Affix

An affix (/'æfiks/ ) is a sometimes helpful linguistic unit of English that, as a morpheme, is bound to a word. An affix is formed by adding a unit of language that generally can't be used by itself, but when added to a word, adds to its meaning. In essence, they're benign tumors for words that give you the power to seem slightly more than half-intelligent.

Types of Affixes

Affix	Example	Structure	Description
Prefix	re-turn	prefix-stem	You affix the affix to the front of a word to make the affixed word have a prefix. Yay, alliteration!
Suffix	eat-ed	stem-suffix	You affix the affix to the end of the word to be affixed to make said word have a suffix. That got real annoying, real fast. Didn't it?
Infix	edu‹ma›cate	st‹infix›em	The affix is jammed into the middle of the word. On a side note: I am very well edumacated. I also play the saxomaphone.
Circumfix	em›big‹gen	circumfix›stem‹circumfix	The original word is surrounded by a suffix and a prefix, instantly converting it to a transitive verb!
Interfix	speed-o-meter	stema-interfix-stemb	You make a compound word by adding an interfix between two words. The letter "O" finally has a use in informal conversation other than exclamation.
Duplifix	itty~bitty	stem~duplifix	You copy the structure of the original word into a different word that you place behind the first. It makes good baby talk. Duplifixes also make you seem almost as cutesy-wootsy as me.
Transfix	Maltese language: k‹i›t‹e›b "he wrote" (compare root ktb "write")	s‹transfix›te‹transfix›m	What the hell is this, Malta? What is wrong with you? The original word doesn't even have vowels in it. What the hell? I don't even know what to make of this. It looks like a toddler slapped a keyboard.
Simulfix	moose → meese	Its obvious, isn't it?	You change the intestines of a word to change its meaning.
Suprafix	produce (noun) produce (verb)	If you really need the construction, go to an English Professor. I dare you.	You just pronounce the word differently. How stupid is that? I bet some Doctoral English Professor made this up to annoy the hell out of me.
Disfix	Alabamian language: cokkalika "enters", cokkaka "enter"	cokkalika - li = cokkaka	The elision of a part of a word? What the hell, Alabama? Is that even English? Someone must have made this up. You can't even call that colloquialism. (The word does kind of look like "colloquialism", though.) ("I'm gonna find 'em, and Imma kill 'em!" <--That's colloquialism, gosh darn it!) That jumbled up amalgamation of letters is not. In fact, it's almost as bad as Maltese!

*If you din't notice, the names of the types of affixes all begin with prefixes. "Suf-" is a stupid way of putting "sub-", which claerly means under. "Under" somehow relates to "ending".

A Brief History of English Affixes

The creation of English affixes (the only affixes that really matter) is a long story involving ancient poetry, imperialism(<---Suffix), (Prefix--->)unjust kings, whiny serfs, dragons, white supremacy movements, and celebrity scandals. It is a vivid story of literary wars and gory syntactical battles, political and incoherent debates, silly, bowling alley feuds, and countless philosophically nihilistic books about the social ramifications of the before mentioned conflicts between thorough explanation and simplification in speech, writing, and advertisements for cigarettes. It was written down in a long-winded epic poem by William Shakespeare that was burned by the public because it was blatantly incoherent. Jokingly, Shakespeare had almost entirely written this epic, named Affixiation, with words randomly formed with disfixes, transfixes, and Klingon.

Some do not believe the tale of conflict and scandal. The most well known opposing belief is widely known as Affixiate Creationism, or, less widely known but more understood as, stupid. This belief is that a omnipotent god of only word and language created all of the languages of the world and a few made to seem like they were from space over the course of 3 business days and 79 minutes. It is said that this god created most of the world's languages (many of which no one uses anymore) in one business day, but then the weekend came. The god wanted to party so he/she/it hit some clubs and passed out drunk after two days of straight drinking. For the next two business days, the god rested and got rid of his/hers/thine/its crippling hangover. After 3 business days, having missed the deadline and about to be fired because of it, the god made many languages still used today in 70 minutes. With 9 more minutes, the god made English with bits and scraps of all the other languages and created many flaws in the language to make it almost too incoherent(<---Circumfix) to be functional.

How to Use Affixes

There are many ways to use affixes, but most of them are horibbly, horribly wrong. It may be hard to decipher between horribly, horribly wrong and bad and acceptable, but English is a complicated language. Someone like you wouldn't be expected to understand.

How Not to Use Affixes

• Using disfixes and transfixes in English (it would be best if you didn't use them in any language)

• In a way that pisses me off (see below)

Ways to Piss Me Off with Affixes

The biggest way to piss me off with the use of an affix is to add a dash and then an affix onto a word that most assuredly doesn't need or clearly shouldn't have one added. These are horribly, horribly wrong.

The most common ways this pisses me off are with words that are clearly (Prefix--->)inappropriate:

• -licious

Christ-licious

• -tastic

Genocide-tastic

How to Use Affixes Well

As long as it makes sense or is funny and doesn't piss me off, it is being used correctly.

A Long Example of Making A Word Huge with the Use of Affixes

Let's start with the word establish. Its a nice, simple verb, right? Well, it won't be simple or a verb for very long. We're going to make an unnecessarily large, redundant word with no use in most informal conversation!

First, let's add a suffix to make it a noun.

• establish + ment = establishment

Now, some people don't like establishment. Let's add a circumfix to make a word to describe them.

• dis + establishment + arian = disestablishmentarian

Next, let's give a name to these people's beliefs by slapping on another suffix.

• disestablishmentarian + ism = disestablishmentarianism

Other people don't like these people. Let's give them a name by adding a prefix.

• anti + disestablishmentarianism = antidisestablishmentarianism

Now, some of the original people who don't like establishment feel inferior because their term is shorter than their opposition'. Adding a prefix for redundancy will help them out.

• contra + antidisestablishmentarianism = contraantidisestablishmentarianism

Let's say that there are some people who hate people who hate people who hate establishment, and they want a longer noun to use to explain their beliefs. This is a complicated addition right here.

• contraantidisestablishmentarianism - m + t = contraantidisestablishmentarianist

Maybe, a longer adjective would help more.

• contraantidisestabliahmentarianiast + ic = contraantidisestablishmentarianistic

Now, there was an argument at the Coalition of Contraantidsestablishmentarianists Conference. The coalition broke in two. One half wants a new name that was longer than their previous name. Another prefix can be used.

• neo + contraantidisestabishmentarianists = neocontraantidisestablishmentarianists

The other half of the broken coalition wants an even bigger name. (What an annoyingly obvious surprise?)

• hyper + neocontraantidisestablishmentariansts = hyperneocontraantidisestablishmentarianism

After some pointless stupidity, the contradisestablishmentariasts rejoin together with a pointlessly large adjective.

• equi + hyperneocontraantidisestablishmentarianist + ic = equihyperneocontraantidisestablishmentarianistic

A fourth unopinionated(<---Circumfix) group just wants to annoy the hell out of every one with an annoying adjective with little to no use.

• in + equihyperneocontraantidisestablishmentarianistic = inequihyperneocontraantidisestablishmentarianistic

Now I want to kill them. They've gotten so good at annoying people they don't need any help. Their organization disbanded because of this great skill that they all had.

• auto + inequihyperneocontraantidisestablishmentarianistic = autoinequihyperneocontraantidisestablishmentarianistic

Let's see what this useless word we have means. We have something new that doesn't equally over hate people who hate people that hate establishment by its self.

Some other annoying ways to make this specific word less usable would be by adding:

• pseudo- = false
• inter- = between
• intra- = within
• macro- = big
• mal- = bad
• micro- = small
• post- = after
• -agogue = leader
• -cide = kill/killing (This one's so perfect for all occasions!)
• -phobia = fear
• -oid = resembling
• -logy = study of

See Also

• Grammar
• Punctuation
• Old English
• Literature
• Word