Introduction to Morphology

Course Description

The key aim of the course is to introduce the students to the basic word structure in Pakistani languages. It engages them to have an understanding of words and parts of words. It will help them to understand word structure in Pakistani languages. 

Course Objectives

The objectives of this course are to enable the students to:

• define and describe the terms like morphemes, morphology etc. 
• understand basic concepts and principles in morphology
• apply these principles in analyzing word structures in Pakistan languages
• compare word formations in Pakistani languages.

Course Contents

• Introduction to morphology (with examples from Pakistani languages)                      
  • free morphemes: roots and stems
  • bound morphemes: affixes: prefixes, suffixes, infixes, interfixes, circumfixes
  • morphological productivity: productivity of affixes, prefixes, suffixes, infixes
• Basics of Phonetic Transcription of Words
• Inflectional Morphology
  • Pluralization, Degree Marking, Verb Forms
• Derivational Morphology
  • Formation of Nouns, Adjectives, Verbs and Adverbs
  • Minor processes of derivation: blending,  clipping, backformation, acronym, Reduplication
  • derivation by compounding: endocentric, exocentric and copulative compounds
  • derivation by modification of base
• Morphology of Pakistani Languages
  • word forms in Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashto and other Pakistani languages
  • Descriptive analysis of word forms in Pakistani languages
• Morpho-Semantics- semantic change in word formation processes
• Morphology Interface with Phonology and Syntax
• Morphology-Syntax Interface

Recommended Readings

1. Aronoff, M.  (1994). Morphology by itself.  MIT Press, Cambridge.
2. Bauer, L. (2003). Introducing Linguistic Morphology–Edinburgh University Press
3. Booij, G. (2005) The Grammar of Words–An Introduction to Linguistic Morphology
4. David et al. (2009). Urdu Morphology. Oxford University Press, London
5. Mangrio, R. A. (2016). The Morphology of Loanwords in Urdu: the Persian, Arabic and      English Strands, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne.
6. McCarthy, A. C (2002). An Introduction to English Morphology-Words and their Structure,    Edinburgh University Press. Edinburgh
7. Plag, I. (2002). Word Formation in English -Cambridge University Press. Cambridge
8. Ayto, J. (1999). Twentieth Century Words, Oxford: OUP .
9. Bauer, L. (2001). Morphological Productivity, Cambridge University Press
10. Halpern, A. (1995). On the placement & morphology of clitics. CSLI

Publications, Stanford

1. Yu, A. C (2006) A Natural History of Infixation. Oxford University Press, Chicago
2. Zwicky, A. (1985b). ‘How to Describe Inflection.’ Proceedings of the BerkeleyLinguistics Society 11: 372-386.  Berkeley, California.
3. Zwicky, A and Pullum, G. (1992). A misconceived approach to morphology. InProceedings of WCCFL 91, ed. D. Bates. CSLI, Palo Alto, 387-398.