All Questions
Tagged with terminology grammar
131
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What is the category name used for words describing mathematical operations?
Refer to this question for more examples.
We have multiplication, which has "multiply" as the verb. But we say "a times b".
Similarly, we have division, which has "divide"...
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What is the grammatical structure of {the + superlative substantive}?
Example 1: This was the deepest a submarine had ever dived.
Example 2: The longest a person can hold their breath for is...
I've looked at a couple grammar resources including "the Cambridge ...
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What's the term for this grammatical problem? "John has gone home and a hat" [duplicate]
What is the term for the grammatical error where the same word is used to tie together two phrases, but in conflicting ways?
For example:
"John has gone home and a hat" - "John has gone ...
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Does a suffix need to be an affix?
I understand that according to Collins Dictionary, a suffix is an affix that follows the stem to which it is attached, as for example -s and -ness in dogs and softness. It has, however, a second ...
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What does it mean 'to reference' and what are the requirements of 'coreferentiality' in the context of descriptive grammar?
I would like to understand exactly what is meant in a grammar discussion when someone uses the word "coreferential". I understand it to mean that two or more constituents (e.g. a noun and ...
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Is there a term to describe the use of an incorrect adverb (as an adjective-modifier)?
The phrase 'slightly dead' would be incorrect because a person can't be 'slightly' dead. Is there a term to describe phrases that incorrectly use adverbs in this way?
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"The water filled the container" [duplicate]
I have a question regarding terminology.
In English, we can say "I filled the container with water", in which the subject is an agent. But you may also say "The water filled the ...
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What type of verb is EAT:FEED, KNOW:INFORM
We have verbs like :
EAT > FEED
KNOW > INFORM
My question is what kind of verbs are they? What are they called in grammar (e.g. causative, factitive etc)? I knew the name a long ago but forgot ...
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Collective term for uncountable nouns for places, like "hospital", "school", "prison", "court", "church"?
Certain nouns for places, locations or buildings seem to have idiomatic uncountability.
This blog lists a couple of those.
Idiomatic uses:
Home / town: No article precedes ‘home’ unless you add ...
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Is there a linguistic term that describes words that change pronunciation when combined together? [closed]
Examples of this include Breakfast which is just 'break,' and 'fast.'
Of particular interest to me is helicopter, which is a combination of 'helico,' meaning spiral, and 'pter,' meaning wing.
This is ...
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I am looking for a word that is synonymous with "syntactic expletive" to describe the purpose of the word "there" [duplicate]
It is a word that describes the purpose of the word "there" in a sentence such as,
"There is a bird in the tree." Expletive is one word, but there is another, longer word, and I ...
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In the sentence "I just saw her," is "just saw" or "saw" the simple predicate? (and a bonus question about predicates)
Based on my reading, the simple predicate only includes the verb or verb phrase, while the complete predicate includes the verb or verb phrase plus all of its modifiers. With that in mind, would "...
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Farthest vs Furthest [duplicate]
I am trying to describe the distance from a root node in a programming context. The root node is abstract and not physical so I'm thinking the proper usage would be furthest, but what would be ...
- 1,114
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What do you call the construction noun + "-ed" which, like an adjective, can modify another noun? [closed]
There are some words that appear to be adjectives formed from nouns inflected with something that looks like the past participle ending "-ed". Some of these are preceded (hyphenated in my ...
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Is the term "animate object" still used?
Is the term "animate object" still acceptable to use, for example for a grasshopper? I remember objects being broken down into either animate objects or inanimate objects back when I was in ...
