Course Programme

Morphology is a branch of grammar that studies the internal structure of words, word formation processes as well as forms that words can take in different grammatical contexts.

Many words are composed of smaller meaningful units called morphemes. The combination of morphemes is not arbitrary. It is governed by a set of rules that ensure the systematicity of word forms and word formation patterns. To become a proficient speaker of English, it is essential, therefore, to be familiar with those systematic patterns in order to be able to use words correctly in different grammatical contexts.

The present course called "English Morphology" will help you to become familiar with the internal structure of English words in order to be able to recognize and use correctly different combinatorial patterns of English morphemes.

The present course consists of 5 modules.

Introduction

This module defines the place of morphology among other branches of linguistics and introduces the basic terminology required to follow the course.

Chapter 1: Inflectional Morphology

Words in a given language can be divided into lexical categories called parts of speech (nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc.). Words belonging to the same part of speech take similar forms in similar grammatical contexts. This phenomenon is called inflectional morphology.

In this chapter we will explore inflectional forms of each part of speech that exists in the English language as well as their morphological structure.

Chapter 2: derivational morphology

Derivation is a word formation process that involves the use of derivational affixes. Each part of speech has its own derivational patterns. We can, for instance, construct a noun from a verb or an adjective using specific affixes.

In this chapter you will study derivational patterns of each part of speech. Then you will consolidate this knowledge by learning how to represent the internal structure of words with the help of tree diagrams.

chapter 3: other words formation processes

In this chapter you will be introduced to other word formation processes that are not derivational in nature.

final test

By doing the final test, you will be able to assess your achievements.