WORD CLASSES AND CONVERSION

WORD CLASSES AND CONVERSION

     

The Definition of Word Classes

Word classes are the same as what in traditional terminology are called parts of speech and what many contemporary linguists call lexical categories.) In English every word belongs to one of the part of speech (few could belong to two like the word “love” which could be both noun and verb). Word classes, also known as part of speech, are a categorization based on the function of the word in the sentence. Therefore, if it is agreed that sentence is an essential element of a language , the discussion on the elements used to build a sentence must be essential too.

Word classes are a set of words that display the same formal properties, especially their inflections and distribution. Similar to the more traditional term part of speech. The two major families of word classes are (1) lexical (or open) classes (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs) and (2) function (or closed) classes (determiners, articles, prepositions, and others).

There are eight word classes, or parts of speech, that are distinguished in English: nouns, articles, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and conjunctions. (Determiners, traditionally classified along with adjectives, have not always been regarded as a separate part of speech.) Interjections are another word class, but these are not described here as they do not form part of the clause and sentence structure of the language.

English language recognize seven major Word Classes. Observe the following chart of word classes!

1. Verb: be, drive, grow, sing, think

2. Noun: brother, car, David, house, London

3. Article: a, an, my, some, the

4. Adjective: big, foolish, happy, talented, tidy

5. Adverb: happily, recently, soon, then, there

6. Preposition: at, in, of, over, with

7. Conjunction: and, because, but, if, or Determining the word class of a word:

In English, there is no ‘one-to-one’ relationship between words and their classes:

1. The meaning of the word (the kind of meanings that words convey è replacement test)

2. The form or `shape' of the word

3. The position or `environment' of the word in a sentence (where words typically occur in a sentence, and the kinds of words which typically  replacement test) occur near to them.

B. The Classification of Word Classes

1.      Open Word Classes

New words can be added to the class as the need arises (new scientific discoveries are made, new products are developed, and new ideas are explored): Noun, Verb, Adjective, and Adverb.

2.      Closed Word Classes

Made up of finite sets of words which are never expanded: Prepositions, Determiners, and conjunctions.

Nouns

A noun (Latin nomen, “name”) is a part of speech which is used to represent a person, place, or thing.[2] Based  on an Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary  “ Noun” is  a word that refers to person,(such as Ann or Doctor ), a place( such as Paris or city), a thing( such as table, can, broom), a quality or an activity ( such as plan, sorrow or tennis)[3].

Many nouns can be recognized by their endings. Typical noun endings
include:

-er/-or  :actor, painter, plumber, writer
-ism     : criticism, egotism, magnetism, vandalism
-ist       : artist, capitalist, journalist, scientist
-ment   : arrangement, development, establishment, government
-tion     : foundation, organization, recognition, supposition

Most nouns have distinctive singular and plural forms. The plural of regular nouns is formed by adding -s to the singular: Singular: car, dog, house Plural: cars, dogs, houses.

            There are two kind of nouns in numeral order, cardinal number like zero, one, two, 3, fifty-six, 100, a thousand and ordinal number like first, second, third, fourth, 500^th and so on.

PRONOUN

Major subclass of nouns è sometimes replace a noun in a sentence. In English, there are nine pronoun:

1. Personal Pronouns, stand in for people, places, things and ideas subjective (I, you, we, they, he, she, it) and objective pronouns (me, you, us, them, him, her, it)

2. Possessive Pronouns: mine, yours, ours, theirs, hers, his, its.

3. Demonstrative Pronouns, point out a specific persons, animals, places, things or ideas: this, that, these, those.

4. Indefinite Pronouns, replace nouns without specifying which noun they replace.
Singular: another, anybody, anyone, anything, each, either, everybody, everyone, everything, little, much, neither, nobody, no one, nothing, one, other, somebody, someone, something Plural: both, few, many, others, several
Singular or plural: all, any, more, most, none, some.

5. Intensive Pronouns, also called emphatic end with self or selves and emphasize (intensify) a noun or another pronoun.

6. Interrogative Pronouns, used to begin or introduce interrogative sentences: who, whom, whose, what, and which.

7. Reciprocal Pronouns show a mutual relationship: each other and one another.

8. Reflexive Pronouns, point back to the subject of the sentence; end with self or selves.

9. Relative Pronouns begin a subordinate clause and connect it to another noun that precedes it: who, whom, whose, whoever, whomever, which, whichever, that, what, whatever.

ARTICLE

When do we say “the dog” and when do we say “a dog” (On this page we talk only about singular, countable nouns). A/an are called articles. We divided them into definite and indefinite. We use definite to mean not sure, certain. Definite is particular. We use indefinite to mean not sure, not certain. Indefinite is general.

VERB

            In simple terms, noun can be understood as thing while verb is action. Take foe example, the sentence “He wants freedom”. Freedom (noun) is something that he wants (verb). A verb is a part of speech which is used to express an action or an existence verbs be (are, am, is etc) are used to express an existence. Meanwhile, verbs other than be (write, read, kick, etc) are used to express an action.

            It should be noted that the concept of verb is very essential in the discussion of English sentence. An English sentence should contain a verb, be it verb be or verb other than be. For examples: she is a beautiful girl; she speaks English well.[4]

 ADJECTIVE

            An adjective is a part of speech which used to qualify or modify a noun to give more information about the noun. Typically describe an attribute of noun endings:

• Can be identified
-able/-ible: achievable, capable, remarkable
-al: biographical, functional, internal, logical
-ful: beautiful, careful, grateful, harmful
-ic: cubic, manic, rustic, terrific
-ive: attractive, dismissive, inventive, persuasive
-less: breathless, careless, groundless, restless
-ous: courageous, dangerous, disastrous, fabulous
but we also have adjectives with no typical adjectival form, e.g.:
bad bright clever cold common

 ADVERB

            An adverb is another part of speech which mainly used to modify a verb, an adjective, or another adverb. To modify means to tell us more about a verb, adjectives or another adverb. For example: Mary sings beautifully. David is extremely clever
Characteristics of adverb mainly always -ly ending: beautifully, carefully, slightly, etc, -ly adverb it means that some are gradable: beautifully, very beautifully
= DEGREE ADVE almost, barely, entirely, highly, quite, slightly, and totally è un-gradable.

PREPOSITION
• Typically come before noun/noun phrase: across, after, at, before, by,
during, from, in, into, of, on, to, under, with, without

• COMPLEX PREPOSITION: according to, along with, apart from, because of

CONJUNCTION

Conjunctions are used to express a connection between words. The most familiar conjunctions are and, but, and or Others: although, because, before, since, till, unless, whereas, whether

C.      CONVERSION

In linguistics, conversion, also called zero derivation, is a kind of word formation; specifically, it is the creation of a word (of a new word class) from an existing word (of a different word class) without any change in form. For example, the noun green in golf (referring to a putting-green) is derived ultimately from the adjective green.[5]

Conversions from adjectives to nouns and vice versa are both very common and unnotable in English; much more remarked upon is the creation of a verb by converting a noun or other word (e.g., the adjective clean becomes the verb to clean).

'Functional conversion' is usually used to describe the situation where a change in word class is not as a result of affixation, and is only signaled by its overall grammatical context, as in:

I decided to toothbrush my way into the bathroom.

Here 'toothbrush' is used not as a noun but as a verb, and it suggests the image of someone trying to enter the bathroom while brushing his or her teeth, probably at the expense of someone else who is already in the bathroom or about to go into it.

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[1] Dedy Irwansyah. 2011. Structure and Grammar Course Material. State Islamic Collage of Jurai Siwo Metro.

[2] Ibid. p.2

[3] Wehmeir sally, Oxford advanced learner’s dictionary, international students. Hal:904.

[4] Dedy Irwansyah. Op. Cit; P 6

[5] Henry Guntur Tarigan.1985. Pengajaran Merfologi Bandung : Angkasa. P 192