Language of the Day: Parts of Speech
Did you know that there are 8 “parts of speech” and each word in a sentence can be identified as a certain part?
Knowing what the parts of speech are, what function they perform, and what order we expect them to come in, can be incredibly useful in creating more natural and fluent sentences in English.
Here are the 8 parts of speech:
1 Nouns
A noun is a word that names a person, place, concept, or object. Anything that names a one of these things is a noun, whether you’re talking about a bicycle, Vancouver, the Prime Minister, or happiness.
Nouns have two categories: common and proper nouns. Common nouns are general things, like basketball player and TV series. Proper nouns are names or titles for specific things, like LeBron James and Glee!
2 Pronouns
Pronouns are words that substitute for specific nouns when someone already knows which noun you’re referring to.
You might say, “Claudia was supposed to arrive at 4pm,” then follow it with “She’s always late; next time I’ll tell her to get early.”
Instead of saying Claudia’s name three times, you substituted she and her, and your sentences remained grammatically correct.
3 Adjectives
Adjectives are the words that describe nouns. Think about your favorite city. How would you describe it to a friend who’s never been there?
You might say the city is beautiful, exciting, tropical, or crowded. When you’re describing the city with these words, you’re using adjectives. An adjective can go right before the noun it’s describing (“I have a black cat”), but it doesn’t have to. Sometimes, adjectives are at the end of a sentence (“My cat is black”).
4 Verbs
Verbs are words that describe specific actions, like studying, competing, and being amazing.
Not all verbs refer to literal actions, though. Verbs that refer to feelings or ‘states of being’, like to love and to be. These are known as stative verbs. Verbs that do refer to literal actions are known as action verbs.
5 Adverbs
An adverb is a word that describes how something is done. They modify an adjective, a verb, or another adverb.
I exited the room quickly.
Quickly is describing how you exited (verb) the room.
An elephant is always bigger than a pony.
Always is describing how frequently an elephant is bigger (adjective) than a pony.
6 Prepositions
Prepositions tell you the relationships between other words in a sentence.
You might say, “I left my bike leaning against the garage.” In this sentence, against is the preposition because it tells us where you left your bike.
Here’s another example: “She put the pizza in the oven.” Without the preposition in, we don’t know where the pizza is.
7 Conjunctions
Conjunctions make it possible to build complex sentences that express multiple ideas.
“I like pesto sauce. I like bolognese sauce. I don’t like alfredo sauce.” Each of these three sentences expresses a clear idea. There’s nothing wrong with listing your preferences like this, but it’s not the best way to do it.
Consider instead: “I like pesto sauce and bolognese sauce, but I don’t like alfredo sauce.
In this sentence, and and but are the two conjunctions that link your ideas together.
8 Articles
A peach. The skyscraper. An thrilling experience. These bolded words are known as articles.
Articles come in two types: definite articles and indefinite articles. Similarly to the two types of nouns, the type of article you use depends on how specific you need to be about the thing you’re discussing.
A definite article, like the or this, describes one specific noun.
Did you buy the car?
From the above sentence, we understand that the speaker is referring to a specific previously discussed car.
Now swap in an indefinite article:
Did you buy a car?
See how the implication that you’re referring back to something specific is gone, and you’re asking a more general question?