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For example, in the sentence "The dog bites the man", the man is both the patient and the direct object. By contrast, in the sentence "The man is bitten by the dog", which has the same meaning but different grammatical structure, the man is still the patient, but now stands as the phrase's subject; and the dog is only the agent.
An example is land in the phrase land mines given above. Examples of the above types of modifiers, in English, are given below. It was [a nice house]. (adjective modifying a noun, in a noun phrase) [The swiftly flowing waters] carried it away. (adjectival phrase, in this case a participial phrase, modifying a noun in a noun phrase)
Noun phrases can be identified by the possibility of pronoun substitution, as is illustrated in the examples below. a. This sentence contains two noun phrases. b. It contains them. a. The subject noun phrase that is present in this sentence is long. b. It is long. a. Noun phrases can be embedded in other noun phrases. b. They can be embedded in ...
For example, the determiners each, enough, less, and more can function as post-head modifiers of noun phrases, as in the determiner phrase each in two seats each. [ 7 ] : 132 Enough can fill the same role in adjective phrases (e.g., clear enough ) and in adverb phrases (e.g., funnily enough ).
For example, the noun phrase kinesiology functions as a pre-head complement in the larger noun phrase a kinesiology student. The noun phrase's status a complement can be made clearer by paraphrasing the noun phrase that contains it: a student of kinesiology , in which of kinesiology is more clearly a complement.
The earliest use of the word clause in Middle English is non-technical and similar to the current everyday meaning of phrase: "A sentence or clause, a brief statement, a short passage, a short text or quotation; in a ~, briefly, in short; (b) a written message or letter; a story; a long passage in an author's source."
Example 2 has two clauses (I don't know how to bake and I buy my bread already made), combined into a single sentence with the coordinating conjunction so. In example 3, I enjoyed the apple pie is an independent clause, and that you bought for me is a dependent clause; the sentence is thus complex.
Categories can also pertain to sentence constituents that are larger than a single word (phrases, or sometimes clauses). A phrase often inherits category values from its head word; for example, in the above sentences, the noun phrase the birds inherits plural number from the noun birds.