Turdalieva Daria HL 2-19 A
Morphophonemic
Rules
Content
1 Morphophonemic Rules 3 Conditioned Allomorphs
2 Deriving Allomorphs 4 Conditioning By
Morphological Class
Morphophonemic Rules
Rules that account for alternations among allomorphs (morphophonemic
alternations)
are called morphophonemic rules. The major differences between
allophonic and morphophonemic rules can be summed up under two
major points.
Allophonic rules are exceptionless, that is they apply in the appropriate
environment to all classes and forms in a language. There are, for
example, no exceptions to a rule such as aspiration in English.
In contrast, morphophonemic rules often show exceptions. They may, for
example, apply to a limited class of forms, as in the case of the rule that
changes final f to v in the plural of a few English words like knife and
thief.
Deriving Allomorphs
We analyze and derive allomorphs in much the same way we derive allophones. An underlying
representation (UR) is set up, and rules apply to derive all phonetic variants from the same
underlying representation. Often, the underlying representation of the morpheme is the elsewhere
allomorph, the one that occurs with the widest distribution.
Deriving Allomorphs
Once the underlying representations Such sequences are found across word
have been set up, the phonetic forms can boundaries in phrases and compounds,
be derived. We can account for the such as crash site or buzz saw.
allomorph /az/ by noting that whenever They may even occur word-internally
the underlying /-z/ appears after a base across syllable boundaries, as in posture.
that ends in a strident coronal consonant, But when a sequence of two coronal
a schwa is present. stridents occurs in a coda, it is broken up
This reflects a phonotactic constraint of by the epenthesis of a schwa. Since the
English that is expressible with coda sequence is impossible, a new
reference to syllable structure. syllable is created to accommodate it.
Conditioned Allomorphs
The plural morpheme in English shows three- A fundamental strategy in
way variation in its allomorphs. The three selecting the underlying form of
allomorphs, /-s/, /-z/, and an allomorph is to choose the one
/-əz/, are distributed in a systematic manner. with the widest distribution. Since
The phonetic form of these allomorphs is the /z/ allomorph occurs after all
determined by the segment that precedes vowels as well as after most
them. Bases that end in a strident consonant voiced consonants, it is chosen as
always appear with the /-az/ allomorph. basic. This choice results in
Bases that end in a vowel or a voiced underlying representations that
consonant that is not strident take the /-z/ show /-z/ after all bases.
allomorph, and bases that end in a voiceless
consonant that is not strident take the /-s/
allomorph.
Conditioning By Morphological Class
A second type of morphophonemic rule refers to a subclass of forms, rather than applying
to all members of a class of forms. English plurals again provide the example.
English includes a limited class of words that show an
alternating /f/ and /v/ in their
plural forms, for example: wife = wives, thief= thieves, knife=
knives. The alternating class is unproductive; new words with
final /f/ entering "English will not show this alternation. For
example, speakers would pluralize a hypothetical new word nif
as /nifs/, not /nivz/. This implies that each word in the
alternating class needs to be marked as undergoing a rule that
voices its base-final segment when the form is pluralized.
Information about rules that a form must undergo is included in
its entry in the lexicon.
Bibliography:
1.https://www.academia.edu/35540546/
Morphophonemic_Rules
2. https://askinglot.com/what-are-
morphophonemic-rules
