The Grammatical Rankscale

This is the hierarchical ordering of grammatical units such that the smallest unit comes last and the
highest unit comes first. The grammatical units in ascending order are: morphemes words, phrases,
clauses and sentences. Each unit of grammar is combined the form the one immediately after it. For
instance, morphemes are combined to form words, words are combined to form phrases, etc. Below is a
diagrammatical representation of the grammatical rankscale.

Sentence

Clause

Phrase

Word

Morpheme

Each of the units in the rankscale is explicitly discussed in subsequent sections below.

Morpheme

A morpheme is the smallest unit of grammar that is significant for meaning. Not all Morphemes are
words because some of them cannot stand alone. Morphemes are indivisible.

Types of Morpheme

Free morpheme: this is also called base/root morpheme. Free morphemes can function as words
because they can stand alone and they are the foundation upon which bound morphemes are added.

Bound Morpheme: this kind of morpheme cannot stand on its own. Rather, it is attached to a word. It
includes affixes added to the beginning or end of a word.

Stem: this is the part of a word to which the last suffix is added.

Inflectional/derivational Morpheme: these are morphemes that do not change the word class of the
word they are added to. They are basically grammatical markers of plurality, comparativeness,
superlativeness, tense, possession, etc. Derivational morphemes on the other hand, changes the word
class of the words they are added to.
Parts of speech/Word Class

Parts of speech /word class are Classification of a word based on its function in a sentence: Nouns,
Pronouns, Verbs, Adverbs, Adjectives, Prepositions, Interjections, Conjunctions, articles and
determiners, etc. They are the building blocks for the formation of sentences e.g

The (article) + boy (noun) + is (verb) + sick (adjective)

Corona Virus (noun) + has been declared (Verb: auxiliary + lexical) a (article) global
(adjective) pandemic (noun)

Every words in English language belongs to a part of speech. Sometimes, a word can belong to one
two word classes depending on the context in which it is used. E.g

He has changed

Change is what we ask for

• Knowledge of part of speech gives you basic understanding of the English sentence structure

• They are categorised into:

 Open Class/ Lexical words and

 Closed Class/ Function words

Open Class

These are nouns, verbs, adverbs and adjectives. They belong to the open class because their number
increases as the language develops. For instance, more words are added to the English language
yearly. They are categorized according to their semantic content, that is, they have meaning. They
are carriers of stress. They can function as the head of phrases/groups.

The naughty boy lied to his father

Diligent students never fail

More words can be formed from them e.g

Beauty – Beautify

Problem – Problematise

Danger - Endanger

Add your own examples

Closed Class/ Function Words

 These are pronouns, prepositions, articles and determiners, conjunctions, etc. New words cannot be
formed from them. They do not increase in number as the language develops e.g in, ah!, because,
among, together, other, etc. They do not have meaning

Parts of Speech

1. Nouns: Nouns are naming words used to refer to the name of persons, animals, places, things and
abstractions. E.g anger, love, happiness, problem, challenge, change, etc. They function as the
subject and object of sentences. E.g

Elephants love grass

Love is a beautiful experience

Nouns are further categorized into proper, abstract, concrete, count/non-count and collective noun.

2. Pronouns: they are words used to replace nouns in order to avoid repetition. They also act as
the subject or object in sentences. They are further categorized into personal, possessive,
reflexive, emphatic, indefinite, relative, etc. examples of pronouns are them, his, she, we,
ourselves, etc. For example
He shot himself in his leg.
The house is gigantic. It has seven bedrooms

3. Verbs: these are words that indicate action or a state of being. They are called the predicator
element in sentences and they state what happed in sentences. Sometimes, a sentence can be
realized by only a verb because the verb is the only obligatory element in a typical sentence.
They have different forms based on the subject (singular/plural), tense (present/past/perfect).
They are further classified into lexical/auxiliary verbs, regular/irregular verbs,
transitive/intransitive, etc. Sometimes, their ‘-ing’ form is used as nouns in sentences, in which
case, they are called gerunds. Examples of verbs are cry, teach, punish, preach, etc
4. Adjectives: these are words that describe nouns and pronouns; they provide more information
about them. They are sometimes the complement element in a sentence and they can be found
in nominal groups. Example of adjectives include: elegant, great, awesome, magnificent, perfect,
etc. When adjectives are used in sentences, they can be predicative or attributive. Adjectives
can be in degrees, thus, they can be comparative or superlative
5. Adverbs: these are words that give use more information about verbs, adjectives and other
adverbs. They specify why, how, when, something happened. They can sometimes be identified
by the ‘ly’ attached to them. Examples of adverbs include slowly, fast, elegantly, etc.
6. Prepositions: these indicate the relationship between nouns or pronouns. They usually start
prepositional phrases. e.g around, in, between, across, etc
7. Conjunctions: these are used to join different linguistic items together. They are further
classified into coordinating and subordinating conjunctions.
8. Articles and Determiners: just like adjectives, they modify nouns. They are used to give a
sentence syntactical meaning. E.g a/an, little, much, a lot, etc.
9. Interjections: these are words that indicate emotions like anger, surprise, etc. e.g ah! Wow!, etc
Word Formation Processes

These are the different processes through which new words are formed in English language. They can be
broadly categorized in

a. Major word formation processes

b. Minor word formation processes

Major word Formation Processes

i. Affixation: this entails adding prefixes and suffixes to the base, which may or may not cause a
change in the word class. E.g
Found founder
Function malfunction
Float afloat
Witch bewitch
Live outlive
Slave enslave
Connect disconnect
Friend friendly
Nation national
insane insanity
adjective adjectival
pig piglet

in affixation, once the base has undergone the process of word formation, the new word can be the
base for another new word. E.g.

friendly unfriendly unfriendliness

sane sanity insanity

Prefixes are added to the beginning of the base and they generally do not alter the word class of the
base except in some very few cases. They are classified into: negative prefixes (un, in, dis) perjorative
(mis, mal, pseudo, under, hyper) degree/size (arch, super, out, under, over, ultra, mini), attitude (co,
counter, anti, pro, etc) locative (sub, inter, trans), time and order (fore, post, pre, etc) number (uni, bi,
di, tri, etc). e.g

Let sublet

Trial pretrial

Modern ultramodern

Unlike prefixes, suffixes usually alter the word class of the base except in cases of verb inflections.
Suffixes are grouped according to the base of the word class they are formed from. Hence, there are
Noun-Noun Suffixes, Noun-Adjective, Verb-Noun, etc. For example

Jubilate jubilation (verb- noun)

Internal internalize (noun-verb)

 ii. Conversion : this is a word formation process whereby an item changes its word class
without the addition of an affix. Conversion is also now as zero affixation. E.g.
The police has released him (verb)
The news of his release spread fast. (noun)
I never doubted his sincerity
His doubt has put him into trouble
She has calmed the baby (verb)
The calm sea is alluring (adjective)
iii. Compounding: this is done by adding one base to another. A word that has undergone the
compounding word formation process usually consist of two or three bases. Compounds are
written in three ways:
a. Together: knitwear, gamekeeper, flashlight, brainwash, earthquake, hangman, etc
b. Separately: firing squad, washing machine, typing paper, oak tree, measuring tape,
tissue paper, etc
c. Hyphenated: self-control, window-cleaner, easy-going, etc

Minor Word Formation Processes

i. Reduplicative: this is like compounding in the sense that two words are added together. But
in reduplicative, the two words have letters that are identical or slightly different. E.g wishy-
washy, humpty-dumpty, tip-top, higgledy-piggedly, walkie-talkie, etc.
ii. Clipping: here, one or more syllables is subtracted from a word to make it shorter, but the
word still retains its meaning. The syllables can be subtracted at the beginning, end, or both
the beginning and end of a word. E.g.
Telephone phone
Photograph photo
Refrigerator fridge
Influenza flu

Clipped words are used in informal speech and writing.

iii. Blends: in blends, two words are also combined, but only fragments of both words are
combined. E.g
Breakfast + lunch = brunch
Motor + hotel = motel
Transfer + resistor = transistor
Camera + recorder = camcorder

iv. abbreviation: these are words formed from initial letters or some letters of words. They are
particularly used for names of organization. They are categorized into two:
a. Alphabetism: these are acronyms pronounced as sequences of letters e.g. UN, OAU, EU
b. Acronyms: these pronounced as words: radar, NISER, ABUAD, NAFDAC etc