Affixes

An affix is a bound morpheme that occurs before or within or after a base. There are three kinds, prefixes, infixes, and suffixes, two of which you have already met in passing. Prefixes are those bound morphemes that occur before a base, as in import, prefix, reconsider. Prefixes in English are a small class of morphemes, numbering about seventy five. Their meanings are often those of English preposition and adverbials.
Infixes are bound morphemes that have been inserted within a word. In English these are rare. Occasionally they are additions with a word, as in un get at able, where the preposition at of get at is kept as an inffox in the –able adjective, though the preposition is usually dropped in similar words like reliable (from rely on) and accountable (from account for). But infixes in english are most commonly replacements not additions. They occur in a few noun plurals. Like the –ee- in geese, replacing the –oo- of goose, and more often in the past tense and past participle of verbs like the –o- of chose and chosen replacing the –oo- of choose. Suffixes are bound morphemes that occur after a base, like shrinkage, failure, nosiy, realize, nails, dreamed. Suffixes may pile up to the number of three or four whereas prefixes are commonly single , except for the negotiative un- before another prefix. In normalizers we perhaps reach the limit with four the base norm plus the four suffixes –al, -ize, -er, -s. when suffixes multiply this, their orders is fixed : there is one and only one order in which they occur.