An Affix is a grammatical morpheme attached to a stem to form a new word or word form. There are three main types of affixes: prefixes, infixes and suffixes.
The prefix occurs at the beginning of a step, suffix to the end and infix occurs in the middle or within the word.
Affixes can be derived from other things, such as English -ness and pre-, or inflectional, such as the English plural -s and past tense -ed. Tied with morphemes by definition; prefixes and suffixes can be separate connectors. See more on derivational and inflectional affixes.
Examples of Affixes
Following are some examples of affixes with example words:
| Affix | Examples |
| in- | incapable |
| ex- | ex-President |
| -ing | laughing |
| -ness | Dryness |
| -less | careless |
| Multi- | multimedia |
| Dis- | dislike |
| -able | disable |
| Pre- | preschool |
Two Types of Affixes – Prefix and Suffix
Prefixes – A letter or group of letters that you put at the beginning of a word to change its meaning. The four most common prefixes are dis-, in-, re-, and un-. (These accounts are over 95% of the originals.) Here are some short quotes. The four most common connectors have -ed, -ing, -ly, and -es.
| PREFIX | DEFINITIONS | EXAMPLES |
| Post | postgraduate | I will do my postgraduate in advance studies |
| Auto | self | due you drive a automatic car or manual |
| Un | not | his attitude is unfriendly |
| Mis | wrong | he misunderstood my conversation |
| Dis | not, opposite of | your behavior is disgraceful |
| Re | again | reuse the paper where it is required |
| Ex | former | his ex-boss kept the promise |
| Pre | before | he had preschool activities |
Suffixes – A letter or group of letters that you add at the end of a word, and that changes the meaning of the word or the way it is used.
| Suffix | Meaning | Example |
| -ness | Like | Happiness |
| -ly | In the manner of | Likely |
| -er | Person carrying out action | Writer |
| -ment | Result of | Development |
| -able | To have the ability or quality | Floatable |
| -age | Result of | Outage |
| -ous | Having the quality of | joyous |
Few Key Points:
- Use an affix to create a new word that allows you to reduce your word count and smooth the flow of your sentence.
- Identify the affixes in a word to help with spelling it and decoding its meaning.
- Don’t use a hyphen with a prefix, but if you can’t bear how it looks, use one.
Quick Links