A ‣ Common noun suffixes

-er /ə/ is used for the person who does an activity, e.g. writer, painter, worker, shopper, teacher. You can use -er with a wide range of verbs to make them into nouns.

Sometimes the -er suffix is written as -or (it is still pronounced/ə/). It is worth making a special list of these words as you meet them, e.g. actor, donor [person who donates something], operator, sailor, supervisor [person whose job is to make sure that other people do their jobs correctly, safely, etc.].

-er / -or are also used for things which do a particular job, e.g. pencil sharpener, bottle opener, grater, projector, stapler, coat hanger.

-er and -ee (pronounced /i:/) can contrast with each other meaning 'person who does something' (-er) and 'person who receives or experiences the action' (-ee), e.g. employer/ employee /emplɔɪjˈiː/, sender, addressee, payee (e.g. of a sum of money).

-tion / -sion / -ion are used to form nouns from verbs, e.g. complication, pollution, reduction, alteration, donation, promotion, admission, action.

-ist [a person] and -ism [an activity or ideology] are used for people's politics, beliefs and ideologies, and sometimes their profession (compare with -er/-or professions above), e.g. Marxist, typist, physicist, terrorist, Buddhism, journalism.

-ist is also often used for people who play musical instruments, e.g. pianist, violinist, cellist.

-ness is used to make nouns from adjectives, e.g. goodness, readiness, forgetfulness, happiness, sadness, weakness. Note what happens to adjectives that end in -y.

B ‣ Adjective suffixes

-able/-ible /əbl/ with verbs means 'can be done', e.g. drinkable      washable      readable      forgivable      edible [can be eaten]      flexible [can be bent]

C ‣ Verbs

-ise (or -ize, which is more common in American English) forms verbs from adjectives, e.g. modernise [make modern], commercialise, industrialise, computerise.

D ‣ Other suffixes that can help you recognise the word class

The informal suffix -ish can be added to most common adjectives, ages and times to make them less precise, e.g. She's thirtyish. He has reddish hair. Come about eightish.