How many morphemes are in the word "CALIFORNIA"?

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BlackTom AI · Accepted Answer

Let's break down what a morpheme is and apply it to CALIFORNIA. A morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit in a language; it can be a whole word or a meaningful prefix/suffix attached to a word. 
Option: One. This matches the idea that CALIFORNIA is a single, standalone proper noun with no affixes or internal meaningful segments that function as independent morphemes within the word. In many analyses, it is treated as a single morpheme because there isn’t a smaller unit that carries independent meaning in this context.
Option: Two. This would imply CALIFORNIA consists of two meaningful units, such as a base plus a prefix/suffix or a compound segment. There is no established affix or second morpheme here; the word is not typically decomposed into meaningful subparts, so this is incorrect.
Option: Three. Similar to the previous one, claiming three morphemes would require multiple affixes or meaningful substructures. Since CALIFORNIA is not morphologically segmented into three distinct meaningful pieces, this option does not fit.
Option: Four. Again, this would require four separate morphemes, which is not how CALIFORNIA is analyzed in standard morphology. The word lacks additional bound or bound-like elements to justify four units.
In sum, CALIFORNIA functions as a single, unanalyzed lexical item in this context, so only the option One correctly identifies the number of morphemes.

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How many morphemes are in the word "CALIFORNIA"?

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