Grammatical particle

Last updated

In grammar, the term particle (abbreviated PTCL) has a traditional meaning, as a part of speech that cannot be inflected, and a modern meaning, as a function word (functor) associated with another word or phrase in order to impart meaning. Although a particle may have an intrinsic meaning and may fit into other grammatical categories, the fundamental idea of the particle is to add context to the sentence, expressing a mood or indicating a specific action.

Contents

In English, for example, the phrase "oh well" has no purpose in speech other than to convey a mood. The word "up" would be a particle in the phrase "look up" (as in "look up this topic"), implying that one researches something rather than that one literally gazes skywards. Many languages use particles in varying amounts and for varying reasons. In Hindi, they may be used as honorifics, or to indicate emphasis or negation. In some languages, they are clearly defined; for example, in Chinese, there are three types of zhùcí (助詞; 'particles'): structural, aspectual, and modal. Structural particles are used for grammatical relations. Aspectual particles signal grammatical aspects. Modal particles express linguistic modality. However, Polynesian languages, which are almost devoid of inflection, use particles extensively to indicate mood, tense, and case.

Modern meaning

In modern grammar, a particle is a function word that must be associated with another word or phrase to impart meaning, i.e., it does not have its own lexical definition.[ citation needed ] According to this definition, particles are a separate part of speech and are distinct from other classes of function words, such as articles, prepositions, conjunctions and adverbs.[ citation needed ] Languages vary widely in how much they use particles, some using them extensively and others more commonly using alternative devices such as prefixes/suffixes, inflection, auxiliary verbs and word order. Particles are typically words that encode grammatical categories (such as negation, mood, tense, or case), clitics, fillers or (oral) discourse markers such as well, um, etc. Particles are never inflected. [1]

Afrikaans

Some commonly used particles in Afrikaans include:

Arabic

Particles in Arabic can take the form of a single root letter before a given word, like "" ('and'), "" ('so') and "" ('to'). However, other particles like "هل" (which marks a question) can be complete words as well. [2]

Chinese

There are three types of zhùcí (助詞; particles) in Chinese: Structural, Aspectual, and Modal. Structural particles are used for grammatical relations. Aspectual particles signal grammatical aspects. Modal particles express linguistic modality. Note that particles are different from zhùdòngcí (助動詞; modal verbs) in Chinese.

English

Particle is a somewhat nebulous term for a variety of small words that do not conveniently fit into other classes of words. [3] The Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language defines a particle as a "word that does not change its form through inflection and does not fit easily into the established system of parts of speech". [4] The term includes the "adverbial particles" like up or out in verbal idioms (phrasal verbs) such as "look up" or "knock out"; it also includes the "infinitival particle" to, the "negative particle" not, the "imperative particles" do and let, and sometimes "pragmatic particles" (also called "fillers" or "discourse markers") like oh and well. [4]

German

A German modal particle serves no necessary syntactical function, but expresses the speaker's attitude towards the utterance. Modal particles include ja, halt, doch, aber, denn, schon and others. Some of these also appear in non-particle forms. Aber, for example, is also the conjunction but. In Er ist Amerikaner, aber er spricht gut Deutsch, "He is American, but he speaks German well," aber is a conjunction connecting two sentences. But in Er spricht aber gut Deutsch!, the aber is a particle, with the sentence perhaps best translated as "What good German he speaks!" [5] These particles are common in speech but rarely found in written language, except that which has a spoken quality (such as online messaging). [6] [7] [8]

Hindi

There are different types of particles present in Hindi: emphatic particles, limiter particles, negation particles, affirmative particles, honorific particles, topic-marker particle and case-marking particles. [9] Some common particles of Hindi are mentioned in the table below:

Hindi particles
TypeParticlesNotesSentences
Emphatic

Particles [9]

  • ही () — Exclusive Emphatic Particle
  • भी (bhī) — Inclusive Emphatic Particle
  • यूँ (yū̃) — Manner Emphatic Particle
ही () can roughly be translated as "only", "just", "alone" etc
भी (bhī) can roughly be translated as "also", "too", "can't even" etc
  1. बस कॉफ़ी ही लेके आये? (bas kôfī hī leke āye?)
    • You brought just coffee?
  2. लिख भी नहीं सकते? (likh bhī nahī̃ sakte?)
    • You can't even write?
  3. मैं यूँ जाऊँगा और यूँ आऊँगा। (ma͠i yū̃ jāū̃gā aur yū̃ āū̃gā.)
    • I'll (instantly) go and (instantly) come back.
Limiter

Particles

  • मात्र (mātr) — mere
  • बस (bas) — mere, only
मात्र (mātr) comes before a noun it modifies, and comes after a noun or verb or adverb when the meaning of "just/mere" is conveyed.
  1. नारंगी मात्र दो हैं अपने पास। (nārangī mātr do hè̃ apne pās.)
    • We have merely two oranges.
Negation

Particles

  • नहीं (nahī̃) — Indicative Negation
  • न / ना (na / nā) — Subjunctive Negation
  • मत (mat) — Imperative Negation
नहीं (nahī̃) can have multiple positions in the same sentence while still conveying the same meaning. By default, it comes before the main verb of the sentence (or after the verb to emphasise). Usually, it doesn't appear at the end of a sentence and also at the beginning if the sentence starts with a noun. [10] (na) and मत (mat) have rather restricted positions in a sentence and can usually only appear around the verb in subjunctive mood or imperative form, respectively.
  1. नहीं करना चाहिए ऐसा। (nahī̃ karnā čāhiye aisā.)
    • One shouldn't do [like] that.
  2. ना हो ऐसा तो अच्छा हो। (nā ho aisā to acchā ho.)
    • It'll be good if it doesn't happen [like that].
  3. मत कर यार ! (mat kar yār!)
    • Don't do it, man!
Affirmative

Particles

  • हाँ (hā̃) — "yes" [11]
  • जी () — "honorific yes"
  • जी हाँ (jī-hā̃) — "emphatic yes"
  • हाँ तो (hā̃-to) — "emphatic yes"
  1. हाँ करता हूँ। (hā̃ kartā hū̃.)
    • Yes, I (will) do it.
  2. जी और आप? ( aur āp.)
    • Yes, and you (formal)?
  3. जी हाँ करूँगा। (jī hā̃ karū̃gā.)
    • Yes sure, I will do it.
  4. अरे हाँ तो ! किया है मैंने। (are hā̃ to! kiyā hai ma͠ine.)
    • (I already said) yes! I have done it.
Honorific

Particles

  • जी () — "honour giving particle"
It comes after a noun and gives the noun an honorific value.

Compare with the honorific particles in Japanese, e.g. さま (sama) and さん (san).

  1. राहुल जी कैसे है? (rāhul kaise ha͠i?)
    • How is Mr. Rahul?
Topic Marker

Particles

तो is used to mark the topic in the sentence which is often not the same the subject of a sentence. It indicates either presuppositionally shared information or shift in thematic orientation. [12] [13] It has a rather flexible position in a sentence; it always goes after the topic of the sentence, even if that topic contains other particles.
  1. नेहा तो अच्छी है। (nehā to acchī hai.)
    • [Speaking of] Neha [she] is good.
  2. तुम अच्छी तो हो पर उतनी नहीं। (tum acchī to ho par utnī nahī̃.)
    • You "sure are" good but not that much.
Question Marker

Particles

  • क्या (kyā) — "question marker"
  • ना () — "doubt / confirmatory marker"
The question-marker क्या can come at the beginning or the end of a sentence as its default position but can also appear in between the sentence if it cannot also be interpreted as its non-particle meaning of "what" at a mid position in the sentence. [14] ना can only come at the end of a sentence and nowhere else. It conveys that the asker is in doubt or is seeking for a confirmation. [15]
  1. वो गाता है क्या? (vo gātā hai kyā?)
    • Does he sing?
  2. ऐसा करना होता है ना? (aisā karnā hota hai ?)
    • It should be done like this, no?
  3. ऐसा करें ना? (aisā karē̃ ?)
    • [Are you sure that] we do this? / we are doing this?
Case Marker

Particles

The case marking particles require the noun to be declined to be in their oblique case forms. However, these markers themselves (except for one)[ clarification needed ] can inflect and change forms depending on the gender of the noun they modify. [16] [17]
CaseHindi
ergativeने (ne)
accusativeको (ko)
dative
instrumentalसे (se)
ablative
genitiveका ()
inessiveमें (mē̃)
adessiveपे (pe)
terminativeतक (tak)
semblativeसा ()
  1. उसने उसको उससे मारा। (usne usko usse mārā.)
    • He/she hit him/her with it.
  2. उसका है? (us hai?)
    • Is it his?
  3. उससे निकालो और इसपे रखो। (usmē̃ se nikālo aur ispe rakho.)
    • Take it out from that a keep it on this.
  4. उसमें होगा। (usmē̃ hogā.)
    • It must be inside it.
  5. उसपे ढालना। (uspe ḍhālnā.)
    • Pour it on that.
  6. कोई मुझसा नहीं। (koi mujh nahī̃.)
    • No one's like me.
  7. चार बजे तक करना। (cār baje tak karnā.)
    • Do it until four o'clock.

Japanese and Korean

The term particle is often used in descriptions of Japanese [18] and Korean, [19] where they are used to mark nouns according to their grammatical case or thematic relation in a sentence or clause. [20] Linguistic analyses describe them as suffixes, clitics, or postpositions. There are sentence-tagging particles such as Japanese question markers.

Polynesian languages

Polynesian languages are almost devoid of inflection, and use particles extensively to indicate mood, tense, and case. Suggs, [21] discussing the deciphering of the rongorongo script of Easter Island, describes them as all-important. In Māori for example, the versatile particle e can signal the imperative mood, the vocative case, the future tense, or the subject of a sentence formed with most passive verbs. The particle i signals the past imperfect tense, the object of a transitive verb or the subject of a sentence formed with "neuter verbs" (a form of passive verb), as well as the prepositions in, at and from. [22]

Tokelauan

In Tokelauan, ia is used when describing personal names, month names, and nouns used to describe a collaborative group of people participating in something together. [23] It also can be used when a verb does not directly precede a pronoun to describe said pronouns. [23] Its use for pronouns is optional but mostly in this way. Ia cannot be used if the noun it is describing follows any of the prepositions e, o, a, or ko. [23] A couple of the other ways unrelated to what is listed above that ia is used is when preceding a locative or place name. [23] However, if ia is being used in this fashion, the locative or place name must be the subject of the sentence. [23] Another particle in Tokelauan is a, or sometimes ā. [23] This article is used before a person's name as well as the names of months and the particle a te is used before pronouns when these instances are following the prepositions i or ki. Ia te is a particle used if following the preposition mai. [23]

Russian

In Russian particles play sometimes an important role making an additional nuance for a meaning of a phrase or of a whole sentence. One example is particle бы which imparts conditional mood (subjunctive) to a verb it is being applied to or to a whole sentence. Another examples are -то and же which are usually used to emphasise or accent other words. Generally there are lot of different particles in Russian of many kinds. Some of them are complex, consisting of other particles, others are as simple as one letter (б, -с).

Turkish

Turkish particles have no meaning alone; among other words, it takes part in the sentence.[ clarification needed ] In some sources, exclamations and conjunctions are also considered Turkish particles. In this article, exclamations and conjunctions will not be dealt with, but only Turkish particles. The main particles used in Turkish are:

  • ancak [note 1]
  • başka, another
  • beri, since
  • bir, one
  • bir tek, only
  • dair, regarding
  • doğru, right
  • değil, not
  • değin, mention
  • denli, as much
  • dek, until
  • dolayı, due
  • diye, so
  • evvel, before
  • gayri, informal
  • gibi, like
  • göre, by
  • için, for
  • ile, with [note 2]
  • kadar, until
  • karşı, against
  • karşın, although or despite
  • mukabil, corresponding
  • önce, prior to
  • ötürü, due to
  • öte, beyond
  • rağmen, despite
  • sadece, only
  • sanki, as if
  • sonra, then
  • sıra, row
  • üzere, to
  • yalnız, alone

Particles can be used with the simple form of the names to which they are attached or in other cases. Some of particles uses with attached form, and some particles are always used after the relevant form. For examples, -den ötürü, -e dek, -den öte, -e doğru:

Turkish particles according to their functions. Başka, gayrı, özge used for 'other, another, otherwise, new, diverse, either'.

Göre, nazaran, dâir, rağmen used for 'by, in comparison, about, despite'.

İçin, üzere, dolayı, ötürü, nâşi, diye used for 'for, with, because, because of, how'.

See also

Notes

  1. used with ama, fakat, lakin ('but').
  2. used with ve ('and')

Related Research Articles

In grammar, tense is a category that expresses time reference. Tenses are usually manifested by the use of specific forms of verbs, particularly in their conjugation patterns.

In linguistics, aspect is a grammatical category that expresses how a verbal action, event, or state, extends over time. For instance, perfective aspect is used in referring to an event conceived as bounded and unitary, without reference to any flow of time during the event. Imperfective aspect is used for situations conceived as existing continuously or habitually as time flows.

A verb is a word that in syntax generally conveys an action, an occurrence, or a state of being. In the usual description of English, the basic form, with or without the particle to, is the infinitive. In many languages, verbs are inflected to encode tense, aspect, mood, and voice. A verb may also agree with the person, gender or number of some of its arguments, such as its subject, or object. Verbs have tenses: present, to indicate that an action is being carried out; past, to indicate that an action has been done; future, to indicate that an action will be done.

English grammar is the set of structural rules of the English language. This includes the structure of words, phrases, clauses, sentences, and whole texts.

Fusional languages or inflected languages are a type of synthetic language, distinguished from agglutinative languages by their tendency to use single inflectional morphemes to denote multiple grammatical, syntactic, or semantic features.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Compound verb</span>

In linguistics, a compound verb or complex predicate is a multi-word compound that functions as a single verb. One component of the compound is a light verb or vector, which carries any inflections, indicating tense, mood, or aspect, but provides only fine shades of meaning. The other, "primary", component is a verb or noun which carries most of the semantics of the compound, and determines its arguments. It is usually in either base or [in Verb + Verb compounds] conjunctive participial form.

In grammar, a future tense is a verb form that generally marks the event described by the verb as not having happened yet, but expected to happen in the future. An example of a future tense form is the French aimera, meaning "will love", derived from the verb aimer ("love"). The "future" expressed by the future tense usually means the future relative to the moment of speaking, although in contexts where relative tense is used it may mean the future relative to some other point in time under consideration.

Russian grammar employs an Indo-European inflexional structure, with considerable adaptation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nganasan language</span> Endangered Samoyedic language

The Nganasan language is a moribund Samoyedic language spoken by the Nganasan people.

Epistemic modality is a sub-type of linguistic modality that encompasses knowledge, belief, or credence in a proposition. Epistemic modality is exemplified by the English modals may, might, must. However, it occurs cross-linguistically, encoded in a wide variety of lexical items and grammatical structures. Epistemic modality has been studied from many perspectives within linguistics and philosophy. It is one of the most studied phenomena in formal semantics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hindustani grammar</span> Grammatical features of the Hindustani lingua franca

Hindustani, the lingua franca of Northern India and Pakistan, has two standardised registers: Hindi and Urdu. Grammatical differences between the two standards are minor but each uses its own script: Hindi uses Devanagari while Urdu uses an extended form of the Perso-Arabic script, typically in the Nastaʿlīq style.

This article describes the grammar of the Khmer (Cambodian) language, focusing on the standard dialect.

The grammar of Macedonian is, in many respects, similar to that of some other Balkan languages, especially Bulgarian. Macedonian exhibits a number of grammatical features that distinguish it from most other Slavic languages, such as the elimination of case declension, the development of a suffixed definite article, the lack of an infinitival verb, and the constructions with ima/nema formed with the auxiliary "to have", among others.

Araki is a nearly extinct language spoken in the small island of Araki, south of Espiritu Santo Island in Vanuatu. Araki is gradually being replaced by Tangoa, a language from a neighbouring island.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Early Middle Japanese</span> Stage of the Japanese language

Early Middle Japanese is a stage of the Japanese language between 794 and 1185, which is known as the Heian period (平安時代). The successor to Old Japanese (上代日本語), it is also known as Late Old Japanese. However, the term "Early Middle Japanese" is preferred, as it is closer to Late Middle Japanese than to Old Japanese.

This article summarizes grammar in the Hawaiian language.

In linguistics, grammatical mood is a grammatical feature of verbs, used for signaling modality. That is, it is the use of verbal inflections that allow speakers to express their attitude toward what they are saying. The term is also used more broadly to describe the syntactic expression of modality – that is, the use of verb phrases that do not involve inflection of the verb itself.

Tense–aspect–mood or tense–modality–aspect is a group of grammatical categories that are important to understanding spoken or written content, and which are marked in different ways by different languages.

In linguistics and grammar, affirmation and negation are ways in which grammar encodes positive and negative polarity into verb phrases, clauses, or other utterances. An affirmative (positive) form is used to express the validity or truth of a basic assertion, while a negative form expresses its falsity. For example, the affirmative sentence "Joe is here" asserts that it is true that Joe is currently located near the speaker. Conversely, the negative sentence "Joe is not here" asserts that it is not true that Joe is currently located near the speaker.

Neverver (Nevwervwer), also known as Lingarak, is an Oceanic language. Neverver is spoken in Malampa Province, in central Malekula, Vanuatu. The names of the villages on Malekula Island where Neverver is spoken are Lingarakh and Limap.

References

  1. McArthur, Tom: "The Oxford Companion to the English Language", pp. 72-76, Oxford University Press, 1992. ISBN   0-19-214183-X
  2. Wightwick, Jane; Gaafar, Mahmoud. Mastering Arabic 1. Hippocrene Books.
  3. Leech, Geoffrey (2006). A Glossary of English Grammar. Edinburgh University Press. p. 79. ISBN   978-0-7486-1729-6.
  4. 1 2 McArthur, Thomas Burns; McArthur, Roshan (2005). The Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language . Oxford University Press. Particle. ISBN   9780192806376.
  5. Martin Durrell, Using German, Cambridge University Press, 2nd edition (2003), p. 156-164.
  6. Bross, Fabian (2012). "German modal particles and the common ground" (PDF). Helikon. A Multidisciplinary Online Journal: 182–209. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2013-03-18.
  7. "Modal Particles: schon, ja, halt". Yabla German.
  8. Vyatkina, Nina; Johnson, Karen E. "German Modal Particles" (PDF). Center for Advanced Language Proficiency Education and Research – The Pennsylvania State University. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2019-07-01.
  9. 1 2 PARGHI, KHUSHBOO (2016). "ON DISTRIBUTION AND SENSES OF THE EMPHATIC PARTICLE hI IN HINDI". Bulletin of the Deccan College Research Institute. 76: 93–100. ISSN   0045-9801. JSTOR   26264771.
  10. Lampp, Claire M. (2006). "Negation in modern Hindi-Urdu: the development of nahII". S2CID   198686698.{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  11. Kalika Bali, "F0 cues for the discourse functions of "hã" in Hindi" https://www.researchgate.net/publication/221486826_F0_cues_for_the_discourse_functions_of_ha_in_Hindi
  12. Montaut, Annie (2015). "The discourse particle to and word ordering in Hindi: From grammar to discourse". 283. Benjamins: 263.{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  13. Case markers and Morphology: Addressing the crux of the fluency problem in English-Hindi SMT: https://www.aclweb.org/anthology/P09-1090.pdf
  14. Bhatt, Rajesh; Dayal, Veneeta (2020-01-31). "Polar question particles: Hindi-Urdu kya". Natural Language & Linguistic Theory. 38 (4): 1115–1144. doi:10.1007/s11049-020-09464-0. ISSN   1573-0859. S2CID   213719773.
  15. Negation in modern Hindi-Urdu: the development of nahII: https://cdr.lib.unc.edu/downloads/g158bh795?locale=en
  16. de Hoop, Helen; Narasimhan, Bhuvana (2005-01-01), Amberber, Mengistu; De Hoop, Helen (eds.), "Chapter 12 - Differential Case-Marking in Hindi", Competition and Variation in Natural Languages, Perspectives on Cognitive Science, Oxford: Elsevier, pp. 321–345, doi:10.1016/B978-008044651-6/50015-X, hdl: 11858/00-001M-0000-0013-1748-5 , ISBN   9780080446516 , retrieved 2020-11-16
  17. "CASE IN HINDI". ResearchGate. Retrieved 2020-11-16.
  18. "All About the Japanese Particles Wa and Ga". Archived from the original on 2009-03-03. Retrieved 2009-10-29. List of Japanese particles
  19. "Paul H. Portner – Paul Portner's academic homepage" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2009-03-06. Retrieved 2008-04-07. List of Korean particles
  20. "conf.ling.cornell.edu" (PDF). cornell.edu. Archived (PDF) from the original on 24 July 2010. Retrieved 7 May 2018.
  21. Suggs, Robert C (1960). The Island Civilizations of Polynesia . [New York] New American Library.
  22. Foster, John. He Whakamarama: A Short Course in Maori.
  23. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Simona, Ropati (1986). Tokelau Dictionary. New Zealand: Office of Tokelau Affairs. p. Introduction.