English prefixes and their productiveness in word formation

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MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY










DO THI TIEU YEN

ENGLISH PREFIXES AND THEIR
PRODUCTIVENESS IN WORD FORMATION

TIỀN TỐ TIẾNG ANH VÀ TÍNH SẢN SINH
CỦA CHÚNG TRONG CẤU TẠO TỪ

M.A. THESIS

Field: English Language
Code: 60220201
Supervisor: Assoc. Prof. Phan Van Que, Ph.D


HANOI – 2013

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DECLARATION

I hereby declare that no part of the enclosed Master Thesis has been copied
or reproduced by me from any other’s work without acknowledgement and that the
thesis is originally written by me under strict guidance of my supervisor.

Hanoi 28
th
November, 2013



Đỗ Thị Tiểu Yến



Approved by

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank all those who have contributed in different ways to
this thesis.
Firstly, I am greatly indebted to all my teachers at the Postgraduate studies
department and the English one at HOU.
In particular, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor,
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Phan Van Que, who has given us his invaluable comment,
directions and wholehearted assistance as well as supplied us with helpful material
of English prefixes during the course of my thesis.
I would also like to acknowledge the contribution of our friends in the same
department, who continuously encourage and provide us with the materials.
I am very thankful to the authors of general and special books and
documents on English prefixes used in the thesis.
Last but not least, my warmest thanks go to my beloved family, my
colleagues, my friends for their kind and helpful supports and useful
encouragements.






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TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iii
PART I: INTRODUCTION 1
1 .Rationale of the study 1
2. Aims and objectives of the study 1
3. Research questions 2
4. Scope of the study 2
5. Methods of the study 2
6. Design of the study 3
PART II: DEVELOPMENT 3
CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 4
1.1. Literature review 4
1.2. Theoretical background 4
1.2.1. The English word structure 4
1.2.1.1. The word: General problems for definition 4
1.2.1.2. The morpheme 8
1.2.1.3. Types of words and morphemes 8
1.2.1.3.1. Types of words 8
1.2.1.3.2. Types of morphemes 9
1.2.2. The English word formation 10
1.2.2.1. Definition 10
1.2.2.2. Productivity 11
1.2.2.3. Ways of word- formation 11
1.2.2.3.1. Affixation 11
1.2.2.3.2. Compounding 12
1.2.2.3.3. Shortening 14
1.2.2.3.4. Conversion 15

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1.2.2.3.5. Back- formation 17
1.2.2.3.6. Sound imitation 17
1.3. English prefixes 18
1.3.1. Definition 18
1.3.2. Main features of the English prefixes 20
1.3.2.1. Class-changing prefixes: 20
1.3.2.2. Class -maintaining prefixes 20
1.3.2.3. Stress of prefixes. 21
1.3.2.4. Other features of English prefixes 22
1.3.3. The classification of English prefixes 22
1.3.3.1. The classification of English prefixes according to their origins 26
1.3.3.2. The classification of English prefixes according to their uses. 27
1.3.3.3. The classification of English prefixes according to their functions 27
1.3.3.4. The classification of English prefixes according to Randolph Quirk 28
CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 38
2.1. Research questions 38
2.2. Research Design 38
2.3. Instruments 42
2.4. Processing and Analysis of data 42
CHAPTER 3: FINDING AND DISCUSSIONS 44
3.1. Finding 44
3.1.1. The productive prefixes in English 45
3.1.1.1. “Counter-“ 45
3.1.1.2. “Dis-“. 46
3.1.1.3.“Non-”: 49
3.1.1.4. “Out-” 54
3.1.1.5. “Pre-“: 55
3.1.1.6. “Re-”: 57

3.1.1.7. “Super-”: 59

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3.1.1.8. “Un-”: 60
3.2. Discussions 60
3.2.1 Some problems and solutions for the prefixes 61
3.2.1.1. Problems: 62
3.2.1.2. Solutions: 63
CHAPTER 4: IMPLICATIONS FOR TEACHING 67
4.1. The target population : 67
4.1.1. English language proficiency level: 67
4.1.2. Motivation and Attitude: 67
4.1.3. Language needs: 68
4.2. The acquisition of English productive prefixes: 69
4.3. Teaching strategies: 72
4.3.1. Presenting: 72
4.3.2. Practice: 73
4.3.3. Expansion of vocabulary: 74
PART III: CONCLUSION 74
1. A brief summary of the thesis and main conclusions 75
2. Suggestions for further study 75
REFERENCES 75






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PART I: INTRODUCTION
1 .Rationale of the study
As we know, there has been a demand for the learning of English all over the
world. It is frequently used in nearly every field from communication, economics,
and technology to sports, games and so forth. English is also widely used in
literature. This is the reason why English is a now compulsory subject in most
schools and tertiary institutions. However, both English teaching and learning still
leave something to be desired. When learning English, Vietnamese students cope
with a number of such as grammar, sounds, vocabulary, etc. Words, therefore, play
a very important role.
Wallace points out: “Not being able to find the words you need to express
yourself is the most frustrating experience in speaking another language”. As a
matter of fact, it is the experience of most language teachers that the single, biggest
component of a language is vocabulary. No matter how well students learn
grammar, no matter how well the sounds of languages are mastered, without words,
communication totally breaks down. Prefixes are extremely common in English
and they cause so many problems for students for instance how to add them to
words, how to pronounce those words. This is the reason why I choose this topic
and carry out a thorough scrutiny in English prefixes and their productiveness.
2. Aims and objectives of the study
2.1. Aims of the study.
I decided to study English prefixes with the following aims:
- Systematizing all kinds of English prefixes.
- Clarifying English Prefixes.
- Carrying out a thorough scrutiny into productive prefixes.
- Discovering the Vietnamese learners ’mistakes in using vocabulary.
- Finding out solutions for overcoming problems in using English prefixes.
- Helping students get a deeper understanding of English prefixes in general and
English prefixes in particular.

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2.2. Objectives of the study.
- Students must use common prefixes effectively. They can add productive
ones rather easily (like: re, non etc)
- In future study, future research they can grasp the whole system of prefixes.
- They can have feeling about not only English vocabulary but also Vietnamese
vocabulary.
For example: learn again – relearn
Produce again – reproduce
3. Research questions
1) What is the role of prefixes in English word formation?
2) What are the types of English prefixes?
3) Which prefixes are productive and which are non-productive?
4) What problems are caused by prefixes in English for Vietnamese learners?
4. Scope of the study
Firstly, the thesis refers briefly to English words as well as ways of forming
words. The focus of my study is on English prefixation, a main way of forming
words because most derived words in English are through prefixation.
Secondly, the thesis goes into the productiveness of English prefixes which are
most often used and most easily used by native speakers and especially foreign
students.
Finally, the thesis points out some mistakes Vietnamese learners usually make.
and discusses common mistakes concerning English prefixes.
5. Methods of the study
Linguistics has many ways and methods to research into certain matters. There
are synchronic approach and diachronic approach. In this thesis we follow the
diachronic approach dealing mainly with the matters of the present day prefixation.
The thesis goes into the matters related to words formation in English in general

and English prefixes in particular. There is a careful discussion as well. We look

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into almost all the aspects of English prefixes and their problems for teaching as
well as learning.
We collect materials from books, newspaper, internet and use descriptive and
analysis methods to make them clearer.
By means of employing this combined approach, the researcher obtains the
advantages of both quantitative and qualitative methods to overcome their
limitations.
6. Design of the study
My thesis, system of delivered materials for a more systematic study will
concentrate on the following:
− Part 1 is the production which presents rationale, aims, objectives, research
questions, scope, methods and design of the study.
− Part 2 is divided into 3 chapters:
o Chapter 1 introduces a brief review of prefix presence in the English
word formation.
o Chapter 2 is methodology which describes the processes or
procedures I have done the study.
o Chapter 3 covers finding and discussions about the main focus, their
productiveness in English word formation and Vietnamese students’
problems in using English prefixes.
o Chapter 4 refers to implication and strategies for successful
instructions of the English prefixes and their productiveness.
− Part 3 is the conclusion, which sum up the issues recorded and makes some
suggestions for further study.

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PART II: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
1.1 .Literature review
Prefixes, as a matter of fact, must have been a common topic for research
since they are extremely widely used and cause many difficulties troubles for
students. They have been dealt with not only in books specializing in grammar but
in many others about English. Text books, students’ books, in internet and so on do
research into them very carefully. However, very few of them investigate their
productiveness in order to enable students to use prefixes more effectively.
Learning prefixes is often a matter of great difficulty for non- native English
learners. Thus, many books on this subject are written by linguistics in hope of
helping learners to have full understanding of prefixes. In 1983, Laurie Bauer
published a book name” English word-formation”. Through reading this book, we
can understand, and then remember different ways of usage as well as individual
meaning of words in real –life situation.
Unlike “English word-formation” by Laurie Bauer (1983) the book “A
University grammar of English” by Randolph Quirk, Sidney Green Baum (1987),
“A University grammar of English” analysis prefixes details. The writer gave
kinds of prefixes; their classification, function…. In Vietnam, Truong, Hoang Tat
wrote “Basic English Lexicology” in 1993, which go deeply into the prefixes: their
classification, their definition, their meaning, and their functions but in this thesis I
concentrate on the productiveness of English prefixes.
1.2 Theoretical background.
1.2.1. The English word structure
1.2.1.1. The word: General problems for definition.
Between linguistic units the border line is not always sharp and clear. “Word”
as the basic unit of language appears to be a simple concept but as a matter of fact,
it is hardly possible to define accurately because the words have many different

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aspects. Different linguists have different definitions; however, all of them find it
very different to find the most appropriate definition for the term word.
The problem with definition is that they must show the most basic characteristic
features of the notion expressed by the term under discussion, the features by which
this notion is distinguished from other notions. However, defining words is one of
the most problems in linguistics; the definitions were so numerous that some
authors have a huge collection.
Following is the mention of some definitions to show the sotiphicateness.
One of the great British philosophers Thomas Hobber (1588-1679), stated a
materialistic approach to the problem of nomination. He wrote “Words are not
mere names but sounds of matter”. Three centuries later, the Great Russian
physiologist IP Pavlov (1849-1936) examined the word in his study of the second
signal system, and defined it as a universal signal that can substitute any other
signal from the environment in evoking a response in human organism.
In linguistics, the word has been defined syntactically, semantically,
phonologically and by combining various approaches.
Haslet syntactically defined it as “the minimum sentence” later L.Bloomfield
defined it as “a minimum free form”. This last definition is equivalent to Sweet’s to
a certain degree, as practically it amounts to the same thing: free forms are later
defined as “forms, which occur as sentences”.
The semantic aspect is taken into consideration by Escaper, when he calls the
word “one of the smallest, completely satisfying bits of isolated meaning”, into
which the sentence revolts itself. He also points out one more a very important
characteristic of the word: its indivisibility. “It cannot be without a disturbance of
meaning, one or two other or both of the several parts remaining as a waif on our
hands”. The essence of indivisibility will be clear from the comparison of the
article “a” and the negative prefix “a” in “a house” and “amoral”. A house is a
word group because we can separate its elements and insert other words between

them: “a beautiful house”, “a detached house” whereas “amoral” is a word, it is

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indivisible, i.e. structurally impermeable: nothing can be inserted between its
elements. The morpheme “a” is not free; it is not a word. The situation becomes
more complicated if we cannot be guided by solid spelling.
Taking about the internal cohesion of the word, the English linguist John
Lyons points out that it should be discussed in terms of two criteria “positional
mobility” and “uninteruptablity”. To illustrate the first, he divides into morphemes
the sentence:
The- boy- s- walk- ed- slow- ly- up- the hill.
The sentence may be regarded as a sequence of ten morphemes, which occur in
a particular order relative to another. There are several possible changes in this
order, which yield an acceptable English sentence:
Slow- ly- the boy- s- walk- ed- up- the- hill.
Up- the- hill- slow- ly- walk- ed- the- boy- s.
However, under all the permutations certain groups of morphemes behave as
“blocks” –they occur always together, and in the same order relative to one another.
There is no possibility of the sequence “S- the- boy- ly- slow- ed- walk”. “One of
the characteristic of the words is that it tends to be internally stable (in terms of the
order of the morphemes), but positional mobile (permutable with other words in the
same sentence)”. A pure semantic treatment will be found in Stephen William’s
explanation: with him connected discourse, if analyzed from the semantic point of
view;” will fall into a number of meaningful segments, which are ultimately
composed of meaningful units. These meaningful units are term words”.
The semantic- phonological approach may be illustrated on Gardiner’s
definition” “A word is an articulate sound symbol in its aspect of denoting
something, which is spoken about”.
A.Meilet an eminent French linguist combines the semantic, phonological

grammatical criteria and advances a formula which underlines many subsequent
definition both abroad and in our country: “A word is defined by the association of

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a particular meaning with a particular group of sounds capable of a particular
grammatical employment”.
This statement does not distinguish words from phrases because not only
“child” but “a pretty child” as well is the combinations of a particular group of
sounds with a particular meaning capable of a particular grammatical employment.
This is acceptable if we add “A word is characterized by positional mobility
within a sentence and indivisibility, and that the word is the smallest significant
unit of a given language, capable of functioning alone”.
All the above definitions are not very convincing in that they don’t establish
the relationship, between language and thought, which is formulated if we treated
the word as a dialectical unity of form and content, in which the form in the spoken
or written expression which calls up a specific content, whereas the content is the
meaning rendering the emotion or the concept in the mind of the speaker which he
intends to convey to his listeners.
These different definitions, can lead us to the conclusion that they are bound to
be strongly dependent upon the line of approach, the aim the scholar has in view.
For a comprehensive word theory, therefore, a description seems more appropriate
than a definition.
The problem of creating a word theory based upon the materialistic
understanding of the relationship between word and thought, on the other hand, and
language and society, on the other hand, has been one of the most discussed for
many years. Many eminent scholars have exerted many effort to name but a few
resulted in throwing light on the problem and achieved a clear exposition of the
word as the basic unit of language. So, let us, for the time being, accept the
following definition, which seems to be the most satisfactory: “The word is one of

the fundamental units of language. It is a dialectical unity of form and content,
independent unit of language to form a sentence by itself, for example: “table,
drink, forget- me- not” and so forth.

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1.2.1.2. The morpheme
If we describe a word as a autonomous unit of language in which a particular
meaning is associated with a particular sound complex and which is capable of a
particular grammatical employment and able to form a sentence by it self, we have
the possibility to distinguish its form the fundamental language unit, namely, the
morpheme.
Looking at the word. We can see that most of them are made up of various of
smaller elements. Consider, for example, the word: “untouchables”. This can be
segmented to show its constituent element thus: “untouchable .s” these segments
/ elements are called “morphemes”. Each has its own form, meanings and its
own distributions. Thus “un-“ has a fixed phonological form /in/, a meaning of
negation, “touch” has a fixed phonological form and fixed meaning “able”
sometimes occurs as /ib(∂) l/ ible/ has a fixed meaning “-s” has a rage of
phonetic forms (/s, z, iz/) but a constant meaning of plurality. None of segments
or elements “un, touch, able” can be further subdivided into smaller segments,
which function in the same kind of way as they do. There are morphemes may
be defined as the minimal unit of grammatical analysis. Is an association of
given meaning with a given sound pattern but unlike a word it is not
autonomous. Morphemes occur in speech only as constituent part of words, not
independently, although a word may consist of a single morpheme. Nor are they
devisable into smaller meaningful units. That is why the morpheme may be
defined as the minimum meaningful language unit.
1.2.1.3. Types of words and morphemes
1.2.1.3.1. Types of words

The morphological analysis of word structure on the morphemic level aims at
splitting the word into its constituent morphemes- the basic units at this level of
analysis- and at determining the number and types. According to the number of
morphemes, word can be classified into “monomorphic” and “polymorphic”.
“Monomoorphic” or “simple word” or “root word” consists of only one root

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morpheme. E.g: “sing, man, woman, god”, etc. All “polymorphic” words fall into
two sub groups: “derived words” and “compound words” according to the number
of root morphemes they have. “Derived words” are composed of one root
morpheme and one or more derivational morphemes, E.g: “lovely, hatred,
happiness etc”. “Compound words” contain at least two roof morphemes, the
number of derivational morphemes in compounds as in “lady-killer, man-eater”, or
only root morphemes as in “ball-point-pen, blackboard”.
1.2.1.3.2. Types of morphemes
It has been universally acknowledged that great many words are made up of
morphemes. However, though morphemes are as a rule easily singled out in words,
are not independent and are found in actual speech only as integral part of the
word. Even a cursory examination of the morphemic structure of English words
reveals that they are composed morphemes of different types: roof morphemes and
affixational morphemes.
The roof morpheme is also called the lexical morpheme or simply the root. It is
the nucleus of the word, it has a very general and abstract lexical meaning common
to a set of semantically related words constituting one word cluster, E.g: “to work”,
“worker”, “working”, “worked”. Besides the lexical meaning, the roots possess all
other types of meaning proper to morpheme except the part of speech meaning,
which is not found in roots. The root remains after removing all the other elements
and cannot be analyzed any further.
Affixational morphemes include inflectional affixes or inflections or endings

and derivational affixes. Inflections carry only grammatical meaning so they are
also called grammatical morphemes, and are thus relevant only for the formation of
word- from. A complete set of forms of words in an inflectional pattern is called
“inflectional paradigm”. It is the system of grammatical form characteristic of a
word, E.g: “child, children, child-like, childish”. Whereas derivational affixes are
relevant for building various types of words, they are lexically always dependent
the root which they modify. They carry both lexical and grammatical meaning;

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therefore they are also called lexical- grammatical morphemes. Due to this
component of their meaning, the derivational affixes are classified into affixes
building different parts of speech such as nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs.
Root and derivational affixes are general easily distinguished and the
difference between them is clearly felt as, E.g., in the words: homeless, childish,
brotherhood, unhappy etc. The root home-, child-, brother-, -happy are understood
as the lexical centers of the words, and –less, -ish, -hood are felt as morphemes
dependent on these roots.
As root morphemes are, in general, free morphemes because they can function
independently and very few roots are bound morphemes, i.e., the morphemes that
cannot function independently and have to be combined with other morphemes,
e.g.: “theo-“ in the word theory, theoretical or horr- in the words horror, horrible,
horrify. Therefore, distinction between the root morpheme and derivational
morpheme is also made of free and bound morpheme. It’s obvious that free
morpheme can be found only among roots and bound morphemes have no identical
word- forms.
1.2.2.The English word formation
1.2.2.1. Definition
According to Sankin (1966) word formation is the process creating new words
from the material available language after certain structural and semantic formula

and patterns.
The principles of word- formation can be look at in two different ways. One is
simply to consider them for learners in the way we describe and explain
grammatical rules or pronunciation rules. But we can also look at word- formation
as a resource in the language, something learners should be allowed to experiment
with and use strategically. Creative word-formation can also be seen as a
communicative strategy for supplying formations on when the right words cannot
be found. Possible ways of exploiting word-formation will be mentioned in later

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part of this chapter. Word-formation is the most effective mean of enriching
vocabulary for the learners.
1.2.2.2. Productivity
So far, it has been implied that word formation is productive, but this position
has not been argued for. In fact, it is probably not controversial to claim that it is
productive. Nevertheless, productivity remains one of the most contested areas in
the study of word-formation and several books have been written specifically on
this area. This is not because there is dispute over whether particular processes of
word-formation are productive; the dispute concerns the extent to which formation
can be said to be productive in general.
However, the productivity of word formation has been a major factor in
providing the huge vocabulary of English, and the fact that the process of creating
new lexemes with new forms can be said to be more or less productive according to
the number of new words which it is used to form. Therefore, there are some ways
of forming words very productive but there are also some other ways which cannot
now produce new words and these are commonly termed non-productive or
unproductive. In the following parts, due to limited conditions, I cannot mentions to
the productivity of all ways of word-formation in English. I only have a wish to
have a brief list of principle ways graded according to their productive degree.

1.2.2.3. Ways of word- formation
1.2.2.3.1. Affixation
Affixation is general defined as the formation of words by adding derivational
affixes to the stems. Derivational affixes consist of suffixes and prefixes. In
conformity with this, affixation is subdivided into suffixation and prefixation.
Warriner (1988: 1740) says about affixation in English as follows: “The parts
that are added are called fixes and an affixes added before the root is called a
prefix, one added are after the root is called a suffix. Word may have one or more
affixes of either kind, or several of both kinds”.
For example:

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Prefix Root Suffix

un forget able unforgettable
un just unjust
nation all national

1.2.2.3.2. Compounding
This is also a productive ways of forming words. According to Quirk
(1972:1019). A compound is a unit consisting of two or more bases. Such
compound words can be nouns E.g: “nuclear + test = nucleartest”, adjectives E.g:
“tax + free = tax-free”, or verbs E.g: “hand + wash = handwash ”.
It is clear that the components of a compound may be either simple or derived
words or even other compound words. However, in general, English compounds
have two bases. The second one, usually expresses a general meaning hence is the
basic part and called “determinatum”. The first part, being the determining one, is
called “determinant”. Concerning compound words there are still many problems
that cause controversy. In fact, there are no formal criteria that can be used for a

general definition of compounds in English phonologically; compounds can be
identified as having a main stress on the first element or determinant.
Hence the compound “ ’dancing girl” (the girl whose job is dancing) has the
stress ’ is different from “ ’dancing ’girl” (the girl who is dancing) has the
stress ’ ’ and is a free word group.
On the other hand, many compound words which have a secondary stress on
the first element in, for example “headmaster, sociolinguistics etc”, and there are
also compounds which have double stress (even stress) E.g: “ ’good ’egg”, “
’happy-go –lucky” etc.
Therefore, phonological criteria are insufficient.
Semantically, compounds can be seen to be isolated from ordinary syntactic
constructions by having a meaning, which may be relates to but can not simply be
inferred from the meaning of its components. For example, a greenhouse (a
building with glass sides and roof, for searing plants) is not just a green house since

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most green house are not greenhouses. On the other hand, it is difficult to see
anything in common between the ordinary noun “dog” and the second element in
the compound “hot dog” (a sausage in a sandwich). Besides, we can also see the
insufficiency of this criteria because in some cases it is difficult to decide whether
there is only one single idea E.g: “window-cleaner”.
Orthographically, compounds are written:
(i) Solid, e.g: bedroom.
(ii) Hyphenated, e.g: goal-keeper
(iii) Open, e.g: red tape (bureaucratic)
This criterion often causes arguments as well. There no safe ruler –of –thumb
that will help in the choice between these 3 possibilities. Practice varies in many
words, on same way even occur in three different compound forms, for example
“airline- airline- air line” different people, and different dictionaries have different

spelling. In AmE there seems to be a trend away form the use of hyphens;
compounds usually written solid as soon as they have gained some permanent
status otherwise they’re written open. In BrE, however, there tends to be more
extensive use of the hyphen. For example:
Air- brake, call- girl, letter- write (BrE)
air- brake, call- girl, letter- write ( AmE )
Therefore, in order to consider whether such and such word groups are
compound, it’s necessary to refer to at least two or even all the criteria.
In some cause, we meet difficulties in distinguishing between compounds and
derivational words. There are words built by a simultaneous application of these
types of words- derivational compounds, E.g. absent-minded, newsmonger,
copyright, chairman, mini-skirt, self-service, etc. the elements: “-monger, -right, -
man, -mini, -self” have great combining ability, they may be independent words
having distinctive meaning but they loose their grammatical independence and
even their meaning, some are used combinations. Thus, these derivational words
can also be called “semi-affixes” or “affixal words”. We can also divide semi-

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affixes into semi-prefixes and semi-suffixes. So, this type of compositing words
can be said to be a source of building prefixal and suffixal words.
1.2.2.3.3. Shortening
Shortening of words stands apart from the above types. It cannot be regarded
as part of either word-derivation or word-composition for the simple reason that
neither the root morpheme nor the derivational affixes can be single out from the
shortened words, E.g: lab, exam, bike, fridge, T.V, brunch, etc. it is also a
productive ways of building words in English, especially in colloquial speech and
advertisement.
There are many types of shortening: They are as follows:
a. Clipping: some linguists also call “shortening” “clipping” but it is not

accurate. The term “clipping” denotes the subtraction of one or more
syllables from a word, which is also available in its full form. The clipped
form is normally felt to be informal. Clipping is subdivided into:
 Intial clipping: e.g: telephone, airplane.
 Final clipping: e.g: ad, photo, exam, taxi, Prof., doc, uni, etc.
 Initio-final clipping (clipped at both ends of words): flu (influenza), fridge
(refrigerator), etc.
 Medical clipping (the middle part is clipped): maths, V-day, H-bomb.
 Elliptico-conversational clipping (phrasal clipping), this is a special way in
which there is a combination of clippies, conversion and clipping: E.g: sit-
down (demonstration), pop (popular music), pub (public house), etc.
b. Blends: is a special type of shortening where parts of words merge into one
new word. E.g: brunch (a meal subsuming breakfast and lunch) is derived
from br (eakfast) + (l) unch. Many blend have only a very short life and are
very informal, E.g: swim sensation ~ swim+ sensation. They are often
conscious and deliberate formation, and license perhaps particularly
common in commercial and scientific language, E.g: lubritection ~
lubrication protections Medicare =medical + healthcare. Quite a few blends,

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however, have become more or less fully accepted in the language, E.g:
“electrocute, heliport, Interpol model motel, smog telecast, transistor”, etc.
c. Acronyms: are words built from the initial letter (or larger parts) of words
that make up a descriptive phrase or a proper name.
Quirk (1972: 1031) divides acronyms into two main types:
(i) Acronyms which is pronounced as sequences of letters can be called
“alphabetize”. In writing, the more institutionalized formations have no
periods between the letters.
a. The letters represent full words, E.g: C.O.D, O.A.O, U.N, F.B.I, E.C, etc.

b. The letters represent elements in a compound or first part of word, E.g:
TV, I.O (identification card), etc.
(ii) Ac which is pronounced as a word and are often used without knowing
what the letters stand for, E.g: NATO, UNESCO, radar, AIDS, etc.
1.2.2.3.4. Conversion
Quirk (1972: 1009) defines that conversion is the derivational process whereby
an item is adapted or converted to a new word- class without the addition of an
affix. Therefore, it is also called: functional change” or “zero derivation”, E.g:
“release, to release; elbow, to elbow; arm, to arm; skin, to skin; lecture, to lecture;
hand, to hand”, etc. Conversion is an extremely productive way of producing new
words in English. There don’t appear to be morphological restrictions on the form
that can undergo conversion, so that other types of word formation are all
acceptable inputs to the conversion process. Similarly, all form classes seem to be
able to undergo conversion and conversion seems to be able to produce words of
almost any form class, particularly the open form classes (N, V, adj., etc). Some
grammars make a distinction between “full conversation: and “partial
conversation” where a word of one class appears in a function which is
characteristic of another word class, E.g: “rich, the rich; wealthy, the wealthy”, etc.
The adjectives are partially converted to noun status.

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As stated above, conversion is able to produce word of almost any form class.
It can be classified into some main types. They are:
 Noun-verb conversion which established examples are: “to badger, to bottle, to
bridge, to commission, to skin, to mail, to cash, to vacation, to boat, to knife”,
etc. Recent examples are: “to chopper, to data, to network, to leaflet:, etc. Most
of these verbs of this category are transitive.
 Verb-noun conversion which established examples are: “a call, a command, a
dump, a guess, a spy” and recent examples are: “a commute, a goggle, an

interrupt:, etc.
 Adjective-verb conversion which established examples are: “to dirty, to dry, to
better, to open, to right”, and recent example is “to total” (a car).
 Adjective-noun conversion which established examples are relatively rare and
frequently restricted in their syntactic occurrence, E.g: “the poor, the wealthy”
cannot be made plural or have any other determiners, less restricted examples are:
“a daily, a regular, a roast”. This type seems to have become much more
productive recently; more examples are: “a creative, a crazy, a gay, a nasty”, etc.
 None-adjective conversion. Membership of this can be postulated only when
the noun form occurs in predicative as well as in attribute positions, E.g: “This
wall is brick. This furniture is reproduction. This teacher is head”. In the above
examples, “brick, reproduction, and head” have become adjective by
conversion.
There are cases of change in form class a verb to a noun and from a verb to an
adjective which do not involve any affixation, but which are not clearly instances
of conversion there cases are called approximate rather than complete conversion.
(i. e, a word, in the course of changing its grammatical, function, may undergo a
slight change of pronunciation or spelling). The most important kinds of
attenuation are:
*Voicing of final consonants; the unvoiced fricative consonants /s/, /f/ and /θ/
in many noun- conversions are voices to /z/, /v/ and /ð/ respectively, E.g:

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“house /s/ (n)- house /z/ (v); advice /s/ (n)- advise /z/ (v); thief /f/ (n)- thieve /v/
(v); belief /f/ (n)- believe /v/ (v); mouth /θ/ (n)- mouth /ð/ (v)”, etc.
(i) Shift of tress: when verbs of two syllables are converted into nouns,
the stress is sometimes shifted from the second to the first syllable;
E.g: abstract, record, conduct, and export, rebel, etc.
(ii) Sound interchange: The new word is built by changing the root vowel

or consonant of the old word, E.g: food (n) feed (v); sing (v)- song
(n), speak (v), long (a)- length (n). These cases of conversion are
marginal and very unproductive ways of word forming.
1.2.2.3.5.Back- formation
This is the forming of new word. This it is opposite process to affixation so we can
offer the term “deapfixation” as opposed to “affixation”. We can make it clear
thought some example:
To edit (from editor); to window – shop (from window – shopping) to escalate
(from escalators). The great majority of back – formation in modern English are
verbs which are built from compound nouns with suffixes: “er” or “ing-“, E.g: “to-
air condition” (from air – conditioner) to tape-recorder to escalate. Some
grammarians prefer the term back derivation to back formation. However, it is not
always a derivational process which is reserved in back formation, E.g: the word
“pea”, a back formation from an earlier singular (uncountable) from “peas”
(plural); “cherry”- the back formation from the French “cerise”, again with the final
/z/ perceived as a plural market, “alms”- back formation from “alms”.
1.2.2.3.6. Sound imitation
Sound imitation is the way to build words by imitating sounds produced by
actions, things, etc. This is also called phonetically motivation. This type of word
formation is subdivided into following cases:
 Words showing animals, E.g: crow, cuckoo, etc.
 Words showing movement of water, E.g: splash, pattern, babble, etc.
 Words showing actions made by man, E.g: giggle, chatter, murmur, etc.
 Words showing sounds made by animals, E.g: moo, roar, howl, etc.

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Many authorities introduce some other minor types of word formation such as:
Word from name, E.g: “Have you read Nguyen Du?; sandwich, hamburger, robot,
cardigan, Roll Royce”, etc.

Reduplicative, E.g: “ tock ping- pong, hocus- pocus tip- top”,…etc. However,
they are unproductive so I mention as reference.
Finally, there are many ways and types of forming words. Each has its own
strong points, characteristics and also restrictions. In the next chapter I would
prefer to go study deeply in the productiveness of English Prefixes, which is a most
interesting and no less difficult problem in English.
1.3.English prefixes
1.3.1. Definition
“A prefix is a syllable or group of syllables placed at the beginning of a word,
affecting its meaning”
Geddes and Grosses, 1994:465.
There is another definition “prefix is a letter or group of letters which is added to
beginning of word in order to make a new word”
Collin Co build, 1987:1129.
“ A prefix is one or more syllables placed in front of a root to form a new word”
Fourth course, 1986:344
In short, “prefix is a letter or group of letters added to the front of a word to change
its meaning”
Oxford advanced learner’s dictionary, 1995:909.
The following examples can serve as illustrations:
Prefixes Roots News words
Ir - + regular -> Irregular
(adj)
Mis - + understand ->
Misunderstand
(v) (v)
Counter- + revolution -> counter-
revolution

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(n) (n)
From the above example, it is noticeable that prefixes “it”, “mis”, “counter-“
precede the roots “regular”, “understand” and “revolution”, and they modify the
meanings of the original roots in different ways.
Knowing the formation of prefixes and some principal prefixes in English can
facilitate us to figure out the meaning of unfamiliar words It is as well helpful to
express the ideas in different ways within a limited stock of vocabulary. There are
some examples for fully understanding:
Pre-intermediate learners may say “I have to consider this plan again”. In fact,
we can officially shorten the form of the verb “consider” like this “I have to
reconsider this plan”.
The prefix “mis-” in the above example makes the meaning of the newly –
formed word clearer: “ to misunderstand” means “ to understand something
wrongly”, learners can say “he misunderstands the lesson”.
Prefixation, all in all, offers another way of learning English new words and
broadens our vocabulary. When we have mastered the mechanic of word –
formation through prefixation and taken in the nature of some common prefixes, it
is very easy for us to automatically utter or guess the meaning and pronunciation of
relevant word or a group of words.
For example, supposing that we all know that “mis-” refers to something wrong or
not righteous. We, thus cam guess the meaning of the new words like:
Misuse = mis + use ( use in a wrong way or not use for its right purpose )
Mistake = mis + take ( take something of another person)
Mislead = mis + lead ( lead so in a wrong way )
Misfortune = mis + fortune ( unlock )
Mispronounce = mis + pronounce (pronounce wrongly ).
From the above list of examples and explanation it can be said that prefixation
is a small aspect, yet important one for learners. Knowing the importance of