In linguistics, an affix is a morpheme that is attached to a word stem to form a new word or word form. Affixes may be derivational, like English -ness and pre-, or inflectional, like English plural -s and past tense -ed. They are bound morphemes by definition; prefixes and suffixes may be separable affixes. Affixation is the linguistic process that speakers use to form different words by adding morphemes at the beginning (prefixation), the middle (infixation) or the end (suffixation) of words.
The accusative case is a linguistics term for a grammatical case relating to how some languages typically mark a direct object of a transitive verb. Among those languages, analogous marking principles often apply to the objects of prepositions. The characteristics of an accusative case often entails what generally is termed the nominative case.
In grammar, the genitive case, also called the second case, is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus, indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can also serve purposes indicating other relationships. For example, some verbs may feature arguments in the genitive case; and the genitive case may also have adverbial uses.
In linguistics, a noun class is a particular category of nouns. A noun may belong to a given class because of the characteristic features of its referent, such as gender, animacy, shape, but such designations are often clearly conventional. Some authors use the term "grammatical gender" as a synonym of "noun class", but others consider these different concepts. Noun classes should not be confused with noun classifiers.
A verb, from the Latin verbum meaning word, is a word that in syntax 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.
A noun is a word that functions as the name of some specific thing or set of things, such as living creatures, objects, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas. However, noun is not a semantic category, so that it cannot be characterized in terms of its meaning. Thus, actions and states of existence can also be expressed by verbs, qualities by adjectives, and places by adverbs. Linguistically, a noun is a member of a large, open part of speech whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition.
In linguistics, a count noun is a noun that can be modified by a numeral and that occurs in both singular and plural forms, and that co-occurs with quantificational determiners like every, each, several, etc. A mass noun has none of these properties, because it cannot be modified by a numeral, cannot occur in plural, and cannot co-occur with quantificational determiners.
A noun phrase, or nominal (phrase), is a phrase that has a noun as its head or performs the same grammatical function as a noun. Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently occurring phrase type.
Prepositions and postpositions, together called adpositions, are a class of words used to express spatial or temporal relations or mark various semantic roles.
Animacy is a grammatical and semantic feature, existing in some languages, expressing how sentient or alive the referent of a noun is. Widely expressed, animacy is one of the most elementary principles in languages around the globe and is a distinction acquired as early as six months of age.
A relative clause is a kind of subordinate clause that contains the element whose interpretation is provided by an antecedent on which the subordinate clause is grammatically dependent; that is, there is an anaphoric relation between the relativized element in the relative clause and antecedent on which it depends.
Finnish nominals, which include pronouns, adjectives, and numerals, are declined in a large number of grammatical cases, whose uses and meanings are detailed here. See also Finnish grammar.
Lezgian, also called Lezgi or Lezgin, is a Northeast Caucasian language that belongs to the Lezgic languages. It is spoken by the Lezgins, who live in southern Dagestan, northern Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkey, and other countries. Lezgian is a literary language and an official language of Dagestan. It is classified as "vulnerable" by UNESCO's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger.
In generative grammar, a theta role or θ-role is the formal device for representing syntactic argument structure—the number and type of noun phrases—required syntactically by a particular verb. For example, the verb put requires three arguments.
Dakota, also referred to as Dakhota, is a Siouan language spoken by the Dakota people of the Sioux tribes. Dakota is closely related to and mutually intelligible with the Lakota language. It is critically endangered, with only around 290 fluent speakers left out of an ethnic population of almost 20,000.
Ayacucho is a variety of Southern Quechua spoken in the Ayacucho Region, Peru, as well as by immigrants from Ayacucho in Lima. With roughly a million speakers, it is the largest variety of Southern Quechua after Cusco Quechua. The literary standard of Southern Quechua is based on these two closely related Quechua varieties.
Maidu, also Northeastern Maidu or Mountain Maidu, is an extinct Maiduan language spoken by Maidu peoples traditionally in the mountains east and south of Lassen Peak in the American River and Feather River river drainages. These river regions include such valleys in the northern Sierra Nevada mountains of California as: Indian Valley, American Valley, Butte Valley, and Big Meadows. Maidu may also refer to the related Konkow and Nisenan languages.
Tsimshian, known by its speakers as Sm'álgyax, is a dialect of the Tsimshian language spoken in northwestern British Columbia and southeastern Alaska. Sm'algyax means literally "real or true language."
Paamese, or Paama, is the language of the island of Paama in Northern Vanuatu. There is no indigenous term for the language; however linguists have adopted the term Paamese to refer to it. Both a grammar and a dictionary of Paamese have been produced by Terry Crowley.
Kēlen is a constructed language created by Sylvia Sotomayor. It is an attempt to create a truly alien language by violating a key linguistic universal—namely that all human languages have verbs. In Kēlen, relationships between the noun phrases making up the sentence are expressed by one of four relationals. According to Sotomayor, these relationals perform the functions of verbs but lack any of the semantic content. However, the semantic content found in common verbs, such as those that are semantic primes, can also be found in Kēlen's relationals, which calls into question whether Kēlen is technically verbless. Despite its distinctive grammar, Kēlen is an expressive and intelligible language; texts written in Kēlen have been translated into other languages by several people other than the creator of the language. In an interview, Sotomayor states that she aims for Kēlen to be naturalistic apart from its verblessness, and that to achieve this she employs the principle "change one thing and keep everything else the same".
