A derivational analysis of foreign stems –

A change in the process of becoming German and its theoretical interpretation

Abstract

The following speciality of German is often mentioned: A loanword gets the corresponding German suffix, and is therefore not like in English just princess, American, musical, but Prinzess-in, amerikan-isch, musikal-isch. Sometimes it is also possible for a stem to become German without this special suffix, for example Baroneß, Photograph, brutal, but in English baroness, photographer, brutal. The process of becoming German with the help of native suffixes and how this process has changed will be described in this paper and will be interpreted theoretically.