Skip to main content

Difference between Morpheme, Morph, Allomorph

  • Morphology focuses on the various morphemes that make up a word. A morpheme is the smallest unit of a word that has meaning. A morph is the phonetic realization of that morpheme, or in plain English, the way it is formed. An allomorph is the way or ways a morph can potentially sound.
  • A morph is simply the phonetic representation of a morpheme-how morpheme is said. This distinction occurs because the morpheme can remain the same, but the pronunciation changes. The best example of this is the plural morpheme in English '-s'. '-s' is the morpheme, but the morph changes in different words.
          Cats     '-s'     morpheme is pronounced   /s/
          Dogs   '-s'     morpheme is pronounced   /z/
          Houses '-s'   morpheme is pronounces   /ɪz/
These various pronunciations are the morphs of the morpheme '-s'.
This leads onto what an allomorph is. Allomorph are the varieties of a morpheme, which is closely related to the morph. The morph is just how you pronounce the morpheme, the allomorph is the variation in pronunciation. So, the morpheme '-s' (plural) has three allomorphs with the morph /s/, /z/ and /ɪz/.

Allomorph:

  • Variations of morphemes
  • Allomorph are different forms of the same morpheme ,or basic unit of meaning.
  • These can be different pronunciations or different spellings. 
  • The plural morphemes in English usually written as {s}, has at least 3 allomorphs"
          s   as   in         'cups'              /kʌps/ 
          z   as   in         'hands'           /hændz/
          ɪz  as   in         'classes'         /klɑːsɪz/
  • The past form morpheme [ed] usually has also three allomorphs:
          ɪd  as   in          'hunted'        /ˈhʌntɪd/
          t    as   in          'helped'        /helpt/
          d   as   in          'loved'          /lʌvd/           

 Types of allomorph:


There are four types of allomorphs:
  1. Additive allomorph
  2. Replacive allomorph
  3. Suppletive allomorph
  4. Zero allomorph

Additive allomorph:

To signify some difference in meaning, something is added to a word. The past tense form of most English verbs is formed by adding the suffix 'ed' which can e pronounced as either /t/,/d/ or
/ɪd/. 't' as in 'helped' , 'ɪd' as in 'hunted' and 'd' as in 'loved'.

Replacive allomorph:

To signify some difference in meaning, a sound is used to replace another sound in a word. The
/ɪ/ in 'drink' is replaced by /æ/ in 'drank' to signal the simple past.
swim-swam      /swæm/              
take-took          /tʊk/
build-built        /bɪlt/ 

Suppletive allomorph:

To signify some difference in meaning,there is a complete change in the shape of a word.
Go + suppletive allomorph of [-D1] = went
Be + suppletive allomorph of [-S3] = is
Bad + suppletive allomorph of [-er1] = worse
Good + suppletive allomorph of [-est1] =  best

Zero allomorph:

Zero allomorph is a term given to the unit involved when a morpheme change status from one type of morpheme another without any addition or subtraction of its parts
Sheep (singular) + ∅          Sheep (plural)
Lawyer (singular) + ∅        Lawyer (plural)

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Types of Distribution

There are three types of distribution: Contrastive distribution Complementary distribution Free variation Contrastive Distribution: In phonology, two sounds of a language are said to be in contrastive distribution if replaciing one with the other in the same phonological environment results in a change in meaning. If a sound is in contrastive distribution, it is considered a phoneme in that language. For example, in English, the sounds [p] and [b] can both occur word-initially, as in the words pat and bat ( minimal pairs ), which are distinct morphemes. Therefore, [p] and [b] are contrastive distribution and so are phonemes of English. Complementary Distribution: Variants of a phoneme that never occur in the same phonetic environment. e.g. voiced [l] as in slip [slIp] and voiceless [l] as in clap [klæp ]. Environment is the phonetic context in which a sound occurs. Complementary distribution is the distribution of phones in their respective phonetic environment in whic...
Post a Comment
Read more

Description of English Vowels

Vowel is a speech sound produced by humans when the breath flows out through the mouth without being blocked by the teeth, tongue or lips. Vowel is a speech sound in which the mouth is open and the tongue is not touching the top of the mouth , the teeth etc. Vowels are described by the IPA using the three dimensions of: Closeness/Height Frontness Rounding 1) Closeness/Height The closeness category refers to the position of the mandible (open or close) while the height of a vowel refers to the vertical position of the tongue towards the palatal area (Low or High). Based on the 'closeness' ,there are five variations used to define vowels such as:   Open,Open-Mid,Mid,Close-Mid,and Close.     Based on the 'height ' there are also five variations use to define vowels.They are: high,mid-high,mid,mid-low and low.   Open: Open vowels use a depressed (lower level) position of the mandible with a low position of the tongue. [a:],[b] Open-Mid: Open-...
Post a Comment
Read more