10.5. Productivity and activity of derivational ways and means.

Productivity and activity in W-F are close but not identical. By productivity of derivational ways/types/patterns/means we mean ability to derive new words,

e.g. The suffix -er/ the pattern v + -er → N is highly productive.

By activity we mean the number of words derived with the help of a certain derivational means or after a derivational pattern,

e.g. -er is found in hundreds of words so it is active.

Sometimes productivity and activity go together, but they may not always do.

DERIVATIONAL MEANS	EXAMPLE	PRODUCTIVITY	ACTIVITY
-ly	nicely	+	+
-ous	dangerous	_	+
-th	breadth	_	_

In modern English, the most productive way of W-P is affixation (suffixation more so than prefixation), then comes compounding, shortening takes third place, with conversion coming fourth.

Productivity may change historically. Some derivational means / patterns may be non-productive for centuries or decades, then become productive, then decline again,

e.g. In the late 19th c. US -ine was a popular feminine suffix on the analogy of heroine, forming such words as actorine, doctorine, speakerine. It is not productive or active now.

Semantic selectivity of derivational means.

By this we mean that a particular affix is added not to all available bases, but only to stems belonging to (1) certain parts of speech and (2) some particular lexico-semantic groups,

e.g. -ish is added to verb-stems (snappish), noun-stems (mulish, boyish), adj.-stems (longish, brownish), num-stems (sevenish). Secondly, -ish in the meaning of "like, resembling" is added to noun-stems of the LSGs "human beings" and "animals" but not, for example, "plants": mannish, womanish, girlish, oldmaidish, etc.; tigerish, owlish, camelish, etc.

-ful is added to noun-stems meaning "container": boxful, spoonful, lungful, mouthful, cupful, etc.

10.6. The main function of W-F is the nominative one, i.e. building new names, but W-F also performs the communicative function.

(1) W-F performs the transformational function; words are transferred to a different part of speech and thus are able to perform new syntactic functions in a sentence. There are certain types of derivatives which retain the lexical meaning of the base, but acquire a different part-of-speech category. They are called syntactic derivatives,

e.g. stillness - the quality of being still, derivation - the process of deriving.

(2) Within a text, derivatives perform the text-building function, they are used as a. means to create cohesion of the text.

A derivative and its base are used to connect sentences, one of which follows the other. The derivational base introduces new information, it is the communicative centre of the sentence, i.e. the rheme. The derivative in the following sentence refers to the base, the information given beforehand is the theme of the sentence, which has a new rheme. Thus, derivatives are used to create the functional (communicative) perspective of the text.

e.g. At your age you can hardly expect to be natural (rheme). Naturalness (theme) is something you learn painfully by a trial and error.

(3) Another W-F function is semantic compression. Derivatives can express much information in a very concise way, replacing complex syntactic constructions,

e.g. ex-IBMer - a former employee of the International Business Machines.

(4) Derivatives may perform the expressive function, making an utterance very expressive, emotional, convey evaluation,

e.g. no-goodnik.