THE MORPHEMIC STRUCTURE OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE: A COMPREHENSIVE ANALYSIS
Keywords:
Morpheme, Morphemic Structure, Allomorph, Free Morpheme, Bound Morpheme, Root, Affix, Derivation, Inflection, Morphophonology, Word Formation.Abstract
This article provides a systematic and detailed examination of the morphemic
structure of the English language.It explores the morpheme as the minimal meaningful
unit of language, analyzing its core types—free versus bound and lexical versus
grammatical—and their distinct functions. The paper delves into the concepts of roots
and affixes (prefixes, suffixes, inflections), explicates the phenomenon of allomorphy
with phonological conditioning, and illustrates central word-formation processes like
derivation and compounding. Furthermore, it discusses the practical implications of
morphemic analysis for vocabulary acquisition, spelling, and language teaching. The
analysis is supported by concrete linguistic examples, factual data, and established
theoretical frameworks.
References
1. Bauer, L. (1983). English Word-Formation. Cambridge University Press.
2. Crystal, D. (2008). A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics (6th ed.). Blackwell
Publishing.
3. Katamba, F. (1993). Morphology. Modern Linguistics Series. Palgrave Macmillan.
4. Lieber, R. (2009). Introducing Morphology. Cambridge University Press.
5. Plag, I. (2018). Word-Formation in English (2nd ed.). Cambridge Textbooks in
Linguistics. Cambridge University Press.
6. Yule, G. (2020). The Study of Language (7th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
7. Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G., & Svartvik, J. (1985). A Comprehensive
Grammar of the English Language. Longman.
8. Fromkin, V., Rodman, R., & Hyams, N. (2018). An Introduction to Language (11th
ed.). Cengage Learning.
