Suffix (linguistics)

In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns, adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs. Suffixes can carry grammatical information ( inflectional suffixes) or lexical information ( derivational/lexical suffixes'').'' An inflectional suffix or a grammatical suffix. Such inflection changes the grammatical properties of a word within its syntactic category. For derivational suffixes, they can be divided into two categories: class-changing derivation and class-maintaining derivation.

Particularly in the study of Semitic languages, suffixes are called affirmatives, as they can alter the form of the words. In Indo-European studies, a distinction is made between suffixes and endings (see Proto-Indo-European root). Suffixes can carry grammatical information or lexical information.

A word-final segment that is somewhere between a free morpheme and a bound morpheme is known as a suffixoidKremer, Marion. 1997. ''Person reference and gender in translation: a contrastive investigation of English and German''. Tübingen: Gunter Narr, p. 69, note 11. or a semi-suffixMarchand, Hans. 1969. ''The categories and types of present-day English word-formation: A synchronic-diachronic approach''. Munich: Beck, pp. 356 ff. (e.g., English ''-like'' or German ''-freundlich'' "friendly").

Examples

English

:''Girls''—where the suffix ''-s'' marks the plurality.
:''He makes''—where suffix ''-s'' marks the third person singular present tense.
:''It closed''—where the suffix ''-ed'' marks the past tense.

French

:''De beaux jours''—where the suffix ''-x'' marks the plural.
:''Elle est passablement jolie''—where the suffix ''-e'' marks the feminine form of the adjective.

German

:''mein Computer''—where the lack of suffixes is because its case, nominative, is "unmarked"
:''meines Computers''—genitive case
:''meinem Computer''—dative case
:''meinen Computer''—accusative case

Russian

:''мой компьютер—''where the lack of suffixes is because its case, nominative, is "unmarked"
:''моего компьютера''—genitive case
:''моему компьютеру''—dative case
:''мой компьютер''—accusative case
:''за-туш-и-ть свечу''—where first word has -и- suffix, -ть ending (infinitive form); second word with ending -у (accusative case, singular, feminine).
:'' добр-о-жел-а-тель-н-ый''—добр- root, -о- interfix, -жел- root, verbal -a- interfix, nominal -тель suffix, adjectival -н- suffix, adjectival -ый ending (nominative case, singular, masculine).

Barngarla

:''wárraidya'' " emu" — where the lack of suffixes is because its grammatical number, singular, is "unmarked"
:''wárraidyalbili'' "two emus" — dual
:''wárraidyarri'' "emus" — plural
:''wárraidyailyarranha'' "a lot of emus", "heaps of emus" — superplural

Inflectional suffixes

Inflection changes the grammatical properties of a word within its syntactic category. In the example:
:I was hoping the cloth wouldn't fade, but it has faded quite a bit.
the suffix ''-d'' inflects the root-word ''fade'' to indicate past participle.

Inflectional suffixes do not change the word class of the word after the inflection. Inflectional suffixes in Modern English include:

Verbs

*-s third person singular simple present tense
*-ed past tense and past participle
*-t past tense (weak irregular)
*-ing present participle and gerund
*-en past participle (irregular)

Nouns

*-s plural number
*-en plural number (irregular)

Adjectives and Adverbs

*-er comparative degree
*-est superlative degree

Derivation

Derivational suffixes can be divided into two categories: class-changing derivation and class-maintaining derivation.Jackson and Amvela(2000): Word, Meaning and Vocabulary- An Introduction to Modern English Lexicology. London, Athenaeum Press, p.88 In English, they include
* -ise/-ize (usually changes nouns into verbs)
* -fy (usually changes nouns into verbs)
* -ly (usually changes adjectives into adverbs, but also some nouns into adjectives)
* -ful (usually changes nouns into adjectives)
* -able/ -ible (usually changes verbs into adjectives)
* -hood (usually class-maintaining, with the word class remaining a noun)
* -ess (usually class-maintaining, with the word class remaining a noun)
* -ness (usually changes adjectives into nouns)
* -less (usually changes nouns into adjectives)
* -ism (usually class-maintaining, with the word class remaining a noun)
* -ment (usually changes verbs into nouns)
* -ist (usually class-maintaining, with the word class remaining a noun)
* -al (usually changes nouns into adjectives)
* -ish (usually changes nouns into adjectives/ class-maintaining, with the word class remaining an adjective)
* -oid (usually changes nouns into adjectives)
* -like (usually changes nouns into adjectives)
* -ity (usually changes adjectives into nouns)
* -tion/ -ion/ ation (usually changes verbs into noun)
* -logy/-ology (usually class-maintaining, with the word class remaining a noun)
* -ant (usually changes verbs into nouns, often referring to a human agent)

Synthetic languages

Many synthetic languages— Czech, German, Finnish, Latin, Hungarian, Russian, Turkish, etc.—use many endings.

References

External links

*{{Commonscatinline, Suffixes

Affixes
Linguistics terminology
English suffixes