Glossary of Grammar and Metalangauge
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Click here for words starting with A
abbreviation:
a word formed from the initial letters of a series of words that refer to an entity or concept. Unlike an acronym, an abbreviation is pronounced just as a string of letters. For example, PDQ (pretty damn quick) and VCR (video cassette recorder) are abbreviations. Sometimes called alphabetisation.
Aboriginal English:
an umbrella term used to cover the many different varieties of English that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples speak.
accent:
pronunciation patterns that are associated with a particular set of speakers.
acronym:
a word formed from the initial letters of a series of words that refer to an entity or concept. For example, AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) and Qantas (Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services) are acronyms.
active:
a grammatical contrast, generally called voice, in which the agent or ‘appears as the subject. For example, The dog ate my homework. is an active sentence. The corresponding passive sentence is My homework was eaten by the dog.
adjacency pairs:
adjacent turns in a spoken interaction that have a close relationship with each other, such as Hello–Hello, how are you?.
adjective:
a part of speech that refers to qualities or states. For example, green and lovely are adjectives. They are typically used to convey information about nouns. They may occur as a modifier in a noun phrase: the lovely weather, or as a predicative complement in a verb phrase: The grass was green. Some English adjectives may be inflected for degree: green, greener, greenest.
adjective phrase:
a phrase that is constructed around an adjective. Examples are, very happy and really bright.
adverb:
a part of speech that refers to the manner, place, time, frequency, or degree in which an event occurs. For example, slowly, often and now are adverbs. Adverbs may also be used to modify adjectives: My hair is very long and to connect sentences: However, my friend showed up on time.
adverb phrase:
a phrase that is constructed around an adverb. For example, so quickly and very often.
adverbial:
the name of the function of an element in a clause that carries information about manner, place, time, frequency, or degree. Adverb phrases, prepositional phrases and some noun phrases can function as adverbials. Consider the prepositional phrase on the table in:
I dropped my plate on the table. Adverbials are optional. For example, we can say either:
That was my favourite meal or That was truly my favourite meal.
affix:
a bound morpheme that is added to the root to form a new word as, for example, -in and -able in in +dispute +able or to express a grammatical relationship such as plural with -s in dog +s. See also prefix and suffix.
affixation or affixing:
the process of combining a root and an affix. For example the word true becomes truth, truthful, untruthful and untruthfulness through the process of affixation.
agentless passive:
a passive sentence in which not only the patient or ‘undergoer’ appears as the subject instead of the agent or ‘doer’, but the agent has also been omitted. For example, Uranium was discovered in 1789. is an agentless passive sentence.
alliteration:
a type of sound pattern that involves the use of identical consonants or consonant clusters at the beginning of words.
anaphora:
a feature of grammatical structure in which a lexical item such as a pronoun refers back to something already expressed.
anaphoric reference:
refers to a relationship between a pronoun and its referent in which the pronoun is referring back to an already expressed referent.
animation:
a type of metaphor that involves the transfer of animate qualities rather than strictly human qualities to things, concepts, animals and natural phenomena. See also personification.
antithesis:
a type of syntactic patterning that involves the setting of one lexical expression or clause against another to which it is opposed. Antithesis is a particular form of parallelism as it expresses a semantic relationship of antonymy between elements in a sentence.
antonymy:
refers to the sense relation between words that are opposites or near opposites of each other.
article:
the English articles are a(n) and the and they belong to the part of speech known as determiners. Articles are used to indicate whether a noun is definite or indefinite.
assimilation:
a phonological process in which a sound is changed to become more similar to a neighbouring sound (typically either in its place or manner of articulation or with respect to whether it is voiced or voiceless). This process makes sequences of sounds easier to produce.
assonance:
a type of sound pattern that involves the use of identical vowel sounds within words.
audience:
the person or people that the speaker/writer/signer is addressing. The audience may also include unintended addressees as is the case when people eavesdrop on a conversation.
Australian English:
an umbrella term for the English language as used in Australia, covering the many different varieties of English that Australians speak, including those under the umbrella of Aboriginal English.
auxiliary:
a part of speech that refers to a group of words that precede verbs in certain forms and express distinctions of time, aspect, modality and voice.
B
backchannel signal:
a short response, such as hmm, yeah, ooh, right, by the audience in a spoken interaction to indicate that they are listening. Also known as a minimal response.
back vowel:
a vowel sound formed by the position of the tongue towards the back of the mouth that is used in naming these vowels. The vowel /u/ is a back vowel.
basic clause:
a structurally complete clause, consisting of a noun phrase followed by a verb phrase. A basic clause makes a grammatical utterance. See also simple sentence, main clause and subordinate clause.
blend(ing):
a process of word formation in which parts of two independent words are combined and used as a new word. For example, smog, is a blend of smoke and fog.
borrowing:
the process of acquiring new words or grammatical features from another language. Examples of borrowings into English include giraffe and lute from Arabic, and cargo, cigar, and vanilla from Spanish.
bound morpheme:
a morpheme that cannot stand alone, typically an affix (for example the verb suffixes -ing and -ed are bound). Some roots are also bound morphemes and must be combined with an affix in order to produce a word. For example, -ceive cannot occur alone but does occur in the forms receive, conceive and deceive.
broad accent:
the Australian English accent most frequently stereotyped as working class or 'ocker' Australian. See also general accent, cultivated accent and ethnic accent.
C
cataphoric reference:
refers to a relationship between a pronoun and its referent in which the pronoun is referring forward to a referent that is coming up later in the text.
clause:
a larger unit than a phrase and usually contains a verb. A complete clause may stand alone as a simple sentence or be part of a compound, complex or compound-complex sentence.
cliché:
an expression that has become so overused it has lost its power to inform and to enliven. A cliché, such as to not beat around the bush, has become trite and stereotyped, and no longer conveys much meaning.
coherence:
the implicit logical connectedness within a text. To have coherence the concepts and relationships expressed within a text should be relevant to each other, enabling the audience to make plausible inferences about the underlying meaning.
cohesion:
the explicit language features that connect or bind a text together. For example, lexical choice, reference, ellipsis, substitution, and connecting adverbials and conjunctions can all serve a cohesive function.
collocation:
a pairing of words that are conventional or closely associated in the minds of speakers. For example, we say on the bookshelf not in the bookshelf, handsome man but beautiful woman.
colloquialism:
a lexical item from the informal, localised, slang, or taboo elements of the lexicon that has the effect of making a spoken or written occurrence of language use more personal, more direct, more sincere, more sociable, more blunt, more playful, and/or more amusing.
comment:
the part of a clause that makes some sort of statement about the topic.
complex sentence:
a sentence containing two or more clauses, where the relationship between the clauses is one of subordination. A subordinating conjunction may occur as a marker of a subordinate clause.
compound-complex sentence:
a sentence containing both two (or more) coordinated clauses and one (or more) subordinate clauses.
compounding:
the creation of a new word by combining two already existing words. For example, the compound carport contains the independent words car and port.
compound sentence:
a sentence containing two or more clauses of equal status, where the relationship between the clauses is one of coordination. Compound sentences make use of coordinating conjunctions.
conjunction:
a part of speech that refers to a group of words that are used to link words, phrases and clauses together. The conjunction in the following example is and: I woke up early this morning and promptly went back to sleep.
connecting adverbial:
an adverbial which functions to connect two sentences within a text. For example, however in The colour of life is always changing. However, the spirit of youth remains ever vibrant.
connotation:
refers to the social meanings or emotional associations triggered by a word. For example, the word mother may have positive (caring, nurturing) or negative (showing excessive concern, limiting) connotations, depending on the context. Compare: I really need some mothering at the moment with She’s always mothering me. See also denotation.
consonance:
a type of sound pattern that involves the use of identical consonants or consonant clusters at the end of words.
content:
the message of the communication, the information being conveyed.
content word:
a word that carries lexical meaning, that refers to something in the real world. The following classes contain content words: nouns, verbs, adverbs and adjectives. See also function word.
context:
the social situation in which communication takes place.
contraction:
a reduced form of one or more words, especially when spoken language is represented in writing. For example, can’t is a contraction of cannot.
conversion:
the process of creating a new word that belongs to a different part of speech than the original word without any affixation. For example, the noun laugh as in That got a few laughs is a conversion from the verb laugh as in She laughed out loud.
cooperative principle:
a unstated agreement people adopt when they communicate: they try to get along with each other by following certain conversational conventions or ‘maxims’ that underlie the efficient use of language.
coordinating conjunction:
conjunctions used to link together language units, such as phrases and clauses, that are of equal status. Coordinating conjunctions include the words and, or, and but. See also compound sentences.
coordination:
the relationship between two language units of the same sort, such as phrases or clauses, that are joined together by means of a coordinating conjunction such as and, or, and but. For example: I wanted to watch TV but I had to finish my homework. See also subordination.
cultivated accent:
the Australian English accent closest to standard British pronunciation of English. See also general accent, broad accent and ethnic accent.
D
declarative:
the sentence type typically used to make a statement. Declaratives have the structure of basic clauses, where the subject precedes the verb. For example:
I like milk on my cereal.
definite determiner or article:
the article the is a definite determiner. This means we use it when referring to something we expect the audience will recognise because it has already been mentioned, or because it will be easy for them to work out. See also indefinite determiner or article.
deictic:
when the interpretation or reference of a lexical item such as a pronoun is directly tied to the personal, temporal or locational characteristics of the context of use. For example, the location identified by here depends on the actual situation of the particular occasion of use.
deixis:
a feature of grammatical structure in which the interpretation or reference of a lexical item such as a pronoun or adverb is directly tied to the personal, temporal or locational characteristics of the context of use.
demonstrative pronoun:
in English the forms this, that, these and those, which refer to things by pointing to their location in time and/or space. For example, This is the one I want. (near the speaker) versus That is the one I want. (away from the speaker). Demonstratives are also used as determiners, as in I want that one.
denotation:
refers to the ‘core’ meaning of a word. For example, the denotation of the word mother is ‘a female parent’. See also connotation.
dependent clause: a clause that is part of a larger clause or sentence. It can have a function such as subject or object in the larger language unit. For example, going to the footy in I really enjoy going to the footy is a dependent clause, and is the object of the verb enjoy. Dependent clauses are also known as subordinate clauses.
descriptivism:
an approach to language that aims to characterise objectively how people use language. See also prescriptivism.
determiner:
a part of speech that expresses the grammatical categories of definiteness, number, and possession. Determiners reflect the grammatical categories of the nouns they precede.
dialect:
the set of grammatical, lexical and pronunciation features that mark the variety of language used by a speech community or an individual. Widespread differences in accent are also associated with dialects.
diminutive:
a form denoting smallness, familiarity, affection or triviality, as the suffix -let in piglet and the suffix -o in smoko.
diphthong:
a vowel sound that is articulated differently as it is being pronounced. The start and end points of the diphthong are indicated in the phonological representation. For example the diphthong / / is initially articulated as / / but ends as a / /.
direct object:
the function of an element in a clause. In English, the direct object follows the indirect object. The direct object is most affected by the verb; typically it is transferred from the subject to the indirect object. In the following example, a letter is the direct object: We sent George a letter.
discourse particle:
words and small expressions, such as well, yep, you know, sort of, and I mean, that are used in a text to communicate to the audience information such as changes of topic or scene, personal attitudes, and other nuances of meaning.
discriminatory language:
language that reflects or imposes hierarchical distinctions between people. For example, the titles Miss and Mrs reflect a distinction between married and unmarried women whereas no such distinction is made for men.
domain:
a contextualised sphere of communication such as home, school, work, medicine or religion where a specific set of language conventions is used marking a register. For example, contracts and wills mark the register of legal English and cardiac arrest and spinal function mark the register of medical English.
doublespeak:
euphemisms used for the purpose of confusing the audience and obscuring the meaning to create social distance.
dysphemism:
the use of a word or expression that emphasises harshness, abusiveness or offensiveness.
E
elision:
a phonological process in which sounds are omitted in connected speech.
ellipsis:
the omission of words or phrases that are not required in order to communicate in a particular context, because the speaker and hearer can make use of information from previous utterances in the discourse or they can infer the information from the context.
emoticon:
an image used to represent facial expressions that is constructed using the standard keyboard. Emoticons are used in emails and SMS messages, for example, to communicate some of the paralinguistic information that is lost in the transition from speaking to writing.
end-focus:
the situation in which new information is presented at the end of a sentence.
ethnic accent:
the umbrella term for the Australian English accent that encompasses the varieties that have emerged through contact with indigenous and migrant languages. See also general accent, broad accent and cultivated accent.
ethnolect:
variation within a language that is associated with a group of speakers who identify with the same ethnic group.
euphemism:
the strategy of referring to taboo subjects using general or indirect language. For example, instead of saying urinate or defecate, people say go to the toilet or use the loo in Australia, and use the bathroom in North America. In Canada and Hong Kong, people go to the washroom for the same purposes.
exclamative:
the sentence type typically used to express an exclamation. An exclamative begins with either what or how. For example: What a beautiful picture you drew!
expression:
the words, phrases and sentences used to communicate a message.
F
false start:
when a speaker, having already started on an utterance, hesitates or changes their mind about what they want to say. A false start is most common in unplanned discourse.
figurative language:
words or sequences of words that take on unusual or striking meanings which involve an extension, linking or transfer of literal meanings. For example, the figurative sense of see or hear as ‘understand’ and stand as ‘tolerate, sustain, maintain’ is based on a bodily experience.
finite verb:
a verb that carries tense, person and number marking in agreement with the subject of the clause.
first person:
the speaker, signer or writer. See also person.
fixed expression:
a sequence of words or an expression that is used frequently for fixed purposes. Examples include: g’day, ciao, how are you, no worries and s’truth.
floor:
the right to speak that is held at each point in a spoken interaction by a particular participant in preference to the other participants.
form:
the appearance, part of speech category or structure of a word or morpheme. The form of a pronoun, for example, depends on its position in a clause. Compare the use of the first person and third person pronouns in the following sentences: I gave it to her and She gave it to me.
formality:
the formality of an utterance can be discussed in terms of a scale of language use relating situations that are socially careful or correct where highly formalised language is appropriate at one end and situations that are very informal and relaxed where non-standard slang is appropriate
at the other.
formulaic opening:
a set beginning to a particular type of discourse that signals to the audience what is to come and allowing the audience to know how to respond.
formulaic utterance:
utterances that are used frequently in a particular context for a fixed purpose. Examples include g’day, s’truth, I’m bid…, I sentence you to…, and Let us pray.
free morpheme:
a morpheme that can be used as a word without any modification. For example, tuna, Warrnambool, drive and purple are all free morphemes. See also bound morpheme.
front-focus:
the situation in which information is presented at the beginning of a sentence rather than later on in the sentence in order to give it greater prominence.
function:
the grammatical role an element is filling. For example, in the following sentence Harry has the function of being the subject: Harry ate a lot of chips.
function word:
a word that carries grammatical meaning only. For example, pronouns, prepositions and conjunctions.
function of language:
the intended purpose of the communication. This may include:
giving directions, asking questions, telling stories and so on.
G
genderlect:
variation within a language that is associated with a group of speakers of either masculine or feminine gender.
general accent:
the Australian English accent that is the middle of the continuum between a cultivated and a broad accent. It is the accent that is becoming most widespread in Australia. See also cultivated accent, broad accent and ethnic accent.
genre:
any variety of language that has a specific purpose, such as persuasion or narrative, uses a distinguishable set of language features and has a typical pattern for the structuring of information. Also known as text type.
given information:
information that is already familiar to the audience, either because the information has already been presented earlier in the text or because the information is already a part of the audience’s background knowledge.
grammar:
the study of the structure of language in general, or of the structure of sentences in particular. In this second sense grammar is mainly concerned with syntax and morphology.
H
hedging expression:
a phrase such as you know, sort of and a bit that is used in order to reduce the force of an utterance. Hedging expressions are a strategy for removing social distance between the speaker and the audience by reducing the authoritativeness of the speaker’s tone.
high-rising terminal (HRT):
the use of a high-rising intonation at the end of a statement (especially in Australian and New Zealand English). HRT sounds similar to the intonation used in English questions but is actually used for a range of other discourse functions such as seeking empathy and regulating conversational interaction.
high vowel:
a position of the tongue high in the mouth that is used in naming these vowels. The vowel /i/ is a high vowel.
hyperbole:
a type of stylistic device that involves a form of exaggeration and is used to intensify the expression of feelings or impressions. For example, the description work my fingers to the bone in a sentence such as I have worked my fingers to the bone trying to get through this subject is disproportionate to the situation and not meant to be taken literally. Also known as overstatement.
I
idiolect:
variation within a language that is associated with individual speakers. Also known as personal variation.
idiom:
a sequence of words that forms a single unit of meaning. For example, burn your bridges, means ‘to act in a way that commits you to a single course of action’. See fixed expression.
imperative:
the sentence type typically used to express a command or directive. Imperatives do not typically contain a subject. As the speaker is addressing the hearer(s), ‘you’, the subject can readily be recovered from the context. In imperatives the verb is always in the infinitive form. For example:
Look at me.
inclusive language:
language usage which ensures that different opinions, lifestyles, choices and experiences are recognised and validated.
indefinite determiner or article:
the articles a and an are indefinite determiners. They are used when introducing something new to the audience. See also definite determiner or article.
indirect object:
the function of an element in a clause. In a transitive clause in English, the indirect object follows the verb and precedes the direct object. The indirect object codes the recipient or goal of the verb. Sarah is the indirect object in the following clause: I gave Sarah a new pencil case.
inference:
something that has been deduced or concluded, often by using implicit situational or cultural knowledge in addition to explicit information.
infinitive:
the base form of the verb. Infinitive verbs are not inflected for tense, number or person. This is the form used as the headword in a dictionary entry. In sentences, infinitives may be preceded by to, as in I like to gaze out the window. See also non-finite verb.
infix:
a bound morpheme that occurs within the root to which it is attached. Infixes are only found in English as intensifiers in forms such as bloody in fanbloodytastic. (note that this is called tmesis)
information flow:
the ways in which language users vary the structural features of sequences of sentences within larger texts in order to create cohesion, show shifts in topic and focus, changes in participants, beginnings and ends of scenes, and so on.
informational text:
a text type whose purpose is to help the audience gain knowledge.
instructional text:
a text type whose purpose is to tell the audience how to do something.
interjection:
a part of speech containing words such as ouch, yuck, ugh, and he-he that are used to express feelings and emotion. With the exception of quoted speech, interjections do not combine with other words to form larger phrases or clauses. This property sets interjections apart from the other parts of speech.
interrogative:
the sentence type typically used to ask questions. Interrogatives usually have subject-auxiliary inversion. This means that the order of the subject and the auxiliary verb is reversed compared with basic clauses. For example:
Can you come? as compared to the basic clause:
You can come.
interrogative tag:
a type of question formed by attaching an element to the end of a statement, as in It sure is bright, isn’t it?
intonation:
the way in which pitch changes during speech. English speakers tend to use rising intonation when asking questions.
intonation pattern:
the pattern of pitch changes characteristic of an utterance.
intonation unit:
a unit of speech identified by its intonation contour. Intonation units can be distinguished by the pauses between them and the changes in pitch that they contain.
intransitive:
a verb that does not occur with an object. For example, I sneezed. See also transitive.
irregular verb:
verbs that create past tense and/or past participle forms by internal modification rather than by taking an inflectional affix. For example, the verb sing has the past tense sang and the past participle sung.
irony:
a type of figurative language in which the real meaning of the message is different from the literal meaning of the words used. Irony is produced when the reality of the context in which language is written or spoken makes the statement untrue in some way.
J
jargon:
a set of lexical items associated with a discrete occupational or social group such as airline pilots, jazz fans and linguistics. It can provide the lexical dimension of a particular register. It can also refer to the use of specialised language to obscure meaning and exclude non-members.
L
language change:
change within a language over time. The change may occur in any subsystem of the language system.
lexical ambiguity:
when a lexical item can be interpreted with more than one meaning.
lexical choice:
the lexical items that are selected to be used in the expression of a particular message.
lexical item:
a basic unit of meaning in a language that may be a single word, as with dog; less than a word, as with the bound root morpheme cran- ; or more than one word as with the multi-word idiom to see eye to eye.
lexicology:
the study of the word stock, or lexicon, of a language.
lexicon:
the entire word stock or vocabulary of a language.
lingua franca:
is used for communication by speakers with no common language. English is a lingua franca in international business communication, and Tok Pisin is a lingua franca in Papua New Guinea, as is Swahili in much of East Africa.
listing:
a type of syntactic patterning that involves the repetition of lexical items or grammatical structures as a list. Listing is a particular form of parallelism.
M
main clause:
a clause that can stand on its own and can also be called an independent clause. For example, I went to the beach on Friday is a main clause. See also dependent clause.
maxim:
a convention for how communication is conducted.
maxim of manner:
the convention that when people communicate their contribution should be orderly and brief, avoiding obscurity and ambiguity.
maxim of quality:
the convention that when people communicate their contribution should be true. They should not say what they believe to be false, nor should they say anything for which they lack adequate evidence.
maxim of quantity:
the convention that when people communicate their contribution should be as informative as is required. They should say neither too much nor too little.
maxim of relevance:
the convention that when people communicate their contribution should clearly relate to the purpose of the interaction.
metalanguage:
the terminology used to describe, analyse and discuss language. The glossary on this CD is a glossary of metalanguage used to discuss the English language.
metaphor:
a type of figurative language in which a term or phrase is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable, in order to suggest a resemblance, as a whale of a problem.
minimal response:
a short response, such as hmm, yeah, ooh, right, by the audience in a spoken interaction to indicate that they are listening. Also known as a backchannel signal.
modal auxiliary:
an auxiliary, such as can, will, should, and may, that expresses modality. Modal auxiliaries do not show information about person, number or tense and occur with an infinitive verb form. For example in the following sentence laugh is the main verb and can is a modal auxiliary: I can laugh louder than you.
mode:
the way communication is accomplished. The three basic modes of communication are speaking, writing, and signing.
morpheme:
the smallest meaningful unit in a language. A word consists of one or more morphemes.
morphology:
the study of the structure of words. See also morpheme.
N
narrative text:
a text type whose purpose is to entertain by telling about events, experiences or the like, whether true or fictitious.
neologism:
the creation of a new word or expression to fill a gap, such as bogan ‘a complete loser’.
New Englishes:
varieties of English that are currently emerging in places in which English is widely used as a second language. Over time, characteristics of local languages are incorporated into the English of the area. Singaporean English is one example.
new information:
information presented in a text that is not familiar to the audience until the point of its introduction.
nominalisation:
the process of forming a noun from some other part of speech–for example, creation from the verb create. It also includes the process of turning whole clauses into noun phrases. For example, the students produced the multimedia extravaganza becomes the students’ production of the multimedia extravaganza.
non-finite verb:
a verb which has not been inflected for tense, person or number. This includes infinitives, and present and past participles.
non-rhotic:
an accent or dialect having the characteristic that /r/ is not pronounced after vowels. Australian English is an example of a non-rhotic variety of English. See also rhotic.
noun:
the part of speech containing words referring to objects and abstractions. Words in this class fulfil a naming function. In English nouns inflect for number and commonly have the functions of subject, object and predicative complement in sentences.
noun phrase:
a phrase that is constructed around a noun or pronoun. Examples are: the Port Philip bowling team, my dog and me.
O
object:
the function of an element in a clause. In a basic clause the object is a noun phrase and follows the verb. In the following sentence Ida is the
object: Sue phoned Ida. In a passive construction the object of a basic clause corresponds to the subject of the passive (consider:
Ida was phoned by Sue).
onomatopoeia:
refers to words that imitate the sounds they refer to. For example, woof represents the sound of a dog barking, while purring and miaowing are done by cats.
overstatement:
a type of stylistic device that involves a form of exaggeration and is used to intensify the expression of feelings or impressions. For example, the description of frillions of emails in a sentence such as There were frillions of emails when I go home. is disproportionate to the situation and not meant to be taken literally. Also known as hyperbole.
oxymoron:
the expression of a paradox, or seeming contradiction, through the use of antonyms or direct opposites, such as make haste slowly.
P
paradox:
a type of figurative language that involves the statement of two seemingly contradictory facts or qualities which are both true at the same time.
parallelism:
a type of syntactic patterning that involves the repetition of a series of similar syntactic structures, most often for stylistic reasons which underline the semantic interpretation of the text.
part of speech:
a set of words sharing many language features, such as the kind of inflectional and derivational morphemes with which they can occur and their syntactic behaviour in a sentence. The terms noun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, and pronoun all refer to parts of speech.
participants:
the speaker/writer/signer and the audience
passive:
a grammatical contrast, generally called voice, in which the patient or ‘undergoer’ appears as the subject instead of the agent or ‘doer’. If the agent is there at all it is in a prepositional phrase beginning with by. For example, My homework was eaten by the dog is a passive sentence. The corresponding active sentence is The dog ate my homework.
past participle:
a verb form used to express either a completed action or a passive action. Typical endings are -en (compare take and taken) or -ed (compare bake and baked). When a past participle is used to express a completed action, the auxiliary have carries the tense, person and number marking, as in She has missed the bus to school every day this week. When a past participle is used to express the passive, the auxiliary be carries the tense, person and number marking. For example, The pizza was baked in a mud-brick oven.
past tense:
used to indicate that the event described by the verb happened before some other relevant event (often the time of speech). See also tense.
pause:
may occur when a speaker breathes in during a turn at talking or when they need time to think. In this latter case, the speaker is likely to use a pause filler to indicate they wish to continue speaking. Pauses may also be used for dramatic effect.
pause filler:
expressions such as um and err that are used by a speaker to indicate they are still taking a turn at talking. They allow the speaker thinking time in order to plan what they will say next.
person:
a grammatical category marked on pronouns. The first person is the speaker/writer/signer, I and we, the second person is the audience, you, and the third person is the person(s) and/or thing(s) spoken about: he, she, it, and they.
personal variation:
variation within a language that is associated with individual speakers. Also known as an idiolect.
personification:
a type of metaphor that involves the transfer of human qualities to things, concepts, animals and natural phenomena.
persuasive text:
a text type whose purpose is to help the audience change their opinions or attitudes.
phonetics:
the study of speech sounds: their production, transmission and reception.
phonological patterning:
the sound patterns created by individual and combined consonant and vowel sounds and the rhythmic patterns created by the overlay of syllable stress.
phonology:
the study of the way speech sounds are organised within a particular language.
phrase:
a language unit that contains one or more words. Phrases are smaller than clauses and are named after the part of speech category of the word that is most important within the phrase. For example, the red skirt and a cup of coffee are noun phrases, while really very beautiful and quite extraordinary are adjective phrases.
pitch:
refers to the high, medium or low sound of someone’s voice. Pitch is relative and depends on the vocal qualities of each individual speaker. The lowest speaking pitch of a soprano may be higher than the highest pitch of a baritone.
planned discourse:
prepared speeches, and most written documents are examples of planned discourse. The speaker prepares the text in isolation from the audience with plenty of time to think. The audience is not typically a participant in planned discourse. See also unplanned discourse.
plural:
the grammatical number used when there is more than one referent. The plural is frequently marked by the suffix -s. See also singular.
politeness:
the use of language expressions to show courtesy and respect towards others and to mark social status and social distance.
politeness marker:
a lexical item or phrase that is used to express politeness such as courtesy and social status. For example, in order to avoid being rude please can be used to reduce the assertive force of a command.
political correctness:
conformity to current beliefs about correctness in language with regard to sexism, racism, ageism, and so forth.
possessive:
a grammatical expression of ownership.
prefix:
an affix that occurs before a root. For example, dis- in dislocate or re- in relocate.
preposition:
a grammatical part of speech that typically expresses spatial information. For example, in, at, through, and by are prepositions.
prepositional phrase:
a phrase that is constructed around a preposition. Examples are: in the water and by my side.
prescriptivism:
an approach to language with authoritarian intent, that aims to tell people how to use language ‘properly’. See also descriptivism.
present participle:
a verb form used to express continuing action. Shown by the ending -ing (compare go and going). When a present participle is part of the verbal element, the auxiliary be carries the tense, person and number marking. For example: I am going to the working bee on Saturday.
present tense:
associated with events that are occurring at the time of speaking (present time). For example, You are funny. Sometimes the present tense is used for things that will actually happen in the future. The grand final is next Saturday.
prestige status:
the variety of a language which is held to be most suitable for serious purposes and is used for official or public purposes. See also Standard Australian English.
principle of appropriateness:
states that the register or language variety used should match the situation in terms of style and levels of formality. Relevant factors include the audience, function and context.
pronoun:
a grammatical part of speech containing words used as substitutes for noun phrases. For example I, you, her and mine are pronouns.
prosodic features:
the collective name for the characteristics of pitch, stress and intonation. They are used to convey important information when speaking.
pun:
the humorous use of a word to bring out differences in meaning or of words that are alike or nearly alike in sound but different in meaning.
R
reduction:
a phonological process in which a sound becomes more central when a word is unstressed in speech. Reduction is also used to refer to the situation where part of a word has been deleted, as in the use of coz for because. Speech that does not contain any reduction sounds halting. Reductions are more frequent in casual conversations than in formal contexts.
reference:
the various ways in the which the denotation of people, places, actions and things mentioned in a text are established and linked or tracked within the text.
regional variation:
a language variety associated with speakers living in a particular geographic location or region. For example, Melburnian English is a regional dialect of Australian English.
register:
a language variety associated with a particular situation of use, that can be described in terms of users, domain and style. For example:
the language of the law, the language of sports junkies, the language of the media, the language of science, the language of academics, the language of foodies, the language of politics, the language of advertising, the language of literature, the language of family and friendship and the language of criminals.
repetition:
a stylistic device that can be used for a number of purposes such as emphasising an important point, drawing parallels between different points, ensuring that the audience has heard or understood, or to hold the floor while the speaker thinks about the next thing to say.
rhotic:
an accent or dialect having the characteristic of pronouncing /r/ after a vowel. Most varieties of American English are rhotic. See also non-rhotic.
rhyme:
a type of phonological patterning in which a word agrees with another in the part of that final syllable that consists of the central peak, which is usually a vowel, and any consonants which follow the peak. Rhyme is a stylistic device used, for example, in poetry and rhyming slang.
rhyming pattern:
the pattern of agreement in the rhyme of the final syllable of lines of poetry or of words.
rhythm:
the flow of words while speaking. The rhythm is marked by patterns of stress placement and the overall tempo of speaking.
root:
a morpheme that forms the basis of a word. In the word idol the root forms an entire word whereas idolised consists of the root idol plus two affixes: the derivational suffix -ise forms a verb from a noun and the inflectional suffix -ed indicates that it is in the past tense.
S
sarcasm:
a type of figurative language in which the real meaning of the message is different from the literal meaning of the words used. Sarcasm, like irony, is produced when the reality of the context in which language is written or spoken makes the statement untrue in some way. However, sarcasm is more explicit and more insulting than irony.
second person:
refers to the audience – that is, the hearer(s) or reader(s). See also person.
self-correction:
occurs when a speaker makes an error such as mispronouncing a word and goes back to correct the error.
semantic field:
an area of meaning covered by a set of words with interrelated meanings. Some examples include:
words relating to food and cooking, words for auto parts, and words associated with football.
semantics:
the study of meaning and how a meaningful message is constructed.
sense:
refers to the meaning of a word.
sentence:
a sentence may consist of a word, as in Fine, a clause, as in Winter finally ended, or more than one clause, as in She laughed when she saw the surprise. See also complex sentence, compound sentence, compound-complex sentence and simple sentence.
sentence type:
refers to the four main sentence types in English, which can be distinguished by the communicative function or message each type typically conveys. See declarative, exclamative, imperative and interrogative.
shortening:
the process of creating a new word by truncating a longer word. For example the word bus comes from omnibus.
simile:
a type of figurative language that performs the function of comparing or connecting two things because they share similar qualities; or sometimes, of transferring the qualities of one thing to another.
simple sentence:
a sentence that contains a single clause. Examples include I am not feeling particularly well this morning, Jill rang me, and The man in the red hat is looking for his dog.
simultaneous speech:
occurs when two or more participants in a spoken interaction speak at the same time.
singular:
the grammatical number used when there is only one referent. The singular is not marked on nouns in English but the plural is.
slang:
distinctive words and phrases associated with informal speech. It tends to be used within clearly defined social or age groups. It is often short lived.
social distance:
social distance can be discussed in terms of a scale of language use relating contexts where the participants are relatively close, of equal status or belong to a common group at one end, and contexts where such relationships do not hold between the participants at the other. Where there is little social distance between the participants, language expressing familiarity or solidarity is appropriate, whereas when the social distance between the participants is large, highly formalised language is appropriate.
social variation:
a language variety associated with groups of people sharing similar social characteristics such as socio-economic class, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation, among others.
sociolect:
variation within a language that is associated with a group of speakers who share similar socially defined characteristics such as socioeconomic class, education level, ethnicity and gender among others. See also ethnolect and genderlect.
speaking:
a mode of communication in which ideas are conveyed by using spoken language. This involves the use of the organs of speech and hearing.
speech community:
a group of people, identified regionally or socially, who share at least one language or variety of a language.
Standard Australian English:
a prestige dialect of Australian English generally used for official or public purposes. This dialect is used by institutions such as schools, the courts, government offices and by the media. It utilises a uniform lexicon and grammar but may include a variety of pronunciations.
stop:
the name given to sounds made by completely closing off the oral cavity with the velum raised to prevent air from entering the nasal cavity. In English these sounds include /b, p, t, d, k, g/.
stress:
refers to syllables that have greater prominence in a word or phrase.
strong form:
a stressed word form in connected speech. See also weak form.
style:
the manner of expression characteristic of a particular register, that can be described in terms of relative formality and the specific language features used.
subject:
the function of an element in a clause. In a basic clause a noun phrase subject is obligatory; the subject comes before the verb; the verb agrees in person and number with the subject; and the subject typically refers to the agent, or actor in a clause.
subordinate clause:
a clause that has a function in another (higher) clause.
subordinating conjunction:
a conjunction that is used to link two clauses where one clause has a function in the other (higher) clause. Subordinating conjunctions include the words because, although and which. See also complex sentence and compound-complex sentence.
subordination:
refers to the relationship between two clauses, where one clause has a function in the other (higher) clause and the two clauses may be linked by a subordinating conjunction such as while, although or that. For example, the subordinate clause that ate my goldfish is describing the noun phrase the cat in the following clause: I saw the cat that ate my goldfish. See also coordination.
substitution:
the replacement of a full lexical expression by another shorter expression.
suffix:
an affix that occurs after the root. For example, -ly in happily and -est in highest are suffixes.
superlative:
an inflectional suffix that indicates one of the three degrees of comparison for many adjectives and some adverbs as in shortest and hardest.
syllable:
a rhythmical unit of speech. Syllables contain one or more sounds and languages have different restrictions on what combinations of sounds are possible in a syllable.
symbolism:
refers to the use of a lexical item or expression as a symbol to represent something beyond itself. A symbol is like an abbreviation or sign which is used to mean far more than its specific denotation. For example, a letter can be a symbol for a specific sound.
synonym:
a word having the same or nearly the same meaning, or denotation, as another word.
synonymy:
refers to the sense relation between words that have similar meanings, or denotations.
syntactic ambiguity:
when a syntactic construction can be interpreted as if it were another.
syntax:
the study of the structure of sentences in a language. In particular, the way that grammatical relationships between words are treated.
T
taboo:
topics and behaviour which are viewed as negative in a given culture. Taboo subjects frequently include death, and bodily parts, functions, and processes. See also euphemism.
tense:
a grammatical category associated with verbs. Tense encodes the relative time an event took place and frequently this is in relation to the time of speech.
text type:
any variety of language that has a specific purpose, such as persuasion or narrative, uses a distinguishable set of language features and has a typical pattern for the structuring of information. Also known as genre.
topic:
the part of a sentence that indicates what is being talked or written about.
turn:
having control of the floor – that is, the right to speak – at a particular time.
turn-taking:
refers to the accepted norms in a particular culture for managing the alternation of turns in a spoken interaction, such as whether it is considered rude or normal to talk over someone else.
U
understatement:
a type of stylistic device that involves minimising or giving less importance to what is being described. Like overstatement, it has the effect of intensifying the expression of feelings or impressions. For example, a statement such as This will only hurt a little. downplays the level of pain that is likely to occur.
unplanned discourse:
spontaneous use of language, typically in conversation but also in email and so on. The roles of speaker and audience switch regularly and there is little time for planning what to say. See also planned discourse.
unstressed:
refers to syllables in words that do not receive prominence. See also stress.
use-related variation:
differences in the variety of language used that are associated with the occasion of use.
user-related variation:
differences in the variety of language used that are associated with the person speaking, writing or signing.
V
variation:
differences in the form of language, arising between individuals, and between communities of speakers, either historically, regionally and/or socially. Variation may occur in all the subsystems of a language. See also regional variation and social variation.
variety:
a distinctive system of language patterns used under specific circumstances by an individual or a communities of speakers.
verb:
a part of speech that refers to actions, events, states, and processes. For example, cry, collide, know, and construct. In English, verbs are marked for tense, aspect, voice, mood, person, and number.
verb agreement:
in English, a verb in the present tense agrees with the subject in person and number. For example, in The baby smiles a lot. the verb occurs with the third person singular present tense suffix, -s, which marks agreement with the third person singular subject.
verb phrase:
a phrase that is constructed around a verb. Examples are have only ever eaten fish and choked on a bone.
voice:
refers to the grammatical contrast between active and passive.
voice quality:
the tone of voice a speaker uses. Examples include creaky voice, associated with tiredness, and breathy voice, associated with shyness, or sensuality, or simply being out of breath.
voiced:
describes sounds which are made using vibration of the vocal folds. All vowels and nasals are voiced, as are many consonants. These sounds include /i, a, m, w, b, d, g/ in English.
voiceless:
describes sounds produced without vibration of the vocal folds. These sounds include /p, f, t, s, k/ in English.
vowel:
a class of sounds produced by allowing the air through the mouth without obstruction. Different vowels are made by changing the shape of the oral cavity. Vowels are always voiced in English. See also consonant.
W
word:
a meaningful unit that can stand alone in speaking or writing. Words may contain one or more morphemes and are combined into phrases, clauses and sentences.
writing:
a mode of communication that relies on visual representations of language. Writing involves the use of an orthography.
Y
yes—no interrogative:
a type of interrogative, that has only two possible answers: yes or no. A yes—no interrogative, which is sometimes called a closed interrogative, is usually formed with an auxiliary in front of the subject: Did you see the movie last night? Are you happy with your plans? Have you got anything in red? See also open interrogative.