Vocabulary: roots, prefixes and suffixes
விளையாடிக் கற்றுக்கொள்ளுங்கள்
ஆற்றல் சம்பாதிக்க இந்த கேள்விகளுக்குப் பதிலளியுங்கள், பின்னர் மீன் பிடித்து ஆராயுங்கள். கணக்கு தேவையில்லை.
பாட குறிப்புகள்
What is Morphology?
- Morphology is the study of how words are formed and how they relate to one another.
- It investigates the structure of words in terms of morphemes, the smallest units with meaning or grammatical function.
- Morphemes include roots that can stand alone as words, and affixes that must attach to other morphemes.
- For example, catch and ‑ing are both morphemes; catch can be a word on its own, and with ‑ing forms catching.
- Morphology also looks at how words behave as parts of speech and how they change for number, tense, and aspect.
- It considers productivity: how speakers create new words in specific contexts, and how these processes change over time.
Morphemes: Roots and Affixes
- A root is the core morpheme that carries the main meaning of a word and can often stand alone.
- An affix is a morpheme that attaches to a root or stem and cannot usually stand alone.
- Prefixes are affixes added to the beginning of a word (e.g., un‑ in unhappy).
- Suffixes are affixes added to the end of a word (e.g., ‑ness in happiness).
- Affixes can change a word's meaning, its word class (part of speech), or both.
Common Prefixes and Their Meanings
- un‑ means 'not' or 'opposite of' (e.g., unfair, undo).
- re‑ means 'again' or 'back' (e.g., rewrite, return).
- pre‑ means 'before' (e.g., preview, prehistoric).
- dis‑ means 'not' or 'away' (e.g., disagree, disappear).
- mis‑ means 'wrongly' or 'badly' (e.g., misunderstand, misspell).
- sub‑ means 'under' or 'below' (e.g., submarine, subway).
Common Suffixes and Their Effects
- ‑ness forms nouns from adjectives, meaning 'state of being' (e.g., kindness from kind).
- ‑ful forms adjectives from nouns, meaning 'full of' (e.g., hopeful from hope).
- ‑less forms adjectives meaning 'without' (e.g., fearless from fear).
- ‑ly often forms adverbs from adjectives (e.g., quickly from quick).
- ‑er can form nouns meaning 'one who does' (e.g., teacher from teach) or comparatives (e.g., faster).
- ‑able forms adjectives meaning 'can be' (e.g., readable from read).
Latin and Greek Roots
- Many English words are built from Latin and Greek roots.
- Latin root port means 'carry' (e.g., transport, portable).
- Latin root dict means 'say' or 'speak' (e.g., predict, dictionary).
- Greek root graph means 'write' or 'draw' (e.g., autograph, graphic).
- Greek root tele means 'far off' (e.g., telephone, television).
- Knowing common roots helps you work out the meaning of unfamiliar words.
Word Families and Word Formation
- A word family is a group of words that share the same root or base.
- For example, act, action, active, react, and actor belong to the same word family.
- Word formation rules create new words (new lexemes), such as dog catcher or dishwasher.
- Inflection rules create different forms of the same word, such as dogs from dog.
- The difference between inflection and word formation is not always clear-cut.
Working Out Unfamiliar Words
- Break an unfamiliar word into its prefix, root, and suffix to guess its meaning.
- Use context—the surrounding words and sentences—to check and refine your guess.
- For example, un‑ + help + ‑ful suggests 'not giving help' or 'not helpful'.
- Combining word parts with context clues makes you a more independent reader.
Synonyms, Antonyms and Shades of Meaning
- Synonyms are words with similar meanings (e.g., big and large).
- Antonyms are words with opposite meanings (e.g., hot and cold).
- Synonyms often have shades of meaning: big, huge, and enormous differ in intensity.
- Choosing the precise word makes your writing clearer and more effective.
Etymology and Borrowing
- Etymology is the study of the origin and history of words.
- English has borrowed words from many languages, including Latin, Greek, French, and Norse.
- For example, telephone comes from Greek roots tele ('far') and phone ('sound').
- Understanding etymology can explain unusual spellings and meanings.
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இலவச முன்னோட்டம் — 55-இல் 8 கேள்விகள். அனைத்தையும் பார்க்க பதிவு செய்யவும்.
1.Which term means 'the smallest unit in a language with some independent meaning or grammatical function'?
Easy- AMorpheme
- BSyllable
- CPhoneme
- DSentence
2.Which of the following are affixes? (select all that apply)
Medium- A-ing
- Bun-
- C-ness
- Dcatch
- Edog
3.A root can exist as a word by itself.
EasyTrue or false?
4.Match each term to its definition.
Medium- Morpheme
- Lexeme
- Inflection
- Word formation
- Smallest meaningful unit
- Set of inflected word-forms
- Creates variant forms of the same lexeme
- Creates new lexemes
5.Put these linguistic units in order from smallest to largest scale.
Medium- Phoneme
- Morpheme
- Word
- Phrase
- Sentence
6.In the word 'catching', what is the suffix?
Easy- Acatch
- B-ing
- Ccat
- D-ch
7.Which of the following pairs are distinct lexemes?
Medium- Aeat and eater
- Beat and eats
- Ceat and eaten
- Deat and ate
8.The word 'unhappy' contains a prefix.
EasyTrue or false?
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இந்த தலைப்பிற்கான ஒவ்வொரு கேள்வியையும், ஸ்லைடுகளையும், ஃப்ளாஷ் கார்டுகளையும் மற்றும் திருப்புதல் குறிப்புகளையும் பார்க்க இலவச கணக்கை உருவாக்கவும்.