Classification of Prefixes According to the Part of Speech in Which They Are Used.

Verb Prefixes.

Adjective Prefixes.

Noun Prefixes.

Classification of Prefixes According to Their Meaning.

Список терминов и определений

1. Derivation is affixation, i.e. adding an affix to the stem of a definite part of speech.

2. 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 or adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs.

3. Prefix is an affix which is placed before the stem of a word. Adding it to the beginning of one word changes it into another word. For example, when the prefix un- is added to the word happy it creates the word unhappy.

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Introduction

Derivation is one of the most productive ways of word-building in English. All affixes are divided into prefixes and suffixes. Prefixes stand before roots and suffixes stand after roots. But prefixes and suffixes are not only different in their positions in a word, but also in their main functions.

Suffixes

The main function of the suffix is to form one part of speech from another (to work – worker, beauty – beautiful). There are some suffixes, however which are exceptions, i.e. they can change the lexical meaning of a word without forming another part of speech, e.g. -ish: if it is added to adjective stems it forms adjectives – green, greenish; -ie: it is added to noun stems and forms nouns with a diminutive meaning – horse –horsie.

Suffixes can be classified according to the part of speech that they form, according to their origin, according to their productivity and frequency of usage.

Noun Suffixes

1) -er – Germanic origin, forms nouns from verb stems, denotes the agent – worker, teacher; nouns from noun stems or adjective stems of place, denotes 'resident of, one living in' – Londoner, islander;

2) -ing – Germanic origin, forms nouns from verb stems, denotes a process, act, fact, doing, feeling, resulting, accompanying – reading, learning, feeling, covering;

3) -ness – Germanic origin, forms nouns from adjective or verb stems, denotes state, condition, quality or degree – goodness, darkness, forgiveness;

4) –ist – Greek origin, forms nouns from nouns, denotes a person who belongs to some profession, occupation, to some trend in politics, art etc. – violinist, socialist;

5) –ism – Greek origin, forms nouns from nouns or adjectives, denotes teachings, trends in politics, art, systems in social life – socialism, capitalism, modernism;

6) –ess – Romanic origin, forms nouns from noun stems, denotes a feminine being – actress, goddess, lioness;

7) -ment – Romanic origin, forms nouns from verb stems, denotes some action, process – development.

Adjective Suffixes

1) -ish – Germanic origin, forms adjectives from adjective stems, adds the meaning of approaching the quality expressed by the stem – reddish.

It can also form an adjective from a noun stem, means 'looking like the person expressed by the stem' (depreciatory colouring) – childish, womanish. It can also be met in some words denoting nationality – Irish;

2) -ful – Germanic origin, forms adjectives from noun stems, denotes 'full of, abounding in' – thankful, hopeful, harmful;

3) -less – Germanic origin, forms adjectives from noun stems, denotes 'without, not having, devoid of the quality expressed by the noun stem from which it is formed' – aimless;

4) -ed – Germanic origin, forms adjectives from noun stems, denotes 'possessing the quality expressed by the noun stem from which it is formed' – bearded, gifted;

Most often it is used to form compound-derived adjectives – long-legged;

5) -able (-ible) – Romanic origin, forms adjectives from verb stems, denotes 'capable of doing the action expressed by the stem' – eatable, movable;

It can also form adjectives from noun stems, then it denotes 'characterized by the quality expressed by the stem' – comfortable, honourable, fashionable.

Adverb Suffixes

1) -ly– Germanic origin, forms adverbs from adjective stems, denotes the manner of the action – carefully. Some scientists (A.I. Smirnitsky is one of them) consider that in this case we deal not with an adverb but with an adjective used in the function of an adverb because these words have the same grammatical forms as adjectives, i.e. they form degrees of comparison in the same manner as other adjectives: quick – quicker – the quickest, quickly – quicker – quickest.

2) -ward– Germanic origin, forms adverbs from noun or preposition stems, denotes direction: skyward, inward.

Verb Suffixes

1) -ize – Greek origin, forms verbs from noun or adjective stems – generalize, materialize;

2) –ate – Romanic origin, forms verbs from adjective stems – differentiate;

3) -fy (-ify) – Romanic origin, forms verbs from noun or adjective stems – simplify, beautify;

4) –en – Germanic origin, forms noun or adjective stems – lengthen, madden.

Numeral Suffixes

1) -ty – Germanic origin, forms numerals from numeral stems – ninety;

2) -teen – Germanic origin, forms numerals from numeral stems – sixteen.

Prefixes

Prefixes in English cannot build grammatical forms as in Russian (for example, the Russian aspect of verbs – делать – сделать). In English prefixes change the lexical meaning of the root without changing the part of speech. This is their main function.But there are some prefixes in English that are exceptions: be-; en- (em-); pre-, post-, inter-, anti-.

There exist 2 classifications of prefixes:

1) according to the part of speech in which they are met, used;

2) according to the meaning of a prefix.

The meaning of the prefix is not so completely fused with the meaning of the primary stem, as in the case with suffixes, the prefix retains a certain degree of semantic independence. It allows to classify them according to their meaning.

There exist 2 classifications of prefixes:

1) according to the part of speech in which they are met, used;

2) according to the meaning of a prefix.

The meaning of the prefix is not so completely fused with the meaning of the primary stem, as in the case with suffixes, the prefix retains a certain degree of semantic independence. It allows to classify them according to their meaning.

In a very ancient prelanguage, primitive language prefixes and suffixes were independent words added to other words and later, they lost, to a bigger or smaller degree, their independence and their lexical meaning, and became some formal parts of words with a certain grammatical function. But it so happened that up to now, prefixes retained their semantic independence and their lexical meaning to a greater degree than suffixes.