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Morphological Exercises
Morphological Processes
Morphological terminolgy from Igor Melcuk, Cours de morphologie générale, Presses de l'Université de Montréal, 1996
Modifications:
Replication: the exact repetition of a morpheme, e.g. (Bourouchaski) 'alto' two; 'alto-alto' by two; (Afrikaans) 'krap' to scratch onesself; 'krap-krap-krap' to scratch onesself vigourously
Redupliction: a replication where a chain of phonemes is repeated exactly once, e.g.
(Tzeltal) 'nit' to push; 'nititan' to push rapidly. 'has' to touch; 'hasasan' to touch rapidly. 'puj' to crush; 'pujujan' to crush rapidly.
(Indonesian) 'kitab' book; 'kitab-kitab' books. 'anak' child; 'anak-anak' children.
(Tagalog) reduplication to the left: 'sulat' writing; 'susulat' one who will write. 'tawa' laughter; 'tatawa' one who will laugh. 'akayat' a rising; 'aakayat' one who will rise.
(Somali) reduplication to the right: 'dab' fire; 'dadab' fires. 'tug' thief; 'tuag' thieves
Partial reduplication: e.g. in French, the reduplication of pronouns:
Robert->Bébert; Emile->Mimille; Martine->Titine; Bernadette->Dédette; Hector->totor; Eugène->Gégène
Sometimes the reduplication is to the left: e.g. Christiane->Cricri; Michelle->Mimi; Didier->Didi; Elizabeth->Zaza; Louise->Loulou
Alternation: a modification which is not a replication
1) Replacement e.g. (Romanian) [kresk] I believe; [crest] you believe
a. substitution, such as
'umlaut': the replacement of the posterior vowels by the corresponding anterior vowels, e.g. (German) Nacht 'night'; Nâchte 'nights', Not 'need'; Note 'needs', (English) man -> men, foot -> feet, tooth -> teeth
'ablaut': a replacement inherited from an earlier form of the language, e.g sing -> sang, shoot -> shot, lead -> led
2) Deletion e.g. (Latin) pont = s -> pons, ponti
a. simplification of groups of phonemes e.g. /ts/ -> /s/ (French) [tsadr] -> [sadr] cendre 'cinder', /ds/ -> /s/ (Latin) mord sum -> morsum (dissimilation), (English) [ebl + li] + [ebli] 'ably'
b.elision:
apocope e.g.(Italian) un bello ragazzo -> un bel ragazzo
syncope e.g.(Italian) sapere
'know' -> sapro; dovere 'duty' -> dovro
aphesis e.g.(French) Je veux
pas 'I don't want' -> [vøpa]
3) Insertion e.g. (Spanish) carec (+er) 'to need': careze (+o) 'I need'; traduc (+ir) 'to translate': traduze (+o) 'I translate'
a. prothesis, if the element added appears at the beginning e.g. scola -> escola
b. epenthesis, in other cases e.g. (Spanish) ven + ré -> vendré 'I will come'
4) Metathesis
(ab -> ba) e.g.
(Old Spanish) dad le 'give to him' -> dalde; poned lo
'put it' -> poneldo
(Quechua) challwa 'fish' -> chawlla; tapsi 'shake' ->
taspi
* It is interesting to note that, in most cases, one of the of the phonemes participating in metathesis is a liquid, one sliding or an /h/ or /?/
Conversion, as a morphological means: examples (E. Kruisanga, 1911) hammer -> to hammer, shout -> to shout, shovel -> to shovel, wax -> to wax, bore -> to bore, cook -> to cook, tease -> to tease
Morphological exercises:
Answers can be found at the bottom of the page.
Consider
a youngster who knows the words photograph [foD
græf]
and photographer
[fth
grf
+ r].
At some point every speaker of English holds a single entry in the
lexicon to represent the core of these two words, that is, PHOTOGRAPH.
When you think sufficiently about what the underlying form must
be,you will see that /foDgræf]
and
[fthgrf
+ r],
a rule that changes unstressed vowels into []
will produce the correct vowels.
If
instead we postulated //
in the underlying form, it would be impossible to formulate a rule that
would produce the correct surface forms. In order to produce the
[]
in [fthgrf
+ r]
from an underlying form with schwas /ftgrf
+ r/,
we would need a rule that produced [o] from underlying //
in the first syllable and [æ] from underlying //
in the third syllable. This would amount to knowing which vowels
exist in the surface pronunciation and encoding that knowledge in the
underlying form along with the //,
but that is exactly what we assume does not happen. Instead, we
postulate different vowels in the underlying forms and a single rule that
derives []
from any underlying vowel in unstressed position; we can now derive the
customary pronunciations for these words. We formulate the rule
as follows:
vowel
unstressed -> []
(unstressed vowels become schwa)
This
rule will not affect stressed vowels; underlying vowels that are unstressed
become schwa [].
Of course, a rule that relies on information about stress relies
on prior assignment of stress.
1. For each of these English words, provide an additional word that will aid a speaker to internalize the correct underlying form as compared to the form that would be posited on the basis of the pronunciation of the given word alone.
Example:
Given photograph [foDgræf]
(with stress on the first and third syllables), the word photographer
[fthgrf
+ r]
(with stress on the second syllable) will help arrive at the correct form
because it will provide the pronunciation for the second underlying vowel,
which cannot be a schwa if photographer is to be pronounced.
Note: The underlying form is not always different from the singular form.
| solemn | compute | bomb |
| history | record (noun) | prosper |
| professor | sulphur | music |
2. Provide phonetic transcriptions for the pronunciations of rhetoric and rhetorical. What abstract underlying form would best explain the to pronunciation? Explain how the underlying form you have posted would generate the correct surface forms.
3. Consider the following pairs of singular and plural words in Persian. How are plural nouns formed in Persian?
| zan | 'woman' | zanan | 'women' |
| baradar | 'brother' | baradaran | 'brothers' |
| bacce | 'child' | baccegan | 'children' |
| gorbe | 'cat' | gorbegan | 'cats' |
| bande | 'slave' | bandegan | 'slaves' |
4. Consider the following Persian word pairs with their English glosses and propose an analysis of the derivational process that forms the abstract nouns of column B from the nouns and adjectives of column A.
| A | B | ||
| zende | 'alive' | zendegi | 'life' |
| sayeste | 'worthy' | sayestegi | 'worthiness' |
| xaste | 'tired' | xastegi | 'fatigue' |
| mard | 'man' | mardi | 'manliness' |
5. Consider the following verb forms in the Tailevu dialect of Fijan:
| rai | 'see' | kindo | 'startle' |
| raiTi au | 'see me' | kindori au | 'startle me' |
| raiTi iko | 'see you' | kindori iko | 'startle you' |
| raiTia | 'see him' | kindoria | 'startle him' |
| mbiu | 'abandon' | mbese | 'be tired of' |
| mbiuti au | 'abandon me' | mbeseki au | 'be tired of me' |
| mbiuti iko | 'abandon you' | mbeseki iko | 'be tired of you' |
| mbiutia | 'abandon him' | mbesekia | 'be tired of him' |
a) What underlying form is the root of each of these four verbs? Remember that the underlying form of the root must contain enough phonological information for all the forms of the verb to be derived, and bear in mind that morpheme boundaries are not necessarily the same thing as word boundries.
b) Consider the following short sentences, in which the verbs are the same as in a). List all the different morphemes that you can identify in these six sentences, and provide an accurate gloss (English meaning) for each.
| au a mbiuti iko | 'I abandoned you' |
| e a raiTia | 'he saw him' |
| e a mbiuti au | 'he abandoned me' |
| o a kindori au | 'you startled me' |
| au a raiTia | 'I saw him' |
| o a mbesekia | 'you were tired of him' |
c) If levaTia means 'be angry at him, how are the following sentences said in the Tailevu dialect?
You were angry at him.
I was angry at you.
He was angry at me.
Answers
1. See Prof. Burnett for answer sheet.
2. See Prof. Burnett for answer sheet.
3.
In Persian the plural form is the suffix 'an' following a consonant, and 'gan' following a final 'e'. The [g] serves to separate the two vowels.
4.
An abstract noun is derived from a noun or adjective in Persian by the addition of the suffix 'i'. If the original word ends in 'e', the suffix is 'gi'. As in question #3, the [g] is added to facilitate the pronunciation of two adjacent front vowels.
5.
Note: [T] describes the voiced interdental.
a) The underlying forms of the four verbs are:
[raiTi]
[mbiuti]
[kindori]
[mbeseki]
b)
| morpheme | gloss |
| iko | you (object) |
| au | I, me |
| -a (bound morpheme) | him |
| a | past tense |
| e | he (subject) |
| o | you (subject) |
| mbiuti | abandon |
| raiTi | see |
| ndori | startle |
| mbeseki | be tired of |
c)
You were angry at him. - o a levaTia
I was angry at you. - au a levaTi iko
He was angry at me. - e a levaTi au