Language Curiosities

By Fabiana Parreira de Oliveira | Feb. 03, 2022

When we talk about morphology (from Greek morphē ‘form’ + -logy) in language studies, we always refer to prefixes and suffixes, isn’t it? I’m sure you’ve already heard words like “childhood” or “neighborhood”, for example.

In childhood, the suffix ‘hood’ is related to time, to a certain period. In this case, to the period in which we are children. So, adulthood can be understood as the period (or even the ‘condition’, the ‘state’) of being an adult, right?

But take a look at the word neighborhood. It brings the suffix ‘hood’ to refer to a place, to an area. Neighborhood is a district or a community within a town or a city. Therefore, the suffix hood may refer to different things depending on the context. Sometimes, it can be related to:

- state, condition, quality, character, time, period, place, area

Let’s take a look at other definitions:

Brotherhood = the relationship between brothers; individuals sharing a (specified) state or character.

Motherhood = the state of being a mother.

Parenthood = the state of being a parent.

Likelihood = the state or fact of something’s being likely; probability.

Livelihood = a means of securing the necessities of life.

Falsehood = the state of being untrue.

All of these pieces of information help us understand how context plays an important role in comprehension.

But... what about the word teacherhood? What does it mean? Can you guess??