Home » Education & Career » TESOL Language Training » How Words Work:5

How Words Work:5

© Brenda Townsend Hall

Morphology

It has been useful to distinguish between syntax (how words relate to each other) and morphology (the different forms a word may have) in order to emphasise how each aspect has its influence on meaning. Patterns of morphology have in fact been much more commonly the focus of classroom attention than patterns of syntax. Learners are given early and regular doses of word endings: nouns - singular/plural; adjectives into adverbs; verbs - singular/plural; tenses; tables of pronouns. Teachers and learners alike seem more comfortable with the effects of morphology on meaning - there are few signs of confusion over the difference between a singular and plural form, for example. Confusion occurs mostly over the uses of different tense forms and the behaviour of different types of verbs, stative /dynamic behaviour, for example. (See the appropriate chapter.) However, less attention seems to be paid to the processes of word formation which allow considerable versatility in the roles words play. (The exception to this is the adjective to adverb process.) By the addition of suffixes (less frequently of prefixes), words can change class to which they belong:

- the suffixes -er; -or; -ee; -ation; -ment; -al; -ing; -age; allow verbs to become nouns:

rider; actor; devotee; derivation; alignment; denial; swimming; coverage.

- the suffixes -ful; -less; -ly; -like; -y; -ish; -ian; -ed; allow nouns to become adjectives:

mindful, penniless; manly; ladylike; creamy; mannish; Beethovenian; turreted.

- the suffixes -ness; -ity; allow adjectives to become nouns:happiness; inanity.

the prefixes be- and en- allow nouns to become verbs: befriend, enslave.

The prefix a- allows verbs to become predicative adjectives: asleep, awake.

It is also possible for words to change their class without any affixation. This process is called conversion and involves the original word being used in a new way. Especially popular at the moment is the conversion of nouns to verbs as in to diary and to rubbish. More unusual forms of conversion are from categories of word not usually subject to alteration: this book is a must; a has-been; the workmen downed tools.

Words may also combine in the process called compounding to form new composites:
noun compounds - toothache, earthquake, bloodstain, housewife
verb/object compounds - haircut, handshake,
verb/adverbial compounds - sleepwalking, airborne, exocentric compounds (the whole refers to a separate entity rather than a sum of the parts) - paperback, scarecrow,

Implications for the classroom

Learners need to be aware that:

a) meaning is affected by the inflections a word may have

b) that the use of inflections, while observing many predictable patterns, is not entirely rule bound, e.g., hardly is the adverb formed from hard, but its adverbial meaning is entirely different from its adjectival meaning.

The copyright of the article How Words Work:5 in TESOL Language Training is owned by . Permission to republish How Words Work:5 in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.