morphology
n. uncountablen. the study of the form and structure of things, like how words are built or how living things are shaped.
n. the branch of biology or linguistics dealing with the form and structure of organisms or words. In linguistics, it specifically addresses the internal structure of words and the rules of word formation.
The morphology of the word 'unhappy' includes the prefix 'un-'.
In biology class, we compared the morphology of different bird beaks to understand how they eat.
The researcher argued that the morphology of the local rock formations was the result of millions of years of glacial movement and subsequent erosion.
Borrowed from German Morphologie. By surface analysis, morpho- + -logy.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Often used with 'of' to specify the subject being studied, such as 'the morphology of plants' or 'the morphology of a language'.
- Nounmorphology
- Adjectivemorphological
Last updated May 6, 2026