Spécial | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z | Tout
A |
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adjectivea class of word which is generally used to describe or modify a noun, such as cat; e.g. a sleepy small furry brown cat. | |
aspectgrammatical information contained in the verb phrase about the duration of an action; for example I was walking in contrast to I walked. | |
auxiliary verba part of the verb phrase, separate from the lexical verb, which carries information about tense, mood and aspect. See page 67. | |
B |
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bound morphemea type of morpheme (such as -ed or -tion) which cannot stand on its own but must be attached to a free morpheme (such as pollute, to produce polluted, or pollution). See also derivational morpheme and inflectional morpheme. | |
C |
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classa term which can be used generally to mean a group of similar things. See word class for a specific linguistic use of this term | |
clausea grammatical unit containing a main verb. A sentence has to contain at least one clause. There are various kinds of clauses. A main clause is one which contains a main | |
clausesA clause is defined as an expression which contains (at least) a subject and a predicate, and which may contain other types of expression as well (e.g. one or more complements and/or adjuncts). In most cases, the predicate in a clause is a lexical main verb, so that there will be as many different clauses in a sentence as there are different lexical verbs. | |
complement:This is a term used to denote a specific grammatical function. A complement is an expression which is directly merged with a head word, thereby projecting the head into a larger structure of essentially the same kind. In ‘close the door’, the door is the complement of the verb close; in ‘after dinner’, dinner is the complement of the preposition after; in ‘good at physics’, at physics is the complement of the adjective good; in ‘loss of face’, of face is the complement of the noun loss. As these examples illustrate, complements typically follow their heads in English. Thus, a complement has a close morphological, syntactic and semantic relation to its head. | |
D |
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declarative:
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E |
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entry:
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F |
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finite verband can stand on its own as a sentence. A subordinate clause needs to be attached to a main clause to be grammatically complete. One kind of subordinate clause, the relative clause, usually starts with a relative pronoun such as who, which, that, where. | |
fragment:
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functionExpressions such as subject, specifier, complement, object, head and adjunct are said to denote the grammatical function which a particular expression fulfils in a particular structure (which in turn relates to the position which it occupies and certain of its grammatical properties – e.g. case and agreement properties). | |
G |
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gerundWhen used in conjunction with the progressive aspect auxiliary be, verb forms ending in -ing are progressive participles; in other uses they generally function as gerunds. In particular, -ing verb forms are gerunds when they can be used as subjects, or as complements of verbs or prepositions, and when (in literary styles) they can have a genitive subject like my. Thus writing is a gerund (verb form) in a sentence such as ‘She was annoyed at [my writing to her mother]’, since the bracketed gerund structure is used as the complement of the preposition at, and has a genitive subject my. | |
I |
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infinitiveThe infinitive form of a verb is the (uninflected) form which is used (inter alia) when the verb is the complement of a modal auxiliary like can, or of the infinitive particle to. Accordingly, the italicised verbs are infinitive forms in sentences like ‘He can speak French’, and ‘He’s trying to learn French.’ An infinitive clause is a clause which contains a verb in the infinitive form. Hence, the bracketed clauses are infinitive clauses in: ‘He is trying [to help her]’, and ‘Why not let [him help her]?’ (In both examples, help is an infinitive verb form, and to when used with an infinitive complement is said to be an infinitive particle.) Since clauses are analysed as phrases within the framework used here, the term infinitive phrase can be used interchangeably with infinitive clause, to denote a TP projection headed by the infinitive particle to (or by a null counterpart of the infinitive particle to). | |
M |
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modifier/modify:
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N |
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Nounnouns are hard to define. You may have heard them described as ‘names’ (e.g. Shân, Joanna, language, or cat), but they can also refer to abstract concepts such as emptiness, joy, and age. However, many words more usually thought of as verbs, or even as adverbs or adjectives, can be used as nouns, and it is its syntactic behaviour which makes a word a noun rather than anything else. Nouns can usually be singular or plural, they can be modified by adjectives and they can be preceded by determiners. For example, in the sentence ‘Have you read a good book?’, a is a determiner, good is an adjective, and book is a noun. Similarly, in the sentence ‘Did you have a good swim?’, swim is a noun, although in a different sentence it could be used as a verb (‘I swim every Monday’). | |
noun phrasea grammatical unit built around a noun. For example, car, the car, and the red car are all noun phrases. See page 64. | |
O |
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objecta constituent of a clause, which is part of the predicate and follows the main verb. In the sentence I ate the chocolate bar, I is the subject, ate is the main verb, and the chocolate bar is the object. | |
P |
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predicateFor example, I hate eating bananas is a sentence: I is the subject, hateeating bananas is the predicate, and hate is the main verb. In contrast, eating bananas isnot a sentence because it does not contain a main, finite verb. | |
prepositionsa class of words which include items such as in, on, over, through, out, etc. pronouns pronouns are a word class which can replace nouns in a sentence. Examples include she, I, you, them, him, its, theirs. | |
S |
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sentencea grammatical unit consisting of at least one main clause, with a subject and | |
SVOrefers to subject, verb, and object; the usual order, or arrangement, of grammatical elements in English. | |
V |
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verb phrasea grammatical unit containing either a finite or non-finite verb. | |