Parts of Speech

There are thousands of words in any language. But not all words

have the same job. For example, some words express "action". Other words express a "thing". Other words "join" one word to another word. These are the "building blocks" of the language. When we want to build a sentence, we use different types of words. Each type of word has its own job. We can categorize English words into 8 basic types or classes. These classes are called "parts of speech". It is quite important to recognize parts of speech. This helps you to analyze sentences and understand them. It also helps you to construct good sentences.

Parts of Speech Table

This is a summary of the 8 parts of speech
part of speech function or "job" example words example sentences

Verb

action or state

(to) be, have, do, like, work, sing, can, must

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Noun

thing or person

pen, dog, work, music, This is my dog. He town, London, teacher, lives in my house. We John live in London. a/an, the, 69, some, good, big, red, well, interesting My dog is big. I like big dogs.

Adjective*

describes a noun

Adverb

describes a verb, adjective or adverb

quickly, silently, well, badly, very, really

My dog eats quickly. When he is very hungry, he eats really quickly. Tara is Indian. She is beautiful. We went to school on Monday. I like dogs and I like cats. I like cats and dogs. I like dogs but I don't like cats. Ouch! That hurts! Hi! How are you? Well, I don't know.

Pronoun Preposition Conjunction

replaces a noun links a noun to another word joins clauses or sentences or words

I, you, he, she, some to, at, after, on, but and, but, when

Interjection

short exclamation, oh!, ouch!, hi!, well sometimes inserted into a sentence

Some grammar sources categorize English into 9 or 10 parts of speech. *Determiners may be treated as a separate part of speech, instead of being categorized under Adjectives

POSITION OF SENTENCE ELEMENTS

In linguistic typology, subject-verb-object (SVO), is a sentence

structure where the subject comes first, the verb second, and the object third. Languages may be classified according to the dominant sequence of these elements. The SVO and Subject Object Verb orders are by far the two most common, accounting for more than 75% of the world's languages which have a preferred order. English, informal Arabic, Finnish, Chinese, the Romance languages, Russian, Bulgarian, Malay and Indonesian are examples of languages that can follow an SVO pattern. All the Scandinavian languages follow this order also but change to VSO when asking a question. Some of these languages, such as English, can also use an OSV structure in certain literary styles, such as poetry. An example of SVO order in English is: Sam ate oranges. In this, Sam is the subject, ate is the verb, oranges is the object.

SENTENCE CLASSIFICATION
A sentence is the largest syntactic and the smallest communication unit Simple Sentence: One independent clause (SV.) The man stole the jewelry. Compound Sentence Two or more independent clauses Connectors with a comma: for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so Connectors with a semicolon and comma: however, moreover, nevertheless, nonetheless, therefore The man stole the jewelry and hid it in his house.

Complex Sentence: One independent clause plus one or more dependent clauses Connectors are always at the beginning of the dependent clause. They show how the dependent clause is related to the independent clause. Different types of relationships and the connectors: o Cause/Effect: because, since, so that o Comparison/Contrast: although, even though, though, whereas, while o Place/Manner: how, however, where, wherever o Possibility/Conditions: if, whether, unless o Relation: that, which, who, whom o Time: after, as, before, since, when, whenever, while, until The man who stole the jewelry hid it in his house.

VERBS
Verbs are the words you use to get others to perform some actions or carry out some activities and vice versa. You use verbs too to describe to others what you are doing and vice versa.One can say that verbs are the vihicle or means by which a language is transmitted from one person to others. They are therefore called "action words" or "doing words". Types of verbs Verbs are of different types according to their forms and functions in sentences.The following are the main verb types in English language. lexical verbs (main) Auxilliary verbs (helping) Finite and non-finite verbs Transitive and intransitive verbs Active and passive verbs Regular and irregular verbs

VERBS
In the sentence in which subject complements are used, the verbs are intensive

such as: be, grow, seem, become, feel, sound, taste, keep, remain, turn All other verbs are extensive. Intransitive verbs are not used with an object: rain, snow, go, some, live, die Transitive verbs are used with an object - they all have a direct object: make, provide, reveal, dig, write, open, close Some verbs can be used with an indirect and direct object and they are called ditransitive: give, bring, get, send, tae, tell, write, teach, give, hand, offer Verbs like make in the sentence: They (S) made (V) her (Oi) queen (Co). - take an object complement and are called complex transitive. All the 3 possibilities can be illustrated by the verb make: She made (V-transitive) a cake. She made (V-ditransitive) him a cake. She made (V-complex transitive) him a hero.

http://www.grammaruntied.com/verbs/Verbquiz1/Iquizv.html

VERBS
Main verbs Main (lexical) verbs are those verbs that can stand on their own in sentences. They do not need the help of another verb to make a sentence meaningful. A main verb directly tells you what the subject of a sentence does. They can be in present or past tense forms (cook, see, etc.). Each lexical verb tells us what the subject of each sentence does/do or did. Example cook - My mother cooks well. [present tense] see - I saw the teacher yesterday. [past tense]

VERBAL FORMS
Many English verbs have 5 forms: 1. The base 2. The s form 3. The past 4. The ing participle 5. The ed participle Regular lexical verbs have the same ed inflection for both the past tense and the ed past participle (talk-talked-talked). Irregular lexical verbs have from three to eight forms (to be has 8 forms: am, are, is, was, were, being, been). *Modal auxiliaries are defective in not having infinitive, -ing form, -ed1, ed2, and imperative.

MORPHOLOGY OF LEXICAL VERBS

For both regular and irregular lexical verbs the s form and ing participle are predictable from the base form. They differ in the fact that -ed1 and ed2 forms in irregular verbs cannot be predicted from the base. Regular lexical verbs examples: V = walk, live, play V-ing = walking, living, playing V-s = walks, lives, plays V -ed1 = walked, lived, played V -ed2 = walked, lived, played

THE S FORMS
Knowing the base of regular verbs we can predict the other forms.

The s form has three spoken realizations - [iz] s - [z] - [s] [iz] is pronounced after bases which end in voiced or voiceless sybilants and it is spelled es if the base doesnt already end in e. pass-passes, buzz-buzzes, catch-catches, camouflage-camouflages [z] is pronounced after bases ending in other voiced sounds and spelled s. call-calls, rob-robs, flow-flows *Exceptions: do-does, go-goes, have-has [s] pronounced after bases ending in other voiceless sounds. cut-cuts, ask-asks, stop-stops

THE PAST TENSE -ed1 and PARTICIPLE ed2

The past tense V-ed1 and participle Ved2 of regular verbs (spelled

ed), if the base does not end in ed have three spoken realizations: - [id] ed - [d] - [t]
[id] after bases ending in -d and -t

add-added, want-wanted, decide-decided [d] after bases ending in voiced sounds other than /d/ play-palyed, open-opened, move-moved, rob-robbed [t] after bases ending in voiceless sounds other than /t/. sop-stopped, ask-asked, walk-walked, brush-brushed

 Doubling of consonants final base consonants (except x) are

doubled before inflections beginning with a vowel letter when the preceding vowel is stressed and spelled with one letter (bar-barringbarred, permit-permitting-permitted). There is no doubling when the vowel is unstressed or written with two letters (enter-entering-entered, dread-dreading-dreaded). Exceptions: BE: signal-signalling-signalled, program-programming-programmed (no doubling in AE: signaling, programming, ) Treatment of Y a) In bases ending in a consonant + -y the following changes occur: carry carries carried but not with present participle: carry carrying

The past of the following verbs has a change of -y into -i also after a vowel: pay paid, say said, lay laid. b) In bases ending in -ie, the -ie is replaced by y before the ing inflection, as in: die dying, lie lying, tie - tying. Deletion of -e - final -e is regularly dropped before the ing and -ed inflections, as in: shave shaving shaved, move moving moved, decide deciding decided, Verbs with bases -ye, -oe and often -ge are exceptions to this rule in that they do not drop the -e before -ing, but they do drop it before -ed (as do forms in -ie tie tied) dye dyeing dyed hoe hoeing hoed singe singeing - singed

IRREGULAR LEXICAL VERBS

Irregular lexical verbs differ from regular verbs in the following

ways: a) They do not have a /t/ or /d/ inflection: drink drank drunk, and they break the rule for a voiced inflection: burn burned/burnt b) They typically but not necessarily have variations of their base vowel: find found found, write wrote written c) Irregular verbs have a varying number of distinct forms; the only forms which need be listed for regular verbs are the base (V), the past (V-ed1) and the past participle (V-ed2). Most irregular verbs have, like regular verbs, only one common form for the past and the ed participle, but there is a considerable variation in this respect.