What is an affix morpheme: definition and examples

The grammar of the Spanish language is considered one of the richest in the world. That is, we enjoy a language with great variety that allows us to speak properly and has terms for everything. However, this great richness also makes its study somewhat more complex, but also exciting. It is wonderful to discover the many "nooks" that our language keeps.

That is why we begin here a new lesson from a PROFESSOR in which we introduce ourselves into several of these aforementioned "nooks". Then let's know what is an affix morpheme. We will learn its definition, we will put several examples and we will also discover how to differentiate them within its many typologies. You sign up? Well get ready, this begins now.

To know exactly what an affix morpheme is, the most important thing is to start with its definition. In this case we are talking about linguistic elements that are attached to other words both in a previous, intermediate and postponed position. They are used in the bypass and bending process

, so that they alter the meaning of the words, and that is how you can create new ones.

It should be added that an affix, when it is prior to a word, receives the name of prefix. Likewise, if it goes in the intermediate zone, it will be a infix, and it goes in the final part, it is a suffix.

We must also distinguish affixes according to their objective, since they can alter the meaning of a word to which they are attached. In this case we find that:

• If they alter the meaning of a word grammatically, they are called inflectional affixes.
• In case they alter the meaning of the word in a semantic sense, they are known as derivative affixes. In fact, some authors consider that these are the only existing affixes.

That is, the affix is ​​a morpheme with ability to form new words in the inflection and derivation processes to enrich the lexical families. For this reason, it is added to the root or lexeme of the original word, in such a way that it offers enormous productivity to give new meanings to the language.

To know more exactly what an affix morpheme is, we must also distinguish between its typology according to your location in a word. That is, we will have in this case:

• Prefixes: they always go before the lexeme, so that they are unstressed and have no capacity to vary the grammatical category of a word. Examples of this are PRE-season or ANTE-deluge.
• Suffixes: these are the ones that always appear on the back of the lexeme. They are tonic and can change the grammatical category of a word, as well as its gender in nouns. That is, they can distinguish between noun suffixes, as cruel-da of cruel, verb suffixes, how to fortify strong, or adverbial suffixes, as wild-MIND of wild.
• Interfixes: they lack meaning and sometimes appear between the lexeme and an added affix, such as piecECito.
• Infixes: they go within the root or lexeme of a word to divide it into two parts. They are not easily located in common Spanish grammar, but when alterations occur as affectionate diminutives, they are used, as in CarlITos.
• Circumfixes: they imply that two affixes appear in different positions. They are very rare to find in any language. In fact, in Spanish they hardly exist, although we can give examples of other languages, such as Mapuche, which is spoken in Chile, with LIENEO.

Here are some examples of affixes, mainly prefixes and suffixes, which are the most common:

Prefixes:

• Amorphous
• Antinomy
• Audiovisual
• Autonomous
• Bike
• Co-author
• Disorder
• Discontinuous
• Discord
• Decrease
• Disbelieve
• Dislocate
• Hemicycle
• Hemiplegia
• Hypothermia
• Immortal
• Impostor
• Dreamer
• Unlikely
• Immoral
• Innate
• Naive
• Unreadable
• Inevitable
• Illegal
• Misfit
• Metamorphosis
• Metacenter
• Megaphone
• Megastore
• Microscope
• Minibus
• Multicolored
• Multimillionaire

Suffixes:

• Monarchy
• Oligarchy
• Friend
• Poke
• Baldazo
• Insecticide
• Genocide
• Parricide
• Paraphilia
• Zoophilia
• Anglophilia
• Bibliophilia
• Cinephilia
• Francophilia
• Timbrofilia
• Great
• Soaring
• Beautiful
• Very fast
• Cubism
• Fascism
• Christianity
• Buddhism
• Communism
• Grandpa
• Mommy
• Puppy
• Psychology
• Immunology
• Slushy
• Intellectualoid
• Booklet
• Manota
• Stone
• Blackish