MORPHOLOGY EXERCISE PART 1 (+KEY)

MORPHOLOGY EXERCISE – PART 1
Exercise 1
Fill in the table using words from the text below:
“A powerful agent is the right word. Whenever we come upon one of those
intensely right words . . . the resulting effect is physical as well as spiritual, and
electrically prompt.”
MARK TWAIN
Open class words

Closed class words

............................

............................

............................

............................

Exercise 2
Identify the root in these words by underlining it and state which syntactic
category it belongs to:
Example: faster: adjective.
a. hushes
b. kindness
c. fried
d. gamers
e. heavily
f. grandfathers
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Exercise 3
A. Identify the suffixes by underlining them:
a. singing
b. unhappy
c. mechanism
d. trousers
e. brother
f. blackboard

B. Identify the prefixes by underlining them:
a. rewarded
b. misfortune
c. establish
d. submit
e. strawberry
f. abnormal

Exercise 4
Identify the free morphemes in the following words by underlining them:
a. kissed
b. freedom
c. stronger
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d. follow
e. awe

f. goodness
g. talkative
h. teacher
i. actor.

Exercise 5
Divide the following into free and bound sets:
ation, nation, pre, post, angle, ible, infra, out
Free sets

Bound sets

............................

............................

............................

............................

Exercise 6
Separate the affixes from the stems in the following words:
Example: faster = fast + er
Trains, succeeded, lighter, predetermined, retroactive, confusions, instructional.

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Exercise 7

Use the words that you think are relevant to answer the following questions:

a. Can a morpheme be represented by a single phoneme? Give examples. By more
than one phoneme? Give examples.
b. Can a free morpheme be more than one syllable in length? Give examples. Can a
bound morpheme? Give examples.
c. Does the same letter or phoneme-or sequence of letters or phonemes- always
represent the same morpheme? Why or why not?
(Hint: you must refer to the definition of morpheme to be able to answer this.)
d. Can the same morpheme be spelled differently? Give examples.
e. Can different morphemes be pronounced identically? Give examples.
f. A morpheme is basically the same as:
i. a letter
ii. a sound
iii. a group of sounds
iv. none of the above

Exercise 8
Compounds are often frequent in modern technical areas where new
vocabulary is being created. Find the compounds in the following passage:

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Free Talker
Nokia 610 Car Kit
The cell phone stays by your side -- instead of your ear -- with Nokia's hands-free
Bluetooth system. An unobtrusive dash-mounted screen provides the same
information as your cell-phone display, and you can effortlessly download contact

info from your phone.
A small console-mounted control unit with three intuitive buttons and a dial is but
one way to manage calls and messages, which sound off through your car's
speakers: Choose to use Nokia's decent voice-recognition software and neither
hand has to leave the wheel.
www.nokia.com

Exercise 9
Complete the process and identify the type of word formation in English:

Influenza

flu

Clipping

Teleprinter, exchanger

telex

..............

Megabyte

meg

..............

Random access memory

RAM

..............

A progress

To progress

..............

Black,board

Blackboard

..............

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United States of America

USA

..............

Compact disc

CD

..............

Act

action

..............

ANSWER
Answers 1
Fill in the table using words from the text below:
Open class words

Closed class words

powerful - agent - is - right - word - come - intensely - right A - the - Whenever - we - words - resulting - effect - is - physical - well - spiritual - upon - one - of - those electrically - prompt - as

and

Answers 2
Identify the root in these words by underlining it and state which syntactic
category it belongs to:

a. hushes : Verb
b. kindness : Adjective
c. fried : Verb
d. gamers : Noun
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e. heavily : Adjective
f. grandfathers : Noun

Answers 3
A. Identify the suffixes by underlining them:
a. singing
b. unhappy
c. mechanism
d. trousers
e. brother
f. blackboard

B. Identify the prefixes by underlining them:
a. rewarded
b. misfortune
c. establish
d. submit
e. strawberry
f. abnormal

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Answers 4
Identify the free morphemes in the following words by underlining them:

a. kissed
b. freedom

c. stronger
d. follow
e. awe
f. goodness
g. talkative
h. teacher
i. actor.

Answers 5
Divide the following into free and bound sets:
Free sets

Bound sets

nation - post - angle - out

ation - pre - ible - infra

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Answers 6
Separate the affixes from the stems in the following words:

Train + s, succeed + ed, light + er, pre + de + termin + ed, retro + act + ive, con +
fus + ion + s, in + struct + ion + al.

Answers 7
Use the words that you think are relevant to answer the following questions:

a. Can a morpheme be represented by a single phoneme? Give examples. By more
than one phoneme? Give examples.
Yes, a morpheme can be represented by a single phoneme, like in:
teacher (/ə/), aside (/ə/), erase (/ɪ/), angry (/i/).
Yes, a morpheme can be represented by more than one phoneme, like in:
freedom (/dəm/), teacher (/titʃ/), talkative (/tɔk/)

b. Can a free morpheme be more than one syllable in length? Give examples. Can a
bound morpheme? Give examples.
Yes, a free morpheme can be more than one syllable in length, like
in: follow (/fɑləʊ/), margin (/mɑ:dʒɪn/), characterize (/kæɹəktə/).
Yes, a bound morpheme can be more than one syllable in length, like in:
aggravation (/eɪʃən/), popularity (/ɪti/), privacy (/əsi/).

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c. Does the same letter or phoneme-or sequence of letters or phonemes- always
represent the same morpheme? Why or why not?
(Hint: you must refer to the definition of morpheme to be able to answer this.)
No, the letter (s) represents 3 different morphemes: plural (hats), 3rd person
singular (hides) and the possessive (cat’s meow). Moreover, the plural morpheme
is represented by 3 different sets of phonemes /s/, /z/ and /iz/.

d. Can the same morpheme be spelled differently? Give examples. Yes,
past tense morpheme

/d/

opened

-ed

/t/

finished

/s/

maps

/z/

bags

/iz/

dishes

the plural morpheme
-s

e.

Can

the

same

morpheme

be

spelled

differently?

Give

examples.

Yes, site, cite and sight all of them are pronounced as /sait/. collector, teacher both
of the morphemes -er and -or are pronounced as /ə/

f. A morpheme is basically the same as:
iv. none of the above

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Answers 8
Compounds are often frequent in modern technical areas where new
vocabulary is being created. Find the compounds in the following passage:
hands-free, dash-mounted, download, cell-phone, console-mounted, voicerecognition.

Answers 9

Complete the process and identify the type of word formation in English:
Influenza

flu

Clipping

Teleprinter, exchanger

telex

Blending

Megabyte

meg

Clipping

Random access memory

RAM

Acronym

A progress

To progress

Conversion

Black,board

Blackboard

Compounding

United States of America

USA

Abreviation

Compact disc

CD

Acronym

Act

action

Derivation

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