Word-Formation Process

Definition:

Word Formation Process (also called Morphological Process) is a means by which new
words are produced either by modification of existing words or by complete innovation,
which in turn become a part of the language.
 Types of Word Formation Processes
The major word formation processes include but are not limited to the following:
1.Affixation
2.Conversion
3.Clipping
4.Back-formation
5.Compounding
6.Borrowing
7.Coinage
8.Blending
9.Acronyms
10.Reduplication
 1. Affixation
Definition of ‘Affixation’:
It is a word formation process wherein an affix is attached to a root to form a new word.

Definition of an ‘Affix’:
An Affix is a bound morpheme which never occurs by itself, but is always attached to some free
morpheme and can be either inflectional or derivational.

In English there are two types of affixations:

1. Prefixation: In this morphological process words are formed by adding an affix to the front of a
root. The type of affix used in this process is referred to as prefix. For example:
un + tidy → untidy

2. Suffixation: In this morphological process words are formed by adding an affix to the end of a
root. The type of affix used in this process is referred to as suffix. For example:
fear + less → fearless
 2. Conversion
Definition:
This refers to the change of function or parts of speech of a word without adding an
affix.

Conversion is also called zero derivation or null derivation since the functional change
is brought about by supplementing an invisible affix. Sometimes it is also
called functional shift.

Typically conversion is made from: “noun to verb” and from “verb to noun”. Less
frequently, conversion is also done from “adjective to verb” and “adjective to noun”. For
instance:
 Noun to Verb: Adjective to Verb: Verb to Adjective:
• access • brown • stand up
• email • black • See through
• film • slow • Leave in
• name • dirty
• shape • empty
• butter
Adjective to Noun:
Verb to Noun: • crazy
• attack • Nasty
• alert
• hope Compound nouns perform verbal
• increase function:
• visit • Mastermind
• cover • Microwave
• spy
 3. Clipping
Definition:

Clipping is the word formation process in which a word is reduced to a shorter form.

With a sharp contrast to back-formation, clipping keeps the original word meaning
intact. These words are very common in everyday speech. For instance:
‘lab’ is the clipped form of ’laboratory’.

There are four types of clippings:

1. Back clipping: (also called final clipping; apocope) it involves the truncation of end of
a word as in: ’ad’ from ’advertisement’.

2. Fore-clipping: (also called initial clipping; apheresis) it is the removal of the

beginning of a word as in: ’phone’ from ’telephone’.

3. Middle clipping: (also medial clipping; syncope) it is the extraction of the beginning
and end of a word as in: ‘flu’ from ’influenza’.

4. Complex clipping: is removing multiple parts from multiple words as

in: ’cablegram’ from ’cabletelegram’.
 4. Back-formation
Definition:

Back-formation is a morphological process in which new word is created by extracting

affixes from another word.

In this way, it is the reverse of affixation, in which affixes are added.

Back-formation is also different from clipping since it brings a change in the parts of
speech or the word's meaning.
For example:
• the noun ’insertion’ has been back-formed into verb ’insert’ by removing the
suffix ’ion’.
• the noun ’editor’ has been back-formed into verb ’edit’ by removing the suffix ’or’.
• the noun ’sculptor’ has been back-formed into verb ’sculpt’ by removing the suffix ’or’.
• the verb ’realize’ has been back-formed into adjective ’real’ by removing the suffix ’ize’.
 5. Compounding
Definition:

It is a process where two or more than two independent words are combined together to
create a single word, having a single idea and function.

In English, there are compound nouns, compound adjectives, and compound verbs.

Customarily compound words are spelt as a single word, or as two or more hyphenated
words, and even as two or more separate words.
For example:
• life + style → lifestyle
• mother + in + law → mother-in-law
• shopping + mall → shopping mall
• finger + prints → fingerprints

Other examples: ‘wallpaper’, ‘textbook’, ‘football’, ‘girlfriend’ and ‘bookcase’.

There are no specific rules for hyphenated compounds. Generally, some new and original
compound nouns are hyphenated, but the hyphen is ignored when they become more
familiar.
 6. Borrowing
Definition:
This refers to the words adopted from other languages.

There are two types of borrowings:

1. Loan-word: By this process, a word is borrowed from another language without translating it
into the target language.
For example: the phrase ’tour-de-force’ is borrowed directly from French, which means ’a
masterly or brilliant feat’.

2. Loan-translation: Also known as calque. It is a morphological process wherein a word or phrase

from another language is borrowed by literally translating it into the target language.
For example: the phrase ’point of view’ has been translated into English from the French
phrase ’point de vue’.
 7. Coinage
Definition:
Also called invention, is a morphological process by which new words are invented.

Sometimes popular trademark names of various products are adopted by people so extensively
that they ultimately become the everyday words of language. For example:

Heroin - Aspirin - Escalator - Xerox - Kerosene - Nylon - Band-Aid - Vaseline - Margarine

Videotape

Again, some words are being invented due to rapid cultural changes and the spread of information
technology, mass media, internet, etc. For example:
Google - Blog - Hotspot - Netbook - Tablet - Tweet - Emoticon - Smartphone
 8. Blending
Definition:
Blending is a morphological process in which the parts of two or more words are combined
together to form a new word by reduction of two or more words.

Usually, the parts consist of the beginning of one word and the end of the other word(s).

Typically, the meaning of the blended word reverberates with the meanings of the original words.

For example:
breakfast + lunch → brunch
motor + hotel → motel
However, blending should not be confused with compounding, which combines two words without
truncation of parts of the roots of the blended words.
 9. Acronyms
Definition:
These words are formed with the initial letters or each of the major parts of a word or a longer
phrase.

With a few exceptions, acronyms are usually capitalized and sometimes not.

Some linguists confuse acronyms with initialisms, which are also abbreviations formed in the
similar manner as the former.

In essence, there is a sharp difference between the two. In language, an acronym is pronounced as
a single word rather than just a sequence of individual letters, which is characteristic of initialisms.
For example:

Acronyms:
• United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization → UNESCO
• Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation → Laser
• International Criminal Police Organization → Interpol
• National Aeronautics and Space Administration → NASA

Initialisms:
• Personal Computer → PC
• Asian Development Bank → ADB
• Liquid Crystal Display → LCD
• Federal Bureau of Investigation → FBI
 10. Reduplication
Definition:
Reduplication is a word formation process of forming new words either by doubling an entire word
(total reduplication) or part of a word (partial reduplication).

Reduplication is not a major means of creating lexemes in English, but it is perhaps the most
unusual one.

Total reduplication is extremely rare.

Based on their usage, the techniques of reduplication could be classified in the following
manner:

1. Repetition without Change: bye-bye, tick-tick

2. Rhyming Reduplication: ding-dong, super-duper, bow-wow -
3. Repetition with Change of Vowel: tiptop, chitchat, flip-flop, ping-pong, dilly-dally, wishy-washy
4. Repetition with Change of Initial Consonant: teeny-weeny, Humpty-dumpty, hocus-pocus