Word Formation
Fully inflected words are usually formed from a root plus a suffix plus an ending. The suffix is sometimes missing, which has been interpreted as a zero suffix. Words with zero suffix are termed root verbs and root nouns. Beyond this basic structure, there is the nasal infix, a present tense marker, and reduplication, a sort of prefix with a number of grammatical and derivational functions.
Read more about this topic: Proto-Indo-European Root
Famous quotes containing the words word and/or formation:
“Out in Hollywood, where the streets are paved with Goldwyn, the word “sophisticate” means, very simply, “obscene.” A sophisticated story is a dirty story. Some of that meaning was wafted eastward and got itself mixed up into the present definition. So that a “sophisticate” means: one who dwells in a tower made of a DuPont substitute for ivory and holds a glass of flat champagne in one hand and an album of dirty post cards in the other.”
—Dorothy Parker (1893–1967)
“Out of my discomforts, which were small enough, grew one thing for which I have all my life been grateful—the formation of fixed habits of work.”
—Elizabeth Stuart Phelps (1844–1911)