Morphological Processes
Submitted by: Mustafa Sohail
Roll No.: 17073
Class: BS English-6B
Course: Grammar, Syntax, Semantics
Date of submission: 14th, Oct, 2019
Submitted to: Ma’am Sana Waqas
Table of Contents
1.Morphological Processes ..................................................................... 3
1.1 Two models of grammatical discerption ........................................... 3
1.2 Item & Arrangement (IA) .................................................................. 3
1.2 Item & Process (IP) ............................................................................ 4
2.Morphological Learning ....................................................................... 4
2.1 Sandhi Rules ...................................................................................... 4
2.2 Assimilation....................................................................................... 4
3.Progressive assimilation vs. regressive assimilation............................. 5
3.1 Progressive Assimilation: .................................................................. 5
3.2 Regression Assimilation: ................................................................... 5
3.3 Automatic: ........................................................................................ 5
4.1 Internal Sandhi .................................................................................. 6
4.2 External Sandhi. ................................................................................ 6
4.3 Liaison and Elision ............................................................................. 6
4.4 Elision: ............................................................................................... 7
5. The Morphology of Derivation ............................................................ 7
5.1 Noam Chomsky & Halle..................................................................... 7
6. Conclusion ........................................................................................... 9
7. Sources and References .................................................................... 10
1. Morphological Processes
Morphological processing is basically a way of using and understanding
language by incorporating semantic and grammatical information both
in the word and sub word levels.
1.1 Two models of grammatical discerption
Hockett views (1958); Item and Arrangement (IA) and Item and process
(IP). Hockett's, two models of morphology viz, the Item and
Arrangement (1958), and Item and Process (1958) embody
Structuralism in morphology. A morpheme, in that sense, was 'the
smallest individually meaningful elements in the utterance of a
language
1.2 Item & Arrangement (IA)
he Item and Arrangement (IA) assumes a concatenative approach
wherein morphemes are lexical units, morphology is an agglutination of
such units, and words are seen as linear sequences of morphs. The
central observation of the model is that certain forms reflect a partial
phonetic-semantic resemblance to other forms. Describing the
morphological patterning of a language would in consequence involve a
specification, of the inventory of morphemes (items), of the possible
sequences in which these morphemes can occur (arrangement), and
defining those morphs through which every morpheme of the language
is realized. A word is analyzed as involving no process at all, but only a
permissive sequence of morphemes. The IA model is thus essentially
morphemic, but non-processual.
1.2 Item & Process (IP)
The Item and Process (IP) model works on the conception that word-
forms constitute paired features of structure and function, or rather
form and meaning, and that elements undergo a variety of
modifications, through transformations, to result in newer forms.
Morphology is regarded as a set of derivational processes, acting on
morphemes or words, producing new word-forms. Hence in IP, there is
only one recognized underlying basic allomorph that contextually takes
the form of an allomorph.
2. Morphological Learning
2.1 Sandhi Rules
Sandhi a word taken from the Indian grammarians is defined as the
intimate conjugation of letters. When letters join according to
grammatical rules new changes occur. Morphophonemic as a process
of joining: sandhi forms and rules of sandhi. Types of sandhi:
assimilation, regressive and progressive, Internal Sandhi and External
Sandhi.
2.2 Assimilation
Assimilation is a general term in phonetics for the process by which a
speech sound becomes similar or identical to a neighboring sound. The
term "assimilation" comes from the Latin meaning, "make similar to”.
Assimilation is the influence of a sound on a neighboring sound so that
the two become similar or the same. For example, the Latin
prefix in- 'not, non-, un-' appears in English as ill-, I’m-. and ire- in the
words illegal, immoral, impossible both m and p are
bilabial consonants, and irresponsible as well as the unassimilated
original form in- in indecent and incompetent. Although the
assimilation of the n of in- to the following consonant in the preceding
examples was inherited from Latin, English examples that would be
considered native are also plentiful.
3. Progressive assimilation vs. regressive
assimilation
3.1 Progressive Assimilation:
When the articulation of a sound is changed under the influence of the
preceding sound, i.e. the influence spreads from the preceding to the
following sound assimilation is termed progressive.
Examples
For example, in the word print [print] [r] becomes partially devoiced
under the influence of the preceding voiceless [p]; in the word news
[nju:z] [u:] becomes more front under the influence of the preceding [j]
3.2 Regression Assimilation:
When the articulation of a sound is changed under the influence of the
following sound, i.e. the influence spreads from the following to the
preceding sound assimilation is termed regressive.
Examples
For example, in the words newspaper ['nju:speIpq] the sound [z]
becomes voiceless under the influence of the following voiceless
consonant.
3.3 Automatic:
There is another important point. If the assimilation had not taken
place, the resultant form would have been phonologically impossible in
Classical Greek. For that language does not permit voiced plosives such
as b and g to occur before s. The variation is, then, in a sense, forced by
the phonology of the language. Such variations are known as
Automatic.
4. Internal Sindhi vs External Sindhi
4.1 Internal Sandhi: Internal sandhi is found in the combination of
a stem and a suffix. It occurs within a word and such type of sandhi is
found in derivation of finished words such as nominal declension and
verbal conjugation. Sandhi operation, in general, takes place involving
the final letter of the starting word and the initial letter of the following
word.
4.2 External Sandhi: External sandhi is joining of two words occurring in
continuous utterance i.e. it occurs across the word boundary and is
found in the formation of compounds, phrases and sentences. In
English, for example, there is the alternation of a and an, and of two
forms of the, IfJ':/and IfJi:/, before consonants and vowels.
4.3 Liaison and Elision
Liaison: It refers to the linking of the final consonant of one word with
the beginning of the next word. Make a liaison when you see that the
pronunciation of the last consonant sound of one word precedes the
beginning vowel of the next word. There is a similar, but more
complicated, feature in French for which the term 'liaison' was first
used. As a fairly general rule many word-final consonants are deleted,
except before vowels within certain grammatical constructions.
Examples: It is this non-deletion that is called 'liaison'. Without liaison
we have masculine and feminine pairs:
French Ie petit garfon & la petite fllie
With liaison, however, we find:
French Ie petit homme
(/p~tit/) 'the little man'
4.4 Elision: It occurs when there are two pronounced vowel sounds:
one at the end of a word, and the other at the beginning of the next
word. The vowel of the first word is replaced with an apostrophe (‘).
Extra care needs to be taken while pronouncing both the words
together. If you try to say them separately, the vowel sounds will clash,
and you will probably. Elision is a very natural device and gives the
language fluidity.
Examples: I don't know' /I duno/, /karma/ for camera, and 'fish 'n'
chips' are all examples of elision.
5. The Morphology of Derivation
5.1 Noam Chomsky & Halle
In the generative phonology, an attempt has been made to deal with
derivation in almost exactly the same way as inflection. Thus, for
Chomsky and Halle a single set of rules will account for all of the
following pairs. Thus, The spelling disguises considerable differences in
the vowels of the second syllable:
1. serene serenity
2. divine divinity
Rule Number one
To generate the adjectives in the above column there is first a rule of
diphthongization which adds y to give: serein diviyn
Rule Number two
There is a second rule of vowel shift to give: serlyn divreyn change
of y into the long vowel /i:/
5. Conclusion
The aim of these rules is to apply them to all inflectional and
derivational patterns. Consequently, the complexities and variations in
the morphological pattern make it impossible even for the great
linguists like Noam Chomsky and Halle to arrive at any plausible
conclusion in this matter.
Analyze why Morphological Patterns are so complex and varied but
also important?
As we discussed the morphological processes in the above section, we
get to know that the Linguists like Hockett and Bloomfield gives
complex analysis and examples but fail to provide any explanation of
why Morphological patterns are so complex and varied in nature. So
that’s why we as a second language learners are often faced with a
dilemma of how in some languages there are different alternations
which are very complex because of abstract forms.
Importance of Morphology awareness
Morphological awareness is very important when we are reading
comprehension for the simple reason. The words reading abilities
contribute significantly to comprehension because it is hard to
understand the passages that contain words that are not familiar to us.
However, the ability to read morphological complex words in only one
part of the contribution of reading comprehension. We should be fully
aware of every critical aspect of morphological awareness as it is
important to reading comprehension.
Spelling vs reading
The differences in the ability of morphological awareness to predict
spelling versus reading may be due, in part, to differences in the task
demands involved with these two literacy tasks. The spelling task
required participants to produce an accurate and complete
representation of the words spelled, including detailed information of
the phonological, orthographic, and morphological structure of the
word. When spelling multimorphemic words, spelling rules often
govern orthographic and phonological changes that must occur to the
base morpheme when adding suffixes For example, when adding the
suffix morpheme ive to a base morpheme that ends with a silent ‘e’ in
(create) the rules of English orthography require omitting the silent ‘t’
in (creat_ive). Repeated encounters of this spelling rule as it occurs in
other multimorphemic words that follow the rule may facilitate the
depth of integration of morphological, orthographic, and phonological
details necessary to produce accurate spellings of multimorphemic
words. Alternately, the word reading task required participants to
match printed words to detailed lexical representations previously
stored; matching a printed word to a stored lexical representation of a
word that is only partially accurate may be sufficient for word reading
For example, successful recognition of the stored lexical representation
of the multimorphemic word creative may not depend on explicit
awareness that the orthography of the base morpheme create
changed.
Conclusion
Since the linguists like Hockett, Noam Chomsky, Halle and Bloomfield
were not able to give us the straight forward explanation of
morphological awareness so we came to the conclusion that Further
research is needed to understand the more detailed nature of relations
among morphological awareness, spelling, word reading, and sentence
comprehension abilities because it is a complex study and so the future
research should investigate the usefulness of this measure for
assessment or instruction with school, college and University students
struggling with reading and writing in their academic years.
7. Sources and References
p.1.http://cs.annauniv.edu/insight/Reading%20Materials/grammar/san
dhi.htm
p.2.https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1086296X15619730
p.3. Palmer, F, R., Grammar New Edition (1986) pp.106-116.
p.4. http://lib.chmnu.edu.ua/pdf/pidruchnuku/18/144.
