词汇学论文On the Three Major Processes of English Word formation.doc

On the Three Major Processes of English Word formation 赖惠珊，英D，NO.12 Various ways of forming words can be classified on the basis of frequency of usage, into major of minor processes. The major processes are three. a. Derivation or Affixation (about 17.5%) b. Compounding (about 27%) c. Conversion (about 10.5%) The minor processes are eight. a. Initialism and acronym首字母缩写 (about 9%) b. Blending (about 6%) c. Clipping (about 2%) d. Words from proper names (about 2%) e. Back formation (about 1%) f. Reduplication (about 0.5%)构成重叠 g. Analogy (about 4%) h. Others ( about 3%) One of the three major processes——Affixation or derivation is generally defined as a word formation process by which new words are created by adding a prefix, or suffix, or both, to the base. To be more exact, derivation may be defined as a process of forming new words by the addition of a word element, such as prefix, suffix or combining form, to an already existing word. Prefixes do not generally change the word-class of the stem but only modify its meaning. However, there is an insignificant number of class-changing prefixes. Non-class-changing prefixes such as natural-unnatural, like-dislike, fair- unfair. Class-changing prefixes such as force-enforce, danger-endanger, enslave, enlarge, enrich and empower and so on. In some reference books, prefixes and suffixes are classified according to their source, but this does not seem to help from a practical point of view. It seems more helpful to classify the most important productive prefixes bu their meaning into the following ten categories: 1）Reversative or privative. For example, de- : decentralize, deforest, deregulate dis- :disconnect,, dishearten un- : unpack, un-wrap, unzip 2) "negative" prefixes (a(n)-, dis- , in-, non-, un-) For example, a- (an-) –: anarchy, amoral dis- : disloyal, dislike, disjoint in- (im-,il-, ir-) : infamous, illegal, impossible, irregular non- : nonessential, non-smoker, non-stop, non-science un- : unwis