Morpheme

In lingueestics, a morpheme is the wee-est pairt o a wird that cairies ocht that gies a semantic unnerstaundin. Morphemes is, for ordinar, a kenspeckle pittin thegither o phonemes (as the lowse furm haund or the bund form s in haunds) haein nae wee-er meaninfu members.

Scots example: The wird wanchancy haes three morphemes, the (negatory) bund morpheme wan, the lowse morpheme chance an y. Wan is a prefix an y is a suffix. The baith is affixes.

kynds o morphemes

  • Lowse morphemes lik toun an mill can be soudert tae ither lexemes (as in tounhoose or mill-lade) or thay can staund alane - lowse. Allomorphs is variants o a morpheme, e.g. the plural merker <s> in Scots whiles comes oot as /z/ or /s/.
  • Bund morphemes like wan juist kythes thegither wi ither morphemes tae shape a lexeme. Bund morphemes for ordinar tends tae be prefixes an suffixes.
  • Inflectional morphemes modifee's a wird's tense, nummer, aspect an siclike.
  • Dereevational morphemes can be eikit tae a wird for tae shape anither wird: for example bi eikin lins tae blind gies blindlins.