CHARACTERISTIC FEATURES OF THE LIVING AFFIXES - Scientific conference
Main page
UA RU EN

Congratulation from Internet Conference!

Hello

Рік заснування видання - 2014

CHARACTERISTIC FEATURES OF THE LIVING AFFIXES

18.04.2023 17:41

[8. Philological sciences]

Author: Oksana Cherniak, PhD in Philology, Associate professor, Associate professor at the Department of Foreign Languages and Translation, Lesya Ukrainka Volyn National University



The vocabulary of each language is constantly changing. According to Crystal  (2002),  English  vocabulary  has  a  “remarkable  range, flexibility, and adaptability”. It is generally accepted that of all language levels, the vocabulary is the most variable, since it is the vocabulary that first reacts to extra-linguistic factors, reflecting changes in society, politics, economy, science and technology, etc., the appearance of new objects and phenomena in the surrounding world.

Derivation is one of the commonest ways of word-formation, and also one of the oldest, being found in all languages. Hudson (2000: 255) defines derivation as the creation of new words by the use of derivational affixes.  Affixation is a method of word formation by means of which new words are created by joining word-forming affixes, i.e. prefixes and suffixes, to the bases of various parts of speech. So we can say that the term is applied to the process by which new words are formed by adding prefixes or suffixes, or both, to a root-form already in existence. Many of these affixes were no doubt originally independent words.

The process was a common one in the earliest stages of the English language, and such words as freedom, kingdom, friendship, lordship, length are all developed from early formations.

But not all the affixes are native forms; Greek, Latin, and French are common. Many native affixes are still productive, and will probably continue so, but the language has apparently felt the need of greater powers in derivation, and has called upon the resources of other languages to remedy its deficiency.

But not all the affixes are productive. Some of them may serve only as an etymological element. One can single out the following characteristic features of the living affixes:

1) joining to the word-forming stem, the affix has its definite abstract meaning;

2) this affix can be easily singled out as a word-forming element;

3) the affix is used for the formation of new words not only from the stems of the same origin as it appeared in the language, but also from the others;

4) the more new words it serves to form, the more productive it is;

5) the living affix must give new formations.

It goes without saying that all the productive affixes are living, but not all living affixes are equally productive. Under the productivity one can understand the number of words which appeared in the language for the period of existence of the given affix as a word-forming element, and, secondly, the frequency of the appearance of new-formations with the given affix. That is why all the affixes can be divided into unproductive, productive and those which have the so called “absolute productivity”. Since affixes are morphemes of the language, which are distinguished by wide compatibility with a certain range of roots or bases and enter into stereotyped semantic relations with them and are at the same time connected, they belong to many word-forming constructions.

References:

1. Crystal, D. (2002), The English Language. Second Edition. Penguin Books, London. 336 p.

2. Hudson, G. (2000), Essential Introductory Linguistics, Blackwell Publishers Ltd, Oxford. 517 p.



Creative Commons Attribution Ця робота ліцензується відповідно до Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
допомога Знайшли помилку? Виділіть помилковий текст мишкою і натисніть Ctrl + Enter

Another articles in this section

Сonferences

Conference 2024

Conference 2023

Conference 2022

Conference 2021

Conference 2020

Conference 2019

Conference 2018

Conference 2017

Conference 2016

Conference 2015

Conference 2014

:: LEX-LINE :: Юридична лінія

Міжнародна інтернет-конференція з економіки, інформаційних систем і технологій, психології та педагогіки

Наукові конференції

Економіко-правові дискусії. Спільнота