- Definition : Morphology is the study of morphemes. A morpheme is a part of a word which has recognisable meaning, and which cannot be broken into smaller meaningful elements.
- Example : The word unthinkable has three morphemes : un- meaning not; think; and able meaning can be done.
- Morphemes may be free (able to stand alone as with think and able) or bound (unable to stand alone as with un-)
- Morphemes may have a number of variants, or allomorphs. For example, the negative morpheme un- may also be expressed in various other ways : in- ir- il- im- etc
Further reading
McCarthy, M. 1990, Vocabulary, OUP
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