Some
languages also have infixes, morphemes that are inserted into other morphemes.
Bontoc, a language spoken in the Philippines, is such a language, as is
illustrated by the following :
Nouns/adjectives
: fikas (strong), kilad (red), fusul (enemy)
Verbs
: fumikas (to be strong), kumilad (to be red), fumusul (to be an enemy)
In
this language the infix –um- is inserted after the first consonant of the noun
or adjective. Thus, a speaker of Bontoc who learns that pusi means ‘poor’ would
understand the meaning of pumusi, ‘to be poor’, on hearing the word of the
first time. Just as an English speaker who learns the verbs sneet would know
that sneeter is one who sneets, a Bontoc speaker who knows that ngumitad means
‘to be dark’ would know that the adjective ‘dark’ must be ngitad.
English
has a very limited set of infixes. English infixing was a subject of the
Linguist List, a discussion group on the Internet, in November 1993, and again
in July 1996. The interest in these infixes in English may be due to the fact
that one can only infix obscentities as full words that are inserted in another
word, usually into adjectives or adverbs. The discussion on the list agreedthat
the most common American inflix is the word fuckin and all the euphemisms for
it, such as friggin, freakin, flippin, or fuggin as in abso + fuggin + lutely
or Kalama +filppin +zoo. In Australian and Britain, a common inflix is bloody
and its euphemisms, such as bloomin. In the movie and stage musical My Fair
Lady, abso + bloomin + lutely occurs in one of the songs sung by Eliza
Doolittle.
