Words combine to form phrases.

A phrase typically serves the same function as a word from some particular word class.[2] For example, my very good friend Peter is a phrase that can be used in a sentence as if it were a noun, and is therefore called a noun phrase. Similarly, adjective phrases and adverb phrases function as if they were adjectives or adverbs, but with other types of phrases the terminology has different implications. For example, a verb phrase consists of a verb together with any objects and other dependents; a prepositional phrase consists of a preposition together with its complement (and is therefore usually a type of adverb phrase); and a determiner phrase is a type of noun phrase containing a determiner. Nouns Nouns form the largest English word class. There are many common suffixes used to form nouns from other nouns or from other types of words, such as -age (as in shrinkage), -hood (as in sisterhood), and so on,[2] although many nouns are base forms not containing any such suffix (such as cat, grass, France). Nouns are also often created by conversion of verbs or adjectives, as with the words talkand reading (a boring talk, the assigned reading). Unlike in many related languages, English nouns do not have grammatical gender (although many nouns refer specifically to male or female persons or animals, like mother, father, bull, tigress; see Gender in English). Nouns are sometimes classified semantically (by their meanings) as proper nouns and common nouns (Cyrus, China vs. frog, milk) or as concrete nouns and abstract nouns (book,laptop vs. heat, prejudice).[3] A grammatical distinction is often made between count (countable) nouns such as clock and city, andnon-count (uncountable) nouns such as milk and decor.[4] Some nouns can function to be either countable or uncountable such the word "wine" (This is a good wine, I prefer red wine). Countable nouns generally have singular and plural forms.[3] In most cases the plural is formed from the singular by adding -[e]s (as indogs, bushes), although there are also irregular forms (woman/women, medium/media, etc.), including cases where the two forms are identical (sheep, series). For more details, see English plural. Certain nouns can take plural verbs even though they are singular in form, as in The government were ... (where the government is considered to refer to the people constituting the government). This, a form of synesis, is more common in

British than American English. See English plural: Singulars with collective meaning treated as plural. English nouns are not marked for case as they are in some languages, but they have possessive forms, formed by the addition of -'s(as in John's, children's), or just an apostrophe (with no change in pronunciation) in the case of -[e]s plurals and sometimes other words ending with -s (the dogs' owners, Jesus' love). More generally, the ending can be applied to noun phrases (as in the man you saw yesterday's sister); see below. The possessive form can be used either as a determiner (John's cat) or as a noun phrase (John's is the one next to Jane's). For details, see English possessive. Noun phrases Noun phrases are phrases that function grammatically as nouns within sentences, for example as the subject or object of a verb. Most noun phrases have a noun as their head.[4] An English noun phrase typically takes the following form (not all elements need be present): DETERMINER + PRE-MODIFIERS + NOUN + POSTMODIFIERS/COMPLEMENT In this structure:

the determiner may be an article (the, a[n]) or other equivalent word, as described in the following section. In many contexts it is required for a noun phrase to include some determiner. pre-modifiers include adjectives and some adjective phrases (such as red, really lovely), and noun adjuncts (such as college in the phrase the college student). Adjectival modifiers usually come before noun adjuncts. a complement or postmodifier[4] may be a prepositional phrase (... of London), a relative clause (like ...which we saw yesterday), certain adjective or participial phrases (... sitting on the beach), or a dependent clause or infinitive phrase appropriate to the noun (like ... that the world is round after a noun such as fact or statement, or ... to travel widely after a noun such as desire).

An example of a noun phrase that includes all of the above-mentioned elements is that rather attractive young college student to whom you were talking. Here that is the determiner, rather attractive and young are adjectival pre-modifiers, college is a noun adjunct, studentis the noun serving as the

head of the phrase, and to whom you were talking is a post-modifier (a relative clause in this case). Notice the order of the pre-modifiers; the determiner that must come first and the noun adjunct college must come after the adjectival modifiers. Coordinating conjunctions such as and, or, and but can be used at various levels in noun phrases, as in John, Paul, and Mary; the matching green coat and hat; a dangerous but exciting ride; a person sitting down or standing up. See Conjunctions below for more explanation. Noun phrases can also be placed in apposition (where two consecutive phrases refer to the same thing), as in that president, Abraham Lincoln, ... (where that president and Abraham Lincoln are in apposition). In some contexts the same can be expressed by a prepositional phrase, as in the twin curses of famine and pestilence (meaning "the twin curses" that are "famine and pestilence"). Particular forms of noun phrases include: phrases formed by the determiner the with an adjective, as in the homeless, the English (these are plural phrases referring to homeless people or English people in general); phrases with a pronoun rather than a noun as the head (see below); phrases consisting just of a possessive; infinitive and gerund phrases, in certain positions; certain clauses, such as that clauses and relative clauses like what he said, in certain positions. Determiners

English determiners constitute a relatively small class of words. They include the articles the, a[n] (and in some contexts some), certain demonstrative and interrogative words such as this, that, and which, possessives such as my and whose (the role of determiner can also be played by noun possessive forms such as John's and the girl's), various quantifying words like all, many, various, andnumerals (one, two, etc.). There are also many phrases (such as a couple of) that can play the role of determiners. Determiners are used in the formation of noun phrases (see above). Many words that serve as determiners can also be used as pronouns (this, that, many, etc.)

Determiners can be used in certain combinations, such as all the water and the many problems. In many contexts, it is required for a noun phrase to be completed with an article or some other determiner. It is not grammatical to say just cat sat on table; one must say my cat sat on the table. The most common situations in which a complete noun phrase can be formed without a determiner are when it refers generally to a whole class or concept (as in dogs are dangerous and beauty is subjective) and when it is a name (Jane, Spain, etc.) This is discussed in more detail at English articles and Zero article in English. Pronouns Pronouns are a relatively small, closed class of words that function in the place of nouns or noun phrases. They include personal pronouns, demonstrative pronouns, relative pronouns, interrogative pronouns, and some others, mainly indefinite pronouns.

A noun phrase or nominal phrase (abbreviated NP) is a phrase which has a noun (or indefinite [1] pronoun) as its head word, or which performs the same grammatical function as such a phrase. Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently occurring phrase type. Noun phrases often function as verb subjects and objects, as predicative expressions, and as the complements of prepositions. Noun phrases can be embedded inside each other; for instance, the noun phrase some of his constituents contains the shorter noun phrasehis constituents. In some modern theories of grammar, noun phrases with determiners are analyzed as having the determiner rather than the noun as their head; they are then referred to as determiner phrases.

Identifying noun phrases[edit]

Some examples of noun phrases are underlined in the sentences below. The head noun appears in bold. The election year politics are annoying for many people. Almost every sentence contains at least one noun phrase.

Current economic weakness may be a result of high energy prices. Noun phrases can be identified by the possibility of pronoun substitution, as is illustrated in the examples below. a. This sentence contains two noun phrases. b. It contains them.

a. The subject noun phrase that is present in this sentence is long. b. It is long. a. Noun phrases can be embedded in other noun phrases. b. They can be embedded in them. A string of words that can be replaced by a single pronoun without rendering the sentence grammatically unacceptable is a noun phrase. As to whether the string must contain at least two words, see the following section.

Status of single words as phrases[edit]

Traditionally, a phrase is understood to contain two or more words. The traditional progression in the size of syntactic units is word < phrase < clause, and in this approach a single word (such as a noun or pronoun) would not be referred to as a phrase. However, many modern schools of syntax especially [2] those that have been influenced by X-bar theory make no such restriction. Here many single words are judged to be phrases based on a desire for theory-internal consistency. A phrase is deemed to be a word or a combination of words that appears in a set syntactic position, for instance in subject position or object position. On this understanding of phrases, the nouns and pronouns in bold in the following sentences are noun phrases (rather than just nouns and pronouns): a. He saw someone. b. Milk is good. c. They spoke about corruption. The words in bold are called phrases since they appear in the syntactic positions where multiple-word phrases (i.e. traditional phrases) can appear. This practice takes the constellation to be primitive rather than the words themselves. The word he, for instance, functions as a pronoun, but within the sentence it also functions as a noun phrase. The phrase structure grammars of the Chomskyan tradition (government and binding theory and the minimalist program) are primary examples of theories that apply this understanding of phrases. Other grammars, for instance dependency grammars, are likely to reject this approach to phrases, since they take the words themselves to be primitive. For them, phrases must contain two or more words.

Components of noun phrases[edit]

A typical noun phrase consists of a noun (the head of the phrase) together with zero or more modifiers of various types. The chief types of these modifiers are: determiners, such as the, this, my, some attributive adjectives, such as large, beautiful, sweeter adjective phrases and participial phrases, such as extremely large, hard as nails, made of wood, sitting on the step noun adjuncts, such as college in the noun phrase a college student

prepositional phrases, such as in the drawing room, of his aunt relative clauses, such as which we noticed other clauses serving as complements to the noun, such as that God exists in the noun phrase the belief that God exists infinitive phrases, such as to sing well and to beat in the noun phrases a desire to sing well and the man to beat

The allowability, form and position of these elements depend on the syntax of the language in question. In English, determiners, adjectives (and some adjective phrases) and noun modifiers precede the head noun, whereas the heavier units phrases and clauses generally follow it. This is part of a strong tendency in English to place heavier constituents to the right, making English more of a headinitial language. Head-final languages (e.g. Japanese and Turkish) are more likely to place all modifiers before the head noun. Other languages, such as French, often place even single-word adjectives after the noun. Noun phrases can take different forms than that described above, for example when the head is a pronoun rather than a noun, or when elements are linked with a coordinating conjunction such as and, or, but. For more information about the structure of noun phrases in English, see English grammar: Noun phrases.

Syntactic function[edit]
Noun phrases typically bear argument functions. That is, the syntactic functions that they fulfill are those of the arguments of the main clause predicate, particularly those of subject, object and predicative expression. They also function as arguments in such constructs as participial phrases and prepositional phrases. For example: For us the news is a concern. - the news is the subject argument Have you heard the news? - the news is the object argument That is the news. - the news is the predicative expression following the copula is They are talking about the news. - the news is the argument in the prepositional phrase about the news The man reading the news is very tall. - the news is the object argument in the participial phrase reading the news Sometimes a noun phrase can also function as an adjunct of the main clause predicate, thus taking on an adverbial function, e.g. Most days I read the newspaper. She has been studying all night.
[3]

Noun phrases with and without determiners[edit]

In some languages, including English, noun phrases are required to be "completed" with a determiner in many contexts, and thus a distinction is made in syntactic analysis between phrases that have received their required determiner (such as the big house), and those in which the determiner is lacking (such as big house).

The situation is complicated by the fact that in some contexts a noun phrase may nonetheless be used without a determiner (as in I like big houses); in this case the phrase may be described as having a "null determiner". (Situations in which this is possible depend on the rules of the language in question; for English, see English articles.) In the original X-bar theory, the two respective types of entity are called noun phrase (NP) and N-bar (N, N). Thus in the sentence Here is the big house, both house and big house are N-bars, while the big house is a noun phrase. In the sentence I like big houses, bothhouses and big houses are N-bars, but big houses also functions as a noun phrase (in this case without an explicit determiner). In some modern theories of syntax, however, what are called "noun phrases" above are no longer considered to be headed by a noun, but by the determiner (which may be null), and they are thus called determiner phrases (DP) instead of noun phrases. (In some accounts that take this approach, the constituent lacking the determiner that called N-bar above may be referred to as a noun phrase.) This analysis of noun phrases is widely referred to as the DP hypothesis. It has been the preferred analysis of noun phrases in theminimalist program from its start (since the early 1990s), though the arguments in its favor tend to be theory-internal. By taking the determiner, a function word, to be head over the noun, a structure is established that is analogous to the structure of the finite clause, with a complementizer. Apart from the minimalist program, however, the DP hypothesis is rejected by most other modern theories of syntax and grammar, in part because these theories lack the relevant functional [4] categories. Dependency grammars, for instance, almost all assume the traditional NP analysis of noun phrases. For illustrations of different analyses of noun phrases depending on whether the DP hypothesis is rejected or accepted, see the next section.

Tree representations of noun phrases[edit]

The representation of noun phrases using parse trees depends on the basic approach to syntactic structure adopted. The layered trees of many phrase structure grammars grant noun phrases an intricate structure that acknowledges a hierarchy of functional projections.Dependency grammars, in contrast, since the basic architecture of dependency places a major limitation on the amount of structure that the theory can assume, produce simple, relatively flat structures for noun phrases. The representation also depends on whether the noun or the determiner is taken to be the head of the phrase (see the discussion of the DP hypothesis in the previous section). Below are some possible trees for the two noun phrases the big house and big houses (as in the sentences Here is the big house andI like big houses). 1. Phrase-structure trees, first using the original X-bar theory, then using the modern DP approach: NP DP / \ \ | | | / NP | DP

det NP | \ the NP | | big N | adj /

N' NP \ / N' adj | | N big | | house N | big NP | \ adj /

N' \ N' | N | houses houses

| | | | | | |

det | the / adj | big

house

2. Dependency trees, first using the traditional NP approach, then using the DP approach: house (null) / \ / house the / | big The following trees represent a more complex phrase. For simplicity, only dependency-based trees are [5] given. The first tree is based on the traditional assumption that nouns, rather than determiners, are the heads of phrases. big big / big houses | / | / / | \ houses | the

The head noun picture has the four dependents the, old, of Fred, and that I found in the drawer. The tree shows how the lighter dependents appear as pre-dependents (preceding their head) and the heavier ones as post-dependents (following their head). The second tree assumes the DP hypothesis, namely that determiners rather than nouns serve as phrase heads.

The determiner the is now depicted as the head of the entire phrase, thus making the phrase a determiner phrase. Note that there is still a noun phrase present ( old picture of Fred that I found in the drawer) but this phrase is below the determiner.