The subject (abbreviated SUB or SU) is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e. the one associated with predicate logic and dependency grammars, the subject is the most prominent overt argument of the predicate. Both traditions see the subject in English governing agreement on the verb or auxiliary verb that carries the main tense of the sentence, as exemplified by the difference in verb forms between he eats and they eat.

The subject has the grammatical function in a sentence of relating its constituent (a noun phrase) by means of the verb to any other elements present in the sentence, i.e. objects, complements and adverbials.

The subject is a phrasal constituent, and should be distinguished from parts of speech, which, roughly, classify words within constituent.

Forms of subject[link]

The subject is a noun phrase in the sentence and can be realised by the following forms

• A determinerless noun phrase, also called a bare noun phrase. In English, this is mostly limited to plural noun phrases and noun phrases headed by a mass noun.

  Builders are at work.

• A noun phrase introduced by a determiner. This complex (determiner + noun phrase) is usually called a determiner phrase:

  The large car stopped outside our house.

• A gerund. These can be shown to behave as noun phrases in many respects, for example, in being able to form determinerless phrases

  Eating is a pleasure.

  His constant hammering was very annoying.

• An infinitive. These can be shown to behave in many respects as embedded clauses, for example in allowing question words like "who."

  To read is easier than to write.

  Whom to hire is a difficult question.

• A full clause, introduced by the complementizer that, itself containing a subject and a predicate.

  That he had travelled the world was known by everyone.

• A direct quotation:

  I love you is often heard these days.

• The subject can also be implied. In the following command, the subject is the implied "you" that is the recipient of the imperative mood.

  Take out the trash!

• An expletive. These are words like it or there when they don't refer to any thing or place. For example in the following sentence "it" doesn't refer to anything.

  It rains.

• A cataphoric it. This is the use of it when it is co-referent with a subordinate clause that comes after it.

  It was known by everyone (that) he had travelled the world.

Definitions of subject[link]

The concept of subject is sometimes mixed with that of actor or agent and other times with that of carrier of attributes. When this happens, it is defined as the argument that generally refers to the origin of the action or the undergoer of the state shown by the predicate. This definition takes the representation of the sentence into account, but it is problematic for several reasons. While interpreting the subject as the actor or agent of the action, two rather different concepts are overlayed. For instance, in the passive voice the subject is the goal, middle or patient/target of the action; for example:

Anggia was arrested by the police.

The police arrested Anggia.

In the first sentence (which is in the passive voice), the subject is Anggia, while in the second sentence (active voice) it is the police. But when it comes to the representation of the action, the actor in both sentences is the police and the goal of the action is Anggia.

Similarly, some verbs can be used both transitively and intransitively. An example of these is the English verb break:

Anggia broke the chain.

The chain broke.

In the first sentence, the subject is Anggia, while in the second one it is the chain. But in the representation of the action or event, the chain plays the same role in both cases, that being the one to which the process is done or happens. This can be seen by considering the fact that the two sentences can be used to describe the same happening. Whenever the first sentence is true, the second one will be true as well, though in the second one it is pictured to have happened without an agent.

Subject in contrastive linguistics[link]

The subject was first defined to be the main argument of a proposition. Since then, linguistic theories have been developed to describe languages all over the world. Some theories, such as Systemic Functional Theory, claim all clauses must have a subject no matter what language is being described. Other theories claim there is no such category that is consistent for all languages. In English, though, every clause has at least an implied subject.

A subject in English typically matches two types of pattern: agreement and word order. It both agrees with the verb group of its clause and is positioned in certain particular ways. The agreement is one of two different forms of the verb (three in the case of the verb be) depending on the number and person of its subject. For instance, if a subject is singular and is a third person, i. e. it is neither the speaker nor the listeners, one chooses the form has of the verb have; otherwise one chooses have. See examples below:

She has left.

They have left.

I have left.

We have left.

You have left.

This pattern of agreement is not an absolute rule, because not all verbs have two different forms. Some have only one and never vary in form. E.g.: must, can, will, might, may.

She must leave.

They must leave.

I must leave.

We must leave.

You must leave.

The second pattern of a subject in English is its position in relation to the verb group. When affirming or denying something, one usually places the subject right before the verb group. But when asking a question, one changes the word order by placing the subject after part of the verb group. This means one makes an interrogative clause by changing the declarative word order. Thus an assertion is turned into a question by making a word order change. See the following examples:

You won't call me.

Won't you call me?

Subjects also follow a third pattern. For instance, in English, the pronoun I is usually a subject while me is usually a complement. This system of language that allows us to determine the arguments of a proposition by inflection is called declension and each form is a case of the declining system. In other languages like German, Russian, Latin and Greek, every noun group assumes a case to represent a specific argument of its proposition. The case assumed by subjects is usually (but not always) the one named nominative. Sometimes the subject carries other cases, like the accusative or the dative, depending on the clause structure and the language. Yet other languages, such as Japanese, use a postposition system to determine the arguments of a clause. The classic theorists were very concerned about this language system for both Latin and Greek had declensions, but this is not a concern in modern English grammars any more as English has no distinct inflexion for the subject. Not all languages have a subject–verb agreement in verb forms (person and number), noun forms (case, postpositions) or distinctive word orders. And none of these patterns safely determines the subject.

The case system, for instance, is not a universal system that works the same way in all languages. In some languages, when the ergative model is foregrounded, the transitive/intransitive distinction does not affect the cases of the complements. The middle to which some process is done or happens carries the same case no matter if it is the subject or a complement of the verb. In other languages, of which German, Latin and Greek are examples, the subject keeps its case for transitive and intransitive uses of a verb and it is quite safe to consider it case-determined.

In languages that lack verb and noun forms for determining the subject, the subject might be determined in terms of word order. For example, in Mainland Scandinavian (Norwegian, Swedish and Danish) the subject occurs either right in front of the tensed verb of a sentence, or follows the verb but precedes the complements.

Finally, in the Topic theory, which is similar but not equivalent to the Theme theory of the School of Prague, the subject is also the topic of a proposition in the default word order. According to this theory, some languages have no means to determine a topic but by making a complement into a subject. So ascribing a passive voice to the verb group is a way to topicalize the said complement: (See also topic-prominent languages.)

I did it.

It was done.

The duke gave my aunt this teapot.

My aunt was given this teapot by the duke.

Another pattern of the subject is the frequency in which it is ellided (removed/dropped) from the clause. Some languages, like Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Latin, Greek, Japanese and Mandarin, use this pattern both in assertions and questions. Though most of these languages are rich in verb forms for determining the person and number of the subject, Japanese and Mandarin have no such forms at all. This dropping pattern does not automatically make a language a pro-drop language. For these concerns visit the pro-drop language article. In other languages, like English and French, declarative and interrogative clauses must always have a subject, which should be either a noun group or a clause. This is also true when the clause has no element to be represented by it. This is why verbs like rain must carry a subject such as it, even if nothing is actually being represented by it. In this case it is an expletive and a dummy pronoun. In imperative clauses, though, most languages elide the subject:

Give it to me.

Dā mihi istud. (Latin)

Me dá isso. (Portuguese in Brazil)

Dá-me isso. (Portuguese in Portugal)

Dámelo. (Spanish)

Dammelo. (Italian)

Subject orientation[link]

The subject of a sentence is often privileged in various ways pertaining to its relation to other expressions in the sentence. One says that these other expressions are "subject-oriented". Examples of subject-oriented expressions include subject-oriented adverbs. Compare the following two sentences:

Clumsily, Al sat down.

Al sat down clumsily.

The first sentence means that it was clumsy of Al to sit down (though the manner in which he did so may have been elegant). The second can also mean that the manner in which Al sat down was clumsy (while it may have been highly appropriate to sit down in the first place).

Reflexive pronouns are sometimes subject-oriented. In the following sentence herself is a reflexive pronoun.

Sue assigned the best student to herself.

This sentence can only mean that Sue assigned the best student to Sue, not that she assigned the best student to the best student.

Subject, predicates, and the copula[link]

It is generally assumed that the Noun Phrase occurring with the Verb Phrase, constituting a sentence, is a subject. Copular sentences challenge this view. In a particular class of copular sentences, called "inverse copular sentences", the noun phrase which occurs with the verb phrase plays the role of predicate, occupying the position which is canonically reserved for subjects, and the subject is embedded in the verb phrase (cf. copula). This can be exemplified by pairs of sentences like these pictures of the wall are the cause of the riot (where the preverbal Noun Phrase plays the role of subject and the post-verbal one plays the role of predicate) vs the cause of the riot is these pictures of the wall (where the order is inverse). This has far reaching consequences, affecting for example the theory of expletive subjects and unaccusative verbs (cf. Moro 1997 and Hale - Keyser 2003 and references cited there).

See also[link]

Look up subject in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Complement (linguistics)
• Copula
• Grammatical case
• Object (grammar)
• Quirky subject
• Sentence (linguistics)
• Subjective (grammar)

References[link]

• Everaert, M.; van Riemsdijk, H.; Goedemans, R. (eds) 2006. The Blackwell companion to syntax, Volumes I–V, Blackwell, London.
• Hale, K.; Keyser, J. (2002). "Prolegomena to a theory of argument structure", Linguistic Inquiry Monograph, 39, MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
• Halliday, M.A.K & Matthiessen, Christian M. I. M (2004). Subject, actor, theme in An introduction to functional grammar. Hodder Arnold, London, England.
• Huddleston, R.; Pullum, K. (2005). A student's introduction to English grammar. Cambridge University Press.
• Moro, A. (1997). The raising of predicates: predicative noun phrases and the theory of clause structure, Cambridge Studies in Linguistics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England.
• Wlodarczyk André & Hélène (2006) “Subject in the Meta-informative Centering Theory” in Études cognitives / Studia kognitywne 7, SOW, PAN, Warsaw.[1]
• Wlodarczyk André & Hélène (2008) “Roles, Anchors and Other Things we Talk About : Associative Semantics and Meta-Informative Centering Theory”, ed. Istvan Kecskes, Series: "Mouton Series in Pragmatics", Intercultural Pragmatics, Vol. 5. No. 3., Berlin/New York.

Look up subject in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Subject (Latin subiectus "lying beneath") may refer to:

Philosophy[link]

• Hypokeimenon or subiectum, in metaphysics, the essential being of a thing
  • Subject (philosophy), a being that has subjective experiences, subjective consciousness, or a relationship with another entity
  • Subject-object problem, the issue of how actors or observers relate to things that are observed or acted upon
  • Subject-object based metaphysics, a term for the dominant view of metaphysics in Western philosophy

Grammar[link]

• in general use, any topic currently under consideration, see subject matter:
  • Subject (grammar), 'who or what the sentence is about'
  • Subject case or nominative case, the grammatical case for a noun
  • Subject term or index term, descriptor of a document used in bibliographic records
• Course (education), a unit of academic instruction
• Research subject, an entity observed for purposes of research
• in computing:
  • Subjects (programming), core elements in the subject-oriented programming paradigm
  • Subject (access control)
  • Subject, an element in the Resource Description Framework
• in music theory, the first melodic fragment of a fugue

People[link]

A subject is an individual subjected to the rule by an elite, see feudalism

• subjects in medieval feudalism, see Commoners
• subjects in modern constitutional monarchies, such as the United Kingdom, see British subject

Library and Information Science[link]

• Subject (documents) (subject classification; subject indexing; subject searching)

Others[link]

Subject as a title or proper noun

• Subject (album) a 2003 album by Dwele

See also[link]

• Subject matter (disambiguation)
• Subjective (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

In linguistics, grammar is the set of structural rules that govern the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in any given natural language. The term refers also to the study of such rules, and this field includes morphology, syntax, and phonology, often complemented by phonetics, semantics, and pragmatics. Linguists do not normally use the term to refer to orthographical rules, although usage books and style guides that call themselves grammars may also refer to spelling and punctuation.

Use of the term[link]

The term grammar is often used by non-linguists with a very broad meaning. As Jeremy Butterfield puts it: "Grammar is often a generic way of referring to any aspect of English that people object to."^[1] However, linguists use it in a much more specific sense. Every speaker of a language has, in his or her head, a set of rules^[2] for using that language. This is a grammar, and—at least in the case of one's native language—the vast majority of the information in it is acquired not by conscious study or instruction, but by observing other speakers; much of this work is done during infancy. Language learning later in life, of course, may involve a greater degree of explicit instruction.^[3]

The term "grammar" can also be used to describe the rules that govern the linguistic behaviour of a group of speakers. The term "English grammar", therefore, may have several meanings. It may refer to the whole of English grammar—that is, to the grammars of all the speakers of the language—in which case, the term encompasses a great deal of variation.^[4] Alternatively, it may refer only to what is common to the grammars of all, or of the vast majority of English speakers (such as subject–verb–object word order in simple declarative sentences). Or it may refer to the rules of a particular, relatively well-defined variety of English (such as Standard English).

"An English grammar" is a specific description, study or analysis of such rules. A reference book describing the grammar of a language is called a "reference grammar" or simply "a grammar." A fully explicit grammar that exhaustively describes the grammatical constructions of a language is called a descriptive grammar. Linguistic description contrasts with linguistic prescription, which tries to enforce rules of how a language is to be used.

Grammatical frameworks are approaches to constructing grammars. The most known among the approaches is the traditional grammar which is traditionally taught in schools.

The standard framework of generative grammar is the transformational grammar model developed in various ways by Noam Chomsky and his associates from the 1950s onwards.

Etymology[link]

The word grammar derives from Greek γραμματικὴ τέχνη (grammatikē technē), which means "art of letters", from γράμμα (gramma), "letter", itself from γράφειν (graphein), "to draw, to write".^[5]

History[link]

The first systematic grammars originated in Iron Age India, with Yaska (6th c. BC), Pāṇini (4th c. BC) and his commentators Pingala (ca. 200 BC), Katyayana, and Patanjali (2nd c. BC). In the West, grammar emerged as a discipline in Hellenism from the 3rd c. BC forward with authors like Rhyanus and Aristarchus of Samothrace, the oldest extant work being the Art of Grammar (Τέχνη Γραμματική), attributed to Dionysius Thrax (ca. 100 BC). Latin grammar developed by following Greek models from the 1st century BC, due to the work of authors such as Orbilius Pupillus, Remmius Palaemon, Marcus Valerius Probus, Verrius Flaccus, and Aemilius Asper.

Tolkāppiyam is the earliest Tamil grammar; it has been dated variously between 1st CE and 10th CE.

A grammar of Irish originated in the 7th century with the Auraicept na n-Éces.

Arabic grammar emerged from the 8th century with the work of Ibn Abi Ishaq and his students.

The first treatises on Hebrew grammar appeared in the High Middle Ages, in the context of Mishnah (exegesis of the Hebrew Bible). The Karaite tradition originated in Abbasid Baghdad. The Diqduq (10th century) is one of the earliest grammatical commentaries on the Hebrew Bible.^[6] Ibn Barun in the 12th century compares the Hebrew language with Arabic in the Islamic grammatical tradition.^[7]

Belonging to the trivium of the seven liberal arts, grammar was taught as a core discipline throughout the Middle Ages, following the influence of authors from Late Antiquity, such as Priscian. Treatment of vernaculars began gradually during the High Middle Ages, with isolated works such as the First Grammatical Treatise, but became influential only in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. In 1486, Antonio de Nebrija published Las introduciones Latinas contrapuesto el romance al Latin, and the first Spanish grammar, Gramática de la lengua castellana, in 1492. During the 16th century Italian Renaissance, the Questione della lingua was the discussion on the status and ideal form of the Italian language, initiated by Dante's de vulgari eloquentia (Pietro Bembo, Prose della volgar lingua Venice 1525). The first grammar of Slovene language was written in 1584 by Adam Bohorič.

Grammars of non-European languages began to be compiled for the purposes of evangelization and Bible translation from the 16th century onward, such as Grammatica o Arte de la Lengua General de los Indios de los Reynos del Perú (1560), and a Quechua grammar by Fray Domingo de Santo Tomás.

In 1643 there appeared Ivan Uzhevych's Grammatica sclavonica and, in 1762, the Short Introduction to English Grammar of Robert Lowth was also published. The Grammatisch-Kritisches Wörterbuch der hochdeutschen Mundart, a High German grammar in five volumes by Johann Christoph Adelung, appeared as early as 1774.

From the latter part of the 18th century, grammar came to be understood as a subfield of the emerging discipline of modern linguistics. The Serbian grammar by Vuk Stefanović Karadžić arrived in 1814, while the Deutsche Grammatik of the Brothers Grimm was first published in 1818. The Comparative Grammar of Franz Bopp, the starting point of modern comparative linguistics, came out in 1833.

Development of grammars[link]

Grammars evolve through usage and also due to separations of the human population. With the advent of written representations, formal rules about language usage tend to appear also. Formal grammars are codifications of usage that are developed by repeated documentation over time, and by observation as well. As the rules become established and developed, the prescriptive concept of grammatical correctness can arise. This often creates a discrepancy between contemporary usage and that which has been accepted, over time, as being correct. Linguists tend to view prescriptive grammars as having little justification beyond their authors' aesthetic tastes, although style guides may give useful advice about standard language employment, based on descriptions of usage in contemporary writings of the same language. Linguistic prescriptions also form part of the explanation for variation in speech, particularly variation in the speech of an individual speaker (an explanation, for example, for why some people say, "I didn't do nothing"; some say, "I didn't do anything"; and some say one or the other depending on social context).

The formal study of grammar is an important part of education for children from a young age through advanced learning, though the rules taught in schools are not a "grammar" in the sense most linguists use the term, particularly as they are often prescriptive rather than descriptive.

Constructed languages (also called planned languages or conlangs) are more common in the modern day. Many have been designed to aid human communication (for example, naturalistic Interlingua, schematic Esperanto, and the highly logic-compatible artificial language Lojban). Each of these languages has its own grammar.

Syntax refers to linguistic structure above the word level (e.g. how sentences are formed)—though without taking into account intonation, which is the domain of phonology. Morphology, by contrast, refers to structure at and below the word level (e.g. how compound words are formed), but above the level of individual sounds, which, like intonation, are in the domain of phonology.^[8] No clear line can be drawn, however, between syntax and morphology. Analytic languages use syntax to convey information that is encoded via inflection in synthetic languages. In other words, word order is not significant and morphology is highly significant in a purely synthetic language, whereas morphology is not significant and syntax is highly significant in an analytic language. Chinese and Afrikaans, for example, are highly analytic, and meaning is therefore very context-dependent. (Both do have some inflections, and have had more in the past; thus, they are becoming even less synthetic and more "purely" analytic over time.) Latin, which is highly synthetic, uses affixes and inflections to convey the same information that Chinese does with syntax. Because Latin words are quite (though not completely) self-contained, an intelligible Latin sentence can be made from elements that are placed in a largely arbitrary order. Latin has a complex affixation and simple syntax, while Chinese has the opposite.

Grammar frameworks[link]

Various "grammar frameworks" have been developed in theoretical linguistics since the mid 20th century, in particular under the influence of the idea of a "universal grammar" in the United States. Of these, the main divisions are:

• Transformational grammar (TG)
• Systemic functional grammar (SFG)
• Principles and Parameters Theory (P&P)
• Lexical-functional Grammar (LFG)
• Generalized Phrase Structure Grammar (GPSG)
• Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG)
• Dependency grammars (DG)
• Role and reference grammar (RRG)

Education[link]

Prescriptive grammar is taught in primary school (elementary school). The term "grammar school" historically refers to a school teaching Latin grammar to future Roman citizens, orators, and, later, Catholic priests. In its earliest form, "grammar school" referred to a school that taught students to read, scan, interpret, and declaim Greek and Latin poets (including Homer, Virgil, Euripides, Ennius, and others). These should not be confused with the related, albeit distinct, modern British grammar schools.

A standard language is a particular dialect of a language that is promoted above other dialects in writing, education, and broadly speaking in the public sphere; it contrasts with vernacular dialects, which may be the objects of study in descriptive grammar but which are rarely taught prescriptively. The standardized "first language" taught in primary education may be subject to political controversy, since it establishes a standard defining nationality or ethnicity.

Recently, efforts have begun to update grammar instruction in primary and secondary education. The primary focus has been to prevent the use of outdated prescriptive rules in favor of more accurate descriptive ones and to change perceptions about relative "correctness" of standard forms in comparison to non standard dialects.

The pre-eminence of Parisian French has reigned largely unchallenged throughout the history of modern French literature. Standard Italian is not based on the speech of the capital, Rome, but on the speech of Florence because of the influence Florentines had on early Italian literature. Similarly, standard Spanish is not based on the speech of Madrid, but on the one of educated speakers from more northerly areas like Castile and León. In Argentina and Uruguay the Spanish standard is based on the local dialects of Buenos Aires and Montevideo (Rioplatense Spanish). Portuguese has for now two official written standards, respectively Brazilian Portuguese and European Portuguese, but in a short term it will have a unified orthography.^[9]

The Serbian language is divided in a similar way; Serbia and the Republika Srpska use their own separate standards. The existence of a third standard is a matter of controversy, some consider Montenegrin as a separate language, and some think it's merely another variety of Serbian.

Norwegian has two standards, Bokmål and Nynorsk, the choice between which is subject to controversy: Each Norwegian municipality can declare one of the two its official language, or it can remain "language neutral". Nynorsk is endorsed by a minority of 27 percent of the municipalities. The main language used in primary schools normally follows the official language of its municipality, and is decided by referendum within the local school district. Standard German emerged out of the standardized chancellery use of High German in the 16th and 17th centuries. Until about 1800, it was almost entirely a written language, but now it is so widely spoken that most of the former German dialects are nearly extinct.

Standard Chinese has official status as the standard spoken form of the Chinese language in the People's Republic of China (PRC), the Republic of China (ROC) and the Republic of Singapore. Pronunciation of Standard Chinese is based on the Beijing dialect of Mandarin Chinese, while grammar and syntax are based on modern vernacular written Chinese. Modern Standard Arabic is directly based on Classical Arabic, the language of the Qur'an. The Hindustani language has two standards, Hindi and Urdu.

In the United States, the Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar designated March 4 as National Grammar Day in 2008.^[10]

See also[link]

Notes and references[link]

External links[link]

Look up grammar in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

•  Archibald Henry Sayce (1911). "Grammar". In Chisholm, Hugh. Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 
• GrammarBank : Grammar rules explanations with examples and exercises online
• The syntax of natural language: An online introduction using the Trees program -- Beatrice Santorini & Anthony Kroch, University of Pennsylvania, 2007
• The Grammar Vandal (Funny, informative blog that fixes bad grammar.)
• The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotes (Another educational, still funny poke at people who incorrectly use quote marks.)

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