Курс лекций по лексикологии английского языка для студентов факультетов иностранных языков

Lecture II. Working Definitions of Principal Concepts 
The word is not the smallest unit of the language. It consists of morphemes. 
The morpheme may be defined as the smallest meaningful unit which has a sound 
form and meaning and which occurs in speech only as a part of a word. 
Word formation is the creation of new words from elements already existing in 
the language. Every language has its own structural patterns of word formation. 
Morphemes are subdivided into root - morphemes and affixational morphemes. 
The root morpheme is the lexical center of the word. It is the semantic nucleus 
of a word with which no grammatical properties of the word are connected. 
Affixational morphemes include inflections and derivational affixes. 
Inflection is an affixal morpheme which carries only grammatical meaning thus 
relevant only for the formation of word-forms (books, opened, strong-er). 
Derivational morpheme is an affixal morpheme which modifies the lexical 
meaning of the root and forms a new word. In many cases it adds the part-of-speech 
meaning to the root (manage-ment, en-courage, fruit-ful) 
Morphemes which may occur in isolation and function as independent words 
are called free morphemes (pay, sum, form). Morphemes which are not found in 
isolation are called bound morphemes (-er, un-, -less) 
Morphemic analysis. 
The segmentation of words is generally carried out according to the method of 
Immediate and Ultimate Constituents. This method is based upon the binary principle, 
i.e. each stage of procedure involves two components the word immediately breaks 
into. At each stage these two components are referred to as the Immediate 
Constituents (IC). Each IC at the next stage of analysis is in turn broken into smaller 
meaningful elements. The analysis is completed when we arrive at constituents 
incapable of further division, i.e. morphemes. These are referred to as Ultimate 

Constituents (UC). The analysis of word-structure on the morphemic level must 
naturally proceed to the stage of UC-s. 
Allomorphes are the phonemic variants of the given morpheme e.g. il-, im-, ir-, 
are the allomorphes of the prefix in- (illiterate, important, irregular, inconstant). 
Monomorphic are root-words consisting of only one root-morpheme i.e. simple 
words (dry, grow, boss, sell). 
Polymorphic are words consisting of at least one root-morpheme and a number 
of derivational affixes, i.e. derivatives, compounds (customer, payee, body-building, 
shipping). 
Derived words are those composed of one root-morpheme and one more 
derivational morphemes (consignment, outgoing, publicity). 
Derived words are those composed of one root-morpheme or more. Compound 
words contain at least two root-morphemes (warehouse, camera-man), 
Productivity is the ability to form new words after existing patterns which are 
readily understood by the speakers of a language. Synchronically the most important 
and the most productive ways of word-formation are affixation, conversion, word-
composition and abbreviation (contraction). In the course of time the productivity of 
this or that way of word-formation may change. Sound interchange or gradation 
(blood - to bleed, to abide -abode, to strike - stroke) was a productive way of word 
building in old English and is important for a diachronic study of the English 
language. It has lost its productivity in Modern English and no new word can be 
coined by means of sound gradation. Affixation on the contrary was productive in Old 
English and is still one of the most productive ways of word building in Modern 
English. 
Affixation is the formation of new words with the help of derivational affixes. 
Suffixation is more productive than prefixation. In Modern English suffixation is a 

characteristic of noun and adjective formation, while prefixation is typical of verb 
formation (incoming, trainee, principal, promotion). 
Affixes are usually divided into living and dead affixes. Living affixes are 
easily separated from the stem (care-ful). Dead affixes have become fully merged 
with the stem and can be singled out by a diachronic analysis of the development of 
the word (admit - L.- ad + mittere). Living affixes are in their turn divided into 
productive and non-productive affixes. In many cases the choice of the affixes is a 
mean of differentiating of meaning: uninterested - disinterested distrust – mistrust. 
Word-composition is another type of word-building which is highly productive. 
That is when new words are produced by combining two or more stems. 
Stem is that part of a word which remains unchanged throughout its paradigm 
and to which grammatical inflexions and affixes are added. The bulk of compound 
words is motivated and the semantic relations between the two components are 
transparent. 
Compound words proper are formed by joining together stems of words already 
available in the language. Compound proper is a word, the two Immediate 
Constituents of which are stems of notional words, e.g. ice-cold (N + A), ill-
luck(A+N). 
Derivational compound is a word formed by a simultaneous process of 
composition and derivation. Derivational compound is formed by composing a new 
stem that does not exist outside this pattern and to which suffix is added. Derivational 
compound is a word consisting of two Immediate Constituents, only one of which is a 
compound stem of notional words, while the other is a derivational affix, e.g. blue - 
eyed - (A+N) + ed In coordinative compounds neither of the components dominates 
the other, both are structurally and semantically independent and constitute two 
structural and semantic centres, e.g. breath-taking, self-discipline, word-formation. 

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