Although we’ve got nothing on German, the English language sometimes involves putting different “parts” of words or even whole words together to make a new term. And prefixes are a big part of this. But what exactly are prefixes? And how do you use them in your writing?
A “prefix” is a group of letters placed at the start of a word to change its meaning. We can even see how this works using the word “prefix” itself, which is a combination of “pre-” and “fix”:
Combined, then, the word “prefix” indicates something we “attach” to the start of a word. There are many different prefixes in English. Some common examples include:
Prefix
Meaning
Example
Anti-
Against or opposed to
Antisocial, antiviral
Auto-
Related to the self or spontaneous
Automatic, autobiography
De-
Reverse or reduce
Devalue, decode
Dis-
Reverse or negate
Disobey, disappear
En-
Cause to be or put into
Enact, encase
Ex-
Out of or former
Extract, ex-girlfriend
Il-, Im-, In- or Ir-
Not or negate
Illegal, immobile, insufficient, irresponsible
Mis-
Incorrect
Misbehave, misspell
Post-
After, later or behind
Postseason, postscript
Pre-
Before or in front of
Prefix, prefrontal
Pro-
Favoring or promoting
Proclaim, pro-democracy
Re-
Repeat or restore
Refresh, rewrite
Sub-
Below or less than
Submarine, substandard
Trans-
Across or beyond
Transatlantic, transgender
Un-
Unzip, undo
In the table above, you may notice that we hyphenate the words “ex-girlfriend” and “pro-democracy.” This is because you should use a prefix with a hyphen in certain cases, including:
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There are exceptions to these rules (e.g., “cooperate” is usually spelled without a hyphen despite the double “o”). But they are useful guidelines when you’re not sure whether to use a hyphen.
Finally, a quick warning. The English language has borrowed lots of words from lots of places, so it is common for similar words to have different meanings. And the same applies to prefixes.
For example, the “in-” in “inaccurate” is a negation, so it is the opposite of “accurate.” However, the word “inflammable” means the same as “flammable,” not the opposite! This is because the “in-” from “inflammable” is from the same root as “en-” in words like “enrich” or “entrust.” It therefore means “cause to be,” which is very different from negating something.
As such, be careful when using prefixes, as they may not mean what they seem! And if you’d like help checking your prefix use, just let us know.
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