The word formation process The word formation process (2) | Page 2

The word formation process
Word formation is the creation of a new word. Word formation is sometimes contrasted
with semantic chance, which is a change in a single words meaning.
There are s numbers of methods of word formation, some of these are:
1. Compounding:
The process of combining two words to create a new word (a noun, a verb or an adjective).
Compounding in English are written sometimes as one word (sunglasses), sometimes as
two hyphenated words ( life-threatening), and sometimes as two separate words (football
stadium)
The combination words can be:
Noun + noun: lipstick, teapot
Adjective + noun: fast food, soft drink
Verb + adjective: breakfast
Noun + verb: sunshine, babysit
Noun + adjective: waterproof
Examples:
Air + port: airport
House + boat: houseboat
Head + room: headroom
2. Affixation
Affixation is the process of adding a morpheme or affix to a word to create either a
different form of that word or a new word with a different meaning; affixation is the most
common way of making new words in English.
With just put an affix is a word element to alter the form or the meaning of a word and
comes in the form of either prefix or suffix. Prefixes includes examples like “re-“ “self” or
“un”, while the suffixes come in the form of ending elements like “-hood” “-ing” or “-ed”