The Suffix -Ist
1985; Duke University Press; Volume: 60; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
10.2307/454888
ISSN1527-2133
Autores Tópico(s)Linguistic Variation and Morphology
ResumoIAMONG THE MORPHEMES WHICH English has borrowed from other languages is the suffix -ist, deriving ultimately from the Greek suffix -istis; -ist entered the English lexicon first during Middle English by way of French versions of Latinized Greek ecclestiatical terms, such as baptist, exorcist, and evangelist. Jespersen (1942) and Onions (1966) harness -ist together with -ism and -ize to form troika, and many modern dictionaries dutifully continue to assert the relationship of the three forms. For example, here is what Webster's New World Dictionary (2nd College ed.) says of -ist: a noun-forming suffix corresponding to verbs ending in -ize or nouns ending in -ism. This linking of -ist, -ism, and -ize is not so much false as it is misleading. Certainly, there is some diachronic justification for seeing the three in paradigm. In Greek, -istes would be the agent-noun suffix for verbs ending in -izein; and -ismos would be attached to the stem of such verbs to form nouns describing actions. For example, the word baptizein means 'to wash'. A baptistes is 'washer'and baptismos is 'washing'. And synchronically we can continue to see the three suffixes being yoked in such modern groupings as moralist, moralism, moralize or terrorist, terrorism, terrorize. But as often as not, the pattern breaks down. Once out of Greek and removed from the formal and semantic constraints of the Greek paradigm, -ist, -ism, and -ize seem to have often gone their own ways. The OxfordEnglish Dictionary takes note of this divergence. The OED entry on -ist, in particular, is clear about the independent growth of the three suffixes' applications. The potential for the paradigm sequence remains, but it is by no means obligatory. In other words, for every -ist word in English there is not necessarily corresponding term in -ism and/or -ize.
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