The etymology(origin) of affixes

From the point of view of origin affixes are subdivided into 2 main classes: the native affixes and the borrowed affixes. Native affixes are those that existed in English in the Old English period or were formed from Old English words.

The term borrowed affixes is not very exact as affixes are never borrowed as such, but only as parts of loan words. To enter the morphlogical system of the English language a borrowed affix has to satisfy certain conditions. The borrowing of the affixes is possible only a)if there a great number of words containing this affix b) if its meaning and function are definite, and if its structural pattern corresponds to the structural patterns already exis­ting in the language.

If these conditions are fulfilled the foreign affix may even become productive and combine with native stems or borrowed stems within the system of English vocabulary like –able- Lat “-abilis” in such words as laugh­able or unforgettable.

Native affixes

Part of speech	Affix	Word(example)
Noun-forming	er ness ing dom hood ship	Worker Coldness Feeling Freedom Chidhood friedship
Adjective-forming	Ful Less Y Ish Ly En some	Joyful Careless Cozy Childish Lonely Wooden tiresome
Verb-forming	en	redden
Adverb-forming	ly	carefully

 

 

Latin affixes

Part of speech	Affix	Word(example)
Noun-forming	Ion tion	Communion, opinion Relation, temptation
Adjective-forming	Able Ate Ant Ent Or Al ar	Curable, detestable Accurate, desperate Arrogant, important Absent, convenient Minor, senior Final, cordial Familiar, solar
Verb-forming	Ate Ute Ct(rare) D(e) Prefix-dis	Appreciate, congratulate Attribute, contribute Act, connect Divide, include Diable, disagree

French affixes

Part of speech	Affix	Word(example)
Noun-forming	Ance Ence Ment Age ess	Arrogance, hindrance Patience, intelligence Development, appointment Courage, village Actress, lioness
Adjective-forming	ous	Curious, serious
Verb-forming	Prefix-en	Enable, enslave

 

Hybrids

Words that are made up of elements derived from two or more differ­ent languages are called hybrids. English contains thousands of hybrid words.

There is an established pattern that could be represented as English stem+ - able, e.g. answerable, eatable, likable, usable. The root is English and the suffix is derived from the Latin -abilis and borrowed through French. There is a variant with the native negative prefix un-: un- + English stem+ -able: unanswerable, unbearable, unforeseeable.

Speaking about word-building we also speak about a special type of word, called splinters(осколочные элементы). They are the result of clipping the end or the beginning of a word and producing other words on the analogy with the previous word: mini from moniature- miniplane, minicar; other splintersare: maxi, bio, agri, mobile, rama(panorama), holic(workaholic), post, preetc.

Compound words

Compound words are words consisting of at least two stems, which occur in the language as free forms. In a compound word the imme­diate constituents obtain integrity and structural cohesion that make them function in a sentence as a separate lexical unit.

The integrity of a compound is manifested in its indivisibility, i.e. the impossibility of inserting another word or word-group between its ele­ments. If, for example, speaking about a sunbeam we can insert some other word between the article and the noun, e.g. a bright sunbeam, a bright and unexpected sunbeam, because the article a is a separate word, no such insertion is possible between the stems sun and beam, for they are not words but morphemes.

In describing the structure of a compound we can examine three types of relations;a) the relations of the members to each other b) the relation of the whole to its members c) and correlation with equivalent free phrases.

1)Some compounds are made up of a determining and a determined part, which may be called the determinant and the determinatum. The second stem, in our case beam, is the basic part, the determinatum. The determinant sun serves to differentiate it from other beams. The determinatum is the grammatically most important part which undergoes inflection: sunbeams, brothers-in-law, passers-by.

If in a compound the two constituent elements are clearly the de­terminant and the determinatum, s uch compounds are called endocentric.

If the determinatum is not expressed but implied, they are called exocentric:A killjoy- “a person who throws gloom over social enjoyment”. The essential part of the determinatum is obviously missing, it is implied and under­stood but not formally expressed.

2)The semantic integrity of a compound means that the meaning of the whole is not a mere sum of its elements. A compound is often very different in meaning from a corresponding syntactic group. Thus, a blackboard is very different from a black board. Many authors treat semantic connections within compounds in terms of syntactic relations. Marchand distinguishes such relations as 1) objective: house-keeping, book­keeping, sightseeing, 2) subjective: earthquaking, 3) predicative: cock-croaaing, sunburning. I.V. Arnold thinks that we should speak about 4)adverbial relations, purpose or functional relations, e.g. bath­robe, raincoat, classroom 5)different local relations, e.g. dockland, garden-party 6) comparison: blockhead, butter-fingers7 ) the material e.g. silverware, tin-hat, waxwork 8 ) temporal relations e.g. night-club, summer-house 9) s ex-denoting compounds, e.g. she-dog, he-goat, Jack-ass.

Compounds that conform to grammatical patterns current in present-day English are termed syntactic compounds, e.g. seashore; those that do not - asyntactic, e.g. baby-sit­ting.

There are two important peculiarities distinguishing compounding in English from compounding in other languages. 1)both immediate constituents of an English compound are free forms, i.e. they can be used as independent words with a distinct meaning of their own. Sometimes there are bound forms like Anglo-Saxon, Indo-European, but they are rare.

2)the regular pattern for the English language is a two-stem compound. An exception to this rule is ob­served when the combining element is represented by a form-word stem, as in mother-in-law, bread-and-butter, whisky-and-soda.

The criteria of compounding

As English compounds consist of free forms, it is difficult to distinguish them from phrases. Scholars often disagree upon the question of relevant criteria.

The problem is connected with the problem of defining word boundaries in the language. E. Nida wrote that "the criteria for determining the word-units in a language are of three types: (1) phonological, (2) morphological, (3) syntactic. None of the criteria is normally sufficient. Other scholars add here the graphic criterion of solid or hyphenated spelling.

The lack of uniformity in spelling is the chief reason why many authors consider this criterion insufficient. Some combine it with the phonic criterion of stress. There is a marked tendency in English to give compounds a heavy stress on the first element, e.g. L. Bloomfield suggested that `ice-cream is a compound but `ice `cream is a phrase. In all these cases the determinant has a heavy stress, the determinatum has the middle stress. Some scholars oppose this idea because the rule is not true for adjectives. Compound adjectives are double stressed like 'gray-'green, 'easy-'going, 'new- 'born.

H. Paul and 0. Jespersen support the semantic criterion, and define a compound word as a combination forming a unit expressing a single idea which is not identical in meaning to the sum of the meanings of its components in a free phrase: dirty work - 'dishonorable proceedings'- a compound; clean work is a phrase. But in reality it is practically impossible to distinguish compound words and phraseological units.

Prof. A. I. Smirnitsky spoke about the size of the unit problem and introduced the criterion of formal integrity, which is a morphological criterion. He compares the compound shipwreck and the phrase (the) wreck of (a) ship comprising the same morphemes, and points out that although they do not differ either in meaning or reference, they stand in very different relation to the grammatical system of the language. It follows from his examples that a word is characterized by structural integrity non­existent in a phrase. N. G. Guterman proves it by comparing the plural forms of the compound sweetheart 'a lover' and the phrase sweet heart (tender heart), i.e. sweethearts and sweet hearts, respectively.

Some authors consider the syntactical criterion based on comparing the com­pound and the phrase comprising the same morphemes more substantial. L. Bloomfield points out that "the word black in the phrase black birds can be modified by very (very black birds), but not so the com­pound-member black in: the first element of black market or black list cannot be modified by very either.

With the problem of compound words the so-called “stone wall problem” is connected. The question here is if it a word or word combination. A.I.Smirnitsky studied the question in detail. There is no absolute solution. But he comes to the conclusion that the first element serves as as adjective, formed from a noun stem by conversion, though it is not a proper adjective. To prove it he offers a transformational procedure. A phrase like a stone wall can be transformed into the phrase a wall of stone, whereas a toothpick cannot be replaced by a pick for teeth. Such word-group as stone wall is called by some scholars, e.g. E.M.Dubenets nominative binomials.

Semi-affixes

There are, however, some borderline cases. Some elements of the English vocabulary occurring as independent nouns, such as man, berry, land are-frequent as second elements of words. They have developed a great com­bining ability and a very general meaning similar to affixes. They are called semi-affixes. They receive this name because semantically, functionally, structurally and statistically they behave more like affixes than like roots. They seem to have acquired valency similar to that of affixes. They are unstressed, and the vowel sound is mostly reduced. The most frequent semi-affixes are man, berry, land, like, -proof –worthy: godlike, gentle­manlike, ladylike, unladylike, manlike, Marchand chooses to include among the semi-affixes also the elements wise, ways, monger: otherwise, likewise, clockwise, anyway (s), otherways, always, likeways, newsmonger, scandalmonger, warmonger.

Classification of compounds

The great variety of compound types brings about a great variety of classifications. Compound words may be classified 1) according to the type of composition and the linking element; 2)according to the part of speech to which the compound belongs and within each part of speech 3)according to the structural pattern. It is also possible to subdivide compounds according to other characteristics, i.e.semantically, into motivated and idiomatic compounds Structu­rally, compounds are distinguished as endocentric and exocentric, with the subgroup of "bahuvrihi" and syntactic and asyntactic combinations. There also some miscellaneous types, such as phrase com­pounds, reduplicative compounds, pseudo-compounds and quotation com­pounds.

The classification according to the type of composition includes the following groups:

1) The predominant type is a mere juxtaposition without connecting elements: heartache; heart-beat; heart-break;

2) Composition with a vowel or a consonant as a linking element. The examples are very few: speedometer; Afro-Asian; handicraft; statesman.

3) Compounds with linking elements represented by preposition or conjunction stems: down-and-out, matter-of-fact, son-in-law

According to the part of speech there are

1) compound nouns: sunbeam, maidservant,looking-glass, searchlight, blackboard.

2) compound adjectives: threadbare, airtight, bloodthirsty, carefree.

3)compound verbs: outgrow, overflow, stand up, black-list, stage-manage, white­wash.

According to the structure of im­mediate constituents the following types are distinguished(structural pattern):

1) compounds consisting of simple stems: film-star.

2) compounds where at least one of the constituents is a derived stem: mill-owner.

3) compounds where at least one of the constituents is a clipped stem:

maths-mistress (in British English) and math-mistress (in American Eng­lish). The subgroup will contain abbreviations like H-bag (handbag) or Xmas (Christmas), but the first is not used in spoken language, and the second is considered sub-standard;

4) compounds where at least one of the constituents is a compound stem: wastepaper-basket.

Derivational compounds

Compound derivatives or derivational com­pounds are words which are formed by a suffix referring to the combination as a whole, not to one of its elements: kind-hearted, old-timer, schoolboyishness, teenager. The essence of the derivational compounds becomes clear if we compare them with derivatives and compounds proper that possess a similar structure: honeymooner and mill-owner. The ultimate constituents of these are: noun stem+noun stem+ - er. Analysing into immediate constituents, we see that the imme­diate constituents (IC's) of the compound mill-owner are two noun stems, the first simple, the second derived: mill+owner. For the word honeymooner no such division is possible, since mooner does not exist as a free stem. The IC's are honeymoon + -er, and the suffix -er signals that the whole denotes a person: the structure is (honey-{-moon) + -er.

The process of word-building in these seemingly similar words is dif­ferent: mill-owner is coined by composition, honey-mooner — by deriva­tion from the compound honeymoon. Honeymoon being a compound, honeymooner is a derivative.

The suffix -er is one of the productive suffixes in forming derivational compounds.

Another frequent type of derivational compounds are compounds of the type kind-hearted: adjective stem+ noun stem+ -ed. Its IC's are a noun phrase kind heart and the suffix -ed that unites the elements of the phrase and turns them into the elements of a compound adjective.

The first element may also be a noun stem: bow-legged, heart-shaped and a numeral: three-coloured. The derivational compounds often become the basis of further deriva­tion. E.g. war-minded - war-mindedness; whole-hearted - whole-hearted-ness:: whole-heartedly.

Some combinations may be called compounds as they consist of two parts, but have some peculiarities. Their motivation is mostly based upon sound-symbolism.Such words are all stylistically coloured.

The group consists of reduplicative compounds that fall into three main subgroups: reduplicative compounds proper, ablaut combinations and rhyming combinations.

Reduplicative compounds proper is a very mixed group containing usual free forms, onomatopoeic stems and pseudo-morphemes. Onomatopoeic repe­tition exists but it is not very extensive: hush-hush - secret, pooh-pooh (to express contempt). Ablaut combinations are twin forms consisting of one basic morpheme (usually the second), sometimes a pseudo-morpheme which is repeated in the other constituent with a different vowel. The typical changes are [i]—[ae]: chit-chat - gossip, knick-knack - small articles of ornament. Rhyme combinations are twin forms consisting of two elements (most often two pseudo-morphemes) which are joined to rhyme: boogie-woogie, flibberty-gibberty.

The words like sparrow-grass are not actually compounds at all, they are cases of false etymology, an attempt to find mo­tivation for a borrowed word: sparrcw-grass from Latin asparagus.

The group of bahuvrihi compound nouns is not very numerous. The term "bahuvrihi" is borrowed from the grammarians of ancient India. Its literal meaning is 'much-riced'. It is used to designate possessive exocentric formations in which a person, animal or thing are metonymically named after some striking feature they possess, chiefly a striking feature in their appearance. The formula of the bahuvrihi compound nouns is adjective stem + noun stem: e.g. bigwig - a person of importance, black-shirt -'an Italian fascist (also, by analogy, any fascist.Some scholars consider such word-combinations as phraseological units.

Shortenings

As a type of word-building, shortening of spoken words, also called clipping or curtailment(слова-обрезки или слоговые аббревиатуры), is recorded in English in the 15th century. It has grown more and more producti­ve ever since: demo- a demonstration, dub - to make another recording (from double); fridge from refrigerator, mike from microphone etc.

In English shortening is connected with the process of loan word assimilation. Monosyllabism typical of in English and that is why shortened words sound more like native ones than their long prototypes. Shortening consists in the reduction of a word to one of its parts, as a result of which the new form acquires some linguistic value of its own. The resulting new morphemes are capable of being used as free forms and com­bine with bound forms.

Most of the shortened words by con­version produce verbs: to phone, to vac, to vet, etc., in which the semantic relationship with the prototype remains quite clear. They also serve as basis for further word-formation by derivation or composition: fa ncy (from fantasy) to fancy, fancier, fanciful, fancifully, fancifulness, fancy-ball, fancy-dress, fancy-work etc.

The correlation of a curtailed word with its prototype is in­teresting. Two possible developments should be noted:

1. The shortened form may be regarded as a variant or a synonym dif­fering from the full form quantitatively, stylistically and sometimes emotionally, the prototype - neutral, e.g. doc - doctor; exam – examination; Frisco - San Francisco.

2. T he connection can be established only etymologically. The denotative or lexico-grammatical meaning or both, may change so much that the clipping becomes a sepa­rate word: etymological doublets appear: fan -an enthusiastic devotee - fanatic, miss - mistress. In both types the clipped forms exist in the language alongside their respective prototypes.

Shortened words render only one of the secon­dary meanings of a polysemantic word: the verb double may mean “to multiply by two”, “to increase two-fold”, “to amount to twice as much”. But to dub means only “to multiply ”..

Shortening produces new words in the same part of speech. The bulk of curtailed words is constituted by nouns. Verbs are seldom shortened in present-day English; e.g. Rev from revolve and tab from tabulate. Such clipped verbs as do, occur - converted nouns. Shortened adjectives are very few and mostly reveal a combined ef­fect of shortening and suffixation, e.g. comfy - comfortable, dilly- delightful.

Various classifications of shortened words may be of­fered. The generally accepted one is that based on the position of the clipped part. According to whether it is the final, initial or middle part of the word that is cut off we distinguish final clipping (cut off apocope), initial clipping (or aphesis(taking away) and medial clipping (or syncope (cutting up)).We also speak about blends.

1. Final clipping in which the beginning of the prototype is retained, is practically the rule, and forms the bulk of the class: e.g. ad, advert – advertisement.

2. Initial-clipped words retaining the final part of the prototype are less numerous but much more firmly established as separate lexical units with a meaning very different from that of the prototype and stylisti­cally neutral doublets, e.g. cute - acute, story - history, sport - disport, tend – attend.

Final and initial clipping may be combined and result in curtailed words with the middle part of the prototype retained. e. g. flu - influenza, frig or fridge – refrigerator.

3. Curtailed words with the middle part of the word left out are equal­ly few. They may be further subdivided into two groups: (a) words with a final-clipped stem retaining the functional morpheme: maths - mathematics, specs - spectacles; (b) contractions due to a gradual pro­cess of elision under the influence of rhythm and context. Thus fancy- fantasy, ma'am - madam may be regarded as accelerated forms.

There is also such a case as ellipsis. Ellipsis is defined as the omission of a word or words essential for grammatical completeness but not for the conveyance of' the lexical meaning. The social causes for ellipsis are emphasized by scholars. Professional communities often produce ellipsis: open on for open fire on, and put to sea for put ship to sea are of wartime and navy origin.

There is a phenomenon that was given several different names: blends, blendings, fusions or portmanteau words. The last term is due to Lewis Carroll, the author of "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass". The process of formation is also called telescoping because the words seem to slide into one another like sections of a telescope, e.g. smog from smoke and fog, slanguist,,bit(binary digit), dramedy(drama, comedy).

Depending upon the prototype phrases with which they can be cor­related two types of blends can be distinguished. One is termed additive, the second restrictive. The semantic re­lations which are at work are different. 1) additive type is transformable into a phrase consisting of the respective complete stems combined by the conjunction and: e. g. smog< smoke and fog - a mixture of smoke and fog. The restrictive type is transformable into an attributive phrase, where the first element serves as modifier of the second: cinemaiographitc panorama > Cinerama..

In general curtailed words appear in various types of colloquial speech They are especially numerous in various branches of slang.

Abbreviation

Speaking about shortening we also speak about graphical abbreviations. Here several words in a word can be dropped out, but the word is recognizable and is pronounced in speech in a full form: e.g. Dr- Doctor, Mr-Mister, st – street.

Words formed from the initial letter or letters of each of the successive parts or major parts of a compound term are called acronyms. There are two possible types of correlation between written and spoken forms.

I. If the abbreviated written form can be read as though it were an or­dinary English word it will be read like one. Many examples are furnished by political and technical vocabulary: U.N.E.S.C.O ., also Unesco (ju:'neskoul— United Nations Educational, Scientific'and Cultural Organi­zation; U.N.O. also Uno ['ju:'noul—United Nations Organization; U.N.R.R.A.

2. The opposite subgroup consists of initial abbreviations with the alphabetic reading retained. They also retain correlation with prototypes: B.B.C. ['bi: 'bi:'si:]—the British Broad­casting Corporation: G.I. l'd3i:'ail— for Government Issue, a widely spread metonymical name for American soldiers on the items of whose uniforms these letters are stamped; M.P. I'em'pi:] - for Member of Parliament, P.M. - for Prime Minister.

A specific type of abbreviations having no parallel in Russian is represented by Latin abbreviations which sometimes are not read as Latin words but substituted by their English equivalents, e.g. ad lib (Lat “ad Ubitum” ) — at pleasure; a. m. (Lat “ante meridiem”) — in the morning; cf. (Lat “conferre”) — compare; e. g. (Lat “exempli gratia” )— for example; ib (id ) (Lat “ibidem”) — in the same place; i. e. (Lat “id est” ) — that is.

In present-day English initial abbreviations are sometimes used for famous persons' names and surnames: George Bernard Shaw was often alluded to as G.B.S., Herbert George Wells as H.G., John Fitzgerald Kennedyas J.F.K.

There are also occasion­al jocular or accidental distortions: the three R's — reading, (w)riting and 'rithmetic – elementary education; Okay is considered to an illiterate form of all correct.

A specifically English word pattern is initial abbreviations in which the first element is a letter and the second a complete word: A-bomb, A-terror, H-accident risk, where stands for atomic or atomic bomb and H for hydrogen bomb. The pronunciation is alphabetic.