В английском языке существуют правила, которые встречаются крайне редко. И даже если иногда кажется, что все темы уже давно пройдены, спешим вас обрадовать, — у нас еще есть, чем удивить. В данной статье мы рассмотрим один из таких примеров, а именно разницу между content (самостоятельные) и function (служебные) words.
Кроме того, что все английские слова делятся на 8 частей речи, они также относятся к одной из перечисленных групп: content или function. Прежде чем детально рассмотреть каждую из них, предлагаем сперва разобраться, что же они значат.
Content Words = информация или значение
Function Words = слова, необходимые для грамматического построения предложений
Иными словами, content words дают нам важную пояснительную информацию о словах в предложении, а function — связывают эти слова в предложении между собой.
Виды знаменательных слов или content word types
Самостоятельные слова чаще всего выступают в роли существительного, глагола, прилагательного или наречия. Самостоятельное слово в качестве существительного указывает на объект, а глагола — на происходящее действие или состояние. Прилагательные же дают нам информацию о предмете, в то время как наречия говорят о том, как, где и когда было совершено действие. При этом, все перечисленные части речи в качестве самостоятельных слов предоставляют необходимые для понимания ситуации данные.
Имя существительное = человек, предмет или место
Глагол = действие или состояние
Имя прилагательное = описание предмета, человека, места или объекта
Наречие = описание предмета, человека, места или объекта
Например:
Building — здание (имя существительное, указывает на объект).
Phoebe — Фиби (имя собственное, указывает на человека).
River — река (имя существительное, указывает на объект).
Science — наука (имя существительное, указывает на объект).
Box — коробка (имя существительное, указывает на предмет).
Smile — улыбаться (глагол, указывает на действие).
Buy — покупать (глагол, указывает на действие).
Learn — учить (глагол, указывает на действие).
Take care about — заботиться (глагол, указывает на действие).
Trust — доверять (глагол, указывает на состояние).
Light — светлый (имя прилагательное, описывает предмет).
Difficult — сложный (имя прилагательное, описывает действие/ситуацию).
Kind — добрый (имя прилагательное, описывает человека).
Chip — светлый (имя прилагательное, описывает предмет).
Tender — мягкий (имя прилагательное, описывает предмет).
Slow — медленный (имя прилагательное, описывает действие/ситуацию).
Quickly — быстро (наречие; описывает действие).
Carefully — осторожно (наречие; описывает действие).
Often — часто (наречие; описывает действие).
Slowly — медленно (наречие; описывает действие).
Кроме всех перечисленных выше частей речи, самостоятельные слова также могут выступать в роли:
- Отрицательных частиц/слов: no, not и never.
- Указательных местоимений: this, that, these и those.
- Вопросительных слов: what, where, when, how and why.
Виды функциональных слов или function word types
Функциональные слова соединяют слова в предложении. Функциональными словами могут быть вспомогательные глаголы, предлоги, артикли, союзы и местоимения. Вспомогательные глаголы указывают на время (например: Present Simple, Past Perfect и т. д.), предлоги — на пространственно-временные отношения слов в предложении. Артикли говорят о числе и конкретике, а местоимения указываю на существительное (объект, человека).
К вспомогательным глаголам относятся все формы do, have, be.
Артикли: a/an, the.
Например:
In — в (предлог, указывает на пространственно-временные отношения).
At — в/на (предлог, указывает на пространственно-временные отношения).
Between — между (предлог, указывает на пространственно-временные отношения).
Under — под (предлог, указывает на пространственно-временные отношения).
And — и (союз).
But — но (союз).
So — так (союз).
As — как, согласно (союз).
Since — с тех пор, как (союз).
Ours — наш (местоимение).
I — я (местоимение).
We — мы (местоимение).
Him — его (местоимение).
Знать о существовании самостоятельных и функциональных слов важно не только для общего развития, но и потому что первые всегда выделяются во время разговора (ударение). Функциональные же слова не выделяются интонационно. Таким образом, изучив эту статью вы значительно улучшите свои коммуникационные навыки и станете еще ближе к чистой британской речи.
Updated on October 02, 2018
Each word in English belongs to one of the eight parts of speech. Each word is also either a content word or a function word. Let’s think about what these two types mean:
Content Words vs. Function Words
- Content = information, meaning
- Function = necessary words for grammar
In other words, content words give us the most important information while function words are used to stitch those words together.
Content Word Types
Content words are usually nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. A noun tells us which object, a verb tells us about the action happening, or the state. Adjectives give us details about objects and people and adverbs tell us how, when or where something is done. Nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs give us important information required for understanding.
- Noun = person, place or thing
- Verb = action, state
- Adjective = describes an object, person, place or thing
- Adverb = tells us how, where or when something happens
Examples:
| Nouns | Verbs |
|---|---|
| house | enjoy |
| computer | purchase |
| student | visit |
| lake | understand |
| Peter | believe |
| science | look forward to |
| Adjectives | Adverbs |
|---|---|
| heavy | slowly |
| difficult | carefully |
| careful | sometimes |
| expensive | thoughtfully |
| soft | often |
| fast | suddenly |
Other Content Words
While nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs are the most important content words, there are a few other words that are also key to understanding. These include negatives like no, not and never; demonstrative pronouns including this, that, these and those; and question words like what, where, when, how and why.
Function Word Types
Function words help us connect important information. Function words are important for understanding, but they add little meaning beyond defining the relationship between two words. Function words include auxiliary verbs, prepositions, articles, conjunctions, and pronouns. Auxiliary verbs are used to establish the tense, prepositions show relationships in time and space, articles show us something that is specific or one of many, and pronouns refer to other nouns.
- Auxiliary verbs = do, be, have (help with conjugation of tense)
- Prepositions = show relationships in time and space
- Articles = used to indicate specific or non-specific nouns
- Conjunctions = words that connect
- Pronouns = refer to other nouns
Examples:
| Auxiliary Verbs | Prepositions |
|---|---|
| do | in |
| has |
at |
| will | though |
| is | over |
| has been | between |
| did | under |
| Articles | Conjunctions | Pronouns |
|---|---|---|
| a | and | I |
| an | but | you |
| the | for | him |
| so | us | |
| since | ours | |
| as | she |
Knowing the difference between content and functions words is important because content words are stressed in conversation in English. Function words are non-stressed. In other words, function words are not emphasized in speech, while content words are highlighted. Knowing the difference between content and function words can help you in understanding, and, most importantly, in pronunciation skills.
Exercise
Decide which words are function and content words in the following sentences.
- Mary has lived in England for ten years.
- He’s going to fly to Chicago next week.
- I don’t understand this chapter of the book.
- The children will be swimming in the ocean this time next week.
- John had eaten lunch before his colleague arrived.
- The best time to study is early in the morning or late in the evening.
- The trees along the river are beginning to blossom.
- Our friends called us yesterday and asked if we’d like to visit them next month.
- You’ll be happy to know that she’s decided to take the position.
- I won’t give away your secret.
Check your answers below:
Exercise Answers
Content words are in bold.
- Mary has lived in England for ten years.
- He’s going to fly to Chicago next week.
- I don’t understand this chapter of the book.
- The children will be swimming in the ocean at five o’clock.
- John had eaten lunch before his colleague arrived.
- The best time to study is early in the morning or late in the evening.
- The trees along the river are beginning to blossom.
- Our friends called us yesterday and asked if we’d like to visit them next month.
- You’ll be happy to know that she’s decided to take the position.
- I won’t give away your secret.
While the concept of “a word” is surprisingly difficult to define with any accuracy, it still makes sense to divide that nebulous idea into more concrete and manageable categories. One way of doing that is to split words into content and function words.
The category names themselves already provide a bit of insight into what type of words they contain but you can read below to find a more precise definition for these both content and function words.
What are content words?
As the name says, “content words” are the parts of speech that provide the content for what you want to say. They convey most of the meaning and information you want to relay. The biggest word groups in the category are nouns, verbs, adverbs, and adjectives.
Nouns denote people, animals, or things. Verbs refer to activities, actions, or states. Adjectives describe places, people, or other objects and adverbs tell us how, when, and where an action takes place.
So, for example, in the sentence “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog”, there are six content words:
– the nouns “fox” and “dog”
– the verb “jumps”
– the adjectives “quick”, “brown”, and “lazy”
What are some examples of content words?
Nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs are certainly the most common types of content words, but there are a few other important additions to consider: question words (such as “how”, “what”, “where”, etc.), demonstrative pronouns (such as “this”, “these”, “those”, etc.), and negatives (for example, “not”, “no”, “never”, “nowhere”, etc.)
Another name for this category is “open-class words”. That’s because the category is essentially infinite. New words are added to this group all the time.
What are function words?
While content words are the vehicles that carry meaning in any sentence, function words are the glue that helps the sentence stay together. They don’t have a very clear meaning on their own and often they remain unchanging in every sentence.
While they don’t have much of a role to play in adding information, they’re still very important for understanding.
In our example sentence “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog”, there are three function words:
– the articles “the”
– the preposition “over”
What are some examples of function words?
The most important function words are articles, conjunctions, pronouns, prepositions, and auxiliary verbs. We use these words to establish tense (auxiliary verbs), define relationships in time and space (prepositions), tie together clauses (conjunctions), replace nouns (pronouns), and fill other important functions.
This group is also called “closed class words” because it consists of a much smaller number of fixed words and new additions are very rare. For example, this is also why it’s been so difficult to find a suitable gender-neutral pronoun in English – because new pronouns are rarely added to a language.
Why it’s important to know function and content words?
The main reason why you should know about content and function words is that they can help you become more fluent in a language.
In English, for example, content words are stressed in a sentence, while function words are glossed over. This creates the normal rhythm when speaking English, Understanding the difference between function and content words can help you understand what you need to emphasise in a sentence, leading to much better pronunciation.
Conclusion
Content words carry most of the meaning and information in any sentence: they cover who is doing what, while function words act as glue to hold all the parts together. Knowing the difference between the two word groups is important because it helps you sound much more natural when learning a foreign language.
Every word in English refers to one of eight parts of speech . Each word is also either meaningful or functional. Let’s think about what these two types mean: Here we will explain the Content and function semantic unit of a text. In other words with examples.
- Content = information, meaning
- Function = necessary words for grammar
In other words, meaningful words give us the most important information, and control words are used to combine these words.
Content word types
Content words are usually nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. A noun tells us which object, a verb tells us about an action or state that is taking place. Adjectives give us detailed information about objects and people, and adverbs tell us how, when and where something is done. Nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs give us important information we need to understand.
- Noun = person, place, or thing
- Verb = action, state
- Adjective = describes an object, person, place, or thing
- Adverb = tells us how, where and when something happens
| Examples: | |
| Nouns | Verbs |
| house | enjoy |
| a computer | purchase |
| student | visit |
| lake | understand |
| Peter | believe |
| the science | look forward |
| Examples: | |
| Adjectives | Adverbs |
| heavy | slow |
| hard | attentively |
| careful | sometimes |
| expensive | thoughtfully |
| soft | often |
Other words of content
While nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs are the most important words in the content, there are several other words that are also key to understanding. These include negatives such as “no,” “no,” and “never”; demonstrative pronouns, including this, that, and those; and question words such as what, where, when, how, and why.
Types of function words
Functional words help us connect important information. Functional words are important to understand, but they add no meaning other than defining the relationship between two words.
Functional words include
- auxiliary verbs,
- prepositions,
- articles,
- conjunctions,
- and pronouns.
Auxiliary verbs are used to indicate time, prepositions show relationships in time and space, articles show us something specific or one of many, and pronouns refer to other nouns.
- Auxiliary verbs = to do, to be, to have (helps with tense conjugation )
- Prepositions = show relationships in time and space
- Determiners/Articles = are used to refer to specific or non-specific nouns
- Conjunctions = words that connect
- Pronouns = refer to other nouns
Examples
- Prepositions:
of, at, in, without, between - Pronouns:
he, they, anybody, it, one - Determiners/Articles:
the, a, that, my, more, much, either,
neither - Conjunctions:
and, that, when, while, although, or - Auxiliary verbs :
verbs be (is, am, are), have, got, do
We hope that you have understood the Content and function words.
The disticntion between content words and function words is one of the key aspects of English stress and connected speech.
Content words are those which carry clear meaning, such as:
MAIN VERBS: go, speak, think
NOUNS: house, word, idea
ADJECTIVES: big, difficult, interesting
ADVERBS: slowly, clearly, quite
Function words are grammatical words that glue a sentence together, such as:
AUXILIARY VERBS: are, have, can
PREPOSITIONS: to, from, for
CONJUNCTIONS: and, but, if
PRONOUNS: her, I, their
ARTICLES: a/an, the
Content & Function Words in Connected Speech
In connected speech, function words tend to be pronounced as weak forms with one of the weak vowels /ə,ɪ,i,u/.
If a function word is stressed, it will be pronounced with a strong vowel sound, meaning that many function words have 2 possible pronunciations: a weak version, and a strong version. These are shown for some function words below:
EXAMPLE /Strong,Weak/
are /ɑː,ə/
have /hav,(h)əv/
were /wəː,wə/
to /tuː,tə/
for /fɔː,fə/
but /bʌt,bət/
been /biːn,bɪn/
he /hiː,(h)i/
Sentence Stress
In a sentence consisting of content and function words, the content words are typically stressed, and the function words are typically weak:
Are we going to the shops?
However, stress is always related to meaning, so the above sentence could have stress on ‘we’ and not on the two content words:
Are we going to the shops?
In this example, the concept of ‘going to the shops’ is already in the conversation and the focus of the meaning is on ‘we’. The strong pronunciation of the function word is then used.