Morphology1 How are phonology and morphology different?

Phonology is the study of the smallest contrastive parts (units) of a language Morphology is the study of the smallest meaningful units in language and of how those meaningful units are used to build new signs. Word formation and how language uses smaller units to build larger units. Ex: BUG, FROG (handshape has no meaning) 3 MONTHS handshape has meaning Ex: PREACH, DYE (handshape has no meaning) 9 WEEKS Morpheme: smallest meaningful unit in a language. A morpheme can also be a process (ex: verbs become nouns convict convict) Free morpheme: can occur by themselves as independent units like cat sit or ASL CAT or LOUSY. Bound morpheme: cannot occur by themselves (ex: plural s) Process morpheme: the process of moving the stress of the syllables present (noun) and present (verb) Form morpheme-walkER, writer Process morpheme- in English, its the process of moving the stress of the syllables English examples present (verb) vs present (noun) convert (verb) vs convert (noun) segment (verb) vs segment (noun) Process morpheme- in ASL, its the process of reduplication in noun/verb pairs ASL examples OPEN BOOK vs BOOK SELL vs STORE SIT vs CHAIR Compounds Phonological rules like assimilation, movement epenthesis and hold deletion apply to compound signs. Morphological rules like the first contact rule, the single sequence rule and the weak hand anticipation rule apply to compound signs. GIRL-SAME sister MOTHER-FATHER parents THINK-MARRY believe THINK-SAME AS its like for example THINK-TOUCH obsess
1. Lingusitics of American Sign Language by Valli, Lucas, & Mulrooney. 2005 Gallaudet University. Summarized by Nicole Wise, Wise Communications Tampa, Fl, myaslmentor.com

TALK-NAME mention FACE-NEW stranger GOOD-ENOUGH barely adequate LOOK-STRONG resemble Lexicalized fingerspelling and Loan Signs (borrowing signs from other countries) #BANK #BACK #OFF #ON #IF #SALE #EARLY #BUT #BUS #CAR #HA #DO #SO #OK #KO #JOB #YES #NO #DOG #TOY #FIX #WHAT The signs above are examples of lexicalized fingerspelled words. They become their own signs. -Signs may be deleted (ex: #YES) -The location may change (ex: #BACK, #FOOD) -Handshapes may change (ex: #CAR) -Movement may be added (ex: #YES, #BANK) -The orientation may change (ex: #JOB, #HA, #DO) -Reduplication (ex: #HA, #DO) -Addition of a second hand (ex: #WHAT, #BACK) -Grammatical information may be included (ex: #BACK, #OFF, #NO) Numeral Incorporation By changing the handshape into a number it changes the meaning of the sign. Numeral incorporation can be found with the signs WEEK, MONTH, DAY, DOLLAR

AMOUNT, PLACE IN A RACE, EXACT TIME, PERIOD OF TIME, AND HEIGHT. Space: Classifier Predicates A classifier in ASL is a handshape that is combined with location, orientation, movement, and non-manual signals to form a predicate (verb phrase). Ex: CAR DRIVE BY Classifier Predicates have 2 parts: Movement roots and handshapes Movement Roots 1. Stative Descriptive: The hand moves to describe an object, but the movement of the hand does not mean that the object itself is moving. Ex: FLAT-SURFACE, PILE-OF-COINS, MOUND-OF-RICE 2. Process: In this group, the hand moves, and the movement does mean that the object is moving or appears to be moving. Ex: CAR DRIVE BY, PERSON WALK BY, TREES GO BY. 3. Contact Root: In this group, the hand has a downward movement, but it does not mean that the object is moving nor does it describe the shape of the object. Ex: CAR PARKED Classifier Handshapes 1. Whole Entity Morphemes: Refers to an object as a whole, like a car, an animal or a person standing. Other examples are airplanes, person lying down, old person, people in a line, and a piece of paper. 2. Surface Morphemes: These handshapes represent thin surfaces or wires, narrow surfaces, or wide surfaces. 3. Instrumental Morphemes: Represents hands holding different objects for instruments as the act on objects. Examples include paper, various cups, and instruments like a hammer, rake or baseball bat. 4. Depth and Width Morphemes: These handshapes represent the depth and width of different things, such as tree trunks and pipes and include the representation of layers, such as layer of think make-up, layer of snow or various widths of stripes. 5. Extent Morphemes: Handshapes in this group represent amounts or volumes such as an amount of liquid in a glass, a stack of papers, or an increase or decrease of an amount. Ex: DEFLATE TIRE 6. Perimeter-Shape Morphemes: represents the external shape of an object, such as a notecard, coins or buttons. 7. On Surface Morphemes: Handshapes in this group represent large groups or crowds of people, animals or objects, such as a herd of cattle moving or an audience. Space: Perspective or Locative Verbs Locative Verbs are like classifier verbs in that they use space to represent a location. Ex: JOHN THROW ROCK the sign THROW represents the direction in which it was

actually thrown Unlike plain verbs (EX: ENJOY, PUNISH, UPSET) where location does not have independent meaning, locative verbs (EX: PUT, #HURT, SURGERY, PAIN) location can be changed and has independent meaning. Classifier Predicates and Signers Perspective Ex: SURFACE PASS UNDER VEHICLE Ex: VEHICLE PASS VEHICLE Ex: SURFACE PASS PERSON Ex: SURFACE PASS UNDER COIN Ex: VEHICLE GOING UPHILL Ex: VEHICLE GOING DOWNHILL Subject-Object Agreement (Directional Verbs) In English, subject-object agreement consists of word order and verbs (whether or not they contain information about the subject) The boy (subject) sees (third person verb) the girl (object). Except fot the third person s verbs in English generally do not contain information about the subject and object. In ASL, many verbs contain information about both the subject and object (separate signs are not required for the subject and verb). That information is contained in the location or orientation or both. Not all verbs include the information in the same way. Ex: HATE, HELP, SAY-NO-TO, HIRE Reciprocals include information about two subjects and two objects. Ex: UNDERSTAND-EACH-OTHER Ex: LOOK-AT-EACH-OTHER Pronouns and Determiners Pronouns: represents a noun In English, its words like he, she, we, us, they, her etc. In ASL, we use indexing. He is silly. Pro 3 SILLY. Determiners: words or signs that modify nouns. In English, those are words like a, an, theIn ASL, it is represented by indexing. Ex: The girl is silly GIRL IX(det) SILLY Temporal Aspect The temporal aspect is how the verb is signed in reference to time. A sign can be modified to show if the verb is never ending, frequent, drawn out, or intense. Ex: STUDY-CONTINUOUSLY, STUDY-REGULARLY, STUDY-FOR A LONG TIME, STUDY-IN-A-HURRY Ex: SIT Ex: WORK

Derivational Morphology and Inflectional Morphology Reminder: Morphology is the study of the smallest meaningful units of a language and of how those meaningful units are used to build new words or signs. Morphology is the study of word formation, how language uses smaller units to build larger units. Derivational Morphology is the process of making new units for the language (deriving new units). Ex: In English, write becomes writer with the addition of the morpheme (meaningful unit) er). In ASL, this is done numerous ways, already described in these notes. Some examples are fingerspelled signs, numeral incorporation, classifier predicates, compounding etc. Inflectional Morphology is the process of adding grammatical information to units that already exist. Ex: In English, cat becomes cats. By adding-s we added information but didnt change the word. In ASL, we have two examples of inflectional morphology-temporal aspect and subject-object agreement. Ex: SIT-FOR-A-LONG-TIME the verb SIT is inflected by adding a circular motion Ex: I-GIVE-TO-HER the verb GIVE is inflected to include both subject and object Time in ASL Expressing Tense in ASL Use of the imaginary time line is integral. Some signs obviously include the time line like FROM-NOW-ON, A-LONG-TIME-AGO, UP-TIL-NOW. Other lexical items can be used like, YESTERDAY, MORNING, NOW, RECENTLY, TOMORROW, SOON etc. Habitual and duration time in ASL EVERY WEEK EVERY MORNING ALL NIGHT ALL DAY EVERY TUESDAY WILL and FINISH The signs WILL and FINISH are not used in the exact same way in ASL as it is in English. In the English sentence Tomorrow I will go to the store could be signed TOMORROW, I GO STORE. Adding the sign WILL adds emphasis I will go to the store tomorrow!!! The English sentence Yesterday he walked should be signed YESTERDAY pro 3 WALK not YESTERDAY pro 3 WALK FINISH. The latter sentence would be translated as Yesterday he did walk! as if to clear up doubt. However, consider the English sentence Once he finished his walk, he ate. YESTERDAY PRO 3 WALK FINISH, EAT PRO 3.