grammar Hear it!

grammar Definition

gram·mar (gram′ər)

noun

  1. that part of the study of language which deals with the forms and structure of words (morphology), with their customary arrangement in phrases and sentences (syntax), and now often with language sounds (phonology) and word meanings (semantics)
  2. the system of a given language at a given time
  3. a body of rules imposed on a given language for speaking and writing it, based on the study of its grammar (sense ) or on some adaptation of another, esp. Latin, grammar
  4. a book or treatise on grammar
  5. one's manner of speaking or writing as judged by prescriptive grammatical rules his grammar was poor
    1. the elementary principles of a field of knowledge
    2. a book or treatise on these

Etymology: ME gramer < OFr gramaire < L grammatica (ars, art) < Gr grammatikē (technē, art), grammar, learning < gramma, something written (see gram): in L & Gr a term for the whole apparatus of literary study: in the medieval period, specif., “the study of Latin,” hence “all learning as recorded in Latin” (cf. grammar school in Brit usage), and “the occult sciences as assoc. with this learning”: see gramarye, glamour

grammar Synonyms

grammar

n.

syntax, accidence, morphology, structure, morphophonemics, syntactic structure, sentence structure, language pattern, sentence pattern, linguistic science, rationalized language, stratificational grammar, transformational grammar, universal grammar, tagmemics, tagmemic grammar, phrase structure grammar, PS, incorporating grammar, synthetic grammar, inflectional grammar, analytic grammar, distributive grammar, isolating grammar, traditional grammar, the new grammar*. see also language 2.

Terms in grammar include: tense, mood, person, gender, voice, number, aspect, case, sandhi, modification, inflection, concord, agreement, sentence, phrase, clause, predicate, nexus, coordination, subordination, deep structure, surface structure, part of speech, punctuation, phoneme, phonemics, morpheme, morphemics, sememe, semiotics, tagmeme;

grammar Usage Examples

Preposition: of

  • sentence: At several points in the text, there are four alternatives in the grammar of the sentence.
  • language: This consists of ' the items that generate the grammar of the language ' .

Converse of object

  • parse: SA reported that work is underway at Grenoble on implementing the query part of the interface to parse gLite query grammar.
  • teach: This sample also leaned toward allowing a native English teacher to teach grammar.
  • practice: If you decided to learn it, you would have to devote years of your life to practicing the grammar and vocabulary.

Adjective modifier

  • context-free: Almost all programming languages are based on context-free grammars.
  • generative: Animals do not have language with syntax and generative grammars, so let us call what they do for a sign game.
  • transformational: We start our game with our basic transformational circus grammar by placing a chair in the real space.
  • pedagogic: The findings also seem to suggest more confidence that a native English speaker can teach this form of pedagogic grammar.
  • categorial: Typed feature structure grammars include construction grammar ( CG ), head-driven phrase structure grammar ( HPSG ) and some versions of categorial grammar.
  • Latin: My schoolboy Latin grammar hasn't been a great help with this, I fear.

Modifies a noun

  • checker: MS Word's built-in grammar checker can also offer helpful hints to improve your sentence structure.
  • checkers: Related tools: editors, spelling checkers, grammar checkers.
  • school: Grammar school pupils were selected entirely on their ability, not on their ability to pay.
  • formalism: Shared utterances are even more problematic, in particular for any grammar formalism whose output is the set of well-formed strings.
  • checking: The grammar checking facilities available in most word-processing packages will assess the reading ease of your Information Sheet.
  • ballot: It has reasserted the Government's position on selection and the grammar school ballots procedure.

Noun used with modifier

  • Sanskrit: Now one might reasonably ask what Sanskrit grammar has to do with mathematics.
  • attribute: Attribute grammars and the interdependence of language syntax and semantics.
  • discourse: His work applies the discourse grammar approach of Robert Longacre to Joshua.