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Root (linguistics)
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The root is the primary lexical unit of a word, which carries the most significant aspects of semantic content and cannot be reduced into smaller constituents. Content words in nearly all languages contain, and may consist only of, root morphemes. However, sometimes the term "root" is also used to describe the word minus its inflectional endings, but with its lexical endings in place. For example, chatters has the inflectional root or lemma chatter, but the lexical root chat.
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The root is the primary lexical unit of a word, which carries the most significant aspects of semantic content and cannot be reduced into smaller constituents. Content words in nearly all languages contain, and may consist only of, root morphemes. However, sometimes the term "root" is also used to describe the word minus its inflectional endings, but with its lexical endings in place. For example, chatters has the inflectional root or lemma chatter, but the lexical root chat. Inflectional roots are often called stems, and a root in the stricter sense may be thought of as a monomorphemic stem.
Roots can be either free morphemes or bound morphemes. Root morphemes are essential for affixation and compounds.
The root of a word is a unit of meaning (morpheme) and, as such, it is an abstraction, though it can usually be represented in writing as a word would be. For example, it can be said that the root of the English verb form running is run, or the root of the Spanish superlative adjective amplísimo is ampl-, since those words are clearly derived from the root forms by simple suffixes that do not alter the roots in any way. In particular, English has very little inflection, and hence a tendency to have words that are identical to their roots. But more complicated inflection, as well as other processes, can obscure the root; for example, the root of mice is mouse (still a valid word), and the root of interrupt is, arguably, rupt, which is not a word in English and only appears in derivational forms (such as disrupt, corrupt, rupture, etc.). The root rupt is written as if it were a word, but it's not.
This distinction between the word as a unit of speech and the root as a unit of meaning is even more important in the case of languages where roots have many different forms when used in actual words, as is the case in Semitic languages. In these, roots are formed by consonants alone, and different words (belonging to different parts of speech) are derived from the same root by inserting vowels. For example, in Hebrew, the root gdl represents the idea of largeness, and from it we have gadol and gdola (masculine and feminine forms of the adjective "big"), gadal "he grew", higdil "he magnified" and magdelet "magnifier", along with many other words such as godel "size" and migdal "tower".
Secondary roots
"Consider Israeli Hebrew ????? mikúm ‘locating’, from Israeli Hebrew ??? vmqm ‘locate’, which derives from Biblical Hebrew ???? måqom ‘place’, whose root is ??? vqwm ‘stand’. A recent example introduced by the Academy of the Hebrew Language is ????? midrúg ‘rating’, from ???? midrág, whose root is ??? vdrg ‘grade’."
According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann, "this process is morphologically similar to the production of frequentative (iterative) verbs in Latin, for example:
iactito ‘to toss about’ derives from iacto ‘to boast of, keep bringing up, harass, disturb, throw, cast, fling away’, which in turn derives from iacio ‘to throw, cast’ (whose past participle is iactus). scriptito ‘to write often, compose’ is based on scribo ‘to write’ (<‘to draw lines, engrave with a sharp-pointed instrument’). dicto ‘to say often, repeat’ is from dico ‘to indicate, say, speak, tell’. clamito ‘to cry loudly/often, shout violently’ derives from clamo ‘call, shout’."
"Consider also Rabbinic Hebrew ??? vtrm ‘donate, contribute’ (Mishnah: T’rumoth 1:2: ‘separate priestly dues’), which derives from Biblical Hebrew ????? t'rumå ‘contribution’, whose root is ??? vrwm ‘raise’; cf. Rabbinic Hebrew ??? vtr` ‘sound the trumpet, blow the horn’, from Biblical Hebrew ????? t'ru`å ‘shout, cry, loud sound, trumpet-call’, in turn from ??? vrw`."
"Similar cases occur in Arabic, e.g.
- ???? vmrkz, cf. ['markaza] ‘centralized (masculine, singular)’, from [markaz] ‘centre’, from [rakaza] ‘plant into the earth, stick up (a lance)’ (< ??? vrkz).
- ???? v'rjh, cf. [ta'arjaha] ‘oscillated (masculine, singular)’, from ['urju:ha] ‘swing (n)’, from [rajaha] ‘weighed down, preponderated (masculine, singular)’ (< ??? vrjh).
- ???? vmhwr, cf. [tamahwara] ‘centred, focused (masculine, singular)’, from [mihwar] ‘axis’, from [ha:ra] ‘turned (masculine, singular)’ (< ??? vhwr).
- ???? vmsxr, cf. ????? [tamasxara] ‘mocked, made fun (masculine, singular)', from ????? [masxara] ‘mockery’, from ??? [saxira] ‘mocked (masculine, singular)’ (< ??? vsxr)."
See also
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