Morpheme and Syllable ( Morph, Allomorph)

A morpheme is the minimal recurring unit of grammatical structure,

possessing a distinctive phonemic form, having a grammatical function and

may differ in its phonological manifestations.

- Morpheme and syllable: 

    A morpheme might have one syllable, more than one syllable, or no syllable at all. Tin, train, gold, pen, man, cat, and dog are monosyllabic morphemes (words with just one syllable). However, terms like station and instructor are not allowed.

Examples:

    Sta-tion, tea-cher, Hyperion, and introduction are two-syllable words; while chloromycetin is five-syllable words. These are all single morphemes with varying syllable counts. On the other hand, there are morphemes that may be characterized as having no syllable at all, such as the plural morpheme /-s/ and the past tense morpheme /- d/. 

    They are morphemes, even if they are not syllables. In this sense, the zero allomorph scenario is much more intriguing.

Morph:

    The idea of morph acknowledges that morphemes have phonetic shapes. This phonetic representation is referred to as its morph. The word writer is made up of two morphemes: write and - er. These may be represented by the phonetic forms /rait/ and/-:/. These are two different variants of the same morpheme (or word in this case).

Allomorph:

     In our examination of morpheme, we noticed that it may appear in a variety of phonetic shapes or forms. The plural morpheme is expressed as /-s/, /-z/, /-iz/, and so on. 

    Similarly, the past tense morpheme may be pronounced as /-d/, /-t/, /-id/, and /-q/. Each of these morphs is a member of the same morpheme. These are known as allomorphs.

In English, the plural morpheme (which combines with a noun morpheme to make a plural) is represented by three allomorphs in distinct environments: /s/, /z/, and /iz/. (which are phonologically conditioned).

Allomorphs of the Plural Morpheme e(s):

    In the case of words ending in /s/, /z/ Buses / bs z /, for example, and trains / ru: z / /s/ when the word ends in a voiceless consonant (other than, s, ) Cats /kts/, caps /kps/, etc. /z/ for words ending in voiced sounds (other than /z,, /). e.g., boys/bz/, bags/bgz/

    Similarly, the present tense morpheme -e(s) has three allomorphs: /s/, /z/, and /iz/, as in packs /pks/, digs /digz/, and washes /wz /. The English past tense morpheme, -e(d), has three distinct (phonologically conditioned) allomorphs: /t/, /d/, and /id/. The following rule regulates these allomorphs:

Morpheme of the Past::

    {e(d)} /t/ following morphs that terminate in voiceless sounds (except /t/) booked / bkt /, pushed / pt / Except for /d/, /d/ is used following morphs that terminate in voiced sounds. bagged /bgd/, adored /lvd/ /id/ after morphs that end in /t/ and /d/ desired /wantid/ married /wedid/

    The words morph, allomorph, and morpheme are related in the same way as phone, allophone, and phoneme are related. The word morph means shape.'

A morph is any minimum phonetic form that has significance. As a result, /bs/, /z/, /kp/,

Morphs include /s/, /bg/, and /z/.

    Allomorphs of a morpheme are morphs that belong to the same morpheme. Thus, the morphemes /s/, /z/, and /iz/ are allomorphs of the plural morpheme e(s). Similarly, a phoneme is a small, discrete element in a language's sound system.

    A phoneme may appear in more than one phonetic form, which is referred to as allophones. These phonetic variants have a great deal of phonetic similarity, and their phonological purpose is the same. They never occur in the same phonetic setting, though, and are considered to be in complementary distribution.

    Allomorphs, like allophones, are distributed in complementary ways. For example, the phonemes /p/, /t/, and /k/ each have two phonetic forms: [p] and [ph], [t] and [th], and [k] and [kh]. The allophones of the phoneme /p/ are [p] and [ph].

    Phones refer to all spoken sounds (phonemes and allophones). It should be noted that in certain languages, words may typically be split into pieces (morphs), whilst in others, this is not the case. Similarly, in some languages, the morph represents a single minimum grammatical unit (a morpheme), but in others, it does not.

    Conditioning may cause allomorphs of a morpheme to modify their phonemic forms in two ways:

1. Phonemic or phonological conditioning
2. Morphological conditioning 

Plural Morpheme Phonological Conditioning:

We'll start with the following word groups:

 

Set A		Set B		Set C
set	/sets/	beds	/bedz/	roses	/rəuziz/
clips	/klips/	lads	/lædz/	poses	/pəuziz/;
bits	/bits/	cabs	/kæbz/	horses	/ hɔːs ɪz/
bats	/bæts/	clubs	/kl^bz/	advises	/ədvaɪsɪz/
caps	/kæps/	beads	/bi:dz/	judges	/ dʒʌdʒ ɪz/

 

    In set A, the pluralizing suffix is /s/; in set B, it is /z/. This may be explained by the occurrence of a voiced or voiceless last sound of the stem. Words in set A finish in voiceless sounds /t/ and /p/, which impact the plural morpheme, which also occurs as a voiceless phoneme /-s/.

     In set B, however, the stems finish in a voiced sound, affecting the plural morpheme, which becomes /-z/. The phonetic quality of one sound influences the phonetic quality of another that occurs nearby. Phonetically, the impacted sound is conditioned. Both /-s/ and /-z/ are plural morpheme allomorphs. 

    Their places cannot be switched, i.e., /z/ cannot be in set A and /s/ in set B. As a result, these sounds are distributed in a complementary manner. Similarly, nouns in set C adopt the plural morpheme, which is phonetically realized as /iz/. These words exhibit phonological conditioning as well.

As a result, three phonologically conditioned allomorphs of the plural morpheme /s/ are obtained.

/z/, /iz/ Phonological conditioning may be predicted.