ability

Ability is a modal meaning that is expressed via can or could. It refers to the physical, intellectual or perceptual capacity (and, hence, the possibility) to do something. Ability is usually associated with an animate Subject referent, but not necessarily: The city’s metro can transport up to 15,000 people per hour can be said to convey ability, for example. (AEG Ch. 5)

abstract noun

An abstract noun denotes an entity that has no physical shape and that can therefore not be perceived by any of the senses: happiness, friendship, love. Nouns like unicorn, dragon or fairy represent imaginary creatures, but they are concrete nouns, not abstract nouns. (AEG Ch. 3)

Accomplishment

A situation is said to be an Accomplishment if it (i) requires input of energy (it is dynamic), (ii) has duration (it has a temporal contour) and (iii) has an intended or inherent endpoint beyond which the situation cannot continue: He ran the NY marathon in 2018. (AEG Ch. 4)

Achievement

A situation is said to be an Achievement if it (i) requires input of energy (it is dynamic), (ii) is perceived as having no duration (it has no inherent temporal contour) and (iii) has an intended or inherent endpoint beyond which the situation cannot continue: He reached the finish line at 2.43. (AEG Ch. 4)

active voice, see passive voice

Activity

A situation is said to be an Activity if it (i) requires input of energy (it is dynamic), (ii) has duration (it has a temporal contour) and (iii) does not include an intended or inherent endpoint beyond which the situation cannot continue: He is jogging. (AEG Ch. 4)

actualization, actualize

We use the term actualization to refer to a situation taking place. If a situation is said to actualize or to have actualized, it means that it is happening / happened / has happened. (AEG Ch. 4)

actualize, see actualization, actualize

adjective phrase (AdjP)

An adjective phrase is a constituent whose head is an adjective: [funny], the [black] cat, [really strange] colours, a [very tall] building, where the AdjPs are in brackets and the heads of the AdjPs are underlined. Adjectives provide additional information about a noun, often providing descriptive information, and occur either directly before the head noun (the black cat), in which case the adjective is used attributively, or after a linking verb (He seemed happy, John became anxious), in which case it is used predicatively. (AEG Ch. 1)

adjective, see adjective phrase

Adjunct

An Adjunctis a syntactically optional constituent that can be realized by a range of different forms (NP, AdvP, PrepP, clause). The claim that it is syntactically optional means that if it is left out the sentence is still grammatical. Needless to say, if a constituent is left out, the message communicated will no longer be the same. It is thus important to distinguish the syntactic effect from the semantic effect that the omission of a constituent has. An Adjunct often gives information concerning the circumstances of the situation represented by the clause, that is, for example, the where, when or why of a situation: I met him on campus at 3 p.m. because there was assembly. (AEG Ch. 1)

adverb of degree, see adverb phrase

adverb of frequency, see adverb phrase

adverb of manner, see adverb phrase

adverb phrase (AdvP)

An adverb phrase is a constituent whose head is an adverb: He is [very] kind; He was dancing [very slowly], where the AdvPs are in brackets and the heads of the AdvPs are underlined. Very in [very slowly] is also an AdvP: [[very] slowly]. It functions as prehead to the adverb head slowly within the larger AdvP. An AdvP can be used to qualify the situation referred to by the verb: He danced gracefully. The adverb in this case is often an adverb of manner. Adverbs of frequency (He comes often) exist as well. An AdvP can also modify an adjective: It was [extremely] hot (extremely, an adverb of degree, modifies the adjective hot) or another adverb: They eat out [quite] frequently (quite, an adverb of degree, modifies the adverb frequently). AdvPs can also be used (often sentence-initially) as sentence adverbs: Obviously, he has had enough of this (= It is obvious that he has had enough of this); Frankly, I’ve had enough of him (= I’m being frank when I say that. . .) (AEG Ch. 1)

adverb, see adverb phrase (AEG Ch. 1)

adverbial clause

An adverbial clause is a subclause functioning as an Adjunct: I’ll do it when I arrive. An adverbial clause has the same role as an AdvP when it functions as an Adjunct: I’ll do it immediately. (AEG Ch. 1)

adverbial

An adverbial is a formal category. The term captures the fact that that slots that are typically filled by AdvPs can also be filled by other forms. In I meet her every week at the gym, for instance, every week is an NP and at the gym is a PrepP. These forms function as Adjuncts, a function that can also be performed by an AdvP: I often / regularly meet her. The subclause in I’ll meet her after she’s finished work likewise functions as an adverbial Adjunct. Adverbial denotes any constituent (including AdvPs) that fulfill this role. (AEG Ch. 4)

agent

Agent is a semantic role; it refers to a doer or an instigator. In an active sentence, a constituent having the semantic role of agent regularly functions as Subject: William baked a cake. In a passive sentence, the agent is often not expressed: My bike was stolen. When it is, it is expressed via a by-phrase: It was stolen by a kid in the neighbourhood. (AEG Ch. 2)

anaphor, anaphora

In its broadest sense, the term anaphora can be used to refer to any expression whose interpretation depends on what occurs before it or after it. In a narrower sense (the more common meaning, and the way it is used in AEG), it refers only to the former case: an anaphor (or anaphoric expression) inherits its reference from a referent earlier in the discourse. In I’ll ask Ingrid – she’ll know the answer, she is an anaphor. Its referent is interpretable only by looking back to the antecedent Ingrid. Anaphors can also be place holders for AdjPs (She’s busy but her partner is less so), AdvPs (If you look in the library you’ll find the book there) and VPs (I didn’t need to lock the door as she had already done so.) Anaphors contribute considerably to the overall cohesion of a text. (AEG Ch. 3, Ch. 6)

anaphoric reference, see anaphor

animate noun

An animate noun is a noun that has animate reference (that is, the referent is alive and sentient), be it human (a girl, people, politicians) or non-human (deer, mouse, kangaroo). The personal pronouns he, she and it are sensitive to animacy: only he and she – and not it – have animate reference. As such, they can often be used even when the referent is an animal. The personal pronoun they, in contrast, in not sensitive to animacy. (AEG Ch. 3)

antecedent

The antecedent is any expression in a clause to which another expression ‘refers back’. In relative clauses, for example, the relative pronoun (in bold in the following examples) has an antecedent (underlined): I’m impressed by the amount of work that you have achieved in such a short period of me; Is this the book which you are looking for?; Betty Birner, whose work you may have heard of, offers a convincing account of information packaging. Another example is personal pronouns, which often have antecedents as well: John is running late; he’ll be here at 7.00. A less common, but useful, term is postcedent, an expression in a clause to which another expression ‘refers forward’: As soon as she gets up, my mother has a cup of tea. (AEG Ch. 3)

anterior(ity)

Informally speaking, anteriority refers to a relationship of ‘before-ness’ – a situation is said to be anterior to a point in time when it is located before it. The tense marker have, used with the perfect tenses, expresses anteriority. The adverbial before likewise signals a relationship of anteriority. (AEG Ch. 4)

appositive clause

An appositive clause is a postmodifying clause that renders explicit the content of the noun (usually an abstract noun like belief or fact) that it follows. On the surface, it looks like a relative clause, but it does not share the same properties – it can only be introduced by that, for example, and not which: I don’t appreciate the notion that (*which) children should be seen and not heard. (AEG Ch. 1)

aspect

Aspect is a category that refers to the way in which the temporal contour of a situation is represented by a speaker. In English, there is one main aspectual distinction: that between progressive (sometimes called continuous) aspect and non-progressive aspect. When the speaker uses non-progressive aspect, she refers to a situation as a single, unanalyzable whole: She answered the phone. Regardless of the time the situation takes up, the speaker presents the situation in its entirety (beginning – middle – end). When progressive aspect is used, the speaker gives a view from the inside: She was answering the phone when I walked in. This ‘view from the inside’ – particularly salient with Achievements and Accomplishments– results in a vision of the situation whereby its beginning and end are out of focus: we refer to this as ongoingness. The speaker is interested only in the ‘middle’ of the situation. (AEG Ch. 4)

aspect markers

Progressive aspect is built by adding aspect markers to the verb base. The aspect markers in English are a form of the verb be and the ending -ing appended to the verb base. In AEG the form resulting from V + -ing is called the -ing participle. The -ing participle is sometimes called a present participle (AEG Ch. 4)

attributive

When an adjective is used attributively or in attributive position, it features within the NP, usually before the noun: a bumpy flight, an utter fool, a warm welcome. Only occasionally are attributive adjectives post-nominal (the people responsible, the students concerned). Certain invariable, set phrases such as the president elector the attorney general can be said to have a post-nominal attributive adjective. Most adjectives can be used attributively, but some cannot: the boy is asleep, but *the asleep boy. (AEG Ch. 1, Ch. 3)

auxiliary verb

Auxiliary verbs and lexical verbs are often defined in semantic terms. Lexical verbs (an open class to which new members can be added) are said to have specific content and to refer to either actions (eat, work, sleep, play) or states (love, consider, know, understand). Auxiliaries (a closed class to which no new members can be added) are said to convey grammatical meaning of secondary importance. While this may be a useful working definition, we argue in AEG that the difference is mainly syntactic. There are three properties shared by all auxiliaries and that lexical verbs do not possess: (i) negation (I am not working /I *work not), (ii) Subject-auxiliary inversion (Are you working? / *Work you?) and (iii) ellipsis (Yes, I am/ *Yes, I work). Lexical verbs require do-insertion via the use of a periphrastic auxiliary do when the finite form of a lexical verb does not include, but requires, an auxiliary: Do you like him?(cf. *Like you him?); I don’t like him (cf. *I like him not); Yes, I do (*Yes, I like). (AEG Ch. 2)