The Dual Nature of the English Suffix Surface Form [-ar]

This study investigates the dual nature of the surface level of the English adjectival suffix [-ar]. Katamba (1989) claims that [–ar] is an allomorph of the morpheme /-al/, which is derived from /-al/ by dissimilation in a certain environment. Despite this observation being partially valid, it never considers the entirety of the data. The excluded data such as familial and familiar shows that the two morphemes /-al/ and /-ar/ should exist as independent morphemes in the underlying level. This finding is supported by the fact that words such as familial and familiar form a minimal pair, and thus the two morphemes, /-al/ and /-ar/, are contrastive; the morpheme /-al/ conveys specific, concrete attributes, whereas the morpheme /-ar/ carries broader and abstract senses. In this way, the surface form [-ar] shows a dual nature; [-ar] exists as an allomorph of /-al/ in a certain environment and, in addition, as an independent morpheme.