Love/Hate Grammar? Got Questions? Ask this guy

[Jay Solomon]

Hello, hello,

This is Jay Solomon, author of the upcoming The Zen of South Park (http://www.thezenofsouthpark.com), and I'm here to let you know that I'm a grammar nerd and simply love the subject. Today I blogged about the Oxford Comma, an important and controversial part of the author's grammatical weaponry (check it out at my blog (http://jaysolomon.wordpress.com)).

If you have questions about grammar, its various forms and possibilities, or even just a paragraph or sentence that needs a little editing, please don't hesitate to post here or send it my way: JaySolomon@thezenofsouthpark.com. I'm also open to editing nonfiction query letters so let me know if you need a little help.

Remember: There are no great writers, only great editors,
Jay

[Use Her Name]

I happen to like grammar. I like that it has allowed me to be a good writer. I think all writers should become good with the tools of the trade. Grammar, spelling, the construction of plots, Rhetoric, imagination and all the other things that together make up the tools of the writer's art.

[Medievalist]

JaySolomon@thezenofsouthpark.com[/email]. I'm also open to editing nonfiction query letters so let me know if you need a little help.

Remember: There are no great writers, only great editors,
Jay

I have questions about using infixes in English.

Please help.

[job]

I have questions about using infixes in English.

I looked this up.

"An infix is an affix inserted inside another morpheme"

So, now I know.


Ummmm .... Use hyphens?

[Dawnstorm]

I have questions about using infixes in English.

Please help.

In English, the infix "-l-" is used to idicate the obesity of a person. It's only used with the proper name "Bob", though.

Bob --> Blob

There may be other instances, but I can't think of any right now.

[Maryn]

The first word in my current novel is a popular infix. Quite the attention-grabber, that one.

Jay, I'm sure you mean well, but this is tiptoeing dangerously near self-promotion, so don't get too twizzled if it disappears, only to reappear in Announcement, Events, and Self-Promotion.

Meanwhile, nice to meet you. Welcome!

Maryn, firm handshake

[Medievalist]

I looked this up.

"An infix is an affix inserted inside another morpheme"

So, now I know.


Ummmm .... Use hyphens?

:D

There really is one, or rather, a cluster of closely related morphemes, in English.

Hey Shweta!

[Shweta]

:eek:
...yes, she said with trepidation?

ETA: Okay, here's one: what's the effect of using the passive voice as opposed to the active? :grins at Dawnstorm:

[Prawn]

I am pretty sure that fucking is an infix for polysyllabic words

Un-fucking-believeable
Gi-fucking-gantic
Im-fucking-possible
Poly-fucking-syllabic

It is an intensifier. It is a very handy word, which is perhaps why so many people like fucking.

[Medievalist]

I am pretty sure that fucking is an infix for polysyllabic words

Un-fucking-believeable
Gi-fucking-gantic
Im-fucking-possible
Poly-fucking-syllabic

It is the only infix English has ever had, and it's less than fifty years old, in terms of usage.
It is a very handy word, which is perhaps why so many people like fucking.

I'm pretty sure that's not the reason ;)

[Matera the Mad]

HI! I'm Matera the Mad and I am here to answer all your questions about total infuckingsanity!

Woowoowoowoowoowoowoo!

gotta be another infix around here somewhere... searches through unnamable stuff on the floor...

ETA: migawd he's a verbose *******

[Dawnstorm]

ETA: Okay, here's one: what's the effect of using the passive voice as opposed to the active? :grins at Dawnstorm:

The other way has been looked. It was whistled and the shadows were shuffled into. Grammar has been bent, too, but it was ignored. Mostly.

It is the only infix English has ever had, and it's less than fifty years old, in terms of usage.

Here's one:

If "fucking" in "absofuckinglutely" is an infix, why isn't "black" in "blackbird" a prefix?

[Shweta]

The other way has been looked. It was whistled and the shadows were shuffled into. Grammar has been bent, too, but it was ignored. Mostly.

:ROFL:
Here's one:

If "fucking" in "absofuckinglutely" is an infix, why isn't "black" in "blackbird" a prefix?
ooh, ooh, I know!

[Matera the Mad]

Ooo, I knowz Y -- "bird" is a non-mammalian suffix, and you can't have a prefix and a suffix in the same word unless you apply a hotfix before an infix in a fixed ratio, else you'll find yourself in a fix, unless the bird is a hoopoe.

[Dawnstorm]

Ooo, I knowz Y -- "bird" is a non-mammalian suffix, and you can't have a prefix and a suffix in the same word unless you apply a hotfix before an infix in a fixed ratio, else you'll find yourself in a fix, unless the bird is a hoopoe.

Almost. Actually, blackbird is a circumfix around an elided root. But few know that. [And, yes, the elided root is "hoopoe".]

ooh, ooh, I know!

See? Schweta knows that, too.

(Seriously, I actually don't know the answer exactly, though I know enough about it that I guessed it falls into your expertise.)

[Shweta]

Almost. Actually, blackbird is a circumfix around an elided root. But few know that.
:ROFL:

See? Schweta knows that, too.
I'm a shweta, not a schwa :D

black- isn't a prefix because it's a free morpheme (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_morpheme). As I understand it, all affixes are bound morphemes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bound_morpheme). One day, however, the in-anti-tion-dities will rise up against the tyranny of linguistic hierarchy and take up their rightful place beside their fellow morphemes. And on that day, oh, on that day, bl- and -ood will run free.

(I bet they'll still keep the phonesthemes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonestheme) down, though.)

[Dawnstorm]

black- isn't a prefix because it's a free morpheme (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_morpheme). As I understand it, all affixes are bound morphemes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bound_morpheme).

I agree that all affixes are bound morphemes. But if "fucking" is an infix, then you'll have to analyse "fucking" as a bound morpheme (which is interesting, as "fucking" itself contains the free morpheme "fuck" and the bound morpheme "ing"). So there has to be some sort of derivation going on. But if we accept a bound morpheme derived from the two-morpheme word "fucking", why can't we accept a single bound morpheme, derived from a single-morpheme word, "black"? (Say, black).

So, you could say:

"That's fucking great!"

And

"That's gr-fucking-8!"

What's the difference? Why adverb in the former and infix the latter? Why isn't this unusual syntax, rather than unusual morphology?

One day, however, the in-anti-tion-dities will rise up against the tyranny of linguistic hierarchy and take up their rightful place beside their fellow morphemes. And on that day, oh, on that day, bl- and -ood will run free.

:eek:

It's the apofucackinglypse!


(I bet they'll still keep the phonesthemes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonestheme) down, though.)

Hey, new word! I haven't come across that one before!

***

Edit: I just noticed there's a frownie heading this thread. Could this have been edited in as a reaction to the reactions in this thread?

[Shweta]

Well, the English infix is just weird all round. So no reason why it'd have to work like other English affixes. I should perhaps say that normal affixes in English are bound morphemes. The infix is the start of the revolution, I guess.

As far as I can tell it has to go in words of at least 3 syllables, with one stressed syllable before the infix and one after.

So:

fan-fucking-tastic
abso-fucking-lutely
ambi-fucking-dextrous
but:
* awe-fucking-some
* gr-fucking-eat
*stu-fucking-pid
??black-fucking-bird


Maybe 2 syllables is okay if both are stressed...

Also what's going on with this one not working?:
* abomi-fucking-nable
I guess the end is... minor (secondary? tertiary?) stress at best...

[Dawnstorm]

As far as I can tell it has to go in words of at least 3 syllables, with one stressed syllable before the infix and one after.

So:

fan-fucking-tastic
abso-fucking-lutely
ambi-fucking-dextrous
but:
* awe-fucking-some
* gr-fucking-eat
*stu-fucking-pid
??black-fucking-bird


Maybe 2 syllables is okay if both are stressed...

Also what's going on with this one not working?:
* abomi-fucking-nable
I guess the end is... minor (secondary? tertiary?) stress at best...

Actually, I do think "gr-fucking-eight" or more likely "guh-fucking-rate" works (but you'd have to draw out the "gr/g" a bit). I don't think it's the number of syllables, as much as the stress pattern. Basically, the main stress of the resulting word comes after the "fucking". (I actually think I heard "g-fucking-rate" or some variation in some film; welsh accent perhaps? Twin Town? Unsure, and I could be utterly wrong, too.) [Edit: Google gives me 9 hits for "g-fucking-rate"; not a wealth of evidence, but then I'd expect that more in spoken language, anyway.]

The prosodic function of the "fucking", I think, is to prolong the tension before the climax. da(da)-dada-DUM(da). Which is why, I think, you need the main stress after "fucking".

It's also why I think it's:

unbe-fucking-lievable, but not:

*un-fucking-believable. (Again, I have no evidence that this is actually not okay. Just thinking out loud here.)

Actually, if "fucking" is an affix, is it an infix in the above, considering that it could just be the last in a series of prefixes? Same as in "ambi-fucking-dextrous", where it doesn't interrupt any morpheme, but sits right between two. It's not really an infix in these cases; more like a prefix. To me, this flexibility of position suggests that it's actually a question of word-compounding not affixation.

So what are the advantages of calling "fucking" (in this function) an infix? I've never really thought about this in depth. [Er, I think this may just go beyond Grammar for Grasshoppers. Should we move the discussion?]

Well, the English infix is just weird all round. So no reason why it'd have to work like other English affixes. I should perhaps say that normal affixes in English are bound morphemes. The infix is the start of the revolution, I guess.

But that's mostly a question of theory and terminology. In what ways does "fucking" behave like an infix? In what ways doesn't it? And do we - on balance - have a case for calling it an "infix", whithout collapsing the system.

[aka eraser]

You people make my brain hurt.

I'm never coming to this forum again.



<eraser eats a panda, says "oh shoot!" and leaves>

[Shweta]

unbe-fucking-lievable, but not:

*un-fucking-believable. (Again, I have no evidence that this is actually not okay. Just thinking out loud here.)

Actually I'd say it was more likely to be un-fucking-believable. When I say the two out loud that sounds much better to me. I have trouble with it interrupting something I know to be a morpheme.

Actually, if "fucking" is an affix, is it an infix in the above, considering that it could just be the last in a series of prefixes? Same as in "ambi-fucking-dextrous", where it doesn't interrupt any morpheme, but sits right between two. It's not really an infix in these cases; more like a prefix. To me, this flexibility of position suggests that it's actually a question of word-compounding not affixation.
If it wasn't an infix it could never interrupt morphemes.




Veering back to the OP, I'm afraid this is the sort of thing that happens if you wander in and say you'll answer all questions. Do feel free to join in the games -- we do love other grammar nerds! But also, do bear in mind that this place has its share of language experts who've been answering questions for rather a long time :)

[Ol' Fashioned Girl]

No day is a total loss in which one has learned something.

[Maryn]

Uh-oh. I think I may have had years of lost days...

Maryn, who raised kids

[Medievalist]

black- isn't a prefix because it's a free morpheme (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_morpheme). As I understand it, all affixes are bound morphemes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bound_morpheme). One day, however, the in-anti-tion-dities will rise up against the tyranny of linguistic hierarchy and take up their rightful place beside their fellow morphemes. And on that day, oh, on that day, bl- and -ood will run free.

(I bet they'll still keep the phonesthemes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonestheme) down, though.)

Yep.

[Dawnstorm]

Actually I'd say it was more likely to be un-fucking-believable. When I say the two out loud that sounds much better to me. I have trouble with it interrupting something I know to be a morpheme.

Counterevidence to my hypothesis right there. :D

On the other hand, you've just said you have trouble using it as an infix. ;)

See:

If it wasn't an infix it could never interrupt morphemes.

What everyone agrees about is that with "fucking" we have unit that sometimes interrupts morphemes.

It behaves like infixes do in other languages.

According to the if-it-quacks-like-a-duck theory, it has to be an infix.

But according to the if-it-looks-like-a-duck, it has to be a word (see, it contains morphemes: "fuck"+"ing"; morphemes don't contain morphemes).

You've already defined "infix" as "affix" and "affix" as "a bound morpheme". So the element in "fucking" in "fucking ambidextrous" and "ambifuckingdextrous", are not the same element, even if they look like it.

Problem: Quacks like a duck, but looks like... two ducks tied together? Um, the metaphor fails me here.

So: it interrupts a morpheme, so it has to be an infix. Which means that anything that interrupts a morpheme has to be an infix. Which means that the infix has been zero-derived from the word "fucking", it's composite morphemes stripped of morpheme status. But where does it end?

What if I said, for the puprose of argument in this thread, "abso-I-bet-you-expected-fucking-here-lutely", or "abso-you're-not-getting-that-word-here-no-lutely". This is clearly on-the-spot improvisation, but I'm using a definite pattern here. How would you describe it?

I'm first making up a clause, then zero-deriving a morpheme from it, and then inserting it into the morpheme "-solute-"? To be honest, I find it a bit simpler to just say that I interrupted a morpheme with a clause.

To me it sounds like people are making up the zero-derivation step (unless you get around that in your theory somehow) in order to avoid facing up to the evidence that words can interrupt morphemes, if the speaker so wishes.

So what's the benefit of having "fucking" be an infix (apart from theoretic aesthetics)?

There's one thing I haven't addressed yet, and I'll go all the way back to Prawn's post for that:

For [duck] = , "fucking":

- quacks like a duck
- doesn't really look like one

- but it might just fill the same ecological niche as one.

"Fucking" is an intensifier. Is there a clue in function?

I tend to think of inserting "fucking" into a morpheme as a weird sort of word compounding; but are there word compounds where one of the compound words is an intensifier? [I can't think of any.] I do think intensifier function lends itself better to infixes.

None of this is important to writers. Using it is [i]far easier than describing it. ;)

Veering back to the OP, I'm afraid this is the sort of thing that happens if you wander in and say you'll answer all questions. Do feel free to join in the games -- we do love other grammar nerds! But also, do bear in mind that this place has its share of language experts who've been answering questions for rather a long time :)

Ah, but now we've also alienated eraser and erased a panda from the earth, in the process. All because of terminology/theory nitpicks. Can't help it. Suppose, I'm a junkie.

[Matera the Mad]

In my trollish opinion, you are ducking the real issue.

[Dawnstorm]

In my trollish opinion, you are ducking the real issue.

Hehe. I do that - sometimes - to duck-less issues.

***

Wait a minute. Perhaps this wasn't a pun? Perhaps you meant: if he ducks like a quack, and he looks like a quack... :eek:

[Shweta]

Counterevidence to my hypothesis right there. :D

On the other hand, you've just said you have trouble using it as an infix. ;)

Goodness.
If I'd known you'd think this much I'd have phrased what I said more carefully. Sorry.

What I meant to say was this:

I have trouble letting anything interrupt a morpheme, like "great" or "believe". But the "fucking" infix can interrupt morphemes, by which I meant go between two main morphemes, like in "bookshelf". So "book-fucking-shelf" is fine by me but "booksh-fucking-elf" isn't.

All of which is to say, I can't stick anything in the middle of a morpheme, but the "fucking" infix does not have to come before the root morpheme in my head, so it's not strictly a prefix.

[Dawnstorm]

I have trouble letting anything interrupt a morpheme, like "great" or "believe". But the "fucking" infix can interrupt morphemes, by which I meant go between two main morphemes, like in "bookshelf". So "book-fucking-shelf" is fine by me but "booksh-fucking-elf" isn't.

All of which is to say, I can't stick anything in the middle of a morpheme, but the "fucking" infix does not have to come before the root morpheme in my head, so it's not strictly a prefix.


I got that. But the very point of an infix is interrupting a morpheme. Not inbetween morphemes, but within morphemes.

Abso-fucking-lutely: "-solute-" is, I think, a single morpheme. Thus "fucking" could be an infix.

Ab- to my mind is a prefix. If I said "Ab-fucking-solutely", I'd have a string of prefixes, not a prefix and an infix. Only if I interrupt a morpheme, that is pry it apart to insert one, do I have an infix.

An example of an infix, taken from George Yule, The Study of Language (a good, not too technical introduction to linguistics, albeit a bit old [1985]):

In Kahmhu (a southeast-asian language) there's the infix "-rn-" that you insert into a verb to make a noun of it:

see - srnee (to drill - a drill)
toh - trnoh (to chisel - a chisel)

And so on.

(Btw, Yule cites "unfuckingbelievable", as you said. ;) )

To be fair, Yule says "inside another word" not "morpheme". But I still wouldn't see "-con-" in "preconception" as an infix. It's still a prefix, even if it follows another prefix; otherwise the distinction between infix and prefix would depend on context ("conception" prefix; "preconception", infix) rather than any property of the affix.

It's interesting how Youle talks about "unfuckingbelievable" etc.:

It is possible to see the general principle at work in certain expressions, occasionally used in fortuitious or aggravated circumstances by emotionally aroused English speakers ... We could view these 'inserted' forms as a special version of infixing. However, a much better set of examples can be provided from Kamhmu...

I love how he's addressing the issue; vague enough to dodge making any commitment, but concrete enough to demonstrate the principle. I should be able to explain things like that, instead of going into way too much detail, in all the wrong places. ;)

To summarise - if the infix doesn't occur within a morpheme, it's not an infix, the way I see the term (and whoever wrote job's definition agrees with me).

***

Btw, I do have an alternate name (found it at last) for what's going in with "absofuckinglutely":

tmesis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tmesis).

Fits better than "infix", IMO. (Boy did it take me long to find that one. I remembered there was a term, but I was too unsure to mention it.)

***

ETA: Look at this (http://www.painintheenglish.com/post.php?id=969) blog. Apart from tmesis and infix, a commenter (Eleanor) calls it "the Australian integral adjective". Gotta love integrity! :D And Chris says "unbefuckinglievable!" Yay!

[L M Ashton]

You guys are such geeks. :D

[CaroGirl]

Eh? You guys'll have to speak up, and into my good ear.

[Maryn]

I wish you'd use that ear trumpet we bought you.

[MelodyO]

You guys remind me of those killer ants that swarm and devour whatever they've targeted for the day. Run, overconfident newbies! RUUUNNNNNN!!!

[Shweta]

Dawnstorm: You're right. I totally forgot absofuckinglutely. Which shows that it's an infix, and I'm wrong about interrupting morphemes. I think it's only monosyllabic morphemes that are problematic for me.

[Matera the Mad]

monofuckingsyllabic morfuckingphemes are tough :(

Isn't "fucking" sometimes used as a conjunction?

[Medievalist]

Btw, I do have an alternate name (found it at last) for what's going in with "absofuckinglutely":

tmesis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tmesis).

Fits better than "infix", IMO. (Boy did it take me long to find that one. I remembered there was a term, but I was too unsure to mention it.)

Meh; not so much tmesis which we've lifted from Greek rhetorical analysis and altered slightly to work in English as a rhetorical figure. Tmesis in Greek originally meant "the artificial separation of a preposition from its verb in poetry after Homer, especially by the interposition of enclitics and particles" (Goodwin and Gulick. Greek Grammar). Then, insertion of a word or phrase between the parts of a compound word" or essentially a synonym for diacope (Lanham. Handlist of Rhetorical Terms).

Abso-fucking-lutely is really a true infix.

It also occurs to me that rather looking to Asian languages to model the functions of infixes, Old Irish is a better one, where they work very much like abso-fucking-lutely does in English.

[JoNightshade]

I... this...

Yes. This entire thread is why I love AW.

[Dawnstorm]

It also occurs to me that rather looking to Asian languages to model the functions of infixes, Old Irish is a better one, where they work very much like abso-fucking-lutely does in English.

That comparison would make way more sense. I'll look it up, maybe then I'll understand the position better.

I think it's only monosyllabic morphemes that are problematic for me.

They're clearly not common, and you'll have draw out a letter. Quite hard with plosives ("tough" and "pot"), though. ;)