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The Eight Parts of Speech
Noun, Pronoun, Verb, Adjective, Adverb,
Interjection, Conjunctions, and Prepositions.
By Sara Hodge
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Introduction
Mastering the English language can be difficult! In order to
be a successful thinker, reader, and especially writer,
an individual must be aware of the different parts
of speech. There are eight parts of speech in the English
language: noun, pronoun, verb, adjective, adverb,
preposition, conjunction, and interjection. The part of
speech indicates how the word functions in meaning
as well as grammatically within the sentence. An individual
word can function as more than one part of speech
when used in different circumstances. Understanding parts
of speech is essential for determining the correct
definition of a word when using the dictionary.
Let’s make sure we understand the 8 parts of speech!
Nouns
The English word "noun" comes from the Latin nomen, meaning "name." We use nouns to name
things, such as a person, animal, object, place, or action or abstract idea, such as an event or quality
(boy, koala, block, farm, invasion, or kindness). Nouns can be defined more precisely by the other
words that go with them. In particular, nouns often have the definite article "the" in front of
them. Example: He liked the chocolate.
Proper nouns are the names of individual people, places, days of the week, months of the year, or
companies, such as Mary, Paris, Sunday, or Heinz. Because proper nouns name something specific,
they are usually capitalized, regardless of how they are used. Unlike proper nouns, common nouns
do not name something specific and are not usually capitalized. Common nouns name members of a
class or group of entities, such as city, book, day, or apple, in contrast to an individual entity, such
as a particular city. Interestingly, some proper nouns have gradually developed common noun
equivalents, such as china and cheddar.
Case defines the role of the noun in the sentence—as the subject or object or to show possession.
Nouns in the subject and object role appear identical in form; nouns that show possession, however,
are slightly different as they usually require an apostrophe.
Gender classifies nouns into masculine and feminine, for example, king, queen, boyfriend, and
girlfriend. In the past, many nouns changed their form according to their gender, for example,
author and authoress. However, these days, the use of gender-specific nouns is rare. Many common
nouns, such as engineer or teacher, can refer to men or women.
Number shows whether one or more objects are being referred to. Most nouns change their form
when they become plural, by adding –s or –es, for example, cloud/clouds or church/churches. A
noun ending in –y, preceded by a consonant, becomes plural with –ies, as in fly/flies, cry/cries, or
city/cities. But forming plurals is not always straightforward. There are many irregular forms of
noun plurals, such as woman/women or crisis/crises.
What about pronouns? Let’s see!
Pronouns
Pronouns are used in place of nouns. The purpose of pronouns is to avoid repetition
and make sentences easier to understand. Some of the most common pronouns to
remember when learning English as a second language are he, she, it, they, and this.
We will discuss 3 types of pronouns that both English and English as a second
language writers must recognize: the personal pronoun, the demonstrative pronoun,
and the interrogative pronoun.
Personal pronouns refer to a specific person or thing. Their form changes to indicate
a person, number, gender, or case.Subjective personal pronouns are pronouns that act
as the subject of a sentence. If you are learning English as a second language,
remember that the subjective personal pronouns are I, you, she, he, it, we, you, and
they. For example:
"I walked directly to the party.”
Demonstrative pronouns point to and identify a noun or a pronoun. This and these
refer to things that are nearby in space or time, while that and those refer to things
that are farther away in space or further away in time. For example:
"This is the dress I will wear; that is the one I wore yesterday.”
Interrogative pronouns are used to ask questions. The interrogative pronouns are
who, whom, which, and what. If you are learning English as a second language, it is
important to remember that who and whom are used to refer to people, while which is
used to refer to things and animals. Who acts as the subject, while whom acts as the
object. For example:
"Which is the best restaurant?”
Time to move on to verbs!
Verbs
When it comes to constructing a sentence, the verb is widely considered to be one of the
most integral elements. In the simplest of definitions, a verb is an action. Run, drink, talk,
drive, and dive are all verbs. Verbs can be transitive or intransitive, can change based on
tense, or can just be plain irregular.
A present tense verb is used to describe something you are currently doing. The past tense
is used to describe something you have done, and the future tense denotes your intention to
do something later. It is important to use the correct tense when you are writing. If you are
writing in the present tense, your verbs must reflect this. If your narrative takes place in the
past, you must use the past tense. Remember, when writing in the past tense, you must
conjugate (modify) your verbs from present to past. This is seen in the example above. In
the present tense, you drink, but in the past tense, you drank (drink has been conjugated, or
modified, to reflect the past tense).
A transitive verb is used when someone does something to an object. This means that the
sentence must have an object. For example, "Bobby finished his homework." In this
sentence, Bobby, the subject, did something to his homework—he finished it. "Homework"
is thus the direct object in the sentence. On the other hand, intransitive verbs don't require
direct objects. For example, "Sandra will sleep until noon." The verb "sleep" has no object.
Verbs of motion are further examples of intransitive verbs, e.g., "She ran" or "We drove.".
Although verbs are often a source of confusion for new writers, these action words are
nothing to be worried about. Simply remember that if you are describing an action, you need
a verb to do it.
Ready to learn about adjectives?
Adjectives
Adjectives are simply words used to describe or modify nouns (people,
places, things) and pronouns (e.g., I, she, he, it, they, etc.) by
depicting, quantifying, or identifying them. What can make them
confusing is that they don't always immediately signal to readers that
they are adjectives. Luckily, there's a foolproof method of identifying
these tricky descriptors: simply find the noun or pronoun of a sentence
and see if any words are describing it.
Another signal that a word is an adjective is its placement; it usually
precedes the noun/pronoun it modifies. However, this is not always so.
When an indefinite pronoun (e.g., something, someone, anybody) is
modified by an adjective, the adjective follows the pronoun, as in:
Example: Anyone capable of hating kittens is someone awful.
It is also important not to overuse adjectives. Two or three well-chosen
adjectives are more than sufficient. Consider this sentence: She had an
expensive, big, long, blue, cotton, Coleman sleeping bag. While
technically correct, the abundance of adjectives should be avoided in
favor of something simpler, such as: She had an expensive, blue
sleeping bag.
There is much to learn about adjectives, but just remember they generally
answer three questions about a noun: How many? What kind? Which
ones?
Now, on to the adverbs!
Adverbs
The adverb belongs to a large class of words that add information by qualifying or
modifying a verb, an adjective, another adverb, a preposition, or clause. They can behave
quite differently from one another and yet still be classified as adverbs. You will have a
much better understanding of this mystifying modifier after seeing examples.
A useful way of summing up these hard-working words is to say that they are used to
describe one of the following instances of an event or action: 1. How an event occurs (also
known as adverbs of manner)
He ate his pear noisily (adverb). 2. When an event occurs (also known as adverbs of time)
He left the town yesterday (adverb). We'll meet again (adverb). 3. Where an event occurs
(also known as adverbs of place) I left the book here (adverb). Outside (adverb), the rain
poured down. 4. How often an action or event occurs
She takes the train daily (adverb). 5. The degree or extent of an action (also known as
degree adverbs)
How (adverb) tall is she? She discovered that the plant was highly (adverb) toxic. 6. To
strengthen or weaken the meaning of an adjective, adverb, or verb Lucy speaks more loudly
(adverb) than her brother.
In English, adverbs of manner are often created from adjectives by adding the suffix "ly" to
the end; for example, "soft" becomes "softly" and "gradual" becomes "gradually." The
placement of "ly" on the end of a word can be a good clue that the word is an adverb.On the
other hand, remember that adjectives naturally ending in "le" or "ly" do not form attractive
adverbs, for example, "silly" as "sillily." These and other words ending in "ly," such as
"friendly" (adjective) or "lonely" (adjective), are never used as adverbs.
Whoa! That’s a lot of info! Ready to see something a little easier, like interjections?
Interjections
Interjections are small words that bear no grammatical connection with
the sentences in which they are used. They express the emotions or
sentiments of the speaker or convey hesitation or protest. They are
usually followed by an exclamation mark.
Since many interjections are mainly written forms of actual sounds that
were produced by humans, they are hardly used in academic or
scholarly writing, unless they are a part of a direct quote or otherwise.
“Ah! Now that’s what I call a good shot! Bravo!” Both Ah and Bravo
are interjections used to show the speaker’s admiration in the sentence.
There are many different uses for various interjections; the following is
a list of the common interjections you may hear around you in daily
life
Some interjections are used to stall for time or indicate that the speaker
is thinking of something. These interjections are also used when
someone doesn’t know what to say. The following is a list of these
sounds or words; they are also called Hesitation Devices, such as
“um” or “hm.”
Let’s not forget the conjunction!
Conjunctions
Some words are satisfied spending an evening at home, alone, eating ice-cream
right out of the box, watching Seinfeld re-runs on TV, or reading a good
book. Others aren't happy unless they're out on the town, mixing it up with
other words; they're joiners and they just can't help themselves. A
conjunction is a joiner, a word that connects (conjoins) parts of a
sentence. Examples are for, and, but, or, yet, nor, so.
It may help you remember these conjunctions by recalling that they all have
fewer than four letters. Also, remember the acronym FANBOYS: ForAnd-Nor-But-Or-Yet-So. Be careful of the words then and now; neither is
a coordinating conjunction, so what we say about coordinating
conjunctions' roles in a sentence and punctuation does not apply to those
two words.)
Ulysses wants to play for UConn, but he has had trouble meeting the academic
requirements.
When the two independent clauses connected by a coordinating conjunction are
nicely balanced or brief, many writers will omit the comma:
Ulysses has a great jump shot but he isn't quick on his feet.
Moving on to prepositions!
Prepositions
In English you use prepositions to connect nouns or between nouns and pronouns.
Imagine that you encounter two nouns: elephant and book. You can use prepositions
in many ways to connect the two nouns to express different ideas:
the book about the elephant, the book by the elephant, the book behind the elephant,
the book in front of the elephant
the book near the elephant, the book under the elephant. The italicized words relate
two nouns to each other. These relationship words are called prepositions.
Prepositions may be defined as any word or group of words that relates a noun or a
pronoun to another word in the sentence.
Prepositions never travel alone; they’re always with an object. In the earlier examples,
the object of each preposition is elephant. Just to get all the annoying terminology
over with at once, a prepositional phrase consists of a preposition and an object. The
object of a preposition is always a noun or a pronoun, or perhaps one or two of each.
(A pronoun is a word that takes the place of a noun, such as him for Eggworthy, it for
omelet, and so forth.)
Here’s an example: In the afternoon the snow pelted Eggworthy on his little bald
head.
This sentence has two prepositions: in and on. Afternoon is the object of the
preposition in, and head is the object of the preposition on.
Now you understand how to connect other parts of speech together!
Summary and Review
Each part of speech explains not what the word is, but how
the word is used. In fact, the same word can be a noun in
one sentence and a verb or adjective in the next.
Here is a fun poem about the parts of speech:
Conjunctions join the words together, As men and women,
wind or weather.
The preposition stands before
A noun, as in or through a door.
The interjection shows surprise,
As Oh! How Pretty; Ah! How wise.
That’s why we learn the parts of speech
Which reading, writing, speaking teach.
‘Cause grammar needs to be correct
To help you earn the world’s respect.
Lets see what you learned!!
Quiz
Jot down your answers on a piece of paper, then click the next arrow for the answers!
_____1. They attended the concert last weekend.
_____2. Several cats ran into Rob’s garage.
_____3. The truck driver delivered the packages quickly.
_____4. Fast runners won all the awards at the track meet.
_____5. My friends and I walked home after school.
_____6. I wanted a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch yesterday.
_____7. She was counting the ballots during social studies class.
_____8. Hey! That is my seat.
_____9. Will they finish the test on time?
_____10. The diagram was pretty complicated for us.
Answers on the next slide!
Answers
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
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10.
Verb
Verb
Adverb
Adjective
Preposition
Conjunction
Pronoun
Interjection
Pronoun
Noun
Congratulations!
You know the parts of speech and how to identify them!