WORD FORMATION

AFFIXATION

In linguistics, affixation is the process of adding a morpheme (or affix) to a word to create either (a) a different form of that word (e.g., bird → birds), or (b) a new word with a different meaning (bird → birder). Affixation is the most common way of making new words in English.
The two primary kinds of affixation are prefixation (the addition of a prefix) and suffixation (the addition of a suffix). Clusters of affixes can be used to form complex words.

Prefixes

A prefix is placed at the beginning of a word to modify or change its meaning. This is a list of the most common prefixes in English, together with their basic meaning and some examples. You can find more detail or precision for each prefix in any good dictionary.

A prefix goes at the beginning of a word. A suffix goes at the end of a word.

SUFFIXES

Unlike a prefix, a suffix is series of letters added at the end of a word. Suffixes fall into one of two categories: inflectional and derivational. 

Inflectional suffixes change the way you understand a word without changing its meaning. For example, what happens when you add the letter 's' to the word 'cookie'? It forms the word 'cookies'...the meaning doesn't change, but now you know there is more than one cookie (which is always a good thing!). Inflectional suffixes can also change the tense of a base word from present to past by adding the letters '-ed' (change 'walk' to 'walked') or can make the root word comparative or superlative by adding '-er' or '-est' ('big' becomes 'bigger' or 'biggest'). Again, the words have changed, but the meaning has not. 

Derivational suffixes change the meaning of a word. In addition to changing the meaning of a word, derivational suffixes can change an adjective to a noun or a verb, or change a noun to an adjective. The list below includes common derivational suffixes that you encounter on a daily basis:

• -able (able to do)
• -acy (quality)
• -er (someone who does something)
• -esque (similar to)
• -ish (having a similar quality)
• -ism (a belief)
• -ist (someone who does something)
• -less (without)

Let's take a look at a suffix in action. Think about the suffix '-less' and how it changes the nouns 'fear', 'friend', and 'emotion':

·      Fear becomes fearless, meaning “without fear”

·      Friend becomes friendless, meaning “without friends”

·      Emotion becomes emotionless, meaning “without emotion”

(http://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-an-affix-definition-examples.html)

INFIXES

An infix is a word element (a type of affix) that can be inserted within the base form of a word (rather than at its beginning or end) to create a new word or intensify meaning. Also called an integrated adjective. The process of inserting an infix is called infixation.

(http://grammar.about.com/od/il/g/infixterm.htm)

CONFIXES

The term “confix” refers to a specific type of affix. Confixes are composed of at least one prefix and one suffix, which are placed on either side of a root word. When a confix is added to a root, a new meaning separate from the meaning of the root word by itself is created. The term “circumfix” is often used interchangeably with “confix.” Confixes are used extensively in Indonesian and Malay, and they appear to varying degrees in many other languages, such as Arabic, German and Japanese, to name a few.

“Confix” derives from Latin roots; con means “with” and fix means “attach” in this context. Unlike a prefix, which is attached to the front of a root, or a suffix, which is attached to the end, a confix is divided and attached to both ends. The fact that the separate parts of confixes appear on different sides of the root makes confixes discontinuous morphemes. Morphemes are the smallest units of a word that carry meaning. Though confixes are discontinuous, both of their halves must be present for the meaning to be formed.

(http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-confix.htm)

SUPERFIXES

Superfixes a suprasegmental feature distinguishing the meaning or grammatical function of one word or phrase from that of another, as stress does for example between the noun conduct and the verb conduct.

(from super- + -fix, on the model of prefix, suffix)

(http://dictionary.reverso.net/english-definition/superfix)