English Structure

English Structure

Greek and Latin. None of this classical lexis was found in Old English, of course - it has entered English from the Renaissance onwards, most of it in comparatively modern times, thanks to its extensive use in science.

Some of the language categories of traditional grammar have more coherence than others. Nouns and verbs are fairly coherent, while adverbs (or all the words classed by lexicographers as such) are certainly not.

If you have any comments or suggestions about the guide, please contact me.

We can study the structure of language in a variety of ways. For example, we can study

• classes of words (parts of speech),
• meanings of words (semantics), with or without considering changes of meaning,
• how words are organised in relation to each other (syntax),
• how words are formed (morphology),
• the sounds of words (phonology) and
• how written forms represent these (lexicography).

There is no universally accepted model for doing this, but some models use the notion of ahierarchy, and this may prove fruitful for you. The framework (description of structure) you will study here is written to be comprehensive yet succinct. Elsewhere, in studying language theory, you will focus on a selective area, and investigate this in more detail.

The most basic units of meaning are simple words (e.g.: dog, yes and swim) or the elements of complex words (e.g.: un- -happi- and -ness in unhappiness). These basic elements are called morphemes, and the study of how they are combined in words ismorphology.

The study of how words are organised into phrases, clauses and sentences is usually referred to as syntax.

A longer stretch of language is known as discourse, the study of its structure as discourse analysis.

This hierarchy is partly explained by the table below, from David Crystal's The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language. The right hand column should be read upwards, in the direction of the arrow.

Outline structure of English
sentences are analysed into clauses are analysed into phrases are analysed into words are analysed into morphemes	↓ ↑	sentences are used to build clauses are used to build phrases are used to build words are used to build morphemes

The following table shows a three-part model of the structure of English.

Three-part model of English
Morphology	Syntax	Discourse
morphemes ↓ words	phrases ↓ clauses ↓ sentences	relationships between sentences in longer stretches of language

Morphology

This is the study of the structure of words. The name comes from Greek morphos (=shape or form). The smallest units of meaning may be whole simple words (e.g. man, run, big) or parts of complex words (e.g. un-, -faith- and -ful in unfaithful) which are called morphemes.

Some morphemes, such as faith in un-faith-ful or dream in dream-ing can stand alone as words which make sense. These are known as free morphemes. You will see how very many simple words are free morphemes, but can combine with other morphemes, both free and bound (see below) to form complex words.

Where two simple words are joined together to form a new complete word, this is called acompound word. Examples include teapot, starlight and careworn. When these terms are first coined, they are shown in some dictionaries with a hyphen, as light-house or fish-finger.

Other morphemes, such as prefixes and suffixes (collectively called affixes), cannot stand alone - they need to be part of a complex word to make sense. Examples are dis- in dis-miss, dis-pute or dis-grace, -ing in dream-ing, -ness in happi-ness or sad-ness and even -sused to form plurals, as in boy-s or horse-s. These morphemes are said to be boundmorphemes.

Inflection and derivation

Bound morphemes are traditionally divided into two further classes. Sometimes a word is changed in its form to show the internal grammar of a sentence (&#quot;agreement&#quot;). Examples would be plural forms of nouns (dog + s → dog-s) or past (imperfect) tenses of regular verbs (want + ed → want-ed). The study of such changes is inflectional morphology (because the words in question are inflected - altered by adding a suffix).

Other compound or complex words are made by adding together elements without reference to the internal grammar of a sentence. For example, the verb infect suggests a new verb disinfect (=to undo the action of infecting). New words are often formed by noun +-ize, noun + ism, or verb + able (scandalize, Stalinism, disposable). The study of such words, "derived" from existing words or morphemes is derivational morphology. The elements of which the word is made may have a grammatical relationship within the word(you may find this idea difficult), but their formation is independent of the syntax of the clause or sentence in which they occur. If you find this puzzling, two things may help:

• Inflectional morphology is much easier to recognize. A relatively small number of types of inflection (showing number or tense, say) covers most cases.
• All compound and most complex words show derivational morphology. If a complex word does not show inflection it will show derivation.

But note: a complex word may show both inflection and derivation! A derived word may be inflected to show, for example, tense or number: deported or disposables (as in nappies or diapers).

This table shows how the most common kinds of inflection are found in three word classes:

Inflection of nouns, verbs and qualifiers
Nouns	Verbs	Adjectives and adverbs
Addition of terminal s to show plural (one cat; two cats); Addition of 's to show possession (Henry's cat).	Ending shows tense (wanted) or person ([she] wants).	Addition of -er → comparative (hotter; likelier); Addition of -est → superlative (coldest; soonest).

This table illustrates how derivation can occur:

Derivational morphology in complex words
Prefix	Base of Word	Suffix	Complex Word
Bi	cycl(e)	ing	Bicycling
Dis	grace	ful	Disgraceful
In	tolera(te)	able	Intolerable
Re	vision	ist	Revisionist
Un, co	operat(e)	ive, ly	Uncooperatively
Un	likely (y becomes i)	hood	Unlikelihood

Remember that morphology is the study of the structure of words. The structure of words can also be studied to show how the meaning of a given morpheme, or its relation to the rest of the word, varies from one complex word to another. Consider how sun works in the following words: sunbeam, sunburnt, sundial, sunflower, sunglasses, sunlight, sunrise, sun-spot (scientific sense), sun-spot (tourist sense), suntan.

Inflection does not really yield “new” words, but alters the form of existing ones for specific reasons of grammar. Derivation, on the other hand, does lead to the creation of new words. David Crystal (Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language; p. 90) lists four normal processes of word-formation, of which three are examples of derivation:

Four kinds of word-formation
Prefixation (derivational)	Suffixation (derivational)	Compounding (derivational)	Conversion (not derivational)
Affix placed before base of word, e.g.disobey	Affix placed after base of word, e.g.kindness	Two base forms are added together, e.g.blackbird	Word changes class, without any change of form, e.g. (the) pet (n) becomes (to) pet (vb.)

Words considered as wholes can be categorized according to how they work within phrases, clauses or sentences. These categories, traditionally called parts of speech are now more usually known as word classes. Parts of speech are labels for categories in which words are usually placed. But in a given sentence a word from one category may behave as if it were in another. A dictionary will only record established or standard usage.

The traditional parts of speech were of eight kinds, excluding the two articles (a/an, the). These were nouns, pronouns, adjectives, verbs, prepositions, conjunctions, adverbs, and interjections. Modern linguists prefer to list words in classes that are coherent - all the words in them should behave in the same way. But if this principle were applied rigidly, we would have hundreds of classes, so irregularities are tolerated!

Closed and open word classes

Table of closed word classes | table of open word classes

Some classes of words are called closed because they contain a relatively small number of items to which no new words can normally be added. These are words (prepositions and conjunctions) which make connections (connectives or connectors), pronouns and words (including articles) like the, some, each that co-occur with nouns - these are calleddeterminers.

Other classes of word are constantly being added to. Each contains a vast number of terms already. They are open to new words being introduced. The open classes are nouns, verbs and the words which qualify them, adjectives and adverbs. These form the bulk of a language's vocabulary or lexis (also lexicon, though this sometimes refers to a published version). These classes may be called lexical whereas the closed-class words arestructural or functional. These tables illustrate the two kinds of word class.

Closed word classes
Determiner	Pronoun	Preposition	Conjunction
A, the, any, my, those, which	She, them, who, that, himself	In, across, at, by, near, within	And, but, if, or, while, unless

Open word classes
Noun	Verb	Adjective	Adverb
Abstract: fear, joy Concrete: chair, mud Common: boy, town Proper: Fred, Hull	Transitive: bite, steal Intransitive: live, cry Modal: can, will, may Auxiliary: be, have, do	Descriptive: lazy, tall Comparative: lazier Superlative: tallest	Manner: reluctantly, keenly, easily, softly Time: soon, often Place: here, there

Problems of classification

Some words are difficult to classify. Not all grammatical descriptions will place them in the same word class. This, these or those are sometimes classified as demonstrative (or distinctive) adjectives or pronouns. Possessives, like my, his, their, are sometimes classified as pronouns (showing the word from which they are formed), sometimes as adjectives, showing their grammatical function of qualifying nouns: usually they are pronouns when alone (I like that) and adjectives when they precede a noun (I like thisweather). Traditional lists of adverbs contain words like very which qualify other adverbs or adjectives. This word class is sometimes called a "dustbin" class, because any word which defies classification will be put in it! Among words which have sometimes been classified as adverbs are the following: however, just, no, not, quickly, tomorrow and when.

This incoherence has long been recognized by grammarians who subdivide adverbs into further categories, such as adverbs of time, place or manner.

In trying to organize words into coherent classes, linguists will consider any or all of the following: what they mean (semantics), their form (morphology), provenance (historical origin) and function in a phrase, clause or sentence (syntax).

Some words, such as numbers, do not fit in any of the word classes given above. They can behave as adjectives (one loaf or two?) or pronouns (I want one now!). And no onedescription of word classes is regarded as finally authoritative. Some classes (such asverbs or conjunctions) are fairly coherent. You should be able to discuss the problems of how or where to classify words which seem not to "fit".

Also note that a dictionary does not (or should not) prescribe, but indicates the word class or part of speech where a word is usually placed. But in a given sentence, if the speaker or writer has used it as if it were in a different class, then this is where it should be placed.

For example, toilet is usually classified as a noun. But UK primary school teachers often speak of toileting children (I had to toilet John twice today). In describing such a sentence, you should be guided by the internal grammar of the sentence (syntax) rather than the dictionary. Here toilet is a transitive verb. If this usage becomes standard, lexicographers will record it. This kind of word formation is called conversion, a self-explanatory name.

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Kinds and Functions of Words:
Word Classes or Parts of Speech

Every statement is a combination of words, and every statement says something to communicate information. The simplest possible kind of statement - for example, Dogs bark - has two kinds of words in it. It has a what word, dogs, and a what happens word, bark. These kinds of words are the most basic parts of any statement. If a person only says dog, no statement is made, and no information is conveyed. A sound is made that calls to mind a common, four-footed animal, but nothing regarding it is learned.

The what words are called nouns. They tell what is being talked about. They are identifying words, or names. Nouns identify persons, places, or things. They may be particular persons, places, or things: Michael Jackson, Reykjavik, World Trade Center. Or they may be general nouns: singer, town, building. Concrete nouns indicate things that can be seen such as car, teapot, and potato. Abstract nouns denote concepts such as love, honesty,and beauty.

It is rather odd that English grammar should retain this abstract-concrete distinction for nouns. It appears to be a survival from the philosopher Plato, who divided the world into mind and matter. If it has any value it is in the philosophical field of epistemology (theory of knowledge). It does not really reveal anything for linguists beyond itself. That is, we can, if we wish, try to place nouns in the sub-categories of concrete and abstract, but once we have done so, this categorization has no further value for the study of language. Moreover, modern science confuses the issue, since it shows that many things we once supposed to belong to mind, are in fact, embodied in matter. A thrill is not only abstract, since it involves matter at the level of biochemistry.

The what happens words are called verbs. They are the action words in a statement. Without them it is impossible to put sentences together. It is the verb that says something about the noun: dogs bark, birds fly, fish swim. Verbs are the important words that create information in statements. Although nouns alone make no statement, verbs can occasionally do so. Help! gives the information that someone is in trouble, and Go away!tells someone or something emphatically to leave.

Besides nouns and verbs there are other kinds of words that have different functions in statements. They are pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, conjunctions, articles, prepositions, and a very few words that can be called function words because they fit into none of the other categories. All of these kinds of words together are called parts of speech. They can just as well be called parts of writing because they apply to written as well as to spoken language.

Nouns and articles

Nouns can be particular or general: the house, a house. The words the and a are articles, or, in more technical terms, determiners. A house can be any house, but the house is a quite definite building. When a noun begins with a vowel (a, e, i, o, u, and, occasionally, y) the indefinite article a becomes an for the sake of easier pronunciation - an apple, an elephant, an orange. Sometimes an is used before words that start with h, especially if theh is silent: an honorary degree. If the h is sounded a is the standard form: an 'otel, a hotel.

Nouns can be singular or plural in number: cat, cats.

• In some cases es is added to make nouns plural: dress, dresses.
• Some nouns change their forms in the plural, without adding an s but by changing ormutating a vowel: foot, feet; man, men; mouse, mice; goose, geese.
• Some nouns do not change at all in the plural: sheep, fowl.

There are also group nouns, called noun phrases. This means that two or more nouns, or a noun and an adjective, are put together to form what amounts to, or works like, one noun:football stadium, rock concert, orange tree. In each case certain nouns - football, rock, orange - are attached to other nouns, and each modifies or describes the second noun in some way to convey a different kind of object. A football and a football stadium are two entirely different things, though they both have to do with the same game.

Some nouns are one-of-a-kind names: Suez Canal, Elvis Presley, Empire State Building.Also called proper nouns, they are capitalized to set them off from general nouns. Sometimes adjectives (words that describe nouns) are also capitalized. This normally happens when the adjective is made from a proper noun, especially a place or person:American literature, English countryside, Elizabethan theatre.

Proper nouns are contrasted with common nouns (naming words for general classes of things which contain many individual examples). In fact many of the nouns that we consider proper are still names for more than one individual, as with the name of a model of car (likeFord Escort or VW Beetle, which might have been produced in the millions). Like the abstract-concrete distinction, the common-proper categories may originate in Platonic philosophy, which contrasted the many things in the real world with unique ideal originals of which they are imperfect copies. It is of more practical concern, since it is meant to inform the written representations of words (whether or not to use an initial capital). Unlike German (which uses a capital for all nouns) or Norwegian (which never does), English has a mixed and inconsistent system which changes over time, and which is confused by the individual tendencies of writers. One problem is that a descriptive phrase (like the second world war) can become petrified into a title, so that we write Second World War or World War Two. And Queen Juliana is or was the queen of the Netherlands, but Queen Elizabeth II is, to many of her subjects, simply the Queen, or even The Queen. In these cases, the "correct" forms are not universally standard for all writers of English, but more a matter of publishers' house styles.

Many introductions to English grammar for schoolchildren are to blame for presenting this common-proper distinction as if it were very straightforward - by referring only to well-behaved kinds of proper noun, such as personal names or the names of cities, rivers and planets. In such introductions the distinction is introduced chiefly to lead onto instruction about the use of capital letters in writing such nouns.

Nouns are used in different ways: The dog barks. The man bit the dog. In the first case, dog is the actor, or the one that initiates the action of the verb. In the second, dog is acted upon. In The dog barks, dog is the subject of the verb. In the other sentence, dog is theobject of the verb.

Sometimes a noun is the indirect object of a verb: He gave the dog a bone. Bone is the direct object; it is what was given. Because it was given to the dog, dog is considered theindirect object of the action.

Nouns can also be objects of prepositions - words like to, in, for, and by - so the above sentence could read: He gave a bone to the dog. The words to the dog are called aprepositional phrase.

Some verb forms take nouns as objects: Drinking milk is good for you. In this sentence,milk is the object of the verbal form drinking. Such a combination of verb and noun is called a verbal phrase.

Nouns can show possession: The dog's collar is on the table. The collar is possessed, or owned, by the dog. All possession does not indicate ownership, however. In The building's roof is black, the roof is on, but not owned by, the building. Adding an apostrophe and an sto a noun shows possession ('): the cat's tongue, the woman's purse. If the noun is plural or already has an s, then often only an apostrophe need be added: the mothers' union (that is, a union of many mothers). The word of may also be used to show possession: the top of the house, the light of the candle, the Duke of Wellington.