Grammar points
Autor: Flavio | Publicado: 2016-06-11T16:04:00-07:00

active voice (aktiv): used about a verb phrase not marked for the passive voice. Typically (but not necessarily), the subject of an active verb phrase is the 'doer of an action'. Examples of sentences with verbs in the active voice: Sheila wrote a letter. Peter saw a reindeer. They have left. There is no morphological marker of the active voice.

adjectival (adjektivisk): having a function similar to an adjective, i.e. functioning as a modifier of a noun (within a noun phrase) or as subject or object predicative. The term is often used about subordinate clauses which function as postmodifiers (relative clauses and non-finite clauses), and about nouns when they function as premodifiers, as in train station. Examples of adjectival clauses: He dates a girl who is a model. They are showing a film starring Meryl Streep.

adjective (adjektiv): one of the lexical word classes. Adjectives are typically descriptive of a noun; they denote qualities, characteristics and properties of people, things and phenomena. Examples: red, dark, small, round, overwhelmed, certain, fantastic. Most adjectives can be compared for degree, and the forms are called positive, comparative and superlative, respectively. Examples: small – smaller – smallest; good – better– best; difficult– more difficult – most difficult.

adjective phrase (adjektivfrase): a phrase with an adjective as its head. An adjective can be intensified by an adverb (as in very good, extremely popular, more difficult), and complemented in various ways. Often an adjective is complemented by a clause, as in the adjective phrases glad to see you, sorry that you couldn't come, smaller than I expected. An adjective phrase can also have an adverb as a postmodifier, as in big enough. Adjective phrases function as modifiers of nouns or as predicatives.

adjunct ('forholdsadverbial'). A type of adverbial indicating the circumstances of the action. Adjuncts may be obligatory or optional. They express such relations as time, place, manner, reason, condition, i.e. they are answers to the questions where, when, how and why. E.g. He lives in Brazil (place adjunct). She was walking slowly (manner adjunct), since she was in no hurry (adjunct of reason).

adverb (adverb): one of the lexical word classes. Adverbs are a very heterogeneous word class. Many are derived from adjectives, and are therefore largely descriptive or evaluative, and typically end in -ly (e.g. greatly, slowly). These can generally be compared for degree, using more/most. Others refer to such things as time, place and reason (e.g. now, yesterday, here, everywhere, therefore), while yet others may express connections between sentences (linking adverbs, e.g. however, so, nevertheless). Adverbs function as intensifiers in adjective phrases or adverb phrases, or as adverbials.

adverbial (adverbial): syntactic function at clause level. Adverbials may be obligatory, though most of them are not. However, they can be added freely to any clause pattern. There are three main types: Adjuncts, conjuncts, and disjuncts. Adverbials can be realized by adverbs, adverb phrases, noun phrases, prepositional phrases, or subordinate clauses.

adverb phrase (adverbfrase): a phrase with an adverb as its head. The head may be preceded by an intensifier (another adverb) and followed by a complement or a postmodifier (usually a prepositional phrase or a clause). E.g. very beautifully, terribly slowly, too fast for me, more slowly than I wanted to go.

affected ('berørt' ): a semantic role referring to the participant in a clause that is affected by the action expressed by the verbal. This semantic role of ‘affected’ is typical of direct objects (The cat killed the mouse), but subjects may also refer to affected participants, particularly (but not exclusively) in passive clauses. (The mouse was killed. The glass broke.)

affix (affiks): a part of a word which is connected with the word's meaning or syntax, but is not a root (e.g. -s and -ed in play-s and play-ed). An affix may be a prefix or a suffix (and in some languages other than English, an infix). Affixes can also be called inflectional and derivational morphemes.

agent (agens): a semantic role referring to the 'doer of the action'. In an active clause, the agent participant is typically expressed as the subject (Peter killed a poodle). In a passive clause, the agent can be realized by a prepositional phrase introduced by by (The poodle was killed by Peter).