The present study explores the semantic and structural aspects of word formation processes in English, focusing on how verbs are derived by the suffixes -ize, -ify, -en, and -ate. Based on relevant derivatives extracted from the British National Corpus, their detailed observation is made from semantic and formal viewpoints. Then their theoretical analysis is carried out in the framework of generative theory. The BNC survey demonstrates that (i) the meanings of derived verbs are largely divided into five types and the submeanings are closely related to each other, (ii) the well-formedness of derived verbs is primarily determined by the semantic and formal features of their bases, and (iii) -ize suffixation is creative enough to provide a constant supply for new labels. To account for these empirical observations, the mechanism for forming -ize derivatives is proposed in which the semantic properties and creativity of -ize derivation stem solely from the underlying structure and the formal properties of the bases derive from the lexical entry of -ize.

The present study investigates the formal and semantic properties of derivational morphology, dealing in particular with -able derivatives in English (e.g. the recorder is pocketable ). Focusing principally on hapax legomena in a large corpus, a reliable indicator of online coinage, -able derivatives are extracted from it. Detailed observation of them is carried out and then their theoretical analysis is conducted in the framework of generative morphology. The data analysis elucidates (i) a core aspect of -able : it productively attaches to transitive verbs to produce modalized passive adjectives whose external arguments are restricted to Theme arguments and (ii) a peripheral facet: the basic meaning of -able as well as its prototypical base category and external argument are extended, on a small scale, to other kinds of meaning and category. Based on these empirical observations, major and minor formation rules are proposed to deal respectively with regular and sub-regular -able derivation.