Re: CONLANG Digest - 28 Feb 2000 to 29 Feb 2000 (#2000-61)

Kristian skrev:

>Nik Taylor wrote:
>
>>Muke Tever wrote:
>>> Sounds like (what the last linguistics book I read called) an interfix.
>>
>>Infix, actually.  However, that's a general term.  I don't know what
>>that specific kind of infix would be called.
>>
>No, I think Muke is correct. An infix is a morpheme inserted
>within another morpheme, essentially breaking that other morpheme
>in two parts. In Tagalog for example:
>
>     ROOT:     bili 'buy'
>     INFIX:    -um- 'perfect agentive trigger'
>     NEW WORD: bumili 'bought:AT'
>
>In the above example, there is no Tagalog morpheme *'b' nor a
>morpheme *'ili. Only 'bili' and '-um-'.
>This is different from the 'a' morpheme in Patrick's poem. Instead,
>it joined two seperate morphemes to form one word, as in the word
>for 'poem' in Patrick's poem.:
>
>     lass-a-ata
>     word-+-thing
>
>My texts call this an interfix - keeping a distinction between
>interfix and infix.
I think Kristian and Muke are right here, although "interfix" is not
exactly a widespread term.  In Bantu and Austronesian circles such
things are often called "linking morphemes".

Matt.