Download lexicology 2

Word classes in English grammar
All words belong to categories called word
classes (or parts of speech) according to the part
they play in a sentence. The main word classes in
English are listed below.
The verb
A verb. In some ways, is the most important part of
speech because it is the ‘action’ word that tells the
listener or reader what is happening in the sentence.
A verb describes what a person or thing does or
what happens. For example, verbs describe:
An action – run, hit, travel
An event – rain, occur
a situation – be, seem, have
a change – become, grow, develop
mental processes and perceptions, like see,
know, think and so on
The basic form of a verb is known as
the infinitive. It’s often preceded by the word ‘to’:
Molly decided to follow him.
He began to run back.
.
The noun
Noun
A noun is a word that identifies:
a person (man, girl, engineer, friend)
a thing (horse, wall, flower, country)
an idea, quality, or state (anger, courage,
life, luckiness)
There are several different types of noun, as follows:
Common noun
A common noun is a noun that refers to people or
things in general, e.g. boy, country, bridge, city, birth,
day, happiness.
Proper noun
A proper noun is a name that identifies
a particular person, place, or thing, e.g. Steven, Africa,
Tower Bridge, London, Monday. In written English,
proper nouns begin with capital letters.
Concrete noun
A concrete noun is a noun which refers to people and
to things that exist physically and can be seen,
touched, smelled, heard, or tasted. Examples
include dog, building, tree, rain, beach, tune, Tower
Bridge.
Abstract noun
An abstract noun is a noun which refers to ideas,
qualities, and conditions - things that cannot be seen
or touched and things which have no physical reality,
e.g. truth, danger, happiness, time, friendship, humour.
Collective nouns
Collective nouns refer to groups of people or things,
e.g. audience, family, government, team, jury.
Collective nouns can usually be treated as singular or
plural, with either a singular or plural verb. Both the
following sentences are grammatically correct:
The whole family was at the table.
The whole family were at the table.
Countable and uncountable nouns
Nouns can be
either countable or uncountable. Countable
nouns (or count nouns) are those that refer to
something that can be counted. Uncountable
nouns (or mass nouns) do not typically refer to
things that can be counted and so they do not
regularly have a plural form.
The adjective
An adjective gives the reader or speaker extra
information about a noun or delimits (specify) it in
some way. It can occur in two positions in a phrase:

before the noun(attributive) as in

clear water,

beautiful beaches,

a terrible decision.



The adjectives in these examples are said to
be attributive,
Predicative adjective:
When adjectives are used after a verb such
as be, become, grow, look, or seem, they’re
called Predicative adjective as in
The cat was black.
The future looks gloomy.
The journey seemed slow.

They were growing tired.
The adverb
Adverbs are those words which are made from
adjectives by the addition of the ending –
ly (quickly, hopelessly).
Function of adverbs
Their main function is to qualify the action of the
verb in the clause in some way.
They can also be used to add more information to an
adjective or other adverb.
e.g. awfully bad, incredibly slowly. The class of
Some adverbs are not added with "ly".
e.g. hard , fast, late ( they function as adjectives and
adverbs)The wind was so fast yesterday. (adjective)
The wind blows fast.(adverb)
Hard times is one of Charles Dicken's novels(adjective)
She works hard.(adverb)
The preposition
Prepositions allow two parts of a sentence to be
related to each other. They include words like in, on,
under, beside, through, inside, before.
Generally, these relationships are to do with either
time or space.
Other types of relationship, such as cause and effect
(because of) can be expressed by using prepositions.
The prepositions themselves are generally short and
simple but some prepositions are multi-word units;
for example, out of, by means of, in spite of, instead of,
up to etc. Unless they are part of a verb (get
in, pick up, switch off), prepositions are always are
followed by a phrase containing a noun – at school, in
the summer, over the moon and so on.
The pronoun
Pronouns are usually treated as a special sub-class of
nouns. This is because they stand for a noun or
group of nouns. They are limited in number and
belong to what is called a closed set, that is, a group
of words to which new members are, not allowed.
E.g., Subject pronouns (nominative) I, you, he, she,
they, it and we.
Object pronouns(accusative): me his, her, them ,us.it.
Possessive pronoun: his ,her, their/mine, yours,
ours……………………..
Reflexive pronouns: myself, themselves……………
Relative pronouns:
who, when……………………….
Demonstrative pronouns: this, that, these, those
Distributive pronouns: They are always followed
with of
e.g., all of, both of, either of, neither of.
Other words which replace nouns:
something, anyone ,the ones
someone,
Determiners: An adjective -like word which
precedes both adjectives and nouns. E.g. a, an,
the,
My, first ,every , few , either, seven boys.
Conjunctions serve to connect two or more clauses,
phrases or words together to make longer
constructions. In the following examples, the
conjunction is in bold:

The coffee was strong, but sweet.

We can go to the match or watch it on TV.

She has a dog and two cats.

When I arrived home, they had already
eaten.



I had to stop driving because the rain was so
bad.
Can I have a word with you, if you’ve got the
time?
Although he can’t swim, he goes sailing.
There are two types of conjunction. The first is
the coordinating conjunction; (fanboys For-AndNor-But-Or-Yet-So: ) they join 2main clause.
or elements that share the same grammatical status,
verb to verb, noun to noun, adjective to adjective and
so on.
The coffee is strong but sweat
The adjectives, strong and sweet, are conjoined by
"but"
The second type is the subordinating conjunction,
Subordinating Conjunction
A subordinating conjunction joins a subordinate
clause to a main clause.
The following is a list of the most common
subordinating conjunctions.
after
how
till ( or 'til)
although
if
unless
as
inasmuch
until
as if
in order that
when
as long as
lest
whenever
as much as
now that
where
as soon as
provided (that) wherever
as though
since
because
so that
before
than
even if
that
while
even though though
An adverb clause is always introduced by a
subordinating conjunction.
.