1.3. Grammatical terms


I use several grammatical terms in this site, and they might be difficult if you haven't learned English grammar. Most of the grammatical terms I use here are used in both English grammar and Japanese grammar, so knowing English grammar will help you learn Japanese grammar. You can skip this section if you are familiar with them.

I explain some of them here.

Adjective
An adjective is a word that means an attribute of a thing, and it adds information to a noun. An adjective is almost always placed before a noun in English. Beautiful, tasty, and good-looking are all adjectives.

Adverb
An adverb is a word that adds information to a verb, an adjective, or an adverb. An adverb is often a form of an adjective in English. Very, quickly, and beautifully are all adverbs.

Copula
A copula is a word that combines the subject and its explanation. The verb be is the English copula. The Japanese copula is not a verb.

Inflection
Inflection is having more than one form to mean different grammatical roles. English nouns have inflection to mean singular and plural, such as cat and cats. Inflection of verbs is often called conjugation. English verbs have inflection to mean present and past, such as eat and ate.

Interjection
An interjection is a word that is independent from other words and used as it is. Yes, hello, and hi are all interjections.

Interrogative
An interrogative is a word to ask specific information. In English, who and what are interrogative nouns, and when and how are interrogative adverbs.

Noun
A noun is a word that means a thing, either concrete or abstract. A noun can be the subject or the object of a sentence in English. Book, money, PC, and web site are all nouns. A proper noun is a noun that is the name of a person or a thing. In English, proper nouns are always written with a capital letter at the beginning. John, Japan, and IBM are all proper nouns.

Part of speech
A part of speech is a category of words based on their grammatical function. Nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, copulas, adverbs, interjections, prepositions, and postpositions are all parts of speech.

Postposition
A postposition is a word that works as a marker of the grammatical role of the preceding noun or noun phrase. It is the same as a preposition except that it is placed after a noun. English doesn't have a postposition.

Preposition
A preposition is a word that works as a marker of the grammatical role of the following noun or noun phrase. It is the same as a postposition except that it is placed before a noun. In, for, and from are all prepositions.

Pronoun
A pronoun is a word that refers to a person or a thing that has already talked about. It is a kind of noun, but its function is different from nouns in English. What a pronoun actually means depends on context. I, you, and themselves are all pronouns.

Verb
A verb is a word that means event or action, and it combines things involved in the event in a sentence. A verb has several forms such as present, past, gerund in English. Have, read, and eat are all verbs.



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