When I was in school, teachers often used to say that we should know the root words in English. But woefully, I forgot how could they be handy. Can anybody here explain if remembering the root words really can help me? I assume it has something to do with acquiring a strong vocabulary, etc.
I am talking about the form in another language from which the word is derived, for example the Latin sto and stare, from which words like stance, status, and state are derived, as pointed out by StoneyB.
Answer
The basis for understanding Latin, Greek, etc. roots is to help you make an educated guess at the meaning of new words you encounter.
Often, context will give you sufficient clues to guess the word's meaning, but not always. If you are familiar with roots and you can recognize the root of the new word, you can get a pretty good idea of its meaning even when there is not enough context to clearly define it, or when the context is ambiguous. Roots are especially helpful when used in conjunction with a word's context.
It also helps to know the English roots of words, so that when you come across compound words or words with crazy prefixes and suffixes you can still pretty well guess what someone is talking about.
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