Glossary of Linguistic Terms

article There are two kinds in English: the defi nite article the and the indefi nite article a(n). The former has derived from OE demonstrative forms like þæm, þa (‘the’), and the latter from the OE numeral an (‘one’).
aspect Refers to a category of the verb pertaining to time. A sentence like “they are traveling” (i.e., be + Present Participle) is progressive in aspect, as it expresses an action in progress. A sentence like “they have traveled” (i.e., Auxiliary + Past Participle) is perfect in aspect, as it expresses a completed action. In some Indo-European languages, perfect is considered a tense category.
aspirate A sound articulated with a puff of breath: e.g., the t sound in top. See further
“Note on Phonetic Symbols and Orthography.”
auxiliary A verb functions as an auxiliary when occurring with a participle or an infi nitive without to: e.g., have is an auxiliary verb in we have met (but a main verb in I have the book); be is an auxiliary verb in you are chosen (but a main verb in I am happy). The use of do as auxiliary (e.g., we do not know; did you meet them?) was established in the Early Modern English period. Modal auxiliaries are verbs like must, can, shall, and may. They were originally main verbs but came to be used exclusively as auxiliaries through grammaticalization.
back vowel A vowel articulated with the highest point of the tongue placed at the back of the mouth. Back vowels in PDE include /u, υ, o, ɔ, ɑ/. See further “Note on Phonetic Symbols and Orthography.”
basilect See dialect, social. borrowing See loan word.
C May stand for “consonant” as in CVC (consonant–verb–consonant, for words like cat), or for “complement” as in SVC (subject–verb–complement, for a clause like they are students).
case Refers to infl ections, or grammatical forms, of pronouns, nouns, and adjectives to denote their syntactic functions within the clause. Old English had at least four cases. Nominative and accusative are cases for the subject and direct object of a clause, respectively: e.g., in se cyning greteþ þone biscop (‘the king greets the bishop’), se cyning is in the nominative case, and þone biscop is accusative. The dative case is most typically used for indirect objects: e.g., þæm bioscope in he hit geaf þæm bioscope (‘he gave it to the bishop’). Genitive is typically a case to denote possession: e.g., þæs bioscopes in þæs bioscopes boc (‘the bishop’s book’). The Old English case distinction, such as se, þone, þæm, þæs became obscured in the Middle English period and was mostly lost by Early Modern English. PDE has retained case distinction in personal pronouns: e.g., they (subjective), them (objective), their (possessive).
clause A syntactic unit that contains at least a subject and a verb: e.g., I ran. In certain clauses, the subject or the verb (or both) may be omitted though understood: e.g., don’t (you) run!; (it is) done.