connotes aging, as in the expression “brown wilh age.”
On the other hand, because kings and queens us
color purple connotes nobility and royalty.
» purple robes, then the
Morphs, Allomorphs and Morphemes
In Module 3, you learned that the study of the sounds of a language is
called pl ny. PI i i
led phonology, Phonology is concerned with the description of all the
speech sounds or phones, the
gnificant sounds or phonemes (both
segmentals and suprasegyr
s a ‘asegymentals), and the variar is r
4 a ariants of those sounds of
allophones resulting, from chang SOUT)
A parallel may be drawn betw
of mea
in the environment of the said sounds.
een phonology and morpholo; y
7 ny a orphology, the study
Ngful units or morphemes of the Language. at
See if you e.
phonology
an fill up this grid to show the
aa ees how the parallel between the units of
‘Scanned with CamScannerUnit | Module5 113
Morphology
Ste aaigeae h Sounds) (The Study of Meaningful Units)
(The Study of |
- — meaningful units
coe a eae = Significant meaningful
Phonemes - significant speech sign
sounds it van
i Signi — variants of a significan'
Aap — meaningful unit
i i i i then you are able to make use of
Does your grid look like this? If it does, pele
y ea previous learnings to draw parallelisms between old and new insights.
Morphology
Phonology , |
\ (The Study of Speech Sounds) (The Study of Meaningful Units)
\
| phones - speech sound Morphs —-_ meaningful units
Phonemes - significant speech Morphemes - significant meaningful
sounds units
| Allophones - variants of significant
speech sounds
L
Allomorphs - variants of a significant
meaningful unit
Morphs are the meaningful units of a language. They may come in the
form of affixes or root words. Whatever form they take, the morphs signal
meaning. Examples of these would be um to signal negation when it is
affixed to a word, and able to indicate “capacity to doa task.” Put together,
the word unable would mean “lacking the capacity to do something.”
it might be noted, however, that there are different morphs that signal
the same meaning. In SAQ 5-2 you note
d how the meanings given below
were signaled by different affixes or mor i
4 7 a phs. See if you can a 2
affixes to those given in each number, ¥ somare
1. Plural-marking affixes
2 Past tense-marking, affixes,
S, en, 0 morph (e.g. deer-deer) where
there is no change in the form,
singular or plural
ed, change in vowel, change in vowel +
final t, 0 morph (e.g, put-put) where
the same form is used to signal past
time and present time :
‘Scanned with CamScanner3. Negative-marking affixes un, in, il, ir, im, dis, non
4. Feminine gender-marking ess, ine
affixes
5. Actor-marking affixes ar, or, er, ist
6. Diminutive size-marking, et, ette, ine
affixes
Alll of those affixes are allomorphs or variants of the same morpheme
since they signal the same meaning. They differ because of the change in
their environment or the word to which they are attached.
SAQ 5-4 |
Give the negative-marking morpheme that you would attach to
these words. Note that the words to which they are to be attached
actually have the same roots. However, they now belong to different
form classes. They may be nouns, verbs, or adjectives. As such, the
negative marking, affix attached to them would also differ. Study
the example that follows.
Inoperable non-operational
The root word of the two terms in the example is the verb operate.
With the addition of the affix able, the resulting term is an adjective
| to which we may add the negative-marking prefix in. On the other
hand, with the addition of the affix ion the resulting term is first a
noun and with the further addition of the affix al, the term also
becomes an adjective. But this time, we add the negative-marking,
affix non instead of in.
Now, add the negative-marking morpheme to the following words:
1. __ gratitude _— grateful
2. __ ability ___ abled __ able
Fi —— belief __ believer ___ believable
equality — equal equivalent
5. __ pleased —_ pleasant —
§ print printable
ion _— consolable
— __stopped
ee
‘Scanned with CamScannerASAQ 5-4 |
Were these your answers?
1. ingratitude ungrateful
2. inabilitv disabled unable
3. disbelief non-believer unbelievable
4. inequality unequal non-equivalent
5. displeased unpleasant
6 unprintable
7. inconsolable
8. unstopped
Sometimes, a phonemic change occurs in the morphemes because
of the environment in which it occurs. When this happens, then
we refer to it as a morphophonemic change. This is true of the
final s plural-marking morpheme and the final ed past time-
marking morpheme as shown in Set A and Set B.
SetA
s=/s/ s=/z/ es = /Iz/
ships, crabs fishes
masts clams seahorses
rocks shells watches
reefs, waves buzzes
shrimps stones ledges
Fill in the blanks to complete this generalization about the
morphophonemic change in the final s plural-marking morpheme.
| ; - ;
the final plural-marking morpheme is pronounced:
afler voiceless sounds except hissing sounds
after voiced sounds except hissing sounds
after hissing sounds
‘Scanned with CamScannerASAQ 5-4 contd
Sot B |
eden ed = Idi ed = /Id/
chopped watered planted
watked pruned cultivated
laughed climbed uprooted
cleared decided
plowed demanded
Fill in the blanks to complete this generalization about the
morphophonemic change that takes place in the final ed in the
past-time marking morpheme.
‘The final ed in the past tense form of regular verbs
is pronounced:
after voiceless sounds except /t/
_ after voiced sounds except /d/
after /1/ or /d/
Types of Morphemes
| sure you must have noted that there are different kinds of morphemes
or Significant meaningful units. On the whole, they may be categorized
bound ond free morphemes. The former come in the form of affixes.
y cannot cecur in isolation. Because they have to be attached to a root
» these affixes are called bound morphemes. You wor
these bound morphemes in SAQ 5-2 of this module.
we
ed on some of
Free morphemes, on the other hand, can stand by themselves, As pointed
out earlier, all free morphemes have a denotative
meanings are given in the dictionary
connotative meanings as well
meanings to cover culturally
Farlier, you were given exampl
free morphemes
meaning, that is, thet!
Some, however, may have
These are usually metaphorical extended
determined associations with the werd
es of these two Meanings imputed to some
‘Scanned with CamScannerBy way of reviewing what you have learned so far in this module
you may want to answer these questions:
1. If phonology is concerned with speech sounds and the
significant sounds of a language, what is morphology concerned
with?
w
The area of linguistics that studies the sounds of a language is
called phonetics, What is the area that studies meaning called?
What four types of meaning are given by Charles Fries? Can
V
you give an example of each type of meaning described by
Fries?
If the smallest significant sound is a phoneme, what is the
smallest meaningful unit of a language?
Activity 5-1
Pause a while and on one whole sheet of bond Papel
E : ’ r make a
lagram showing the two main categories of morphi
lemes.
Comments on Activity 5-1
Does your diagram look like th
is? If ’
diagram and put it aside eoeen
t, then i
for now, modify your
| Morphemes,
| |
| |
{ 4
| \ ee !
\ oo. —
Free Morphemes |
‘Scanned with CamScanner118 EDL 201 Applied Linguistics for Communication Arts
smes or affixes may in turn be categorized into two types
bound morphemes, which create
different functional roles of
inflectional bound
Bound morphe y
The first of these are the inflectional
“variant forms of a word to conform to the
the word ina sentence.” On nouns and pronouns these
morphemes mark grammatical functions like case (he-him his) or semantic
notions like number (plural-marking, morphs — s, el, unmarked or 0
inmorph). On verbs they usually mark tense (past tense marking, affix-final
edand the progressive marking, affix ig). On adjectives they serve to mark
degree (er to indicate the comparative degree and est to signal the
superlative degree).
‘The second type of bound morpheme is the derivational bound morpheme:
One kind of derivational bound morpheme changes the form class or part
of speech of the words to which they are affixed. The meaning, remains
basically the same but the part of speech or form class of the word changes,
‘Thus, a word like act becomes an adjective with the addition of ive as in
active and another noun activity with the addition of -fy to the adjective:
When, however, the affix -ly is added to the adjective, the resulting, word
actively, becomes an adverb, The word act becomes a verb (enact) when
the prefix en is attached to the root word. Thus, there are four kinds of
derivational morphemes, namely, noun-marking, verb-marking, adjective
marking and adverb-marking morphemes,
‘The other kind of derivational bound morpheme is the meaning-bearing,
morpheme which changes the meaning, of the word to which it is attached
Without altering, its syntactic function: nouns would remain nouns, verbs
stay as verbs, adjectives as adjectives, and adverbs as adverbs. Examples
of this kind of derivational affix are negative-marking, affixes (appear
disappear), gender-marking, affixes («idlor-aviatrix), and diminutive size-
marking, affixes (river-rivulet).
Activity 5-2 |
Pause and add the new categories to the diagram you made earlier
here i i
Where in the diagram would you put them? |
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Does your expanded diagram look like this? If it doesn’t, then make |
the needed modifications.
Morphemes
_ ee al
| Bound Morphemes Free Morphemes
| (cannot occur in isolation) (can occur in isolation)
| Inflectional Derivational
On nouns and
“— pronouns (mark Changes the
case and number) meaning
__ On verbs (mark - /
fees) | negative marking
| —size-marking
ES On) adjectives) (mark L__gender-marking
comparative and
superlative degree)
Changes the
form class
|—noun-marking
|— verb-marking
| —adjective-marking
'—adverb-marking
—|
As me ed earli
pena d earlier, free morphemes can stand by themselves. Fries
ivides them into four sub-types although three of these can be
Brouped topet}
gether because, ike the rl i €
phenomena in the unlike the fourth one which stands for
‘Among, the ee the first three stress grammatical relations.
nal 266 pr ical rela ;
substitute stress grammatical relations are function words,
and paired expressions indi
absence of "= nena? ired expressions that indicate the presence or
words,
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jon words are markers of content words: auxiliaries
Himark verbs, articles, namely, aa the which
Jere such as very and truly which mark modifiers
yrds like what, who, ihn, ele, are also function
as wh questions. Also included as
tc, which show the
Examples of func
like is, has, can, etc. wh
mark nouns; and inten
Interrogatives or question We
words since they mark the utterance
function words are prepositions such as of, it, fo, e'
relationship between two nouns, and conjunctions, namely, and, but, for,
etc. which connect parallel items. Other linguists would also consider
interjections like Oh! and Really! as function words.
Still another set of words which signal grammatical relations are substitute
Words, These would include noun substitutes or pronouns like he, she, it,
ete. as well as verbal and even phrasal and clausal substitutes, as in the
sentence “I know the answer but he doesn''t.”
‘The paired expressions that signal the presence or absence of “a negative”
are some-any, yet-already, too or also-cither as shown in the examples that
follow.
1. [have some but he doesn’t have any.
2. Lhave yet to know, but he already does.
3. [know it and he does too.
he also does.
so does he.
4. [don’t know it and he doesn’t either.
neither does he.
In contrast to those three sets of words that show grammatical relations
are the content words which refer to items in the world. These could be
names of things which Fries refers to as Class I words. In effect these
could be the nouns. Then, too, the content words could be actions, which
are referred to as Class II words or verbs. Finally, for Fries, the third set of
content words name modifiers. These are called Class II] words or
adjectives. Although Fries gives only three form class words, we could
add a fourth class, Class IV, which modify verbs. These would be adverbs
Activity 5-3 |
Now complete your diagram about the different types of |
morphemes. Put in the categories that fall under free morphemes:
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Here
look like:
[ ne
L
what your final diagram of morpheme categories should
is wha
Free Morphemes
Bound Morphemes: {ean occur in
(cannot Oo in isolation)
isolation)
C
Words that
indicate
grammatical
coe eal 0 relations
prone (enark, casey ca i -
‘an rurnbor) - ;
= On vas (mar ogee marbing {ronenon wats |
mee size-tmartang a
On anyortrns (rank I gender-marking anti
ceanparative avs ~ ais
suipetatiy degre) raat
— prepositions
|~ noureenartang
— vortvanarking
~ adjective: ranting
vorb substitute
propositions,
phrasal of
~ clausat
substitute)
Expressions that
| signal presence!
absence of
negates.
lo synthesize what we learned thus far
which is concerned with the '
Jooks into the diff
Morphological,
added are
ferent types of me.
lex
and connotative meanings.
=
—
Words that
indicate
‘grammatical
relations
Class | - Nouns
(tring)
L
Adpectives
(moxsifiers of
Adverbs
(mositiers of
we can say that morphology,
study of the meaningful units of a language,
ines aning. These would be intonational,
al and syntactical. selcatenoniceni ia 1 be
‘denotative yntactical. Other categories that could be
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EDL 201 Applied Linguistics fOr Communicator AP
1. How clear are those type of meaning, te you?
suinh one from the other? |
2, Can you distings
3 Can you cite examples of eae hy of those type
ee negative to any of those three questions,
If you answered in the ,
sread the seetion in this module entitled
then you might want to re
types of Meaning.”
The meaningful units that morphology serutinizes are called morphs,
allomorphs and mor phemes, The last of these may be bound or free
morphemes, Bound morphemes may be inf lectional or derivational. Free
morphemes, on the other hand, may signal grammatical relations or name
phenomena in the real world
Once more:
1. Can you tell what these concepts are
2, Can you explain how one differs from the other?
3. Can you give examples of each of them?
4, Can you discuss and give examples of each of their subtypes?
If you cannot answer any of those four questions in the positive
then you could reread the sections “Morph, Allomorph and
Morpheme” and “Types of Morpheme.” |
Forming Words
When bound morphemes or affixes are attached to free morphemes fF
root words, they form new words. The resulting word may exhibit ¢
modification in meaning depending on the affix that is attached to it, The
new word, for example, may now be plural or it could be denoting the
past. It may now be negative or it could name the female of the specie
Atother times, however, the resulting, word exhibits no change in meaning,
with the addition of a bound morpheme, Instead, a functional shift eccu™
changing, the word from one form class to another, Thus, a root wer
that was originally a noun may be changed to a verb, an adjective oF 2”
adverb as the case may be, depending, on the affix attached to it, Nour
may be changed to a verb as in friend - befriend or an adjective as in /"e™"
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construct - constructive and the adjective may in turn be changed to an
arb as in constructive = cost tively.
adv
also combine with other free mor phemes to come
iting compound word may bea solid
es are merged together to form one
hence the term solid compound.
Ia many instances, the meaning of the compound word may be arrived at
by putting together the meaning, of the free morphemes that comprise it.
Tana analysis, in this case, would be a good strategy to employ to arrive
aning of the term. Some examples of solid
atan educated guess of the me
oat (made up of the free morphemes house and boat),
and nonetheless (composed of three morphemes, namely, non, the and less).
It might be pointed out, however, that this is not always the case with
compound words. There are, in fact, some compound words like silverfish
whose meaning cannot be inferred by putting together the meanings of
‘re awo words silver and fish that compose it since silverfish is an insect
and not a fish nor a marine animal.
morphemes may
up with a compound noun The resul
compound Ww here the two morphem:
word. In writing, they are joined as one,
Free
compounds are [ous
Sometimes, free morphemes which are combined to form compounds are
not merged into one but rather, are written as separate words as in the
rote constructs given below. In such a case, they are called separate
compounds. These two-word verbs are written as two separate words in
contrast to their noun equivalents, which are usually written as solid
compounds as shown in the paired list that follows. Orally, the difference
between the two is signaled by the stress patterns used. In writing,
however, noun constructs come in the form of solid compounds whereas
verb constructs come in the form of separate compounds.
Noun Constructs Verb Constructs
a dropout todroy
pout
a blackout to black out
a standout to stand out
Other ex
examples of separate c
a vperatinng ® of separate compounds are swimming pool, sewing machine,
veri table which are taken to name one item. The first word is
Pepe ae describe the second word as in the expressions
not compound w: smelling flower or barking dog, Those last three one
‘ords but are made — s are
noun ‘ je up of a ve nctive i
‘AS was pointed out in Module 4, we verbal acest modilying a
, we can say:
A shining
hinting star is a star that is shining,
A sweet-smellin
. smelling flower
A bu i, ig is a flower a
urking dog is a dog that is ee smells
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But we cannot say
fe Aswimming pool
A sewing machi
@ Anoperating table i
J is a pool that
ine that is sewing.
able that s operating.
Rather, we may ;
+ A swimming pool is a pool used for swimming
A sewing machine is a machine used for sewing.
a table used for operating on patients.
© An operating table
|\ third kind of compound word is the hyphenated compound. Here, the
free morphemes are not written out as one. Rather, a hyphen is used to
show that these morphemes joined by the hyphen are to be considered as
tne unit. Examples of hyphenated compounds are son-in-law, ladies-in-
waiting, commander-in-chief.
Aside from affixation and compounds, new words can also be formed by
combining parts of existing words. Examples of the resulting blends are
smog (smoke and fog), motel (motor and hotel), and glasphalt (glass and
asphalt)
Then, too, new words may be formed by shortening the original term.
Examples of this would be jet for jet plane, obit for obituary, and the colloquial
yuppy for young urban professionals + y.
Morphology and The Language Teacher
Now that you have gone through this module, can you tell how
morphology can help you develop these vocabulary skills in your students?
Can you add to this list of “word-attack” and vocabulary building skills
that could be developed if ane had a knowledge of morphology?
1. Arriving at the meaning of unfamiliar terms through word analysis
2. Determining, the form class of a word and building words through
affixation
3. Distinguishing between the denotative and connotative meaning of 4
erm .
4.
Coming, up w!
Coming, up with semantic maps to show collocations and associations
of meaning, with a given term
5. Arranging wor :
ging words in a cline to show difference in shades of meaning
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Determining morphophonemic changes in given terms
Choosing the negative-
marking affix that goes with the different form
classes of a term
Using context to determine meaning, of unfamiliar words
9_ Determining which words go together in a given context.
You may discuss your ideas about those skills and how morphology may
be of help to you when you meet your facilitator in the next study session.
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