Skip to content
EntityQ210523· pop 51· linked from 317 articles

Also known as stem

word part responsible for a word's lexical meaning

~5 min read

Article

In linguistics, a word stem is a word part responsible for a word's lexical meaning. The term is used with slightly different meanings depending on the morphology of the language in question. For instance, in Athabaskan linguistics, a verb stem is a root that cannot appear on its own and that carries the tone of the word.

Typically, a stem remains unmodified during inflection with few exceptions due to apophony (for example in Polish, miast-o ("city") and w mieści-e ("in the city"); in English, sing, sang, and sung, where it can be modified according to morphological rules or peculiarities, such as sandhi).

Connections

Categories