Lecture 4 Morphology by Prof. Mohammed Farghal

The lecture is introduced by Matt Farrell discussing morphology, focusing on three aspects: types of morphology, types of morphemes, and word formation processes. Morphology is a level of language description dealing with the internal structure of words, comprising either single or multiple morphemes, which are the smallest meaning units. Examples from English and Arabic are provided to illustrate basic concepts.

He distinguishes between analytic and synthetic morphologies. Analytic morphologies, like English, involve words that can be segmented into separate morphemes. Conversely, synthetic morphologies have discontinuous morphemes, making segmentation difficult. Arabic mostly exemplifies non-concatenated morphology. He cites examples of word segmentation and derivation processes.

English has analytic morphology where derivation occurs via affixation, leading to words with separable internal structures. In synthetic morphologies like Arabic, affixes can be discontinuous or involve vowel and consonant changes, resulting in words where components aren't easily separable. The discussion transitions into word formation processes, such as affixation in English and Arabic.

Discussing infixation and circumfixation, examples show how infixes alter word internal structures in Arabic. Circumfixation involves adding morphemes around a root. The character of morphologies reflects in languages' inability to easily break words into separate elements. Analytic morphologies contrast synthetic morphologies where internal structure clarity is higher.

He explains free vs. bound morphemes, differentiating between lexical and functional morphemes. Functional morphemes don't lend themselves to derivation, while lexical do. Free morphemes, like 'child,' are standalone and used to form various derivatives. Bound morphemes, unlike free, can't stand alone and come as derivational or inflectional.

Bound morphemes include derivational (change word class) and inflectional (grammatical function). Derivation is a primary formation process, forming word families. Use of analogy extends derivational frames, creating words not traditional in form. English derivation is mainly single-stratum, unlike Arabic's multi-strata derivations, which complicates translation back into English.

Inflectional morphology in English is limited compared to Arabic, with only eight primary morphemes impacting verb tense, comparisons, etc. Arabic is richer due to gender, number, and case agreements. Understanding these differences impacts translation and language teaching contexts. He emphasizes the relevance of awareness of morphological processes.

Word formation beyond derivation includes conversion (changing word class without form change) prevalent in English but absent in Arabic. This highlights the importance of translators understanding morphological processes when handling cross-language translation. Other processes include compounding, with transparent (easily understood) and idiomatic (require cultural knowledge) compounds.

Other English processes include clipping (shortening a word without changing its meaning), blending (mixing parts of words to create new ones), and acronyms and abbreviations, diversely pronounced as words or initials (e.g., AIDS, USA). Back-formation involves forming new words by removing elements of existing ones. Most processes lack Arabic equivalents.