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14 Lesson 14: Morphology-How Do We Build Words? (has activities)

Activity: Morphology Basics

 Part I: Answer the questions about this word: ‘unbloodyhinged’. This word is used in the movie Chasing Liberty.

  1. How many morphemes are in this word?
  1. Which part of the word is prefix?
  1. Which part of the word is a suffix?
  1. Which part of the word is an infix?
  1. Which part of the word is the root?
  1. Which morphemes are bound?
  1. Which morphemes are free?

 

Part II: Identify which morphological process is illustrated by each of the following data sets and describe what is happening in plain language.

  1. Hebrew color terms (don’t worry about the vowel change):

[lavan] ‘white’             [lvanvan]         ‘whitish’

[kaxol] ‘blue’               [kxalxal]          ‘bluish’

[jaɣok] ‘green’             [jaɣakkak]       ‘greenish’

  1. Process:
  2. Describe exactly what is happening:

 

Choctaw negation

Pisa ‘to see’
Akpiso ‘I do not see.’
Chikpiso ‘You do not see.’
Ikpiso ‘She does not see.’
Kepiso ‘We do not see.’
Hachikpiso ‘You all do not see.’

 

  1. Process:
  2. Describe exactly what is happening:

 

Spanish ‘irregular’ verbs

dormir ‘to sleep’         duermo    ‘I sleep’       durmio’    ‘she slept’

sentir    ‘to feel’           siento       ‘I feel’          sintio’       ‘she felt’

servir   ‘to serve’         sirvo        ‘I serve’        sirvio’      ‘he served’

  1. Process:
  2. Describe exactly what is happening:

English affix –tion (you already know affixation is occurring here—what else is going on?) 

(Hint 1: Divide the root from the affix and look for patterns. Hint 2: think about sounds, not writing. Hint 3: This is not suppletion.).

 

 A                                                        B                                             C

ɑpt –> ‘ɑpʃən dɪs’kəs –> dɪs’kəʃən ɪn’veid –> ɪn’veiʒən
ækt –> ‘ækʃən əb’sɛs –> əb’sɛʃən pɚ̬̯̬s’weid –> pɚ̬̯̬s’weiʒən
dɪlɪnieit –> dɪ’lɪnieiʃən ɛk’spɹɛs –> ɛk’spɹɛʃən ɪ’ɹəud –> ɪ’ɹəuʒən
sədeit –> sədeiʃən

 

  1. What is happening to the sounds in the stem when the suffix is added in set A?
  2. What is happening to the sounds in the stem when the suffix is added in set B?
  3. What is happening to the sounds in the stem when the suffix is added in set C?
  4. Why do you think this is happening to each set?

 

 

Activity! Navajo Kinship Terms

Navajo is an Athabaskan language spoken by about 170,000 people in Arizona and New Mexico (Lewis et al 2016). Look at the examples below, and answer the questions that follow. The data below are from Parsons Yazzie & Speak 2007.

These examples are written in the practical orthography standardly used by Navajo speakers. Glottal stop is indicated with an apostrophe, and an accent mark indicates a high tone. Two consonant digraphs – ‘zh’ (for the sound in ‘measure’) and ‘ch’ (for the sound in ‘church’) – are used. Long vowels are written with two adjacent identical vowel letters (i.e. ‘ee’), and vowels are pronounced as they would be in Spanish.

Méelii bádi                ‘Mary’s older sister’

Méelii bideezhí         ‘Mary’s younger sister’

Jáan bádi                   ‘John’s older sister’

Jáan bideezhí            ‘John’s younger sister’

Méelii bik’is              ‘Mary’s sister, or same-sex friend’

Jáan bik’is                 ‘John’s brother, or same-sex friend’

Méelii bitsilí              ‘Mary’s younger brother’

Jáan bitsilí                 ‘John’s younger brother’

Jáan bínaaí                ‘John’s older brother’

Méelii bínaaí             ‘Mary’s older brother’

 

QUESTIONS:

Part 1:

  1. Each of the Navajo terms above contains a morpheme (a meaningful element such as a prefix, suffix, or root) that means ‘his/her X’.
  2. a) Step 1 Identify the morphemes that mean ‘Mary’ and ‘John’. What are they? How do you know?
  3. b) Step 2. Identify the morpheme that means ‘his/her X’. What is that morpheme? How do you know? (Hint 1: look for what is the same in all the words. Bi-
  4. Step 3.  Identify the morphemes for the remaining meanings (Hint 2: ‘younger sister’ is unanalyzable (all one morpheme) in Navajo. So, is ‘older sister’, etc.).
  • ‘older sister’
  • ‘younger sister’
  • ‘same age sister or brother or same-sex friend’
  • ‘younger brother’
  • ‘older brother’

Part II:

  1. What kind of morpheme is it (i.e. prefix, suffix, root?)?
  2. Are there any allomorphic variants for the morpheme meaning ‘his/her X’?
    • If yes, what are the allomorphs and what environment conditions them?
    • If no, why do you think there are not any allomorphs for the morpheme meaning ‘his/her X’?
  3. What kind of morpheme is it (i.e. prefix, suffix, root?)?

 

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Lingustics for Conlanging Copyright © by Elizabeth A. Redd. All Rights Reserved.

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