Procedures of morphemic analysis

Morphemic analysis deals with segmentable words. Its procedure flows to split a word into its constituent morphemes, and helps to determine their number and type. It's called the method of immediate and ultimate constituents. This method is based on the binary principle which allows to break morphemic structure of a word into 2 components at each stage. The analysis is completed when we arrive at constituents(UC) unable of any further division. E.g. Louis Bloomfield - classical example:
ungentlemanly
I. un-(IC/UC) +gentlemanly (IC) (uncertain, unhappy)
II. gentleman (IC) + -ly (IC/UC) (happily, certainly)
III. gentle (IC) +man (IC/UC) (sportsman, seaman)
IV. gent (IC/UC) + le (IC/UC) (gentile, genteel)
The aim of the analysis is to define the number and the type of morphemes.
As we break the word we obtain at any level only 2 immediate constituents, one of which is the stem of the given word. The morphemic analysis may be based either on the identification of affixational morphemes within a set of words, or root morphemes.

For example, the noun friendliness is first segmented into the ICs 1) friendly- (recurring in the adjectives friendly and friendly-looking) and 2) -ness (found in a countless number of nouns, e.g. happiness, darkness). The 1C -ness is at the same time a UC of the noun, as it cannot be broken into any smaller elements possessing both sound-form and meaning. The 1C friendly- is next broken into the ICs 1) friend- (recurring in friendship, unfriendly) and 2) -ly (recurring in wifely, brotherly). The ICs friend- and -ly are both UCs of the word under analysis.

The division into ICs and UCs can be carried out on the basis of two principles: I) the affix principle and 2) the root principle. According to the affix principle the segmentation of the word into its constituent morphemes is based on the identification of an affixational morpheme within a set of words, e.g. the identification of the morpheme -less leads to the segmentation of words like useless. According to the root principle the identification of the root-morpheme agree- in the words agreeable makes it possible to split these words into the root agree- and the affixational morphemes -able.

Date: 2016-01-20; view: 2095; Нарушение авторских прав