HAFIZ SHAIK HUSSIN

MUHAMMAD TAMIZI NGAH

MORPHEME
What is MORPHEME ?
 A morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit
in the grammar of a language.
 can be used as a word on its own where
every word in every language is
composed of one or more morphemes.
One morpheme
Two morpheme
Three morpheme
Four morpheme
More than four morpheme
 5 morpheme…
 Free morpheme
 Bound morpheme
 Inflection morpheme
 Derivational morpheme
 Allomorphs morpheme
 Free
morpheme:
 a morpheme that can stand alone as a
word without another morpheme. 
 It does not need anything attached to it
to make a word.
 Cat, girl, system, desire, hope, act,
phone, happy are a free morpheme.
 Bound
morpheme:

 a sound or a combination of sounds that

cannot stand alone as a word. 
 CAT and CATS
 The ”s” in cats is a bound morpheme,
and it does not have any meaning
without the free morpheme cat.
 Inflectional
morpheme:
 This morpheme can only be a
suffix. The s in cats is an inflectional
morpheme. 
 An  inflectional morpheme creates a change
in the function of the word. Mean that, no
change of meaning
 Example:
Invite vs invited
The - ed in invited indicates past tense.
How about:

invite
vs
invited
 In English there are seven inflectional morpheme:
noun inflections;
○ -s (plural) - She waits at home.
○ -s (possessive)  - Ali’s hair is short.
○ -s ( 3rd-person singular) - She waits at home.
verb inflections;
○ -ed ( past tense) – started
○ -en (past participate) -Ali waited at home.
○ -ing ( present participle) - Ali has eaten the
donuts.  
adjective and adverb inflections
○  -er (comparative) - Ali has shorter hair than me.
○ -est (superlative) - Ali has the shortest hair.
 Derivational
morpheme:
 This morpheme changes the meaning of
the word.
 Mean that a new word created and will
change the meaning of the word. 
 Invited vs uninvited
un-(prefix) added
It changes the meaning of the word
invited.
How about:

sing
vs
singer
 Change of the syntactic category.

Noun to Adjective – affection vs affectionate

Verb to Noun – sing vs singer
Adjective to Adverb – exact vs exactly
Noun to Verb – moral vs moralize
Adjective to Noun – specific vs specificity
 Allomorphs
morpheme:
 different phonetic forms or variations of
a morpheme.  Example: The final
morphemes in the following words are
pronounced differently, but they all
indicate plurality: dogs,
cats, and horses.