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Synchronic morphology

A synchronic investigation is asking, basically, what kinds of morphemes are combining in which sorts of ways to form a word. Often, a synchronic analysis of morphemes begins to spill over into an analysis of syntax, for morphology in general often becomes the sharedterritory of word meaning and sentence structure. We will try here, however, to keep our analysis of morphemes separate from syntax as much as possible.

To begin such a synchronic investigation, we must first discover in what ways morphemes can be synchronically classified. Most useful may be three binary terms, three sets of two words nearly opposite in meaning. One term from each set can be applied to each morpheme as we encounter it. [...] Each morpheme should be describable by one, but not the other, of the words in each binary set. We have already mentioned the first pair of classifiers: lexical — syntactic. Nearly all words in the lexicon can be identified as either lexical or syntactic morphemes.

Free — bound. The second such binary set is free-bound. Morphemes can be classified as either free or bound, that is, either capable of standing by themselves, as words, or not capable of standing by themselves. A free morpheme can be either lexical, like the word {rat}, or syntactic, like the operator {or}. If the free morpheme is syntactic rather than lexical, other morphemes will not combine with it. Lexical morphemes, however, can combine with other morphemes or other words. For example, to the free lexical morpheme {rat}, we can add the bound allomorph {s}, producing the word “rats”, or the bound morpheme {ty}, producing “ratty”, or another free morpheme {catch}, plus a bound one, {er}, producing “rat-catcher”.

Base — affix. The third useful binary set for synchronic analysis of morphemes is base — affix. A morpheme may be classified as a base or as an affix but not as both — at least, not in the same word. (Like the other terms in the two previous binary sets, “base” and “affix” are relational classifications rather than pure opposites. It is possible for the same morpheme to be free in one use and bound in another, or lexical in one case and syntactic in another.) A base — sometimes called a root — is a morpheme to which other morphemes are attached. The attaching morphemes are called the affixes.

Bases are morphemes that lexically, rather than syntactically, dominate other morphemes. Bases always have more lexical than syntactic meaning but bases are not always free. There are many bound bases in English as well as free bases. An example of a bound base is {gen}, a morpheme that has more lexical than syntactical meaning (gen = beginning), so it is a base rather than an affix; but it cannot stand by itself as a word, so it is bound, not free. Put together with various other attaching morphemes, {gen} gives us words like “generic”, “gene”, and “engender”.

Affixes. The affixes, or attaching morphemes, can be further subdivided by two subsidiary binary sets. The first set, prefix — suffix, merely indicates where the attachment occurs. If the affix is attached at the beginning of a base, as {un} is, then the technical term used is prefix. Prefixes alter the lexical meaning of a morpheme, but do not change its syntactic function. The prefix {un} and its allomorphs {im} and {in}, for example, turn an affirmative base into a negative one: {un} + {well} means “not well”; {im} + {possible} means “not possible”; {in} + {secure} means “not secure”.

If the attachment appears at the end of a base, as does {ed}, then the name for it is suffix. It is in connection with suffixes that the second binary subdivision should be applied, for there are two kinds of suffixes: inflections and derivations. As we indicated earlier, inflections alter the syntactic function of a base but do not change the lexical meaning very much. The class of inflections is very small (plural, tense, possession, comparison) and very stable; no new forms are being added. Derivational morphemes, however having more lexical meaning than do the inflections, belong to a larger and a more open class. New derivations can easily be added. Like inflections derivations can change a base’s syntactic function, but they can also alter the base’s lexical meaning somewhat, in a way that the inflections do not. For example, take the base {friend}. This is a noun of the type called [±count], that is, having the feature “capable of being counted individually”. Such a noun can be made plural by the addition of the plural allomorph {s}: we can speak of one “friend” or of many “friends”, and we can count the number of friends if we wish, one by one. The basic lexical meaning of {friend} has not been much altered by the addition of an inflection. But if to the singular base, we add the derivation {ship}, to produce the word “friendship”, we have a different sort of change. The syntactic meaning has not been altered, for the word is still a noun, but now the lexical feature shifts from [+count] to [–count]; “friendship” is ordinarily a mass noun, one that refers to a quality or a concept rather than to a number. Ordinarily, such nouns cannot function as plurals: we say “friendship is” rather than “friendships are”.

As another example, if we add the derivational suffix {tion} to the base {derive}, the suffix will change the function of the word from verb to noun. If we then add another suffix, {al}, to the newly produced noun “derivation”, we get a second a second category change: the word “derivational” is an adjective. Add one more, {ly}, and there is a third change in function, to adverb. Derivational suffixes, like {ship}, {tion}, {al}, and {ly}, are added to a base before the inflectional suffixes: inflections always tag along last.

Now let us try a little practice with synchronic analysis. [...]... keep in mind that the principle of minimal-pairing applies in morphology as well as in phonology: investigating types of morphemes, we should use morphemes that are as syntactically similar as possible — preferably identical — but are different in lexical meaning. Let us use the word “geography” as a test case, to discover how many morphemes it contains and of what sort they are.

Let us substitute {bio} (life) for {geo} (earth); we get a recognizable word, “biography”. So {geo} is a morpheme. Substitute {logy} (study of) for {graphy} (writing about), and the result is another familiar word, “geology”. Finally, change {y} (activity or product) to {ic} (characteristic of), and we have a new word, “geographic”. Since we cannot change any other part of “geography” and still get a standard English word — that is, we cannot subdivide the meaningful forms of “geography” any more than we already have — these must be the only three morphemes in the word: {geo}, {graph}, {y}. One of these morphemes never appears by itself as a separate word; therefore, it is not a free morpheme, but a bound one. Is it a bound base or an affix? It has very little lexical meaning, serving mainly to direct traffic, so it must be an affix. Since it appears at the end, it is specifically a suffix. Since it has some lexical meaning of its own, as well as indicating the function — noun — of the word “geography”, {y} is a derivational rather than an inflectional suffix.

{Geo} is a bound base. It cannot stand by itself lexically as a word and therefore is not free; in other words, it is bound. But morphemes with even less lexical meaning do attach to {geo}, so it is a base. In fact, other morphemes must attach to {geo} in order for there to be anything like a word formed from it, so it has to be a bound base.

Finally, there is {graph}, the most independent morpheme in “geography”. It is, we discover, a free base: free, because it can stand by itself as a word; base, because it can accept other, attaching morphemes. Like other free bases, {graph} is unlimited positionally. It can appear at the beginning of a word (“graphology”), in the middle (“geography”), or at the end (“photograph”).

Around such bases as {graph} is our English lexicon built. One of the reasons for the flexibility of English is that it borrows bases from just about every language there is; {graph} comes from Greek. Another reason for this flexibility is that English constantly uses bases and affixes to produce precise distinctions of lexical meaning. This manipulatability of parts allows for marvelous adaptability to the shifting demands of linguistic contexts, the changes that happen to all languages in response to historical, social, or other pressures. In the next section, we will discuss some specific ways in which morphemes can be manipulated to form different kinds of words.