Each of the constituent parts of a word (stems, affixes, endings, etc.) which, even isolated, still conserves some meaning. For example, booklets is decomposed into the morphemes book- (stem: ‘book’) + -let- (suffix: ‘diminutive’) + -s (ending: ‘plural’). Certain morphemes may present variants, called allomorphs, that is, different forms with the same meaning. For example: got vs. gotten, go vs. went, etc.
Morpheme
Morphological
Belonging to morphology; concerning the structure and formation of words.
Morphology
Part of linguistics that studies the formation of words from their constituent elements, the morphemes: stems, affixes, thematic vowels and endings.
Mother language
See Parent language.
Nasal
Phoneme pronounced with resonance in the nasal cavity, as [ã], [m] and [n], for example.
Neo-Latin
See Romanic.
Neologism
New word, newly introduced in a language, either by internal creation or loan.
Nominative
See Case.
Open vowel
Vowel articulated with the tongue close to the floor of the mouth, like [a], for example.
Oral
Phoneme pronounced without resonance in the nasal cavity.
Palatal
Consonant pronounced in the region of hard palate.
Palatalisation
Phonetic mutation in which a consonant becomes palatal.