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Word for a specific way we noun our verbs? (lemmy.dbzer0.com)

submitted 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/33025461

I'm doing some conlanging for a book and I'm having trouble finding the word for how we can take a verb, add -er at the end, and get a word for a person who does that thing. For example, a driver is someone who drives, a commander is someone who commands, a lawyer is someone who laws, and a finger is someone who fings. I am having trouble finding out how other languages noun their verbs in this way since I don't know what this thing is called. Pls halp.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 weeks ago

I don't know the specific name for this process, but the general term is derivation. A suffix added to a word which changes its meaning is derivational morphology (this is opposed to inflectional morphology, which is grammatical. So -er in driver is derivational, but the -s in drivers is inflectional) A noun which is made by adding -er to a verb is an agent noun, and a noun which is formed by adding derivational morphology to a verb is a deverbal (and the inverse is a denominal). Hope you find this helpful!