Understanding Morphemes: Simplex and Complex Words
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The morpheme is the smallest, indivisible unit of semantic content or grammatical function from which words are made. Words can be classified into monomorphemic or simplex words ('faith' or 'week') and polymorphemic or complex words ('faithfully' or 'weekly'). 'Faith' and 'week' are free morphemes, while 'faithfully' and 'weekly' are bound morphemes that need to be attached to others. Bound morphemes can be prefixes, suffixes, or infixes.
Free morphemes act as bases to which other morphemes are attached to form derivatives. 'Mother' and 'faith' are examples of simplex bases, while 'faithfulness' is an example of a complex base composed of multiple morphemes.
'Teeth' and 'tables' are examples of nouns in the plural form, with 'tables' showing regular realization of the plural morpheme and 'teeth' showing irregular realization. These variations are allomorphs of the same morpheme.
Various forms of the verb 'to manage' (e.g., 'manage', 'managed', 'manages') represent different forms of the same word, with suffixes providing grammatical information but not altering the lexical meaning of the verb.