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• Words, like sentences and clauses, have a predictable internal structure
• The plural marker on nouns occurs at the end of a word (e.g. law+s), while what are known as derivational affixes can occur at either the beginning or the end of a word (e.g. un law+ful)
• The creation of dictionaries falls within the province of lexical semantics, an area of linguistics concerned with the study of the meaning of individual words
• Lexicographers, those who create dictionaries, have developed methodologies for discovering the meanings of words and most effectively presenting these meanings to users of dictionaries
• It is equally important to study the specific processes, known as word formation processes, that describe the ways that new vocabulary are added to a language
• Types of meaning


  • Grammatical meaning
  • Pragmatic meaning
• Grammatical meaning


  Meaning that can be derived directly from the words, phrases, clauses, and sentences in which language is encoded
• Pragmatic meaning


  Meaning as a product of the social context in which language takes place
• Denotation


  The dictionary sense of a word
• Connotation


  The associations a word evokes
• Types of meaning (Lyons)

  • Descriptive meaning
  • Social meaning
  • Expressive meaning
• Descriptive meaning


  Related to grammatical meaning
• Social meaning


  Serves to establish and maintain social relations
• Morpheme


  The smallest unit of meaning
• Morphemes


  • Can be free or bound
  • Free morphemes can stand on their own
  • Bound morphemes must be attached to a free morpheme
• Base


  The part of a word which an affix is attached to
• Some words may contain more than one base, and some bases are (arguably) a bound rather than a free morpheme
• Compound words


  • upon
  • bookshelf
• Words with Latin roots

  • perceive
  • receive
  • conceive
• Inflectional morphemes


  Grammatical morphemes that indicate some kind of grammatical relationship
• Derivational morphemes


  Can be either prefixes or suffixes, can change the meaning of a word or its part of speech
• A word can contain many derivational affixes, but only one inflectional affix; and if a word contains an inflectional suffix and one or more derivational suffixes, the derivational suffixes will always precede the inflectional suffixes
• What is back formation?

  A process of removing suffixes and prefixes
• What is the most common outcome of back formation?

  Creating a new verb from an existing noun
• What are examples of back formation?

  • Editor → Edit
  • Occupant → Occupy
  • Examination → Examine
  • Babysitter → Babysit
• Why is back formation important in English grammar?

  It allows quick and easy creation of new words
• How does back formation help in understanding word meanings?

  By breaking words into their component parts
• What is the conclusion of the study material?

  Does Anyone Have A Question?
• What is the source of the definition of back formation?

  Cambridge Dictionary
• What is another source mentioned for back formation examples?

  Study.com
• What is the last source mentioned in the study material?

  MLA Style Center