noun phrase.docx

8/10/2019 noun phrase.docx

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noun phrase (NP)

ByRichard Nordquist,About.com Guide

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Grammar & Rhetoric Glossary2. >Main Clause - Oxymoron

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Definition:

A word group with anounorpronounas itshead.The noun head can be accompanied bymodifiers,determiners(such as the, a, her), and/orcomplements.

A noun phrase (often abbreviated asNP) most commonly functions as asubject,object,orcomplement.

See also:

Adjective Phrase Nominal Noun Clause

Examples and Observations:

"The only white peoplewho came to our housewere welfare workers and bill collectors."(James Baldwin,Notes of a Native Son,1955)
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2/19

"McSorley's baris short, accommodating approximately ten elbows, and is shored upwith iron pipes."(Joseph Mitchell,"The Old House at Home,"1940)

"The wells and water tablehad been polluted by chemical pesticides and fertilizersthatleached into the earthand were washed by rain into the creeks, where the stunned fishwere scavenged by the ospreys."(Peter Matthiessen,Men's Lives,1986)

"More than onedeterminercan introduce a noun phrase; for example, alland ourin [2]:

[2] In the initial sorties all our aircrafthave returned safely [S2B-008-15]

" . . . A noun head may also have more than one postmodifier. Two postmodifiers areexhibited in [3]:

[3] [. . .] I think it is a pity that LB is the only major corporation I have worked for wherethis has been a problem. [W1B-020-24]

The noun head is corporationand the two postmodifiers areI have worked forand where

this has been a problem. The second postmodifier modifies the whole of the precedingnoun phrase, including the first postmodifier, since clearly the writer does not want togeneralize by extending the reference to major corporations where he has not worked. Onthe other hand, the two postmodifiers in [4] modify the head separately:

[4] [ . . .] we could not trace the invoice dated 22nd March 1990 for 43.13.[W1B-021-37]

We could reverse the order of the postmodifiers without changing the meaning."(Sidney Greenbaum, Oxford English Grammar. Oxford Univ. Press, 1996)

A Georgia womanwas jailed briefly after a run-inwith courthouse securityover herrefusal to remove a religious head scarf.

"The menin the class--there were a few older students, veterans--listened withgood-natured interest, and the girlsgazed at the instructorwith rosy-faced, shy affection."(Bernard Malamud,A New Life,1961)

"Your type really makes me puke, you vacuous, toffy-nosed, malodorous pervert!"(Graham Chapman in "The Argument Clinic,"Monty Python's Flying Circus)
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3/19

"Some of the owners of Harlem clubs, delighted at the flood of white patronage, made thegrievous errorof barring their own race, after the manner of the famous Cotton Club."(Langston Hughes,The Big Sea,1940)

"Most forms ofcontrolled Englishsuggest revising noun phrasesthat are more thanthree words long. However, even a two- or three-word noun phrase can be unclear orambiguous. For example, in the following sentences, someone who is not familiar withthe subject matter cannot fully understand the two-word noun phrases, because eachindividual word has multiple possible meanings:

o If you haven't imported a filter, the default is a unity gain.

o The tracking loopmitigates the effects of multi-path interference on code-phase

errors.

On the other hand, some longer noun phrases are easy to comprehend--especially if partof the noun phrase is aproper noun.As long as the reader understands the two-word nounphrase dialog box, the four-word noun phrase in the following sentence iscomprehensible:

In the Advanced Options dialog box, use the arrows to adjust the percentage.

" . . . Clearly it is important to keep noun phrases as short as possible in English. But even

the short ones often need to be explained or defined in order for translators to be sureabout their meanings."(John R. Kohl, The Global English Style Guide: Writing Clear, TranslatableDocumentation for a Global Market. SAS, 2008)

Head (linguistics)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In linguistics, the headof aphraseis the word that determines thesyntactictype of that phrase oranalogously thestemthat determines the semantic category of acompoundof which it is a part.The other elements modify the head and are therefore the head's dependents. Headed phrases andcompounds areendocentric,whereasexocentricphrases and compounds (if they exist) lack aclear head. Heads are crucial to establishing the direction ofbranching.Head-initial phrases areright-branching, head-final phrases are left-branching, and head-medial phrases combine left-and right-branching.

Contents

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1 Basic examples 2 Representing heads

o 2.1 Trees
http://grammar.about.com/od/shortpassagesforanalysis/a/hughesharlem07.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/shortpassagesforanalysis/a/hughesharlem07.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/shortpassagesforanalysis/a/hughesharlem07.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/c/g/ControlledEnglish.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/c/g/ControlledEnglish.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/c/g/ControlledEnglish.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/pq/g/propnounterm.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/pq/g/propnounterm.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/pq/g/propnounterm.htmhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_stemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_stemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_stemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branching_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branching_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branching_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Basic_exampleshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Basic_exampleshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Representing_headshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Representing_headshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Representing_headshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Basic_exampleshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branching_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocentrichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_stemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://grammar.about.com/od/pq/g/propnounterm.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/c/g/ControlledEnglish.htmhttp://grammar.about.com/od/shortpassagesforanalysis/a/hughesharlem07.htm


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o 2.2 More treeso 2.3 X-bar trees

3 Head-initial vs. head-final languages 4 Head-marking vs. dependent-marking 5 Prosodic head

6 Notes 7 References 8 See also

[edit] Basic examples

Examine the following expressions:

big red dog

birdsong

The word dogis the headof big red dog, since it determines that the phrase is anoun phrase,notan adjective phrase. Because the adjectives bigand redmodify this head noun, they are itsdependents.[1]Similarly, in the compound noun birdsong,the stemsongis the head, since itdetermines the basic meaning of the compound. The stem birdmodifies this meaning and istherefore dependent on bird. The birdsongis a kind of song, not a kind of bird. The heads ofphrases like the ones here can often be identified by way ofconstituency tests.For instance,substituting a single word in for the phrase big red dogrequires the substitute to be a noun (orpronoun), not an adjective.

[edit] Representing heads

[edit]Trees

Many theories of syntax represent heads by means of tree structures. These tree tend to beorganized in terms of one of two relations: either in terms of the constituencyrelation ofphrasestructure grammarsor the dependencyrelation ofdependency grammars.Both relations areillustrated with the following trees:[2]

The constituency relation is shown on the left and the dependency relation on the right. The a-trees identify heads by way of category labels, whereas the b-trees use the words themselves asthe labels.[3]The nounstories(N) is the head over the adjectivefunny(A). In the constituencytrees (= a-trees), the noun projects its category status up to the mother node, so that the entirephrase is identified as a noun phrase (NP). In the dependency trees (= b-trees), the noun projectsonly a single node, whereby this node dominates the one node that the adjective projects, asituation that also identifies the entirety as an NP. The b-trees are structurally the same as their a-counterparts, the only difference being that a different convention is used for marking heads anddependents. The conventions illustrated with trees are are just a couple of the various tools thatgrammarians employ to identify heads and dependents. While other conventions abound, theyare usually similar to the ones illustrated here.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#More_treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#More_treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#X-bar_treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#X-bar_treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Head-initial_vs._head-final_languageshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Head-initial_vs._head-final_languageshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Head-marking_vs._dependent-markinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Head-marking_vs._dependent-markinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Prosodic_headhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Prosodic_headhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Noteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Noteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constituent_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constituent_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constituent_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=2http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=2http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=3http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=3http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrase_structure_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrase_structure_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrase_structure_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrase_structure_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependency_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependency_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependency_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Funny_stories.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependency_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrase_structure_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrase_structure_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=3http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constituent_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Noteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Prosodic_headhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Head-marking_vs._dependent-markinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#Head-initial_vs._head-final_languageshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#X-bar_treeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#More_trees


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[edit]More trees

The four trees above show a head-final structure. The following trees illustrate head-finalstructures further as well as head-initial and head-medial structures. The constituency trees (= a-trees) appear on the left, and dependency trees (= b-trees) on the right. Henceforth the

convention is employed where the words appear as the labels on the nodes. The next four treesare additional examples of head-final phrases:

The following six trees illustrate head-initial phrases:

And the following trees six trees are examples of head-medial phrases:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=4http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=4http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=4http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Trees_showing_head-initial_structures.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Heads_picture_1.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Trees_showing_head-initial_structures.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Heads_picture_1.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=4


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The head-medial constituency trees here assume a more traditional n-ary branching analysis.Since some prominent phrase structure grammars (e.g. most work inGovernment and bindingtheoryand theMinimalist Program)take all branching to be binary, these head-medial a-treesmay be controversial.

[edit]X-bar trees

Trees that are based on theX-bar schemaare also acknowledging head-initial, head-final, andhead-medial phrases, although the depiction of heads is less direct. The standard X-bar schemafor English is as follows:

This structure is both head-initial and head-final, which makes it head-medial in a sense. It ishead-initial insofar as the head X0precedes its complement, but it is head-final insofar as theprojection X' of the head follows its specifier.

[edit] Head-initial vs. head-final languages

Some language typologists classify languagesyntaxaccording to ahead directionality parameterinword order,that is, whether a phrase is head-initial(= right-branching) or head-final(= left-branching), assuming that it has a fixed word order at all. English is more head-initial than head-final, as illustrated with the following dependency tree of the first sentence of Franz Kafka's TheMetamorphosis:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_and_binding_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_and_binding_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_and_binding_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_and_binding_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimalist_Programhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimalist_Programhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimalist_Programhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=5http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=5http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=5http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-bar_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-bar_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-bar_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=6http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=6http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_directionality_parameterhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_directionality_parameterhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_directionality_parameterhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_orderhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_orderhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_orderhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Branching7.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Head-medial_picture.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Branching7.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Head-medial_picture.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_orderhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_directionality_parameterhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=6http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-bar_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=5http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimalist_Programhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_and_binding_theoryhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_and_binding_theory


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The tree shows the extent to which English is primarily a head-initial language. Structure isdescending as speech and processing move from left to right. Most dependencies have the headpreceding its dependent(s), although there are also head-final dependencies in the tree. Forinstance, the determiner-noun and adjective-noun dependencies are head-final as well as thesubject-verb dependencies. Most other dependencies in English are, however, head-initial as thetree shows. The mixed nature of head-initial and head-final structures is common acrosslanguages. In fact purely head-initial or purely head-final languages probably do not exist,

although there are some languages that approach purity in this respect, for instance Japanese.The following tree is of the same sentence from Kafka's novel. The glossing conventions arethose established byLehmann.One can easily see the extent to which Japanese is head-final:

A large majority of head-dependent orderings in Japanese are head-final. This fact is obvious inthis tree, since structure is strongly ascending as speech and processing move from left to right.Thus the word order of Japanese is in a sense the opposite of English. One can imagine thedifficulties that this state of affairs presents to English speakers learning Japanese and toJapanese speakers learning English.
http://www.folialinguistica.com/documents/Interlinearmorphemicglossing.pdfhttp://www.folialinguistica.com/documents/Interlinearmorphemicglossing.pdfhttp://www.folialinguistica.com/documents/Interlinearmorphemicglossing.pdfhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kafkaj.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kafka_English_tree.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kafkaj.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kafka_English_tree.jpghttp://www.folialinguistica.com/documents/Interlinearmorphemicglossing.pdf


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[edit] Head-marking vs. dependent-marking

It is also common to classify languagemorphologyaccording to whether a phrase ishead-markingordependent-marking.A given dependency is head-marking, if something about thedependent influences the form of the head, and a given dependency is dependent-marking, if

something about the head influences the form of the dependent.

For instance, in the Englishpossessive case,possessive marking ('s) appears on the dependent(the possessor), whereas inHungarianpossessive marking appears on the head noun:[4]

English: the man's house

Hungarian: az ember hz-a(the man house-POSSESSIVE)

[edit] Prosodic head

In aprosodic unit,the head is that part which extends from the first stressed syllable up to (butnot including) the tonic syllable. A high head is the stressed syllable which begins the head andis high in pitch, usually higher than the beginning pitch of the tone on the tonic syllable. Forexample:

The bus was late.

A low head is the syllable which begins the head and is low in pitch, usually lower than thebeginning pitch of the tone on the tonic syllable.

The bus was late.

[edit] Notes

1. ^Discerning head from dependent is not always easy. The exact criteria that one employsto identify the head of a phrase vary, and definitions of "head" have been debated indetail. See the exchange between between Zwicky (1985, 1993) and Hudson (1987) inthis regard.

2. ^Dependency grammar trees similar to the ones produced in this article can be found, for

instance, in gel et al. (2003/6).3. ^Using the words themselves as the labels on the nodes in trees is a convention that is

consistent with bare phrase structure(BPS). See Chomsky (1995).4. ^See Nichols (1986).

Noun phrase

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaIt has been suggested thatNominal group (language)bemergedinto this article or

section. (Discuss)Proposed since January 2010.It has been suggested thatEnglish noun phrasebemergedinto this article or section.(Discuss)Proposed since March 2011.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=7http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=7http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphology_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphology_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphology_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependent-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependent-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependent-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=8http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=8http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosodic_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosodic_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosodic_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=9http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=9http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrase#Noun_phrases_v_nominal_groupshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrase#Noun_phrases_v_nominal_groupshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrase#Noun_phrases_v_nominal_groupshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrase#Noun_phrases_v_nominal_groupshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_ref-0http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=9http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosodic_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=8http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependent-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head-marking_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphology_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Head_%28linguistics%29&action=edit&section=7


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Those five beautiful shiny Jonathan apples sitting on the chair. This is a noun phrase of whichapplesis thehead."They" could be substituted for the whole noun phrase, as in "they aredelicious".

Ingrammar,a noun phrase, nominal phrase, or nominal group[1](abbreviated NP) is aphrasebased onanoun,pronoun,or other noun-like word (nominal) optionally accompanied by

modifierssuch asadjectives.

[2]

Noun phrases are very commoncross-linguistically,but some languages likeTuscaroraandCayugahave been argued[by whom?]to lack this construct.

Contents

[hide]

1 Form 2 Grammatical unit 3 Grammatical function 4 See also 5 References

o 5.1 Footnoteso 5.2 Notations

[edit] Form

Noun phrases normally consist of a head noun, which is optionally modified ("premodified" if

the modifier appears before the noun; "postmodified" if the modifier follows the noun). Possiblemodifiers include:

determiners:articles(the, a),demonstratives(this, that),numerals(two,five, etc.),possessives(my, their, etc.), andquantifiers(some, many, etc.). In English, determinersare usually placed before the noun;

adjectives(the redball); or complements,in the form of aprepositional phrase(such as: the student of physics), or a

That-clause(the claim that the earth is round); modifiers;pre-modifiers if before the noun and usually either as nouns ( the university

student) or adjectives (the beautifullady), or post-modifiers if after the noun. A

postmodifier may be either aprepositional phrase(the man with long hair) or arelativeclause(the house where I l ive). The difference between modifiers and complements isthat complements complete the meaning of the noun; complements are necessary,whereas modifiers are optional because they add information about the noun.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_modifierhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_modifierhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayuga_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayuga_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Formhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Formhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_functionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_functionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Footnoteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Footnoteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Notationshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Notationshttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determiner_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determiner_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That-clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That-clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That-clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determiner_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Notationshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Footnoteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_functionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Formhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayuga_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_modifierhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29


10/19


11/19

Those five beautiful shiny Jonathan apples sitting on the chair. This is a noun phrase of whichapplesis thehead."They" could be substituted for the whole noun phrase, as in "they aredelicious".

Ingrammar,a noun phrase, nominal phrase, or nominal group[1](abbreviated NP) is aphrasebased onanoun,pronoun,or other noun-like word (nominal) optionally accompanied by

modifierssuch asadjectives.

[2]

Noun phrases are very commoncross-linguistically,but some languages likeTuscaroraandCayugahave been argued[by whom?]to lack this construct.

Contents

[hide]

1 Form 2 Grammatical unit 3 Grammatical function 4 See also 5 References

o 5.1 Footnoteso 5.2 Notations

[edit] Form

Noun phrases normally consist of a head noun, which is optionally modified ("premodified" if

the modifier appears before the noun; "postmodified" if the modifier follows the noun). Possiblemodifiers include:

determiners:articles(the, a),demonstratives(this, that),numerals(two,five, etc.),possessives(my, their, etc.), andquantifiers(some, many, etc.). In English, determinersare usually placed before the noun;

adjectives(the redball); or complements,in the form of aprepositional phrase(such as: the student of physics), or a

That-clause(the claim that the earth is round); modifiers;pre-modifiers if before the noun and usually either as nouns ( the university

student) or adjectives (the beautifullady), or post-modifiers if after the noun. A

postmodifier may be either aprepositional phrase(the man with long hair) or arelativeclause(the house where I l ive). The difference between modifiers and complements isthat complements complete the meaning of the noun; complements are necessary,whereas modifiers are optional because they add information about the noun.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_modifierhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_modifierhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayuga_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayuga_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Formhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Formhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_functionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_functionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Footnoteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Footnoteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Notationshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Notationshttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determiner_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determiner_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That-clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That-clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arkansas_Black_apples.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That-clausehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepositional_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possessive_adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonstrativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determiner_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Notationshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Footnoteshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_functionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Grammatical_unithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#Formhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_wordshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayuga_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscarora_languagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjectivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_modifierhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29


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Noun phrases can make use of anappositionstructure. This means that the elements in the nounphrase are not in a head-modifier relationship, but in a relation of equality. An example of this isI , Caesar,declare ...,where "Caesar" and "I" do not modify each other. [citation needed]

The head of a noun phrase can be implied, as in "The Bold and the Beautiful"orRobin Hood's

"rob from the richand give to the poor"; an implied noun phrase is most commonly used as ageneric plural referring to human beings.[3]Another example of noun phrase with implied head isI choose the cheaperof the two.[citation needed]

That noun phrases can be headed by elements other than nounsfor instance, pronouns (Theycame) or determiners (I'll take these)has given rise to the postulation of adeterminer phraseinstead of a noun phrase.The English language is stricter than some other languages with regardto possible noun phrase heads. German, for instance, allows adjectives as heads of nounphrases[citation needed], as in Gib mir die Altenfor Give me the olds(i.e. old ones).[citation needed]TheScandinavian languages can do the same, as in Swedish: Ge mig de gamlafor Give me the old(ones).

In addition to pronouns and demonstratives, numerals and adjectives may function as the head ofthe noun phrase, and take modifiers as a noun would. For example, The Secret Seven,somethingwild,the first few, we three, all this, only you, just mine.

[4]

[edit] Grammatical unit

In English, for some purposes, noun phrases can be treated as single grammatical units. This ismost noticeable in thesyntaxof the Englishgenitive case.In a phrase such as The king ofSparta's wife, the possessiveclitic"-'s" is not added to the kingwho actually has the wife, butinstead to Sparta, as the end of the whole phrase. The clitic modifies the entire phrase the king of

Sparta.[citation needed]

[edit] Grammatical function

Noun phrases are prototypically used for acts ofreferenceas in "The blonde girlshouts" or "Shekissed the man". Also possible, but found less often, is the use of noun phrases for predication,as in "Suzy is a blonde girl". Note that in English the use of thecopulaisindicates the use of anoun phrase as predicate, but other languages may not require the use of the copula. Finally,noun phrases are used for identifications like "The murdererwas the butler", where noascriptionis taking place. The possibility for a noun phrase to play the role ofsubjectandpredicate leads to the constructions ofsyllogisms.[citation needed]

English noun phrase

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaIt has been suggested that this article or section bemergedintoNoun phrase.(Discuss)Proposed since March 2011.

InEnglish grammar,anoun phrasehas three components:

Thehead

is the hub, the center of attraction (as it were) of the noun phrase; it is thenounorpronounaround which the other parts gather together.[1]The headdeterminesconcordwith the portion of the sentence outside the noun phrase.[1]Thus:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appositivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appositivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appositivehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bold_and_the_Beautifulhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bold_and_the_Beautifulhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bold_and_the_Beautifulhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Hoodhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Hoodhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Hoodhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DP_hypothesishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DP_hypothesishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DP_hypothesishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DP_hypothesishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Sevenhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Sevenhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Sevenhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Wildhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Wildhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Wildhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Wildhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=2http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clitichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clitichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clitichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=3http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referencehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referencehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referencehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copula_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copula_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copula_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ascriptionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ascriptionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subject_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subject_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subject_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllogismhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllogismhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllogismhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreement_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_noun_phrase#cite_note-greenbaum-quirk-363-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nounhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Merginghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllogismhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subject_%28grammar%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ascriptionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copula_%28linguistics%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referencehttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clitichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive_casehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntaxhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Noun_phrase&action=edit&section=2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Wildhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Wildhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Sevenhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DP_hypothesishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DP_hypothesishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Hoodhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bold_and_the_Beautifulhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_neededhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appositive


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o The changein the Asian economies isunprecedented.o The changesin Japan's economy aremost unexpected.

Premodification

consists of all the words placed beforethe head. These words are usuallydeterminers,

adjectivesandnouns.

[2]

Thus:Example Determiner Adjective

Adjective

phraseNoun Head

That sophisticated city woman That sophisticated city woman

Many honest down-and-outsmall-town businessmen

Many honest down-and-outsmall-town

businessmen

Postmodification

comprises words in the noun phrase thatfollowthe head. These words usually consist ofprepositional phrases, nonfinite clauses, and relative clauses.[2]Thus:

Example Postmodification Category

The talkative man in the center of theroom

in the center of the room prepositional phrase

All the women walking on the bikepath

walking on the bike path non-finite clause

The house that I purchased for mythird husband

that I purchased for my thirdhusband

restrictive relativeclause

The house, which my partner and Ibought a month after we met

which my partner and I bought amonth after we met

non-restrictiverelative clause

There can also be adjectival post-modification:

Corruption aplenty("aplenty" (adjective); corruption (head)). Thus: Corruptionaplenty, in every unsurprising form, graced the occasion.

Apposition

A related concept isapposition,a construction usually involving two noun phrases thatrefer to the same entity (noun or pronoun).[2]Examples:

Example First sentence Second sentence Entity

That president,Abraham Lincoln,lives in the hearts ... That president, , lives in the hearts ... Abraham Lincoln

Her dog, sixteen years old andnearly blind with cataracts,greeted ...

Her dog, , greeted ...sixteen years old andnearly blind withcataracts

The book was written by JaneDoe, a pioneering seventeenth-century veterinarian.

The book waswritten by JaneDoe,

a pioneeringseventeenth-centuryveterinarian.

Jane Doe

Although these examples are non-restrictive, apposition canbe restrictive as well:[2]

The book is written by Jane Doe the local veterinarian.

Apposition can also take the form of a prepositional phrase:[2]

... until the twin curses of famine and pestilenceare lifted from the brows ofmankind. (The "twin curses" are"famine and pestilence").
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Nominal group (functional grammar)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia(Redirected fromNominal group (language))

"Those five beautiful shiny Jonathan apples sitting on the chair"

Insystemic functional grammar(SFG), a nominal groupis a group ofwordswhich expresses anentity.A "nominal group" is widely regarded as synonymous tonoun phrasein othergrammatical models,[1][2]although Halliday and some of his followers draw a theoreticaldistinction between the termsgroupandphrase. He argues that 'A phrase is different from agroup in that, whereas a group is an expansion of a word, a phrase is a contraction of a clause' .[3]Halliday borrowed the term 'group' from the linguist/classicist Sydney Allen.[4]

Contents

[hide]

1 The rank scale in SFG 2 Three metafunctions in the nominal group 3 Experiential dimension

o 3.1 Functions of the premodifierso 3.2 Ordering of the premodifiers: from speakernow to increasingly permanent

attributes 4 Logical dimension 5 Rank-shifting 6 See also 7 References

[edit] The rank scale in SFG

SFG postulates a 'rank scale', in which the highest unit is the clause, and the lowest is themorpheme. The intermediate units are groups/phrases, and words. Each unit of scale is said to

consist of one or more units of the rank below.[5]

.At group/phrase rank, Halliday proposes alsothe "verbal group", the "adverbial group", and the "prepositional phrase". The term 'nominal' in'nominal group' was adopted because it denotes a wider class of phenomena than the term'noun'[6].The nominal group is a structure which includes nouns, adjectives, numerals anddeterminers. The term "noun" has a narrower purview. Formal linguists recruit the termnounphrasefor their grammatical descriptions. Given the significant differences in the theoreticalarchitecture in functionalist and formalist theories, the terms must be seen to be doing quite
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age%29#cite_note-4http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nominal_group_%28functional_grammar%29&action=edit&section=1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Referenceshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#See_alsohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Rank-shiftinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Logical_dimensionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Ordering_of_the_premodifiers:_from_speaker.E2.80.93now_to_increasingly_permanent_attributeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Ordering_of_the_premodifiers:_from_speaker.E2.80.93now_to_increasingly_permanent_attributeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Functions_of_the_premodifiershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Experiential_dimensionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#Three_metafunctions_in_the_nominal_grouphttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#The_rank_scale_in_SFGhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#cite_note-3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_group_%28language%29#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entityhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systemic_functional_grammarhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nominal_group_%28language%29&redirect=no


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different descriptive work. For instance, these group/phrase elements are re-interpreted asfunctional categories, in the first instance as "process", "participant" and "circumstance", withthe nominal group as the pre-eminent structure for the expression of participant roles indiscourse[7].

Within Halliday's functionalist classification of this structure, he identifies the functions ofDeictic, Numerative, Epithet, Classifer and Thing. The word classes which typically realise thesefunctions are set out in the table below:

Deictic Deictic2 Numerative Epithet Classifier Thing

determiner adjective numeral adjective noun or adjective noun

Within aclause,a nominal group functions as though it is that noun, which is referred to as thehead; the items preceding the head are called thepremodifiers, and the items after it thequalifier.[8]In the following example of a nominal group, the head is bolded.

Those five beautiful shiny Jonathan applessitting on the chair

English is a highly nominalised language, and thus lexical meaning is largely carried in nominalgroups. This is partly because of the flexibility of these groups in encompassing premodifiersand qualification, and partly because of the availability of a special resource called thethematicequative,which has evolved as a means of packaging the message of a clause in the desiredthematic form[9](for example, the clause [What attracts her to the course] is [the depth ofunderstanding it provides] is structured as [nominal group A] = [nominal group B]). Many thingsare most readily expressed in nominal constructions; this is particularly so in registers that haveto do with the world of science and technology, where things, and the ideas behind them, are

multiplying and proliferating all the time.

[10]

[edit] Three metafunctions in the nominal group

Like the English clause, the nominal group is a combination of three distinct functionalcomponents, ormetafunctions,which express three largely independent sets of semantic choice:theideational(what the clause or nominal group is about); theinterpersonal(what the clause isdoing as a verbal exchange between speaker and listener, or writer and reader); and the textual(how the message is organisedhow it relates to the surrounding text and the context in which itoccurring). In a clause, each metafunction is a virtually complete structure, and the threestructures combine into one in interpretation. However, beneath the clausein phrases and in

groups, such as the nominal groupthe three structures are incomplete of themselves and needto be interpreted separately, "as partial contributions to a single structural line".[11]In nominalgroups, the ideational structure is by far the most significant in premodifying the head. Tointerpret premodification, it is necessary to split the ideational metafunction into two dimensions:the experiential and the logical.

[edit] Experiential dimension

The experiential dimension concerns how meaning is expressed in the group as the organisationof experience. The critical question is how and whether the head is modified. The head does nothave to be modified to constitute a group in this technical sense.[12]Thus, four types of nominalgroup are possible: the head alone ("apples"), the head with premodifiers ("Those five beautifulshiny Jonathan apples"), the head with a qualifier ("applessitting on the chair"), and the fullstructure of premodification and qualification, as above.
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