WORDS AND MORPHOLOGY

Contents of Basic Unit:

1. Defining “word”
2. Word meaning and compositionality
3. Lexical v. grammatical meaning
4. Test Yourself: Quiz for Module 2, Basic Unit

1. Defining “word”

Recall the example from the previous module, involving the non-word vo, which I made up a meaning for, as in: Limp Bizkit voed this George Michael song; I wish Devo would devo it.

Once you know the word vo, you are able to understand a related word, devo, based on your existing knowledge of English morphology. Specifically, the prefix “de”—what it means, and what it typically attaches to.

Morphology is the study of how sounds are put together to carry meaning. Put more casually, it’s the study of word formation. What is a “word,” though? Let’s check out the definitions given by a popular dictionary, Merriam-Webster.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/word

Merriam-Webster definition of “word”

Definition 1a: “something that is said” – wow, how’s that for vague? And is a word on a page that is not spoken aloud not actually a word?

Definition 2a is a little more precise, but let’s look more closely. Is it true that most words are not “divisible into smaller units capable of independent use”? What about the following words?

Can’t each of these be “divided into smaller units capable of independent use”? And isn’t each of them a word? This definition doesn’t seem to cover all of the things we think of as “words”!

For our purposes, consider “words” to be correspondences between linguistic forms—sequences of sounds—and meanings—what those sounds represent. When one English speaker utters a sequence of sounds, how does another English speaker recognize the linguistic meaning that it carries? How do they even know when they’ve heard an English word (instead of a word from another language, or an utterance with no linguistic meaning)? English speakers share knowledge of sound-meaning relationships.

2. Word meaning and compositionality

Not only do speakers share knowledge of words, but they also share knowledge of smaller units of meaning that can combine to form words—and the rules that govern which units can combine or not. Of course, most of this knowledge is implicit and subconscious—it is simply part of what someone knows when they “know a language.”

To talk about this precisely, though, we need to talk about a unit of meaning that is somewhat different from a “word.” Consider that the following are all “words”:

You will probably intuit that some of these words are “smaller” or “bigger” than others—you probably have a sense that some of them are composed of multiple internal units, while others are not. A fundamental property of word meaning is compositionality—the meaning of a word comes from the composition of its parts. This is in fact how we are able to make new words from old ones. For example, hashtag is a compound word formed from hash (referring to the # symbol) and tag (referring to an annotation of some sort). A hashtag is the use of the # symbol in order to annotate something. The meaning of the word hashtag is therefore composed from the meaning of its two parts. Its meaning is compositional. (This is also an example of hierarchy in language—the larger unit’s meaning relies on that of the smaller units.)

Words have internal composition in less obvious cases, too. Consider the words vase and vases. One has an –s (which sounds like “z”) on the end and one doesn’t. (Make sure to say them aloud to hear this difference, rather than just reading it: remember that speech, not writing, is the basis of the English language.) Vase and vases are different word forms with slightly different meanings. Similarly, consider walk and walked. One has an –ed on the end and one doesn’t. Walk and walked are different word forms with slightly different meanings. Vases and walked are more complex words than vase and walk—they are composed internally of more than one meaningful unit.

Take a quick survey below before you continue reading!

DID YOU TAKE THE SURVEY???

In the activity you just did, you were guessing from one form of a word what its other forms would be. How did you know, without ever having seen these words before, which new word form would make sense in each sentence? You used grammatical clues from the surrounding words to figure out what form would fit naturally in each blank. I’m willing to bet that you did NOT generate the following sentences:

*This party needs more gilpret. Let’s gilpretted it!

*I tried to jedi the glass but failed. I guess the glass is jediness.

These sentences are marked with an asterisk. In linguistics, an asterisk indicates that a phrase or sentence is ungrammatical: it would not be produced or understood by a native speaker of the language, because it violates the rules underlying the linguistic system. These word forms don’t fit in these slots because the meanings they signal are somehow inappropriate for their sentence positions.

These differences in word forms—with one form being appropriate in one sentence position but not others—are morphological differences. Remarkably, you don’t even have to know the meaning of a new word to know what form it should appear in! Define gilpret…

How did you perform the task above? By following the abstract rules you know about English morphology. You recognize that some of the same sound sequences are used in lots of different words to signal the same meaning. When given a new word, you can deduce how its form will change given where it is in a sentence, or given a slightly different meaning it needs to express. Consider the following sets of words. Which component do you think is shared across each set?

Words are composed from smaller units called morphemes. A morpheme is a sequence of sound(s) that carries a linguistic meaning and cannot be broken down into smaller sequences of sound(s) that carry their own meanings. Every word contains at least one morpheme, and a word can consist of a single morpheme. Examples of single-morpheme words:

However, most words contain more than one morpheme, and hence we can analyze how they are composed internally, from multiple morphemes.

Different forms of the “same” word are composed from different morpheme combinations. For instance, cat contains one morpheme: {cat}. In contrast, cats contains two morphemes: {cat} and {-s}. Note that when we are writing, we can use curly brackets to indicate morphemes. What we call “compound” words typically have two morphemes, as in hashtag: {hash} and {tag}; or workhorse: {work} {horse}.

A morpheme has three important properties:

1. it cannot be broken down into smaller units of meaning,
2. it carries a meaning—though that meaning may not be easy to define,
3. it carries that same meaning into different words, or on its own as a word.

For instance: word only contains one morpheme. It cannot be broken down into smaller units that have their own meaning. The composition of this word is simply {word}.

However, words has two morphemes: {word}, which carries the main meaning, and {-s}, which lets us know we are talking about more than one word. This {-s} also occurs on another word in the list above: wordsmiths. If I use this word in a sentence, you will picture multiple wordsmiths (at least two), not just one.

How many morphemes do you think wordsmiths has? If you said three, you’re getting it! {word} {smith} and {-s}. What other words can the morpheme {smith} occur in?

Before moving on, take this little quiz to check your understanding of morphemes:

3. Lexical v. grammatical meaning

Not all morphemes carry the same kind of meaning. Neither do all words: though we think of words as things you can look up in a dictionary and maybe even draw a picture of, not all words are so easily defined! How would you draw a picture to represent the word of? How about before? Yet? Therefore?

We divide the types of meanings morphemes carry into two categories: lexical meaning and grammatical meaning.

Lexical meaning is also called semantic meaning—it is what the word refers to, whether that is a concrete entity or abstract concept or relationship.

A question about lexical meaning is, “What do I mean when I say silly v. silliness?” These two words refer to different things. Silly refers to a state of being (“She’s awfully silly today!”) whereas silliness refers to an entity (“Her silliness is really annoying me!”). {silly} is a morpheme that carries lexical meaning. {-ness} is also a morpheme that carries lexical meaning, because it changes the concept that {silly} refers to.

Grammatical meaning pertains to a word’s function in a sentence, and the type of meaning it conveys relative to other words in a phrase or sentence. This definition can feel very vague but should make more and more sense as we explore different grammatical patterns over the course of this semester.

A question about grammatical meaning is, “When would I say wags versus wagged?” These two words refer to the same thing—the act of moving back and forth in a peculiar manner. But they are used under different syntactic circumstances. Wags is used when I am talking about something currently or regularly happening (“Her tail wags constantly” but not “*Her tail wags last night”). Wagged is used when I am talking about something that happened in the past (“Their tails wagged last night” but not “*Their tails wagged right now”). The reference of wags and wagged is not different, but their use in a sentence is.

One way to think of this difference is that lexical meaning has clear signification outside of a particular sentence context, whereas grammatical meaning is only relevant to the interpretation of a particular sentence.

Both words wags and wagged carry both lexical and grammatical meaning. The lexical meaning is expressed by the component they share in common: {wag}. Whether I say wags or wagged, you probably envision the same image: a tail moving back and forth. That’s the lexical meaning—the reference. The grammatical meaning is expressed by the parts that are different: {-s} or {-ed}. If I am talking about the act of a tail moving back and forth that happened yesterday, I use the form wagged. If I am talking about the act of a tail moving back and forth that is happening currently, I use the form wags. The ending expresses a relationship to time, which is only necessary as part of interpreting a description of a specific event.

In this example, we see a shared morpheme that carries lexical meaning: {wag}. We see two morphemes that carry grammatical meaning: {-s} and {-ed}. {wag} provides the reference, and {-s} and {-ed} change what syntactic circumstances the word can be used in.

Some morphemes can occur freestanding as words; these are called free morphemes. Examples are {car}, {word}, {fill}, and {light}.

Morphemes that must attach to words in order to express their meaning are called bound morphemes. Examples are {a-}, {-ness}, and {cran-}. We will talk specifically about affixes. Affixes attach to root morphemes, which carry the core meaning in a word. {word} is a root morpheme, and so is {wag}.

English has both prefixes, attaching at the beginning of a root, and suffixes, attaching at the end of a root. In cats, {cat} is the root morpheme and {-s} is a suffix. In undo, {do} is the root morpheme and {un-} is a prefix. Consider the following words, which are composed from a prefix, a root, and a suffix.

We divide affixes into two classes of morphemes, depending on whether they carry lexical or grammatical meaning. Affixes that carry lexical meaning are called derivational morphemes. Affixes that carry grammatical meaning are called inflectional morphemes.

English has countless derivational prefixes and suffixes. These alter the reference of a word and often change the part of speech of the word as well (from noun to adjective, for instance). Though there is a core meaning that remains consistent when you add a derivational morpheme to an existing word, the overall reference changes.

For instance, word, wordy, and wordily all share the morpheme {word}. Reference associated with {word} is present in all three words. Wordy is a combination of {word} and a derivational suffix {-y}, which changes it from a noun to an adjective—from a thing to a quality. Wordily is further a combination of {word} {-y} and another derivational morpheme, {-ly}, which changes it from an adjective to an adverb—from a quality to a manner of doing. The addition of derivational morphemes changes how the word can be used in a sentence. They are not interchangeable! Note the asterisks meaning “ungrammatical” in the examples below.

3a) I read the word.

3b) *I read the wordy.

3c) *I read the wordily.

4a) The writer was wordy.

4b) *The writer was word.

4c) *The writer was wordily.

5a) The writer spoke wordily.

5b) *The writer spoke word.

5c) *The writer spoke wordy.

Can you explain why only the first sentence is grammatical in each trio of sentences?

English has only 8 inflectional morphemes, and all are suffixes. Each inflectional suffix attaches to either nouns, verbs, adjectives, or adverbs. These four word types constitute, not coincidentally, the major categories of words that carry lexical meaning, and which make up the “meat” of sentence meaning. For a very quick introduction to these categories, consider the sentence below.

We will explore over the course of the semester these word categories, and the grammatical meanings the inflectional morphemes carry. For now, you should be able to recognize these endings as inflections. And when I say the word inflection, you should know that I am referring to the change in a word’s ending that carries grammatical meaning. Start noticing when you see these endings on different words.

3. Test Yourself: Quiz for Module 2, Basic Unit

Complete this before moving on to the next unit!