Affixation In English And Vietnamese English Language Essay

Affixation In English And Vietnamese English Language Essay A purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and desires by means of a system of voluntarily produced symbols is defined as language (Sapir, Language, P.7). Therefore, every language itself provides attentive learners with a wide knowledge of the primary function, social nature as well as the important characteristic which is the system of symbols consisting of different levels from sound systems to meaning, such as phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics. Only the unity of these four systems can form what is so-called language. Correspondingly, with a purpose of researching on this field that is to bring you, Vietnamese learners of English, an in- depth look at how minimal meaningful English morphemes can be used again and again as building blocks to form different words and some relevance to the constitution of Vietnamese words, I hope this can be a useful material for you to approach English reading comprehension and bilingual translation work fr om a more efficient and interesting angle. Literary review According to Eugene A Nida, â€Å"morphemes are the minimal meaningful units which may constitute words or parts of words† (Nida, 1946:1) and are defined as units of semantic content or grammatical function. Morphemes are of two kinds: free morphemes, ones that can be uttered alone with meaning and bound morphemes, ones that cannot be uttered alone with meaning. Based on this definition, affixes are defined as bound morphemes because they occur before or behind roots or cores of all words and somewhat modify the basic meaning of the roots. e.g. Verb + – able Æ’Â   Adj: enjoy + – able Verb + – er Æ’Â   Noun: wait + – er, act + – or un + Adj Æ’Â   Adj: un + – productive, un + – easy Adj + – en Æ’Â   Verb: deep + – en, thick + – en Besides, like bound morphemes, affixes may also be derivational or inflectional, which means that affixes can create new words by deriving new words from other words or making minor grammatical changes necessary for agreement with other words without changing meanings or parts of words. From that point, affixation is assumed as the linguistic process speakers use to form new words by adding bound morphemes at the beginning, the middle or the end of words. Correlatively, affixes are divided into prefixes, suffixes, infixes, suprafixes or suprasegmental and so on. Some categories of affixes: Prefix un-do prefix -stem Appears at the front of a stem Suffix look-ing stem-suffix Appears at the back of a stem Infix Minneà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¹flippin’à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ºsota st-infix-em Appears within a stem – common in Borneo-Philippines languages Circumfix a-scatter-ed circumfix-stem-circumfix One portion appears at the front of a stem, and the other at the rear Interfix speed-o-meter stema-interfix-stemb Links two stems together in a compound Duplifix teeny-weeny stem-duplifix Incorporates a reduplicated portion of a stem (may occur in front, at the rear, or within the stem) Transfix Maltese: k-i-t-e-b = â€Å"he wrote† (compare root ktb = â€Å"write†) s-transfix-te-transfixà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ºm A discontinuous affix that interleaves within a discontinuous stem Simulfix mouse à ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ mice Changes a segment of a stem Suprafix produce (noun) produce (verb) Changes a suprasegmental phoneme of a stem Disfix Alabama: tipli = â€Å"break up†