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What is a phrase?
A phrase is two or more words that do not contain the subject-verb pair necessary to form a clause. A group of two or more grammatically linked words that do not have subject and predicate is a phrase. Phrases act like parts of speech inside clauses. A phrase is not a sentence because it is not a complete idea with a subject and a predicate. A phrase is a syntactic structure that consists of more than one word but lacks the subject-predicate organization of a clause. In everyday speech, a phrase may refer to any group of words. In linguistics, a phrase is a group of words (or sometimes a single word) that form a constituent and so function as a single unit in the syntax of a sentence. A phrase is lower on the grammatical hierarchy than a clause. Here are some kinds of phrases: What is an adverb phrase? What is an adverb clause? What is an adjective phrase? What is an adjective clause? What is a noun phrase? What is a noun clause? What is a prepositional phrase? What is a verb phrase? What is an adpositional phrase? What is a pronominal? Heads and dependents Most phrases have an important word defining the type and linguistic features of the phrase. This word is the head of the phrase and gives its name to the phrase category. The heads in the following phrases are in bold: too slowly - Adverb phrase (AdvP) very happy - Adjective phrase (AP) the massive dinosaur - Noun phrase (NP) at lunch - Preposition phrase (PP) watch TV - Verb phrase (VP) before that happened - Subordinator phrase (SP) Here are further guidelines. Here are further guidelines. |