prefixes and suffixes are types of affixes that respectively go before or after a base. These are not the only positions in which affixes can occur. This section will look at these different sorts of affixes.

Infixes

Infixes are affixes that are inserted right into a root or base. We saw an example in (1a) above. In Tagalog, a Malayo-Polynesian language spoken in the Philippines, it is possible to form intransitive verbs meaning ‘become X from adjectives by inserting the morpheme -um- after the first consonant of the adjective root. Example (2) shows how the words can be broken down:

Another example of infixation can be found in Karok (a nearly extinct Hokan language, formerly spoken in northern California). In Karok, a form of verb called the intensive is created by infixing the morpheme -eg- after the first consonant or cluster of consonants in the root, as in (3):

Both examples of infixation that we’ve seen so far have had the infix right after the first consonant or consonant cluster of the base, but sometimes infixes can come near the end of the base as well. As the examples in (4) illustrate, in Hua, a Trans-New Guinea language, the negative infix -‘a- comes before the last syllable of the verb root: