sci.lang
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: stem or root?

Subject: Re: stem or root?
From: Nathan Sanders
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 2006 18:01:12 -0400
Newsgroups: sci.lang
In article <1156877767.835269.254560@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
 "Peter T. Daniels" <grammatim@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Nathan Sanders wrote:
> > In article <4lj1vkF258ckU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
> >  Harlan Messinger <hmessinger.removethis@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> > > > In your example, "Wag" would be the root (and perhaps a zero-derived
> > > > stem, if inflectional affixes can be added to it alone), while "Wagen"
> > > > is a stem.
> > >
> > > But "en" in "Wagen" isn't an affix. The fact that it reduces to "n" in
> > > "Wagner" isn't different from the "y" in "city" changing to "ie" in
> > > "cities", and the "y" certainly isn't an affix.
> >
> > Oops, sorry, I completely misunderstood your example.  In that case,
> > "Wag(e)n" is both a root and a suffix.  "Wag" is nothing, unless is
> > appears in another word without "(e)n".
> 
> Both a root and a stem.

Dangit, yep.  An unfortunate thinko there.

> You've left "base" out!

True.

Nathan

-- 
Nathan Sanders
Linguistics Program
Williams College
http://wso.williams.edu/~nsanders/

-- 
Posted via a free Usenet account from                                 www.teranews.com">http://www.teranews.com


<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>
Privacy Policy