(toc) #title= (Table of Content)
Clipping
Clipping occurs not only in the English language but also in many African languages. It involves some element of reduction in the length of a word. According to Adeniyi (1997), clipping is a pseudo-lexical unit that results from the grapho-phonemic reduction of a word, which still shares the semantic and paradigmatic relationship with the full form of the word. It can also be seen as extracting a shortened form of a word from its longer morphological form. In English, for instance, ‘telephone’ becomes phone; brassiere is bra. In some cases, the clipped version has more or less completely replaced the original longer word, e.g., flu. Note that a clipped form is a complete lexical unit that should not be confused as an abbreviation of its full form.
Crystal (1999) defines ‘clipping’ as a type of word formation in which new words are derived by shortening another word. Some of the examples he gave include exam from examination and ad for advertisement. However, Aronoff (1997) defines clipping as a process that shortens a polysyllabic word by deleting one or more syllables. He gave examples such as Liz, Ron, Rob, Sue, and so on. In all the definitions above, it is clear that both the clipped form and the word from which it originates share both semantic and syntactic features. However, the two words are distinct lexical units with separate morphological identities. We have to note that the various types of clipped forms are restricted to everyday casual and informal discourse among family members, friends, and acquaintances.
However, the full length of these names is usually reserved and employed for formal interactions and official records. We can identify two types of clipping in the English language. These are back-clipping and fore-clipping. In fore-clipping, an element or elements are taken from the beginning of a word. Some of the examples in this category include (ham) burger, (omni) bus, (alli) gator, (tele) phone, (heli) copter, and many more. This type of clipping also occurs with personal names in the English language. Some of these examples include Becky for Rebecca, Drew for Andrew, Grinny for Virginia. In the case of fore-clipping, an element or elements are taken from the end of a name. What we then have is an abridged version, which can still stand in its place. In English, for instance, the following have undergone various back-clippings as can be seen from the following examples: chimp (panzee), deli (catessen), hippo (potamus), lab(ratory); gas (oline), Pro(fessor), and many more. Many names in the language have been clipped to the extent that some native speakers cannot relate the full version of the name with the clipped version.
SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 1
Explain the morphological process of clipping with 10 practical examples.
Affixation
The term ‘affixation’ can be defined as a morphological process of attaching an affix to the root or base of a word. Affixes are classified based on two criteria. The first criterion is the position in which the affix occurs relative to the location of the root of the word, while the second is the function an affix performs when it is attached to the root of a word. Let us examine these criteria one by one.
Positional classification of affixes
If we use the position in which an affix occurs relative to the location of the root of a word as the basis for classifying affixes, we shall have the following types: prefix, suffix, infix, interfix, circumfix, and superfix or suprafix. Let us discuss these affixes one by one.
The prefix
A prefix is an affix that occurs before the root or base of a word. Examples of prefixes in English are presented in table 4 – 11.
Table 1: Negative Prefixes
Prefix Meaning Host Examples
a- ‘lacking in’ adjective noun Asexual Asymmetry
de- ‘the opposite of’ noun verb Demerit Demystify
dis- ‘the opposite of’ adjective verb noun Disloyal Disrespect Dishonour
il- ‘the opposite of’ adjective Illegal
im- ‘the opposite of’ adjective Impossible
in- ‘the opposite of’ adjective Insensitive
ir- ‘the opposite of’ adjective Irregular
mis- ‘the opposite of’ noun verb Misconduct Misdirect
non- ‘not’ various Non-starter Non-binary
un- ‘the opposite of’ adjective Unwise
Table 2: Reversative Prefixes Prefix Meaning Possible Host Examples
de- ‘to reverse an action’ Verb Noun Defrock Defrost Delocalize Deforestation
dis- ‘to reverse an action’ verb Disconnect Disorganise
un- ‘to deprive of’ verb Unmask Unhorse
un- ‘to reverse an action or ‘to reveal’ verb Untie Undress unlock
Prefix Meaning Possible Host Examples
Inter- ‘between’ adjectival verb Intercontinental Interfuse
sub- ‘beneath’ Noun Submarine Subsoil
super - ‘over’ Noun Superstructure
trans - ‘across or ‘from one location to another. Adjectival Verb Transcontinental transplant
Table 3: Age, Size, and Degree Prefixes
Prefix Meaning Possible Host Examples
Arch- ‘highest in status’ or ‘worst’ Noun Archangel arch-enemy
hyper- ‘excessive’ adjective Hypersensitive Hyperactive
mini- ‘diminutive’ noun Minibus Minicomputer
neo- ‘new’ version’ or modern noun Neophobia neo-colonialism
out- ‘to surpass’ verb Outgrow Outshine
over- ‘to exceed’ verb Overbook Overcharge
proto- ‘first in origin’ or ‘primitive’ Noun Protomartyr photo-language
semi- ‘half of’, or ‘partly’ noun adjective semi-metal semi-literate
sub- ‘lesser in status’ verb adjective sub-lease Substandard
supra- ‘above’ or ‘beyond’ Noun Supranational Supramundane
sur- ‘additional’ Verb Noun Surcharge Surcoat
ultra- ‘extreme’ ‘beyond’ or Adjective Ultra- Conservative
under- ‘diminutive’ Verb Adjectival Noun Underestimate Underdeveloped Underdog
vice- ‘deputy’ Noun Vice-chairman
Table 4: Temporal, Scope, and Sequential Prefixes
Prefix Meaning Possible Host Examples
ex- ‘former’ Noun ex-wife ex-soldier
fore- ‘before’ Noun Verb Foreplay Foresee
Pan- ‘all’ Adjective Pan-African
Post- ‘alter’ Noun Adjective Verb Post-modern Posthumous Post-date
pre- ‘before’ Noun Adjective Verb Preview Premature pre-date
re- ‘again’, ‘back’ or ‘change order’ Verb Noun Restructure, regain representation
Table5: Derogatory or Prejudice Prefixes
Prefix Meaning Possible Host Examples
Mal- ‘amiss’ ‘badly’ or Verb Noun Adjective Maladminister Mal-administration maladjusted
mis- ‘wrongly’ Verb Noun Adjective Misapply Misbelief Misbegotten
pseud o- ‘unreal’, ‘false’ or not genunine’ Noun pseudo-science pseudo-language
quasi- ‘seemingly’ or ‘not really’ Adjective Noun quasi-independent quasi-democracy
Table 6: Quantity Prefixes
Prefix Meaning Possible Host Examples
bi- ‘having two’ Or ‘occurring twice’ adjectival noun Biannual Biennial Bilingual Bicycle
di- ‘having two’ Adjective Noun Disyllabic Digraph
mono- ‘having one’, ‘single’ or ‘alone’ Noun Adjective Monoculture Monolingual Monosyllabic
multi ‘many’ or ‘several’ Adjective Noun multi-ethnic multi-millionaire
Poly- ‘many’ or ‘several’ Adjective Noun Polyvalent Polytheism
quadri - ‘having four’ Adjective Quadrilateral
tri- ‘having three’ Noun Adjective Tricycle Triangular
uni- ‘having one’ Adjective Noun Unidirectional Uniformity
Note:-
The learner should always note the difference in the use of biannual and biennial. Biannual means ‘occurring twice a year’ while biennial means occurring once in two years. So a biannual conference, for instance, means a conference that holds twice a year, while a biennial conference means a conference that holds once in two years.
SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 2
Give 5 types of prefixes, with two examples of each.
The Suffix
The suffix is an affix that occurs after the base or root of a word. Examples of suffixes in English are presented in tables 12-13.
Table 8: Quality Suffixes
Suffix Meaning Possible Host Examples
-(e)ry ‘behaviour’ Noun Adjective mastery, thuggery bravery
(-(i)ty ‘state’ Adjective Noun equality gentility
-able/ -ible ‘worthy of’ verb adjective Forgivable Forcible
-al/ial/ -ical ‘quality of being’ Noun Adjective logical memorial periodical
-er ‘occupational’, comparative, instrumental, agenitive, etc. Varied Teacher Taller Cooker Player
-ess ‘effeminate’ Noun Portress
-est -superlative’ Adjective Adverb Smallest Soonest
-ful ‘having the quality of’ Noun Adjective Careful Dutiful
-hood ‘status’ Noun Womanhood
-ic ‘quality of being’ . Noun Adjective Metallic Alcoholic
-ish ‘having character of’ the Noun Adjective Boyish Childish
-ist ‘member of’ or ‘believer of’ Noun Adjective Capitalist Socialist
-ive/ -ative ‘quality of being’ Verb Adjective Informative Attractive
-less ‘lacking’ Noun Adjective Motherless Powerless
-let ‘diminutive’ Noun Eaglet
-like ‘having the quality of’ Noun Adjective Manlike Christlike
-ly ‘in a manner’ Adj Adverb Bravely Slowly
-ness ‘state’ Adj Noun Sadness Goodness
-or ‘agentive’ Verb Noun Sailor Director
-ship ‘status’ Noun Fellowship
-wise ‘in the manner of’ Noun Adverb Clockwise Lengthwise
-y ‘be like’ Noun Adjective Oily Juicy
Table 9: Causative and Activity Suffixes
Suffix Meaning Possible Host Examples
-age ‘the result of’ Verb Noun linkage leakage
-ation ‘the act of’ Verb Noun importation fertilization
-ed ‘past’ Verb talked
-en ‘past participle’ Verb beaten
-en ‘to cause to become’ Adj Verb deafen gladden
-ify ‘cause to become’ Noun Verb tesify exemplify
-ing ‘progressive’ Verb Singing
-ize ‘cause to become’ Adj Verb Regular
D. The Interfix:
An interfix is an affix which occurs between two identical or sometimes non-identical roots. In other words, an interfix interrupts the sequence of two roots. Of all the affixes identified in human language, the interfix is the least discussed.
English does not have any case of interfixation. But Yoruba has many good examples of interfixes, as we see in the following examples:
Omo + ki + omo = Omokomo
Ile + ki + Ile = Ilekile
Owo + bi + owo = Owobowo
Eya + mo + eya = Eyameya
In the above examples, bound morphemes such as ki, bi, and mo are all examples.
E. THE CIRCUMFIX:
The circumfix is sometimes called a discontinuous morpheme. It is an affix that surrounds the root of a word. In other words, a circumfix is an affix which has two parts, so that the first half occurs before the root of a word, while the second half occurs after the root. Circumfixation is, in essence, a situation where both the prefix and suffix are simultaneously employed to express one meaning. It is like “a combination of a prefix and suffix operating as.
F. THE SUPERFIX OF SUPRAFIX:
All the affixes we have discussed so far are of the segmental type. Let us now turn to discuss affixes of a non-segmental type. Superfix or suprafix is an affix which is marked over the syllables that form part of a root. Superfixes come in the form of tones/or stress marks placed over words. Superfixes are also morphemes because they carry some element of meaning. Tone or stress marks can cause meaning differences between morphemes or words that are segmentally alike.
In table 10 below, we shall use some examples in English to show how a change in stress placement can trigger a meaning difference between segmentally identical words: -
Nouns Verbs
‘Insult ‘CONvert ‘Import ‘Rebel ‘Export ‘SUBject ‘CONtest ‘PERmit ‘SURvey ‘PROtest
In’SULT Con’VERT IM’port re’BEL ex’PORT sub’JECT con’TEST per’MIT sur’VEY Protest
The syllables in upper case (capital letters) in the table are the stressed ones. From the above examples, we can see that a change in stress placement results in a change in meaning.
In a tone language (i.e., a language where a variation in the pitch of the voice causes a change in meaning between segmentally identical utterances) such as Igbo, tone can also be said to be a superfix, as we can see in the following examples:
Table 11: Tone as a Superfix in
isi ‘head’ isi ‘odour’ isi ‘blindness’ isi ‘to cook’ Ike ‘strength’ Ike ‘to share’ or ‘buttocks’ Ike ‘to tie’ Ike ‘bunch’
oke oke oke oke ‘rat’ ‘boundary’ ‘a share’ ‘male’ akwa ‘a cry’ akwa ‘cloth’ akwa ‘ egg’ akwa ‘bed’ or ‘bridge’
From each set of examples above, we can see that is only tone (i.e., a variation in the pitch of the voice) that causes the change in meaning between words which look alike in all respects.
SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 4 Discuss a major defining factor for affix types. Discuss superfix type, using 10 examples. Classification of Affixes Based on Function In the foregoing section, we classified affixes based on the position they occupy vis-à-vis the position of the root or base of a word. In this part of the book, we shall classify affixes based on the function they perform when attached to a word. Affixes can perform essentially three functions when they are attached to the root of a word. These are inflectional, derivational, and extensional functions. We shall discuss these functions under inflectional, derivational, and extensional affixes. INFLECTIONAL AFFIXES An inflectional affix is that affix which performs a grammatical function without changing the part of speech of the word to which it is attached. Inflectional affixes are not used to create new words; rather they are used to show if a word is singular or plural, if the tense of the verb is past or non-past, if the word expresses comparative or superlative degree, or to show the case feature of the word in question. Case is a grammatical category which is concerned with the ability of a nominal (noun or pronoun) to change its form with respect to the environment in which it occurs. Examples of inflectional affixes in English are presented in table below:- Table 12: Inflectional Affixes in English
Inflectional Affix Function/meaning Examples
-s (N) Plural boys
-ed past tense worked
-ing progressive working
-s (V) 3rd person singular simple eats runs present
-en past participle eaten
-er Comparative shorter
-est Superlative shortest
-‘s Possessive John’s
All the inflectional affixes in English are suffixes, and they are few. The inflectional affixes in English are ‘morphemes of the outer layer’, because it is not possible to have another suffix after an inflectional affix. Another interesting quality of inflectional suffixes in English is that it is not possible to have more than one of them hosted by the same root at a time. It is, however, possible for a semantically empty formative to occur between the root or stem and the inflectional suffix. Such semantically empty formatives have been referred to as stem extenders. An example of a stem extender in English is the –r- which occurs between the root child and the –en plural marker, as in child-r-en. DERIVATIONAL AFFIXES A derivational affix is that which changes the part of speech or alters the meaning of the word to which it is attached. Robins (1964:258) divides derivational affixes into class-changing and class-maintaining types. Both the class-changing and class-maintaining derivational affixes affect the lexical meaning of the word to which they are attached, while only the class-changing ones affect the syntactic value (i.e., the part of speech) of the word. But based on the enormous evidence from some African languages, the need to re-examine the status of the so-called derivational affixes which merely after the meaning of their hosts without changing their parts of speech has arisen. It is now a common practice to treat affixes which extend or modify the meaning of their hosts separately from the class-changing ones. Hence, in this unit, we limit the discussion of derivational affixes to the class-changing affixes. In the following table, we present the major differences between inflectional and derivational affixes in English:
Table 13: Differences between inflectional and derivational affixes in English
Inflectional affix Derivational Affix
1. Maintains part of speech of its host. 1. Changes part of speech of its host
2. Always a suffix 2. Can be a prefix or suffix
3. Always one in a word. 3. Can be more than one in a word.
4. Morpheme of the outer layer (i.e., always occurs last) 4. Morpheme of the inner layer (i.e., can be followed by other affixes)
5. Few in number 5. More than the inflectional affixes.
6. Occurs more frequently than any particular derivational affix. 6. Occurs less frequently than any particular inflectional affix
Having demonstrated the differences between inflectional and derivational affixes in English. Let us now give examples to show derivational affixes that change the part of speech of their hosts.
Table 14: Derivational prefixes in English
Prefix Function(s) Examples
A- V Adj Afloat
be- N V Adj V bewitch be fool
de- N V defrost
em- Adj. V embitter
en- N V enslave
Note: The derivational prefix em- is a variant of en- when it occurs before bilabial consonants.
Borrowing
One of the commonest ways of creating new words in human language is by borrowing. Borrowing simply means the process of taking words from one or more languages to fit into the vocabulary of another. It is important to mention that no language is free from borrowing. Borrowing presupposes some element of cultural contact. According to Donwa-Ifode (1995:132), “Two or more languages are said to be in contact if they are used by the same individuals or group of persons alternately. The individual using the languages is referred to as the ‘locus’ of the contact The language that borrows from the other is said to be the ‘recipient’ language, while that from which the item is borrowed is known as the “donor’ language”.
There are different forms of borrowing. They are loan-word, loan-blend and calque or loan-translation.
A loan-word is that which “a recipient language has lifted from a donor language to mean the same object and practice to which it originally referred in the donor language” (Donwa-Ifode 1995:135). Examples of loan-words in English include:
Piano (from Italian),
Alcohol (from Arabic),
Zebra (from Bantu),
Tycoon (from Japanese),
Angel (old French and Ecclesiastical
Latin), Advertise (French)
Adventure (from old French)
Browse (from Old French)
Tailor (from Latin)
and many more etc
A loan-blend is a hybrid word created by combining morphemes of two or more languages in its creation. The process of forming a word by combining morpheme of different languages is known as hybridization.
Examples of hybrid words in Igbo include
Ite pootu
tekinuzu
uzo moto
The morphemes in bold face in the above examples are of English origin, while others in the normal type-face are of Igbo origin.
Claque or loan translation
A claque or loan-translation is a word created by using the
morphemes of a recipient language to represent all the senses in a donor
language.
Below are examples of calques in Igbo:
Ugbo elu
(literally: a vessel that
ugbomniri
(literarlly: a vessel that moves on water)
ugbo ala
(literally: a vessel that moves on land)
mmo ozi
(literally: a benevolent and errand spirit)
mmuo nso
mmuo ojoo
3.4 Blending
Blending is a morphological process of creating a new word by combining parts of two or more already existing words in the same language. Examples of blends in English include:-
(derived from breakfast plus lunch),
(derived from smoke plus fog), (derived
from motor plus hotel), (derived from
television plus broadcast), (derived from
urine plus analysis), (derived from
fantastic plus fabulous), (derived from
American plus Indian), and (derived from
European plus television).
From the above examples, it seems that a blend is achieved by taking only the beginning part of one word and joining it to the end of another word. But it is necessary to mention that the decision as to where to begin or end the cut is arbitrary.
3.5 Stress – Shift
This is also referred to as functional shift. It is a change in lexis that as a result of change that occurs in stress placement e.g. re’cord (v) and ‘record (noun).
classify two utterances into different category of the units of grammar.
Take a look at the examples below.
Kola & John like Mary (that is, both ‘Kola’ and ‘John’ have affection towards ‘Mary’)
Kola & John, like Mary love table tennis. (that is, ‘Kola’ and ‘John’
both love to play table tennis game as much as ‘Mary’).
In the first example, ‘like’, which is said with a rising tune is a linking verb that connects the subjects ‘Kola’ and ‘John’ to the object ‘Mary’ .
In the second example, the ‘like’, produced with a falling tune changes its role as a verb to an adverb and turns ‘Mary’ to a qualifier element in the adverbial group.
4. What are the bases or roots of these words?
(a) encouragement
(b) internationalization
(c) disappointments
(d) Illegality
(e) disability
(f) unquestionable
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