 an exponent is a phonological manifestation of a morphosyntactic property. in non-technical language, it is the expression of one or more grammatical properties by sound. there are several kinds of exponents: *identity *affixation *reduplication *internal modification *subtraction ==identity== the identity exponent is both simple and common: it has no phonological manifestation at all. an example in english: deer + plural â deer ==affixation== affixation is the addition of a prefix, suffix or infix to a word. an example in english: want + past â wanted ==reduplication== reduplication is the repetition of part of a word. an example in sanskrit: da ("give") + present + active + indicative + first person + singular â dadaami (the da at the beginning is from reduplication, a characteristic of class 3 verbs in sanskrit) ==internal modification== there are several types of internal modification. an internal modification may be segmental, meaning it changes a sound in the root. an example in english: stink + past = stank (i becomes a) an internal modification might be a suprasegmental modification. an example would be a change in pitch or stress. an example of the latter in english (acute accent indicates stress): recÃrd + noun = rÃ©cord ==subtraction== subtraction is the removal of a sound or a group of sounds. an example in french: oeuf /Åf/ ("egg") + plural = Åufs /Ã¸/ (final f is lost) 
Linguistic_morphology