 In the literature, the terms morphological processes and morphological operations have not been used in a uniform way. Some linguists even contradict each other. In the terminology of the virtual linguistics compass, however, these two aspects of morphology have been kept apart very strictly. Morphological operations, as you can see here, morphological operations define how words can be modified, for example by the addition of new material, by the change of existing material. This unit outlines the central operations using present-day English and some other languages as examples. Let's first of all look at some types of morphological operation in general. To build words, morphological operations have to manipulate base forms in various ways. This can be done by means of adding material, concatenating material, adding material. Two or more entities can be added. It can be achieved by non-concatenative operations, in which case the base is somehow modified, and it can be done in terms of further operations that range from more complicated concatenative operations or others, or to the subtraction of material from the base. Let's start with concatenative operations. As you can see here, on top there is the term affix. First of all, because many people associate concatenative operations with affixation, and this is the simplest and most direct means perhaps by which a language can mark a category in terms of grammatical properties. The material that is added is referred to as an affix. The operation is called affixation. Depending on their position in relationship to the base, affixes can be called prefixes, and the operation would be prefixation. So let's write down some examples here. For example, in present-day English we have something like misleads. I'm now using orthography even though everyone knows that it is pretty clear that morphological analysis has to be carried out in terms of phonology. But this is the simpler procedure here. So this would be a prefix. A next possibility would be an infix. The operation would be called infixation. Now infixation is hardly used in English. Well, if it is used, it is used in highly expressive language. For example, you could invent or make up the word kangaroo and insert, as I said, in an expressive way kangaroo. Well, what a word this is. This would be an infix because it is inserted into the base. Another one would be suffixation. This is another operation where we add material to the base. Now suffixes typically occur in present-day English again. Kindly, this would be a suffix that turns an adjective into an adverb. Or inflectional suffixes like walks. So here something is added towards the end. And finally we have circumfixes. Now circumfixes do not exist in present-day English, but here's an example from German. My mother tongue, which expresses a verb. Now the base form of the verb is leg, which means is the base form of the verb to put something somewhere. And this circumfix then expresses the past participle of this verb. So these are concatenative operations, as I said, the most important ones affixation. Now let's look at some non-concatenative operations. Well, they show us that the picture of words consisting of a string of morphs is too simple across languages. Besides affixation there are quite a few other formal operations by which complex word forms can be derived. These operations in summary are called non-concatenative operations, since the resulting word cannot easily be segmented into morphs. Let's first of all look at vocalic changes. Now vocalic changes are well known. This is an important type of base modification where the vowel of the base is changed. Often this is referred to as vowel alternation. Well, two types of vowel change can be found in present day English or in other languages. The first one is the so-called ablout, which where the vowel of the base form is changed. In English we have verbs like drink and the past tense form is drank. Now this is a typical vocalic change where the i is changed into a. By the way the same can be used for German where we have ich trinke, i drink, versus ich trank. So this is an ablout. Other changes which we do not want to exemplify here is the so-called umlout, which in English cannot be found any more, at least not in the synchronical analysis of English as it stands now. But in the past in old English there were many cases of umlout. Let's now look at another change, the tonal change. Now this is quite interesting. However we need a native speaker here and I introduce Mao Mao from China, whose mother tongue obviously is Mandarin Chinese and she will illustrate to us now tonal changes by first of all writing down one word in four different characters. Okay, go ahead please. So first of all the Chinese characters and then later Mao Mao will pronounce these words and will also tell us what they mean. And tonal changes of course are used in languages such as Chinese or Vietnamese languages where the syllables are associated with particular tones. Now here we see the one wonderful logographic script. Perfect writing. I will never understand how Chinese speakers can cope with this complicated writing system. Okay, now first of all tell us what they mean these words. What is the first word? Mother. Mother. Okay, let's write down these words. Mother, the next one is hemp. And then we have horse. Okay, and curse. Okay, curse. Okay, so these are the meanings. Now we need the Chinese pronunciations and we have to write that down phonologically. So can you pronounce them to us? Ma. And I can identify a level tone here. The second one is ma. Ah, that was a nice rising tone. And the third one is ma. That's the one where we have most trouble. That was a fall rise, wasn't it? Okay, fall rise. And the last one is ma. Ah, that was a very significant fall. So let me repeat that. Ma. Ma. Ma. Ma. Oh, well, this is difficult anyway. But you can see here the problem of the tonal analysis. In fact, one of the most well known non concatenative operations in morphology. Now, let's look at another operation, stress change. Now we know that in present day English, for example, we can distinguish words by shifting the stress. For example, if we stress the first syllable in this word, then it is a noun. Contrast. If we stress the second syllable in this word, contrast, it becomes a verb. And we have similar phenomena in my mother tongue in German. Where, for example, you have a word like, let me first of all spell it before I pronounce it. Übersetzen. If I stress the second syllable, then the meaning is translate. So here we have a meaning change. And if I stress the first syllable, Übersetzen, then it means something like carry over. So stress shift determines the meaning in some German examples. It determines the word class, can determine the word class in selected examples in present day English. Now let's look at some further operations. Well, a well-known operation which can be found across languages is reduplication. In fact, we can find this operation where part or all of the affected base, perhaps modified in some systematic fashion, is copied. English makes use of this very sporadically. You can see examples here, like in Hurley Burley or 50-50, Sing Song, Helter Skelter or Honky Tonky. So these are typical examples that I use. Children use this very often in words like yummy yummy when something tastes very nice. So that is reduplication. However, reduplication can also be used in other languages to mark inflectional categories. Let's look at an example. So here is an example from the VLC Language Index, a large database with sound information about the languages of the world. And here we have Indonesian. I just picked one speaker out of our 15 speakers which are represented on the VLC. And here you find the pattern which signals books, big books, the very big book in the book, on the book and so on. And you see the singular in Indonesian is buku. And the plural, buku buku. Again, buku buku. So you see, full reduplication, you simply use the same base form twice to signal the plural in Indonesian. Finally, we have an operation which is called supletion. This is perhaps the most extreme form of base modification. It concerns the complete replacement of one base by another. This is most frequently encountered in the close classes of grammar, pronouns, copula. And here even, so copula would be something like B is M, where it is very hard if not impossible to see relationships between these items which belong to the same paradigm. Or the example, go and went, where really it is impossible to relate went as the past tense form of go morphologically to its base. So supletion is thus a morphological operation that expresses no systematic similarity between the forms of a paradigm. Let's summarize. Morphological operations define how words can be modified. In other words, what type of operation is applied to change a word? Morphological processes that have not been dealt with here, they define different ways of building words. The two principle ones are inflection and word formation. But they will be discussed in another unit of the virtual linguistics campus.