MORPHOLOGY

BY :
USWATUN HASANAH
HAFIZA ADHA NISA
What is Morphology?
Morphology is the study of how words are put together. In biology
morphology refers to the study of the form and structure of organisms, and
in geology it refers to the study of the configuration and evolution of land
forms. In linguistics morphology refers to the mental system involved in
word formation or to the branch of linguistics that deals with words, their
internal structure, and how they are formed.

A. Morphology
Etymologically, Morph = form or shape, ology = study of. Morphology is
the study of the basic building blocks of meaning in language. These
building blocks, called morphemes, are the smallest units of form that bear
meaning or have a grammatical function. Morphology is the study of word
formation in a particular language. It focuses especially on the internal
structure of the words and their alteration through the addition of prefixes
and suffixes.
 Morphemes
Words are potentially complex units, composed of even more basic units, called
morphemes. A morpheme is the smallest part of a word that has grammatical
function or meaning (not the smallest unit of meaning); we will designate them
in braces—{ }. For example, sawed, sawn, sawing, and saws can all be
analyzed into the morphemes {saw} + {-ed}, {-n}, {-ing}, and {-s},
respectively. None of these last four can be further divided into meaningful
units and each occurs in many other words, such as looked, mown, coughing,
bakes. {Saw} can occur on its own as a word; it does not have to be attached to
another morpheme. It is a free morpheme. However, none of the other
morphemes listed just above is free. Each must be affixed (attached) to some
other unit; each can only occur as a part of a word. Morphemes that must be
attached as word parts are said to be bound.
The more combinations a morpheme is found in, the more productive it is said
to be
A single word may be composed of one or more morphemes :
one morphemes - boy
- desire
two morphemes - boy + ish
- desire + able
three morphemes - boy + ish + ness
- desire + able + ity
four morpheme - gentle + man + li + ness
- un + desire + able + ity
more than four - un + gentle + man + li + ness

Those morphemes which can stand alone as words are said to be free morphemes, e.g.
ripe and artichoke. Those which are always attached to some other morpheme are said
to be bound, e.g. -en, -s, un-, pre-.7
•C. The Classification of Morphemes
- Free Morphemes.
Free morphemes are morphemes that can stand by themselves as single
word. Examples: child, teach, kind, open, tour, etc. Free morphemes fall into
two categories:
- Lexical Morphemes
Morphemes that set of ordinary nouns, adjectives and verbs that we think
of as the words that carries the `content` of the message as we convey. Some
example: tiger, yellow, sad, open, look, follow, etc.
- Functional Morphemes
Functional morphemes are morphemes that consist largely of the
functional words in the language such as conjunctions, preposition, articles and
pronouns. Example: and, but, above, when, because, in, the, that, it, etc.
Bound Morphemes
Morphemes which are can not normally stand alone and are
typically attached to another form, example: re-, -ist, -ed, -s. They
were identified as affixes. So we can say that affixes (prefixes and
suffixes) in English are bound morphemes.
For example:
Undressed Carelessness
u- Dress -ed care -less -ness
prefix Stem Suffix stem Suffix suffix
(bound)(free) (bound) (free) (bound) (bound)

Bound morphemes fall into two categories:

- Derivational Morphemes
- Inflectional Morphemes
- Derivational Morphemes
Morphemes that are used to make new words or to make words of a different
grammatical category from the stem, for example the additional of the derivational
morpheme -ness change the adjective good to the noun goodness. The noun care can
become the adjective careful or careless by the addition of the derivational morpheme –
ful or –less. A list of derivational morphemes will include suffixes such as the ¬–ish in
foolish, and the -ment in payment. The list will also include prefixes such as re-, pre-,
ex-, mis-, co-, un-, and many more.
- Inflectional Morphemes
These are not used to produce new words in the language, but rather to
indicate aspects of grammatical function of a word. In flectional, morphemes
are used to show if a word is plural or singular, if it is past tense or not and if it
is comparative or possessive form. English has only eight inflectional
morphemes (or ‘inflections’), illustrated in the following sentences.
Inflectional morphemes, in contrast to derivational morphemes, are a small
closed set of eight grammatical morphemes. These eight morphemes serve to
indicate a grammatical feature of major category words, such plural or tense,
and can only occur as suffixes. Inflectional morphemes change the form of a
word only. They do not change either word class or the lexical meaning of a
word:
cat  cats
walk  walked