Morphological derivation, inlinguistics, is the process of forming a new word from an existing word, often by adding aprefix orsuffix, such asun- or-ness. For example,unhappy andhappiness derive from theroot wordhappy.
It is differentiated frominflection, which is the modification of a word to form differentgrammatical categories without changing its core meaning:determines,determining, anddetermined are from the rootdetermine.[1]
Derivationalmorphology often involves the addition of a derivational suffix or otheraffix. Such an affix usually applies towords of onelexical category (part of speech) and changes them into words of another such category. For example, one effect of theEnglish derivational suffix-ly is to change anadjective into anadverb (slow →slowly).
Here are examples of English derivational patterns and their suffixes:
However, derivational affixes do not necessarily alter the lexical category; they may change merely the meaning of the base and leave the category unchanged. A prefix (write → re-write;lord →over-lord) rarely changes the lexical category in English. The prefixun- applies to adjectives (healthy →unhealthy) and some verbs (do →undo) but rarely to nouns. A few exceptions are the derivational prefixesen- andbe-.En- (replaced byem- beforelabials) is usually a transitive marker on verbs, but it can also be applied to adjectives and nouns to form transitive verbs:circle (verb) →encircle (verb) butrich (adj) →enrich (verb),large (adj) →enlarge (verb),rapture (noun) →enrapture (verb),slave (noun) →enslave (verb).
When derivation occurs without any change to the word, such as in the conversion of the nounbreakfast into the verbto breakfast, it's known asconversion, or zero derivation.
Derivation that results in a noun may be callednominalization. It may involve the use of an affix (such as withemploy → employee), or it may occur via conversion (such as with the derivation of the nounrun from the verbto run). In contrast, a derivation resulting in a verb may be called verbalization (such as from the nounbutter to the verbto butter).
Some words have specific exceptions to these patterns. For example,inflammable actually meansflammable, andde-evolution is spelled with only onee, asdevolution.
Derivation can be contrasted withinflection, in that derivation produces a new word (a distinctlexeme), whereas inflection produces grammatical variants (or forms) of the same word.
Generally speaking, inflection applies in more or less regular patterns to all members of apart of speech (for example, nearly everyEnglish verb adds-s for the third person singular present tense), while derivation follows less consistent patterns (for example, thenominalizing suffix-ity can be used with the adjectivesmodern anddense, but not withopen orstrong). However, derivations and inflections can share homonyms, that being,morphemes that have the different sound, but not the same meaning. For example, when the affix-er is added to an adjective, as insmall-er, it acts as an inflection, but when added to a verb, as incook-er, it acts as a derivation.[2]
A derivation can produce a lexeme with a different part of speech but does not necessarily. For example, the derivation of the worduncommon fromcommon +un- (a derivational morpheme) does not change its part of speech (both are adjectives).
An important distinction between derivational and inflectional morphology lies in the content/function of a listeme[clarification needed]. Derivational morphology changes both the meaning and the content of a listeme, while inflectional morphology doesn't change the meaning, but changes the function.
A non-exhaustive list of derivational morphemes in English:-ful, -able, im-, un-, -ing, -er.
A non-exhaustive list of inflectional morphemes in English:-er, -est, -ing, -en, -ed, -s.
Derivation can be contrasted with other types ofword formation such as compounding.
Derivational affixes arebound morphemes – they are meaningful units, but can only normally occur when attached to another word. In that respect, derivation differs fromcompounding by whichfree morphemes are combined (lawsuit,Latin professor). It also differs frominflection in that inflection does not create newlexemes but newword forms (table →tables;open →opened).
Derivational patterns differ in the degree to which they can be calledproductive. A productive pattern or affix is one that is commonly used to produce novel forms. For example, the negating prefixun- is more productive in English than the alternativein-; both of them occur in established words (such asunusual andinaccessible), but faced with a new word which does not have an established negation, a native speaker is more likely to create a novel form withun- than within-. The same thing happens with suffixes. For example, if comparing two wordsThatcherite andThatcherist, the analysis shows that both suffixes-ite and-ist are productive and can be added to proper names, moreover, both derived adjectives are established and have the same meaning. But the suffix-ist is more productive and, thus, can be found more often in word formation not only from proper names.
