Word formation
Many words are made up of parts. Learning to "see" those parts is a fantastic shortcut to increasing your vocabulary. The first time you realize that you understand a new word because you can pick out its parts, shout Eureka! Eureka is Greek and means "I got it!". Archimedes, the ancient Greek mathematician, is supposed to have shouted Eureka! when he stepped into his bath. Do you know what it was that he suddenly understood? On these pages you will learn to detect three kinds of word parts, prefix (beginning of words), root (basic meaning), and suffix (word ending). Let's take a look at the word decentralization - "the spread of power away from the centre to local branches or governments". It is a typical word of Latin origin with a prefix (de-), a root (-centr-), and suffixes.	"Eureka!"
Decentralization  "The act of taking things away from the middle"    de- prefix, meaning "away from"  -centr- root, meaning "middle"  -al suffix, making adjectives from nouns  -iz(e) suffix, making verbs from nouns and adjectives  -(at)ion suffix, making nouns from verbs
| Prefixes |
There is a small number of prefixes (beginning of words) that always have the same basic meaning. Examples: de- has the meaning of "away from", "off", "aside", as in defrost (remove the ice from the car window), as in destabilize (make something unstable by "putting the stability to the side") pre- has the basic meaning of "before", as in pre-war, prepare, prenatal (before birth) sub- has the basic meaning of "under", as in submarine
| Roots |
There is a number of Latin roots (piece/s of a word carrying the original meaning) that appear in so many different English words that it pays off to learn them. Examples: -centr- has the basic meaning of "middle", as in centre, central, concentricity (the quality of having the same centre, as circles inside one another) -tract- has the basic meaning of "pull", as in tractor, extract (pull out), attract, etc. -sid- has the basic meaning of sit as in president (the one who sits before the others)
| Suffixes |
There is a small number of suffixes (word endings) that always have the same basic meaning. Examples: -al has the basic function of forming adjectives from nouns; centre into central -ize has the basic function of forming verbs from nouns and adjectives; centre/central into centralize, America/American into Americanize, Islam into Islamize -ion has the basic function of forming nouns from verbs; centralize  into centralization, create into creation
| Word families |
Many words belong together in "families", often appearing as different word classes. If you look up words that have the root -centr- in common, you will find hundreds, e.g.   centre centra central centrally centralistic centralist central heating centrifugal concentric egocentric epicentre acentric bicentric decentralize nonconcentric The family "ancestor" is the root -centr- Central has the suffix -al, which turns it into an adjective with the basic meaning of "having the quality of", so central means "being in the centre". Acentric has both a prefix  a-  and a suffix  -ic . The prefix means "not", and the suffix -ic, just like al-, turns the word into an adjective. So acentric means "not centred or having no centre". Bicentric has the prefix  bi-  , which means "two", so if something is bicentric, it has two centres. Concentric has the prefix  con-  which means "together", "with", so concentric means "having the same centre. Do you know what concentric circles are? What about nonconcentric? Well, the prefix  non-  means "no", so obviously it is the opposite of concentric. Eureka!