Word-Formation Processes
| Process | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Neologisms | Invented words that have no reference to existing words. | ‘googol’ (a lexeme meaning ‘1 followed by 100 zeroes’) |
| Blends | Amalgamations of two free morphemes, combining parts of each original morpheme. | spork (spoon + fork), podcast (iPod + broadcast) |
| Initialisms | Words formed from the initials of a sequence of words, pronounced as letters. | ‘FBI’, ‘CD’, ‘USB’ |
| Acronyms | Words formed from initials of a sequence of words, pronounced as a whole word. | ‘QANTAS’, ‘RAM’ |
| Shortenings/Reductions | Reduced forms of words used to save time or space, often informal. | university > uni, telephone > phone |
| Compounding | Combining two free morphemes into one new word, with no part of either morpheme lost. | carport (car + port), Facebook (Face + book) |
| Conversion | Creating a new word by changing the word class of an existing word. | email (noun) > to email (verb), Google (noun) > to Google (verb) |
| Contractions | Standardised shortenings of two words, with an apostrophe replacing omitted letters. | I’ll (I will), don’t (do not) |
| Collocations | Groups of words that frequently occur together, forming predictable associations. | hustle and bustle, salt and pepper, man and wife |
| Borrowing | Lexemes borrowed from other languages. | ‘café’ (French), ‘boomerang’ (Darug), ‘algebra’ (Arabic) |
| Commonisation | Proper nouns that broaden their meaning over time. | ‘biro’, ‘kleenex’, ‘hoover’ |
| Archaism | Lexemes that have fallen out of regular use. | ‘thee’ and ‘thou’ for ‘you’, ‘coney’ for ‘rabbit’ |
Lexical Patterning
| Type | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Simple Lexical Patterning | Repetition of a word in its identical form or with minor changes. | ‘sing’ (first person) and ‘sings’ (third person), ‘horse’ (singular) and ‘horses’ (plural) |
| Complex Lexical Patterning | Repeated use of words and their forms through affixation. | ‘category’, ‘categorise’, ‘categorical’ |
Morphological Patterning
| Process | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Conversion of Word Class | Changing a word class, primarily through suffixes. | -able (‘readable’), -er (‘teacher’) |
| Affixation (Nominalisation) | Creating a noun from other word classes, adding stylistic patterns. | -ist (‘artist’), -ism (‘ageism’) |
| Reduplication | Repeating part of a word to form diminutives. | ‘Night night’, ‘cuddle-wuddle’ |
| Diminutives | Adding a diminutive suffix to indicate intimacy or fondness. | barbie (for barbeque), servo (for service station) |
Phonological Patterning
| Pattern | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Alliteration | Repetition of a phoneme at the beginning of words. | Big blue balloons |
| Assonance | Repetition of the same vowel sound in a sequence. | Save the whales! |
| Consonance | Repetition of the same consonant sound anywhere in a sequence. | red-head, willy-nilly |
| Onomatopoeia | Words that resemble their meaning through sound. | Snap, Crackle, Pop! |
| Rhythm (Meter) | Pattern of syllables in a text, including stressed and unstressed syllables. | ‘Jack fell down and broke his crown’ |
| Rhyme | Repetition of sound units at the end of lines. | ‘I’m a little teapot / short and stout’ |
Semantic Patterning
| Pattern | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Simile | Comparing two things using 'like' or 'as'. | White as a sheet, Sleeps like a log |
| Idiom | Fixed expressions with meanings conveyed as a whole. | It’s raining cats and dogs, Bring a plate |
| Pun | Linguistic humour based on wordplay and lexical ambiguity. | ‘Flu York City’, ‘I’m feeling effluent today’ |
| Personification | Attributing human qualities to non-human entities. | The stars winked cheerfully, The computer hates me! |
| Animation | Attributing animate qualities to non-human entities. | The wind howled, The waffle leapt out of the toaster |
| Metaphor | Equating one thing to another by transferring qualities. | Love is a harsh and pure honey, You’re being such a dog |
| Irony | Meaning is opposite to the literal interpretation of the words. | ‘We are committed to excellence’ |
| Lexical Ambiguity | Potential for multiple interpretations of language. | ‘Flying planes can be dangerous.’ |
| Oxymoron | Combining seemingly opposite qualities that are both true. | Parting is such sweet sorrow, The living dead |
Syntactical Patterning
| Pattern | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Listing | Placing three or more related elements together. | Syntactical patterning is characterised by structures like listing, parallelisms, and antithesis… |
| Parallelism | Structural similarity between phrases, clauses, or sentences. | ‘I stand before you today the representative of a family in grief, in a country in mourning before a world in shock.’ |
| Antithesis | Contrasting ideas or phrases repeated in sequence. | ‘There’s a long version and a short version.’ |