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Morphs and Allomorphs

The document discusses morphs, allomorphs, and morphemes. [1] A morph is the phonological realization of a morpheme and is the smallest unit with meaning. [2] Allomorphs are variant forms of a morpheme that have the same meaning but different sounds depending on their environment. [3] A morpheme is an abstract linguistic unit representing a set of allomorphs with the same meaning.

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685 views3 pages

Morphs and Allomorphs

The document discusses morphs, allomorphs, and morphemes. [1] A morph is the phonological realization of a morpheme and is the smallest unit with meaning. [2] Allomorphs are variant forms of a morpheme that have the same meaning but different sounds depending on their environment. [3] A morpheme is an abstract linguistic unit representing a set of allomorphs with the same meaning.

Uploaded by

Vicky Galih Dewangga
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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English Morphology
Morphs and Allomorphs Instructor: Prof. Dr. Siusana Kweldju

1. Morphs

Morph is a name derived from the Greek word for shape and form. A morph is
a combination of phones that has a meaning. It is the phonological realization of
a morpheme. Thus, a morph is a phonological string (of phonemes) that cannot
be broken down into smaller constituents that have a lexicogrammatical
function. In some sense it corresponds to a word-form.

2. Allomorphs

An allomorph is a family of morphs which are alike in two ways:

(a) in the allophones of which they are composed.


(b) in the meaning which they have.

For examples:

Allophones: the English phoneme /p/ can have these following allophones:
pen [phɛn]
spent [spɛnt]

Allomorphs: English plural morpheme {–s}:


hats [hæts]
pens [phɛnz]
glasses [glæsiz]

For your exercise:

What are the allomorphs of the plural morpheme {-s} for cats, twigs,dogs,
and houses?
Cats - '-s' morpheme is pronounced /s/
Twigs, Dogs - '-s' morpheme is pronounced /z/
Houses - '-s' morpheme is pronounced /ɪz/

In other words, an allomorph is a variant form of a morpheme about the sounds


and phonetic symbols but it doesn’t change the meaning. There are three types
of allomorphs, phonologically, morphologically and lexically conditioned
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allomorphs. They have the same meaning and occur in different environments
in complementary distribution.

For example, the English past tense morpheme that we spell -ed has various
morphs. It is realized as [t] after the voiceless [p] of jump (cf. jumped), as [d]
after the voiced [l] of repel (cf. repelled), and as [əd] after the voiceless [t] of
root or the voiced [d] of wed (cf. rooted and wedded). We can also call these
morphs allomorphs or variants. The appearance of one morph over another, in
this case, is determined by voicing and the place of articulation of the final
consonants of the verb stem.

The members of a set of linguistic entities are in complementary distribution


when there is no common environment in which two or more of them appear.

An allomorph is a morph that has a unique set of grammatical or lexical


features. All allomorphs with the same set of features forms a morpheme. An
allomorph is conditioned by the phonetic or sound environment of the word. A
morpheme, then, is a set of allomorphs that have the same set of features.

2.1 Phonologically conditioned allomorph

The choice of allomorph is predictable on the basis of the pronounciation

 Allomorph of the indefinite article : an (before vowels, ex : an elephant)


and a (before consonant, ex : a dog) both of them have the meaning of
“one”, or “single”.
 Allomorphs of the regular past tense morphemes:

1. /id/ after d, t : hated


2. /t/ after all other voiceless sounds : picked
3. /d/ after all other voiced sounds : wedged
4. /im/ before bilabial sounds : impossible
5. /il/ before consonant /l/ : illegal
6. /in/ elsewhere : independent

 Some allomorphs of the negative prefix in-

2.2 Morphologically conditioned allomorph

The choice of allomorph is determined by particular morphemes, not just by


their pronounciation, ex : the morpheme –sume in changes to –sumpt- in
(consume = consumption)
3

2.3 Lexically conditioned allomorph

The choice of allomorph is unpredictable, thus memorized on a word by word


basis, ex : ox –plural- oxen, sheep-plural- sheep.

There are examples of allomorph.

Example :

(a) Cats /s/, Dogs/z/, Boxes/iz/


(b) Disagreement /dis/
(c) Loved /d/ (Voiced /d/), Walked /t/, (Stopped /t/)

[əz] occurs on nouns ending in s, z, š, z, č, j (sibilants)


[s] occurs following all other voiceless sounds
[z] occurs following all other voiced sounds

3. Morphs, Allomorphs, and Morphemes

A morph is the actual form used to realize a morpheme; while an allomorph is


the different forms of a morpheme. Each morpheme may have a different set of
allomorphs. For example, "-en" is a second allomorph that marks plural in
nouns (irregular, in only three known nouns: ox/ox+en, child/childr+en,
brother/brether+en). The morph "-en" is linked to the allomorph "-en", which
occurs in complementary distribution with "-s". When the possessive is
adjoined to a noun phrase, there is only one phonological form, /s/, but it is
written either as " 's " or " s'". The inflectional pattern of English pronouns is too
complex to go into here. "-en" is a distinct morph from "s".

A morpheme is an abstract entity. A morph is the concrete realization of a


morpheme.

morphs    s, en

 allomorphs s  s, en  s
 morpheme  {[-Past,-Pers, -Pl]} {[+Pl]}  {[+Poss]}

A morpheme can have one or more morphs. Morphs that belong to the same
morpheme are allomorphs.

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