English Grammar - Word Endings - What are suffixes?

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What should we do now?

Hi.

James, from EngVid.

Looking for classroom stuff because you know we have so much here for you.

But before I forget, I can't do my job without my favorite pal in the world, Mr. E. And this

lesson today, actually, guys, it's sort of a lesson that we did before, and it's a second

part.

I didn't say it was a second part, but it is.

You'll go back -- if you go to EngVid, you can see the lesson on prefixes, which funny

enough, is the beginning of the word, and this is the end of the word, which are called

"suffixes".

Let's start from the beginning.

What are suffixes?

Let's go to the board.

A suffix: "suf" means -- this part of the word here actually means "under".

It means "under" or "lower".

Why?

When we did prefixes, prefixes meant "before", which meant you put two, three, or five letters

in front of a word.

And that actually changed the meaning of the word if you remember.

If we did "do" and "redo", they're not the same meaning.

"Do" -- one time, "redo" means "start again".

When we do suffixes, a suffix goes on the end of the word.

And I'm going to try to explain to you by going here first.

Grammar suffixes.

You've seen these before.

S, ED, and ING.

When we have S -- you know if you see a pronoun ending in S, like -- sorry.

A verb, I should say.

"She is", "he goes" -- you know by seeing the S on the end of that verb that that verb

is taking on a third person singular.

In other words, it's talking about a person we don't know, right?

And it's a singular person.

So that's the grammar suffix, one letter added on.

When you see ED on the end of the word, you know that that means this verb is in the past.

"I watch TV all the time."

"I watched television last night."

"I stopped my car in front of the house."

This is something that happened in the past, not now.

When we have the third ending you're familiar with, ING, they're used for gerunds.

And you know the gerund has three uses: It's either a present participle -- working, talking,

singing; an adjective -- a climbing tree or a swimming pool; or just a noun -- cooking.

Yeah, I know.

All end in ING, but they have three different functions.

Well, these are examples of suffixes -- letters at the end of the word that change the class

or the verb function, you might say, or the grammar function.

But it doesn't actually change the meaning of the word.

"Swim", "swimming" -- similar.

Okay?

Now, how do I explain this?

Well, when we do this, we do the same thing here, which is grammar, specifically, but

now, we can change the word class.

What I mean is going from -- this is just changing a verb.

We're actually going to change the class from, maybe, a noun to an adjective or an adverb,

okay?

With me so far?

It's easy.

We're going to add a few letters at the end of the word, and it will change what type

of word it is.

Is it a noun?

Is it a verb?

Is it an adverb?

Is it an adjective?

That's it.

And by doing these -- adding some of these, that's how we do it in English.

Excuse me.

So let's take a look.

These are the top three that you'll find in English.

On the last video, at the end of the video, I told you, like, we don't use these for 95

percent, so I'll fix this now.

These are the most common, and what I mean by "common" is "most useful for you."

There are many other suffixes.

But these are most useful for you to kind of figure out or understand words that you'll

see because this will tell you what's, basically, the meaning.

So I'm going to help you with what the meaning is and how it changes it.

So you can look at words and kind of go, "Okay, this must be a noun because I see this ending.

Or this must be an adjective."

Sound cool?

Let's go to the board.

Mr. E, help me with the class.

It's a joke.

See, you're the class now and "word class".

Anyway.

The first one we're going to look at is MENT, m-e-n-t.

"Government", "improvement", all right?

When we add MENT to the end of a word, it's used to make nouns.

So what you'll see is this added to a word becomes a noun.

And what does it mean?

Well, it means an action or process.

Okay?

So we talk about government, you think, "Okay, now, it's the people, like the president -- President

Obama, President Reagan, Prime Minister Harper."

Yeah, I like him.

Anyway.

Sorry.

It's a process.

So we talk about government is helping the people.

That's what they do when they govern.

When we put MENT in, we talk about the institution or the group of people that help the People.

Cool?

So "governing" the verb means to help the People; "government" is the group of people

or institution of people that help the People.

That's one example.

But let's look here, okay?

So we know it's a process or an action, which is when it happens, because we're taking a

verb and adding this ending to make it a noun, something we can touch, okay?

I'm going to give you a word you've probably heard before, or hopefully you don't have

many of them, but you know what they are: argue.

"To argue" something, as a verb, is to try to prove something is true.

Or when two people fight -- but not physically, verbal, "verbal" meaning with your mouth -- they

fight with each other, like, "I don't agree.

You agree."

All right?

So you put forth, or we say -- you say you give an argument.

What you think is true is your argument.

We also do it in essays on paper.

They call it a "thesis", but what is your argument?

Your idea you think is true that you want to compete or fight with other people's argument.

See, that's a process, right?

I say, you say, he says, you say.

Okay?

So it's the process or action of not agreeing with each other or verbal fight.

So then, you say to me, "Well, what is an 'argument'?"

Well, an argument is, as I said, it could be just that, an idea that you think this

is true.

This is my argument, my thought.

So you're not actually doing it.

That's the argument.

Or you could have that verbal fight.

You say they're having an argument because it's a process; it's ongoing; they're doing

it; and you can see them fighting, like, "I don't agree!

Blah, blah, blah!

Blah, blah, blah!

You should wear blue socks!"

Right?

That's a verbal fight.

And you say, "But it's an argument.

It's one form of communication.

And it's a particular form at that time, okay?

So here's a process, argue.

An "argument" is when one group of people are fighting or an idea you want to prove

is true, all right?

What else can we say?

I'll give you another one.

Encourage.

Encourage.

It comes from the French, "en", "to put in"; and "courage" -- for the heart, all right?

So you encourage somebody; you motivate them.

And to "motivate" them means to say or do things to make them feel that they can do

it.

As Obama would say, "Yes, we can."

Okay?

"You can, too, with EngVid."

Okay?

So you encourage somebody, all right?

You say, "Yeah!

You can do it!

Come on!

Yay!"

All right?

"Encourage".

Now, that's the verb.

"Encouragement" may be what you do.

You go, "Are you going to encourage your son to go to law school?"

"Well, yeah."

"Well, what are you going to give him for encouragement?

Will it be words?

Will it be a book?

Will it be the money?

The money?

The money?

Yeah.

Give him the money.

That encourages people.

It motivates."

So an "encouragement" would be similar.

It would be, you know -- encouragement could be the words you give to someone to make them

want to do it or something you give them like a book or a pen, right?

And "to encourage" is the verb.

So that's another example of how MENT is used to show a process or action.

That was number one.

Let's go down.

Mr. E are you ready for ANCE?

Sometimes, ANCE has an E. I put a little E there because it might be like this.

It might look like this, okay?

Now, this is because there is a Latin -- it comes from the Latin language.

And there aren't really -- there isn't really a rule I can give you to tell you why ENCE

or ANCE.

And I'm very sorry about that.

I did look.

I'm only human.

But you should be aware it could be spelled either this way or that way.

Okay?

Once again, similar to MENT, it's used to make nouns.

And the meaning is also similar, very similar.

Because especially when we do nouns, a lot of nouns just describe action.

Well, when we say something like, "law", you know, "the law", to be practicing law -- a

lawyer is the person that practices the law.

See?

That's another suffix.

ER usually means person or thing that does something.

So it's not a surprise that we add these suffixes on, and they take -- they come from actions

or processes or "processes" depending on where you live.

All right?

So in this case, we're going to look at this one.

This one is used to make action or process -- but it also talks about a state or quality.

I picked this very weird word for a reason because it expresses a state or quality.

I didn't want to talk about action or process; I wanted to show you this because for some

of you, you're going to say, "Teacher, what is a 'state' or 'quality'?"

A "state" is -- think of love.

When you love someone, it's not an action you do, but it's where you exist.

Now, we're getting very deep.

It's gone from English to...

PhilosoVid?

That's it!

The new one, PhilosoVid.

All right, anyway.

So I needed a word to show you this.

Now, for some of you, if you're religious -- or if not religious, you love your sports

stars, right?

Like Mike Tyson, Muhammad Ali, you hold them in great -- you revere them.

Or even political leaders or generals, right?

You hold them in great esteem or revere, meaning respect.

You hold them and think you give them great respect.

You can say you "revere" something.

Or even an idea.

Freedom.

God, I'm going crazy.

All right.

But when we have "reverence" for something, all right, it's the quality of having this

belief or this great respect for something.

So "revere" is to have great respect; "reverence" is to be in the state of having it for something

or someone.

You know, "Show reverence for the flag."

So you see the flag; every time you salute, and you wait for a few seconds for all the

people who fight for the flag.

Yes.

Show your reverence -- a state of respect, okay?

You like that one?

Me too.

There's another one called "deference" and "defer".

I'll do it quickly.

When you have "deference" for someone, you say you have superior position to me, and

I show this by letting you go first.

So in deference to someone, you're literally saying, or you're saying, "They are better

and know more.

I step out of the way."

This is a similar state of saying there's a state of respect for someone who is in a

higher position, and I show this by stepping aside.

"Deferring" is like when I defer to my colleague or defer to my worker.

I'm actually doing the action of stepping out of the way to give them a place.

"I will defer to you."

I'm saying, "You know more, so I will listen to you."

Showing "deference" is here, "I show, I listen to you in great reverence and deference."

Those are two big words.

Good luck with that.

That's for those students that go, "I like your lessons, but it's too easy."

Yeah.

Use those in a sentence right now.

Who do you show deference to or reverence?

And do they mean the same thing?

I already told you they don't.

On the quiz, for sure.

And now, number three.

ABLE.

Cain and Abel -- not related, okay?

Not related.

But I wanted to show you something a little bit different.

I've showed you -- or shown you, sorry.

I've shown you how MENT and ANCE change words into nouns.

And I don't want you to think that this is all that suffixes do.

But I gave you two strong cases to help you remember this is what they're going to generally

do.

But I have one more case.

And this is ABLE and IBLE.

But what they do is something different.

When they're used at the end as a suffix, they create adjectives.

They make a word an adjective.

And in this specific case, what I want to talk about is how they change a word into

making something worthy, which means it is good -- similar to "good for".

But if you're "worth" something, it has value.

When something is "worthy", it has value enough for something.

If somebody is "worthy of you" or "worthy for you", basically, what we're saying is

they have enough value that you can maintain a relationship with them.

If you say, "This is not worthy of me", it does not have enough value that we should

be together.

Okay?

Or "good for", like "good for you".

So if I may, and if you can give me a second, I want to do this last one before we move,

all right?

Let's talk about the word "love".

Love is -- well, it's deep.

Deep, deep, deep like my voice.

Barry White is deep.

It's deep, romantic, and/or sexual feeling.

"Sexual feeling.

When I get the --" yeah.

You get it.

You understand.

Okay.

So when you say somebody is "lovable", what you're really saying is "they are worthy of

love".

"They are not lovable" -- they do not deserve, or they should not be loved.

"They are lovable" -- "Oh, so lovable, so cute, look at my little puppy!

He's so cute!"

It's worthy.

It has the value to be loved.

And that's what ABLE means here, right?

So it's an adjective.

We say, "lovable kitten, lovable puppy.

Right?

Lovable desktop, laptop computer."

No.

You don't say that, Son, but that's the next word I'm going to teach you, "enjoyable",

okay?

So we can also say this to use the "good for" as in "enjoyable".

"To enjoy" is to get pleasure -- "pleasure" meaning happiness from something.

If you enjoy it, it gives you happiness or pleasure, right?

Okay.

So when we say something is "enjoyable", it means it's good for fun.

"That's an enjoyable book."

It's not that it's got value -- "It's valuable.

It's worthy of you because it is like you and fantastic!"

No.

It means it's good for fun.

It's an enjoyable book.

It's good for fun.

It's good for happiness or for pleasure.

All right?

So when you have it here -- I know I don't have it, but I gave you one visually.

I'm giving you one audio -- auditory, auditory speech.

Why?

Because there are different forms of learning.

Visual is one -- I write for you.

I speak.

You need to, when you practice your English, not just always have it written down for you.

You have to learn to capture the information through listening.

I've got at least two videos on listening skills, and you have to practice them on this

lesson.

As I said, some of you complain that it's too easy.

Well, now, it's a bit hard.

They're here.

The information's here.

If you're not listening, you're not catching.

If you're not looking, you're not catching.

I'm giving you some serious vocabulary; I mean serious.

Sorry.

And some serious humor.

Anyway.

All right, E?

So I gave you three of the most useful -- listen carefully because those of you out there who

go, "Oh, but what about 'ness', and what about 'ly', and what about --" I know.

I've got some other videos -- I already checked -- that have some of those endings.

These are the three most useful because they will appear a lot, and they're going to let

you know that it's adjective or noun, action and process.

Boom.

I helped you out, okay?

So we've got that.

I gave you "enjoyable", "lovable".

I gave you "revere" and "defer".

See?

I hope you're listening, okay?

I gave you "argument", and what's the other one I gave you besides "argue"?

"Argument" and -- did we do "enjoyment"?

Did I forget "enjoyment"?

I forgot "enjoyment".

That's my fault.

Okay.

"Enjoyment".

Similar to this.

"To enjoy" is to get fun or -- similar to being -- you got it.

Anyway.

When we talk about someone's enjoyment -- oh, no.

I did give you the second one.

I forgot.

I lied.

It's up to you to go back in the video and figure out what the second one was here.

Yeah.

See?

I'm making stuff up just to make you happy.

No more of that.

You earn -- you have to earn my respect.

You have to be worthy of my love.

Okay.

Anyway.

To go through it quickly but not so quickly.

We have two sets or two classes of suffixes.

The first one, you should be familiar with if you've done any grammar at all.

These are the grammar suffixes.

They are grammar function.

S -- talking about the third person.

ED -- talking about the simple past.

ING -- which leads to gerunds.

And in gerunds, we're talking about nouns, adjectives, and present participle, okay?

Then we talked about the second class of suffixes, which change the class of a word.

And we did that here looking at -- we were taking verbs and making them adjectives, right?

"Enjoyable" or "love".

And we took verbs over here and made them nouns.

Similar in meaning, but we change the actual class.

And this is good to know for (a) what the word means, and (b) how to use it properly

in context.

And that's what we mean by "properly" in your sentence and in your language, okay?

So this is part two of prefixes is suffixes.

It wasn't listed as part two.

But if you know the beginning, which is prefix for "pre", you should know the end, which

is "suf", "suf" for "end".

See?

Cool, right?

Like a Bond movie.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Mr. E, of course, it's always been -- well, you are number one in my heart.

All right?

I hope this has been enjoyable for you.

I'm going to wrap this up, okay?

Anyway.

No argument.

This has been a valuable lesson.

And I'm sure you'll show the proper reverence when you finish and do the quiz, all right?

Have a good one.

We'll see you soon.