The document discusses conceptual categories in linguistics. Conceptual categories are classes of linguistic units like nouns or verbs that share common characteristics. Linguists make hypotheses about conceptual categories by looking for patterns in how language is used and relates form and meaning. For example, in some languages verbs can take derivational suffixes to form nouns related to the verb's meaning. The document contrasts derivational categories, which can change word class or meaning, with inflectional categories, which simply provide syntactic information without major changes to word meaning.

2. The word ( Category) is a very useful and common word in
linguistics that means a class of units (such as noun and verb)
or features (such as number and case) that share a common
set of characteristics.

3. - Conceptual Categories
The notion of conceptual categories is closely tied to the
problem of how to provide meaningful glosses or labels
for grammatical units ( words ,morphemes….etc.)

4. In order to discuss this problem, we will consider the following data from
Central Yup’ik) (Reed et al,1977:99):

5. The first question to ask about these data is “Is there a pattern?” Is there
any variation in form that seems to correlate, even partially, with a
particular variation in meaning? Clearly there is a formal relationship
between the words in the two column .
The words on the right all end in -vik, and seem to be based on the corresponding
words on the left, though there is some variation.
“Is there any conceptual pattern that corresponds to the observed formal
pattern?”
Just going by the English translations, you may guess that the words in the left
column are verbs and the ones in the right column are probably nouns.

6. This is how linguists make hypotheses regarding conceptual
categories – they stand back and make an educated guess about
the general function of any grammatical pattern based on
evidence from the clear examples, and observation of native
speakers in conversation.

7. Every language has sets of roots that differ according
to some definable element of meaning .
Watch See
- Describe very similar concept.
- Describe scene.
Intentional Experiential

8. The important ideas to keep in mind at this point are:
- Conceptual category labels or (“glosses”) are interpretations
designed to help readers of a grammatical description understand and
remember the functions of particular structures
- A conceptual category exists when there is an expectation of patterned
behavior – a recurring relationship between variation in form and variation
in meaning.

9. Derivational Vs. inflectional
categories….

10. The difference between derivation and inflection is best characterized
in terms of prototypes, and clusters of features that tend to go
together. Prototypical derivational categories create new stems .Often
the new stems created by a derivational category belong to a different
word class than the stem that is the basis of the derivation and
sometimes the derivational category just significantly changes the
meaning of the base stem

11. NOMINALIZATION:
VERB → NOUN :
Grow growth
Destroy destruction
ADJ → NOUN:
Wide width
Happy happiness
(“nominalize” something means to make it into a noun).

12. Comparison
ADJ → Comparative ADJ
Wide wider
Happy happier

13. Inflectional categories, on the other hand, don’t change word
classes, and don’t adjust the meanings of roots in major ways.
They simply add some important information that may be
required by the syntactic or situational context.
NUMBER:
SINGULAR → PLURAL:
dog dogs sing sang
cat cats walk walked
TENSE:
PRESENT → PAST

14. Bound Morphemes
Derivational Inflectional
Suffixes
-Ing
-ed
-s
Suffixes
- er
-Ly
-ion
Prefixes
de
pre