Grammar Dictionary Flashcards
The grammatical form that shows that something is in the genitive case. Its mostly used when one is being described as the owner of something.
Possessive
A verb phrase whose main verb is separated from one or more of its auxiliary verbs by one or more adverbs. Is almost never considered grammatically incorrect.
Vladimir HAS DeFiNiTEy PROVEN that he has no fear of snakes.
Split Verb
A punctuation mark that looks like three periods in a row (…) which are used to show where you’ve left words out of a passage your quoting
Elipses
A sentence that has at least one subordinate clause, in addition to its independent clause.
(Subordinate Clause) If I were you, (Independent Clause) I’d tie my shoelaces.
Complex Sentence
A way of using an adjective or adverb when you want to describe something as having a quality, without comparing it to other things that have more or less of that quality. WEIRD is the ____ _____ of WEIRDER/WIERDEST
Positive Degree
The grammatical relationship of nouns and pronouns to other words in a sentence.
ex.
To show possesion
Leon’s Cup (correct) Leon Cup (Incorrect)
To show whether the pronoun is the subject or object.
My brother pinched me back (correct) vs. My brother Pincched I back.(Incorrect)
Case
The verb form you use when you’re making a statement or asking a question about the way things ARE, WERE or WILL BE as opposed to the way they COULD be or SHOULD be, and is the most common grammatical mood.
This is some Hot chili!!!
Indicative
A word (usually an adjective or an adverb) that you use to emphasize a point or strengthen the meaning of another word.
Intensifier
When Several adjectives are used to modify a noun some adjectives usually come before other kinds of adjectives, based on what kind of info the give about the noun they modify.
Just look at that lovely NEW-SILVER-ITALIAN-MOUNTAIN. bike.
Hierarchy of Adjectives
A question that’s phrased as a part of a statement
I want to know why you stole my Money.
Indirect Question
A word or set of words that you attach to the end of a sentence to turn a declarative statement into a question.
I’m the smartest person in the class. ——->I’m the smartest person in the class, DON’T YOU THINK?
Question Tag/Tag Question
Forms of the verb that you need to know in order to construct any other form of the verb.
They include the…
Bare infinitive (SPEAK)
Past tense (SPOKE)
Past Participle (SPOKEN)
Present Participle (SPEAKING)
Principal Parts
A Noun that refers to an ordinary object idea action or living thing; THE OPPOSITE OF A PROPER NOUN, in that they don’t get capitalized (except at the beginning of a sentence)
They are more common and more likely than proper nouns to have plurals and be used with an article or adjective pebble, beauty, question, sardines NOT ZIMBABWE ALEXANDER THE GREAT, OR ALICE IN WONDERLAND.
Common Noun
The person or thing in a sentence that the action is done for.
The waiter brought US the wrong check.
Indirect Object
Auxiliary verbs such as can, may, must, shall, and will, that describe how possible, allowable, or required something is. When used with other “auxiliaries” such as be, do , or have, these _____ ______comes first.
Those drawings on the cave wall MUST have been made by prehistoric humans.
Modal Verb
To list the various forms a verb takes in various tenses, and aspects when paired with different kind of subjects.
Conjugate
When two words are ran together as if they were one and you don’t pronounce the sounds of the word. They+Have= They’ve We+ Will= We’ll
Contraction
A part of speech that can be a word or set of words that you use to show how you feel about something,
WOW! That looks scary!
Interjection
An affix that you use to show that something is small or your or cute.
-let,ling,ette. booklet, duckling,statuette.
Diminutive
A phrase or other construction whose meaning isn’t obvious to people who have never heard it before. even they know all the words in the phrase.
Way out of line
Idiom
A Grammatical gender, that appears in a limited number of grammatical forms, mostly personal pronouns, and are used to refer to boys or men.
He,Him, Himself
Masculine
One of the possible aspects of a verb that is used to describe events that are or will be in progress.
I am FEELING a little queasy.
Progressive Aspect ( or sometimes THE IMPERFECT)
The act of putting the words of a sentence in a different order than they usually have.
Ex. (Switching the Subj. and Comple.) “The night was dark—> Dark was the night”
(Moving the Prep. Phrase away from the word it modifies.) “We rode out of town —> Out of town we rode”
(Placing the Adj. after the Noun it modifies.)
“The City beckoned, with its tall buildings and bright neon—>The City beckoned, with it’s buildings tall and neon bright.”
Inversion
A question that includes a negative word or particle and that expresses an expectation about what the will be.
ISN’T it a nice day.
Negative Question (Leading question)
An adjective that refers to a specific person, place, thing, or group.and are made from proper nouns American (____)–> America (Prop. Noun) Victorian (____)–> Queen Victoria (Prop. Noun)
Proper Adjective
A form of the verb that you use when you’re discussing something as going on now.
Over a billion people LIVE in China
Present Tense
When two or more parts of a sentence match each other in some way. When using numbers the adjective that modifies nouns should be singular if the number is one and plural for the rest.
The subject should ______ with the verb in
person,
number,
Agreement
A Pronoun that introduces a relative clause.
They are…
who, whom, which, what and that.
Is this the only trick THAT your dog can do?
Relative Pronoun
A grammatical gender that is asexual, that can be replaced by the personal pronoun “it” or ‘itself”
Most nouns inn the English language are neuter (unlike other languages) unless it the noun represents a human being,
Nueter
The part of the word that forms the basis of its various different inflections.
Latin—> Latino,Latina
Walk—> Walks, Walking,Walked
Stem
A way of using an adjective or adverb to to compare something (or action or quality) to something else.
In the following sentence SHAGGIER is the _____ ______of the word SHAGGY.
A collie is SHAGGIER than a dalmation
Comparative Degree
A type of construction that that uses extra words instead of using -er More shallow vs Shallower
Periphrastic Comparative
A pronoun that helps to draw attention to a particular noun or pronoun in a sentence.
I MYSELF occasionally make mistakes.
Intensive Pronooun
A kind of subordinate clause that behaves as a noun in the grammar of a sentence.
I BELIEVE THAT everything happens for a reason
Noun (Nominal) Clause
A part of a sentence (usually an adverb) that has no direct connection to the words or phrases in the rest of the sentence.
Absolute Construction
A word that looks like a verb but doesn’t act like one. It is actually called a VERBAL that acts as a noun. They are made of the present participle they are derived from with an -ing to follow.
Don’t you enjoy TRYING new foods?
Gerund (Participial Noun)
Verbs that have predictable past tense forms, and participles, for these verbs you can create any form regardless of the number, person, tense, aspect, or voice.
Regular(Weak) Verb
The relationship between different words, phases or clauses that play a similar grammatical role in a particular sentence.
Chicken AND Ducks
Its dark (–>Semicolon); I cant see anything
Coordination
A construction that uses both the word of and a possessive form (Usually -‘s) to show the relation between one thing and another.
A cousin OF Maxwell’S
Double Genitive
Language that presents somebody’s speech or ideas, but not in his or her own words.
Vladimir told me he’s allergic to shellfish.
Indirect Discourse (Indirect quotation)
A noun or noun phrase that acts as a complement to a subject in a sentence. It tells what kind of thing the subject is.
She should be OUR NEXT CLASS PRESIDENT
Predicate Nominative
The category of grammatical forms that you use when you’re refering to yourself- either yourself alone or yourself and other people.
I,Us,We.
First Person
An_____ _____is a sentence wherein the person or thing performing the action in the sentence is also the grammatical subject. And is best used when the person or thing of interest is the the thing that something happens to.
Weasels dislike strawberries.
vs.
Strawberries are disliked by Weasels
Active Voice
A set of words that expresses some idea about what something or someone is or does,did, or will be.
WARTHOGS EXIST.
Sentence
When words are divided into one of three categories, masculine, feminine, neuter. In the English Language ______ usually only becomes an issue when discussing personal pronouns. He,She, Him, Her, His Hers.
Gender
One of the parts of speech usually placed before nouns or noun phrases, to help explain how the thing named by the noun relates to the overall category of things it belongs to. a, an, the,
Article
A word or particle that changes the meaning of a sentence, by indicating something as not the case.
NEITHER flapping your arms NOR chirping like a robin will enable yo to fly.
Negative
A part of speech that describes someone/something as doing, experiencing or being, something, in a particular way.
Next time, I SUGGEST, you TRY the jeans on, before you BUY them.
Verb
A way to describe how the verb’s form tells when in time a particular action happens.
I HATED candied yams the first time I TRIED them, I HATE them now, I always WILL HATE them.
Tense
A group of two or more words that act together in the grammar of a sentence as if they were a single adverb.
Jasmine reached FOR THE PADDLE
Adverbial Phrase
A phrase that acts like a single preposition in the grammar of the sentence.
out of, in place of, due to,
Put the vase ON TOP OF the bookcase
Complex (Compound) Preposition
A verb that takes a particular form (it gets inflected) to show the number and person of the subject and to show the tense of the verb.
Jasmine has been advancing very quickly in Math.
Finite Verb
A noun that is used to refer to a thing or things that can be either singular or plural. Cab be used with both articles, and determiners.
A bicycle, Two bicycles, One million bicycles, Any bicycles, Your bicycle
Count Noun
A phrase that exists in verb phrases beginning with used to.
Myanmar USED TO be called Burma.
Habitual Aspect
Something that has two or more parts where there would ordinarily be just one.
______Words; Greenhouse ________Subjects; Snakes, Lizards and Turtles are all reptiles. _______ Verbs; The engine sputtered and died.
Compound
Used a determiner before nouns that refer to specific people, places, objects, actions, or ideas, the only____ ____in the English language is the word “THE”. Please hand me THE blue mixing Bowl.
Definite Article (The)
A sentence that is used to express strong feeling rather than stating a fact.
What an unusual hat!
Exclamatory Sentence
When one tells a story about Something that happened in the past but uses the present tense to describe what happened
So I’M trying to get my kite down from the tree, and I’VE GOT this long stick, but what DON’T realize is…
Historical Present
A part of speech that is used to describe the relationship between one noun phrase and another, or the relationship between a verb and a noun phrase, often to do with space and time.
There is a spider crawling UP your leg.
Prepositions
A verb form that combines the future tense with the progressive aspect.
In a few minutes Max WILL BE FEELING sick to his stomach.
Future Progressive
A noun or noun phrase that combines with a preposition to form a prepositional phrase.
There’s some gum on THE BOTTOM (preposition) OF YOUR SHOE.
Object of a prepossition
A part of speech that adds meaning to (nouns usually) other words in the sentence Hollow, funny, sweeter
Adjective
A verb form used in conditional sentences to describe things that are extremely unlikely or that aren’t actually the case.
IF i HAD a job,(______.) I COULD purchase a car(____.).
Subjunctive Conditional
Different kinds of words, divided into categories based on what they’re doing in the grammar of a sentence.
Part of Speech
A ______ consists of a SUBJECT and PREDICATE, with the predicate always containing one finite verb.
The sun rose like a glowing coal over the palm fringed lagoon.
(Subject)THE SUN (Predicate)ROSE(FINITE VERB) LIKE GLOWING COAL OVER THE PALM FRINGED LAGOON
Clause
A word that is made from a verb but can act as any part of speech.
Usually by adding -ing, or -ed to a bare verb.
If you had to sit through such a BORING movie, you’d be as BORED as I am.
Particple
A part of speech that usually modify verbs and adjectives.
Never, well, quickly, softly.
Adverb
A pronoun in the genitive case, that appear as a replacement for noun phrases that involve possessive adjectives.
IN the sentence below the word “HIS” is a replacement for ‘his phone”
He accidentally walked away with my phone and I walked away with HIS.
Possessive Pronoun
The noun, pronoun, or other nominal of a clause, that the subj. of the sentence is built around(the head of a noun phrase that’s acting as the subject).
The PAINT (______ ________) on those chairs(subject) hasn’t dried yet.
Simple Subject
A set of words working together (not a sentence) as a unit. Some act as nouns,verbs,adj,adv,prep, or conj. The sentence below is an example of a ______ because it behaves a noun.
GIRAFFES WITH SHORT NECKS don’t like tall trees.
Phrase
A noun, noun phrase, or noun clause, that completes a larger part of the sentence. They are usually _____ of verbs, and follow directly after helping to form a complete predicate.
Jasmine finally located HER LOST BACKPACK.
Object
A construction that adds extra info to a sentence that is grammatically non-essential. \
(Simple sentence) Maria Sklodowska pioneered the study of radioactivity.
(Ex.) Maria Sklodowska, the polish scientist also known by the name Marie Curie, pioneered the study of radioactivity
Parenthetical Expression
The first auxiliary verb in a verb phrase. It’s important because it is the only finite verb in the phrase, which means it is the only verb that can be changed to show number,person and tense.
That house HAS been standing for over 300 years.
Operator
Pronouns that have grammatical person, that is they make it clear whether you’re are referring to yourself, someone else or to the listener/reader.
SHE may not look it, but shes the state ping pong champion.
Personal Pronoun
A construction that uses two negatives to express an idea that could be expressed using one negative.
DIDN’T say NOTHING
Double Negative
A type of construction that that uses extra words instead of using the possessive ending -‘s.
The house of my friend. vs. My friend’s House.
Periphrastic Genitive
The word that a noun (subject) phrase is built around.
When a Noun Phrase acts as the subject of a clause you look at whether the head of the phrase is singular or plural to determine whether or not the verb should be singular or plural.
ONE of the best ways to cook eggs is by poaching them.
Head
Two or more noun/phrases that are the objects of the same verb or preposition
My closet (verb)contains (Noun phrase/object) three pairs of old sneakers and (noun phrase/object) a pile of dirty laundry.
Compound Object
A Phrase that contains one or more prepositions (INTO) followed by a noun or noun phrase (THE DEEP END OF THE POOL)
Vladimir’s sunglasses sank INTO THE DEEP END OF THE POOL.
Prepositional Phrase
A type of construction that that uses extra words to say what could ordinarily be said more simply.
Ex. Genitive
and
Comparative vs. Superlative
Periphrastic
A clause that cant stand alone as a sentence, and has to be connected to an independent clause.
WHEN I SAW SMOKE POURING OUT OF THE KITCHEN, I knew I was In trouble.
Subordinate Clause
When the grammatical subject is paired with two or more main verbs.
(Subject)We (verb)lit the (verb)fuse and ran for out lives.
Compound Predicate
One of the grammatical voices in English wherein the person or thing that is performing is not performing the action but action is performed on it and appears in a prepositional phrase and is preceded by the word “BY”
The code was broke BY a team of mathematicians.
vs.
The team of mathematicians broke the code.
Passive Voice
Language that presents somebody’s speech or writing in his or her own words.
Jasmine said “I’LL BE A LITTLE LATE GETTING HOME TOMORROW.”
Direct Discourse (Direct Quotation)
Plural forms that don’t match the pattern of adding an -s or -es to them, a form that most nouns follow.
Irregular plural
A case that shows that one noun is modifying another.
There are two ways to use a _____
Add an “-s” to the end of the first modifying noun or by putting the modifier second as part of a prepositional phrase starting with “of”.
Steven’S jacket
or
The jacket OF Steven.
Genitive
A sentence that makes a statement of some kind, as opposed to one that asks a question.
There is a jaguar on the branch just above your head.
Declarative Sentece
A pronoun that you use as a grammatical object, whether its a direct/indirect object,the object of a verb,an infinitive, participle,or preposition. T
he sudden downpour soaked ME from head to toe.
Objective Pronoun
A Clause that can stand alone as a sentence.
ex.
Suddenly I heard a strange hissing wound.
Independent Clause
