Inflectional Morphemes: Adding Detail to Words
Inflectional morphemes are a type of morpheme (the smallest unit of meaning in a language) that change the grammatical function of a word without altering its core meaning. They add information like tense, number, gender, or case to a word.
Here's a breakdown:
* Grammatical function: They tell us things like:
* Tense: Present, past, future (e.g., *walk*, *walked*, *will walk*)
* Number: Singular, plural (e.g., *cat*, *cats*)
* Gender: Masculine, feminine, neuter (e.g., *actor*, *actress*)
* Case: Nominative, accusative, genitive (e.g., *he*, *him*, *his*)
* Core meaning: They don't change the word's basic meaning. For example, "walk" and "walked" both refer to the act of moving by foot, but "walked" indicates past tense.
Examples:
* -ing: Present participle (e.g., *walking*)
* -ed: Past tense (e.g., *walked*)
* -s: Third-person singular present tense (e.g., *walks*)
* -es: Third-person singular present tense (for words ending in -s, -sh, -ch, -x, or -z) (e.g., *passes*, *watches*)
* -er: Comparative adjective (e.g., *taller*)
* -est: Superlative adjective (e.g., *tallest*)
* -s: Plural noun (e.g., *cats*)
* -ies: Plural noun (for words ending in -y) (e.g., *babies*)
In contrast to derivational morphemes:
Derivational morphemes change the meaning of a word, often creating a new word with a different part of speech. For example:
* -ness: Changes an adjective into a noun (e.g., *happy* -> *happiness*)
* -ful: Changes a noun into an adjective (e.g., *care* -> *careful*)
In summary:
Inflectional morphemes are like little grammatical switches that add specific information to a word without altering its core meaning. They are essential for building complex sentences and conveying precise meanings.