The Chinese word 袖子 (xiùzi), meaning "sleeve", is a classic example of a root + nominal suffix compound. It is formed by combining the meaningful root character 袖 (xiù), which itself means "sleeve", with the extremely common and often meaningless nominalizing suffix 子 (zi). The suffix 子 here does not add specific semantic content but serves a grammatical and phonological purpose: it standardizes the word as a disyllabic noun, which is a dominant pattern in modern Chinese, and provides a more natural, colloquial flow compared to the monosyllabic and more literary-sounding 袖 alone. Thus, 袖子 is the standard, everyday term for "sleeve".