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In linguistics, 'derivation' is the process of creating new lexemes from other lexemes, for example, by adding a derivational affix. It is a kind of word formation.
A derivational suffix usually applies to words of one syntactic category and changes them into words of another syntactic category. For example, the English derivational suffix ''-ly'' changes adjectives into adverbs (''slow'' → ''slowly'').
Some examples of English derivational suffixes:

★ adjective-to-noun: ''-ness'' (''slow'' → ''slowness'')

★ adjective-to-verb: ''-ise'' (''modern'' → ''modernise'')

★ noun-to-adjective: ''-al'' (''recreation'' → ''recreational'')

★ noun-to-verb: ''-fy'' (''glory'' → ''glorify'')

★ verb-to-adjective: ''-able'' (''drink'' → ''drinkable'')

★ verb-to-noun: ''-ance'' (''deliver'' → ''deliverance'')
Although derivational affixes do not necessarily modify the syntactic category, they modify the meaning of the base. In many cases, derivational affixes change both the syntactic category and the meaning: ''modern'' → ''modernize'' ("to make modern"). The modification of meaning is sometimes predictable: ''Adjective + ness'' → ''the state of being (Adjective)''; (''stupid''→ ''stupidness'').
A prefix (''write'' → '' re-write''; ''lord'' → ''over-lord'') will rarely change syntactic category in English. The derivational prefix ''un-'' applies to adjectives (''healthy'' → ''unhealthy''), some verbs (''do'' → ''undo''), but rarely nouns. A few exceptions are the prefixes en- and be-. En- (em- before labials) is usually used as a transitive marker on verbs, but can also be applied to adjectives and nouns to form transitive verb: ''circle'' (verb) → ''encircle'' (verb); but ''rich'' (adj) → ''enrich'' (verb), ''large'' (adj) → ''enlarge'' (verb), ''rapture'' (noun) → ''enrapture'' (verb), ''slave'' (noun) → ''enslave''(verb). The prefix be-, though not as productive as it once was in English, can function in a similar way to en- to mark transitivity, but can also be attached to nouns, often in a causative or privative sense: ''siege'' (noun) → ''besiege'' (verb), ''jewel'' (noun) → ''bejewel'' (verb), ''head'' (noun) → ''behead'' (verb).
Note that derivational affixes are bound morphemes. In that, derivation differs from compounding, by which ''free'' morphemes are combined (''lawsuit'', ''Latin professor''). It also differs from inflection in that inflection does not change a word's syntactic category and creates not new lexemes but new word forms (''table'' → ''tables''; ''open'' → ''opened'').
Derivation may occur without any change of form, for example ''telephone'' (noun) and ''to telephone''. This is known as conversion. Some linguists consider that when a word's syntactic category is changed without any change of form, a null morpheme is being affixed.

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See also

See also

★ Compound (linguistics)

★ Inflection

★ Nominalization

★ Word formation