Allomorph 4m4e29

ALLOMORPH PREPARED BY: NADIYA BINTI KHALIK MOHD FADHLI BIN DAUD FARHANA BT MOHD FAUZI PISMP 5 SNED 1

 Allomorph is a linguistics term for a variant form of morpheme.  In some cases a morpheme has more than one allomorph. Concept of allomorph occurs when a unit of meaning can vary in sound (phonologically), but the meaning is remain the same.

It is used in linguistics to explain the comprehension of variation in sound for a specific morpheme.  In some cases a morpheme has more than one allomorph.

This happens when the same meaning unit like [past] for past tense or [pl] for plural has more than one sound form Past: one feature [past] kick / kick-ed leave / lef-t hit / hit-Ø  Different allomorphs of a morpheme are part of the same morpheme, but are found in particular contexts.

The same is true of the different allomorphs of a morpheme Which allomorph of a morpheme is found depends on its context; Example: consider [pl] for English plural. It normally has the pronunciation –s (i.e. /z/), but moose / moose- Ø ox / ox-en box/*box-en/box-es So, the special allomorphs depend on the noun

Regular and irregular allomorph In the examples above, the different allomorphs have a distinct status. One of them is regular. This is the default form that appears when speakers are using new words: (one blork, two blorks) For another allomorphs, speakers have to memorize the fact that the allomorph is what it is Example: It cannot be predicted from other facts that the plural of ox is ox-en Demonstration: The regular plural is /z/; consider one box, two box-es.

Default cases like the /z/ plural are called regular. Allomorphs that have to be memorized are called irregular. Irregular allomorphs block regular allomorphs from occurring (ox-en, not *ox-es or *ox-en-s).

Two types of Allomorph The Plural morpheme in English has different soundforms: dog-s/cat-s/churches These are predictable, based on the phonological context

In the case of Past Tense allomorphy, it is not predictable from the phonology which affix appears We can find verbs with the same (or similar) sound form, but with different allomorphs: break/broke, not stake/*stoke

In English, the negative prefix ‘in’ has several allomorph. For examples: 1.in-capable 2.il-logical 3.im-probable 4.ir-relevent