TON DUC THANG UNIVERSITY

Faculty of Foreign Languages

Division of Linguistics, Culture & Literature

MORPHOLOGY - 001167

Chapter 3:
ALLOMORPHS

Designed by Lam Quang Tuyet Minh

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08/10/2020 1
ALLOMORPHS
 CHAPTER 3 - CONTENTS
3.1 Definition and Characteristics of Allomorphs
3.2 Conditioning: Phonological and Morphological
3.3 Types of allomorphs
Replacive allomorphs
3.4 Homophones

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 3.1 DEFINITION OF ALLOMORPHS
Allomorphs are “any of the different forms of a
morpheme.”
In morphology, an allomorph is a variant form of
a morpheme.
[Richards, Platt & Weber, 1987:9]
e.g. long, length
morpheme free allomorph bound allomorph
{long} /lɒŋ/ /leŋθ/
Exercise 8-27 (page 111)

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 3.1 CHARACTERISTICS
Allomorphs of a morpheme have the same
meaning, either lexical or grammatical.

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 3.1.1 CHARACTERISTICS
They are in complementary distribution
(CD).
We cannot replace one allomorph of a
morpheme by another allomorph of that morpheme
and change meaning."
(Francis Katamba, English Words: Structure,
History, Usage, 2nd ed. Routledge, 2004)

Exercise 8-28 (page 111)

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 3.2. CONDITIONING

Phonological Morphological

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 3.2 CONDITIONING

3.2.1 Phonological conditioning

- When the phonological environment determines which
allomorph is used, the selection of the allomorph is
phonologically conditioned.

- The allomorphs are conditioned by phonetic feature of

the preceding sounds.

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 3.2 CONDITIONING
3.2.1 Phonologically conditioned
e.g. {-s pl} or {-s 3d} = /-iz ~ -s ~ -z/

1. /-s/ after the voiceless consonants /p, t, k, f, Ɵ/

cat  cats /kæts/ = /kæt/ + /-s/
2. /-iz/ after the sibilant consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʧ, dʒ/
box  boxes /boksiz/ = /boks/ + /-iz/
3. /-z/ after all vowels and other voiced consonants
except /z/, / ʒ/ and /dʒ/
arms  arms /a:mz/ = /a:m/ + /-z/

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 3.2 CONDITIONING

3.2.2 Morphological Conditioning

The selection is conditioned by a particular
morpheme forming the context;

We can describe the environment that requires a

certain allomorph by identifying specific
morphemes.

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 3.2 CONDITIONING

Some examples for morphologically conditioned

allomorphs:
foot  feet = /fi:t/ + /u  i:/
tooth  teeth = /ti:Ɵ/ + /u:  i:/
have  has = /hæz/ + /v  z/

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 THE REPLACIVE ALLOMORPHS

To signify some difference in meaning, a sound is used to

replace another sound in a word.

e.g. drink  drank /dræŋk/ = /driŋk/ + /i æ/

build  built /bju:lt/ = /bjuld/ + /d  t/

Exercise 8-32 (p.114)

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 3.4 HOMOPHONES
Homophones: words that sound alike but differ in
meaning.
e.g. Do you like the meet? /mit/ (track meet)
Did you like the meat? /mit/ (roast beef)
=> meet and meat are different morphemes.
It feels good. /-z/
Those frogs /-z/
John’s book /-z/
=> the three homophonous /-z/ are different morphemes.

Exercise 8-33 (p.114)

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 HOMEWORK
Do exercises in:
[2]: 21-27
[3]: 158, 173-176
[4]: 73-95

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