What are the open word classes

In English grammar, open class refers to the category of content words—that is, parts of speech (or word classes) that readily accept new members, as contrasted with closed class, which do not. The open classes in English are nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. Research supports the view that open-class words and closed-class words play different roles in sentence processing.  

The Importance of Open-Class Words

Open-class words comprise a large portion of any language. Unlike closed-class words, which are finite, the possibility of creating and adding new words to an open word-class is practically infinite.

«All the words in a language can be broadly divided into two categories, open and closed,» writes Thomas Murray in «The Structure of English,» explaining that the closed category does not readily accept new words. «Its members are fixed and do not usually change.» Nouns, verbs, adverbs, and descriptive adjectives are, as he puts it, «exactly those parts of speech that remain open to new additions.»

Murray goes on to say that words in the open category are usually divided into simple and complex words. «Simple words contain just one morpheme (for example, house, walk, slow, or green), whereas complex words contain more than one morpheme (such as houses, walking, slowly, or greenest).»

Open-Class Words in Telegraphic Speech

One archaic form of language in which the distinction between open-class words and closed-class words is especially evident is what’s known as telegraphic speech. The term telegraphic is based on the wording style that was commonly used in telegrams. (Western Union sent the last telegram in the U.S. back in 2006. The final telegram in the world was tapped out in India in 2013.)

The format required senders to squeeze as much information into as few words as possible. It’s hard to imagine now, but back in the day, every letter and space in a telegram cost money. The less said, the more powerful the message, and also the more economical. Telegrams also had a sense of immediacy. Even though they had to be hand-delivered, they were the closest thing to instant communication available prior to the invention of the telephone and were generally sent to impart important information that required a timely response.

For example, if a college student traveling abroad wanted to make sure his parents were at the airport to pick him up upon his return, he might send them a telegram along the lines of: «HAVING WONDERFUL TIME; HOTEL GREAT; RETURNING THURSDAY; FLIGHT 229 KENNEDY; MEET ME.» As you can see, in the telegraphic forms of language, the crucial open-class words take precedence, while the closed-class words are edited out whenever possible.

Telegraphic language has evolved to include many forms of information exchange inherent to the Internet and texting. Tweets, metadata, SEO (search engine optimization), and texts all rely heavily on abbreviated content similar to the format once used in telegrams (although, leaving your caps-lock on is no longer a preferred or even desired choice stylistically speaking—unless you’re YELLING!).

How Open-Class Words Become Part of a Language

One of the ways by which new open-class words become part of a language is a process known as grammaticalization, which happens, usually over the course of time, when a word or set of words undergoes a semantic change that results in a revised lexical meaning or grammatical function. Keeping up with this word evolution the reason dictionaries are routinely updated.

In «Grammatical Analysis and Grammatical Change» Edmund Weiner cites the verb «ought» as an example: «[Ought] has evolved from being the past tense of to owe to the condition of a pure auxiliary.» Weiner goes on to explain that «open-class words can develop senses that constitute fully grammaticalized lexical items while retaining their original character in their other senses.» Another method open-class words are developed notes Weiner, is «from compounds that start out as straightforward syntactic constructions, for example, as and also from all so.»

Portmanteau Open-Class Words

One form of open-class words that are finding their way into more and more dictionaries are portmanteau words, which are what happens when two words are merged together to create a meaning that carries aspects of the two original words. The word «portmanteau» is itself such a combined word, taken from the French verb porter, meaning «to carry, and manteau, meaning «cloak» or «mantle.» When applied to luggage, the combined phrase means something in which one carries an article or two of clothing. When applied to language, it means one word packed with two slightly altered meanings.

While modern technology is rife with open-class portmanteau words— email (electronic + mail), emoticon (emotions + icons), podcast (iPod + broadcast) freeware (free + software), malware (malicious + software), netizen (Internet + citizen), and netiquette (Internet + etiquette), to name just a few—there are plenty of portmanteaus you might not even know are portmanteaus. Smog? That’s smoke plus fog. Brunch? Breakfast plus lunch.

Of course, the most amusing class of portmanteau words are those that developed as a result of sharp minds and wicked senses of humor, and include such gems as chillax (chill + relax), bromance (brother + romance), mockumentary (mock + documentary), and finally, ginormous (gigantic + enormous), which made the cut with the keepers of the Oxford English Dictionary in 1989, albeit as “slang” (although Merriam-Webster’s counts the relatively new open-class word as “authentic”).

SPAM^® (as in the trademarked canned-meat product from the Hormel Company) is a portmanteau word that originally combined the words «spice» and «ham.» Now, however, thanks to open-word evolution, the word is generally defined as «mass unsolicited junk email.» If you’re wondering how SPAM became spam, etymologists give credit to the crew from Monty Python and their «SPAM» sketch, in which every item on the menu of a particular eatery contained ubiquitous and sometimes copious amounts of the prefab canned meat product.

Other Relevant References

• Complex Words
• Grammaticalization
• Mental Lexicon
• Monomorphemic Words
• Word Classes

Sources

• Murray, Thomas E. «The Structure of English.» Allyn and Bacon. 1995
• Akmajian, Adrian; et al., «Linguistics: An Introduction to Language and Communication.» MIT. 2001
• Weiner, Edmund. «Grammatical Analysis and Grammatical Change.» «The Oxford Handbook of Lexicography.» Durkin, Philip: Editor. Oxford University Press. 2015

Words are the building blocks in any sentence. They just don’t ‘mean’ something, they ‘do’ something in every sentence. Hence words are grouped into word classes based on what they do. A word class is a group of words that have certain common features. The term “word class” is analogous to the more conventional term, “part of speech.” It is also variously named grammatical category, lexical category, and syntactic category.

• Types of Word Classes
• Open and Closed Word Classes
• Open Word Classes
• Closed Word Classes
• How to identify the word classes in a sentence?
• How to classify a word class?
• What is the difference between a word class and part of speech?

Word classes can be divided into two families:

• Lexical Classes: Also known as open classes and form classes. The lexical classes include nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.
• Function Classes: Also known as closed classes and structure classes. Includes: pronouns, determiners, conjunctions, prepositions, and interjections.

Open and Closed Word Classes

As previously mentioned some word classes are open, that is, the class can be expanded with the addition of new words. Take the example of the class of nouns, it is potentially infinite as the number of words in the class is increasing as new scientific and technological discoveries are made.

The latter half of the twentieth century witnessed developments in computer technology which have in turn given rise to many new nouns like the Internet, URL website, bitmap, email, etc.

On the other hand, the word classes of prepositions, determiners, or conjunctions are known as closed word classes. Words like of, the, and but come under these. They are named closed word classes because they consist of a definite set of words. These classes never expand even though the words included in the class may change their spelling.

Open Word Classes

1) Nouns

This class includes words that you frequently use in everyday life. Nouns are most commonly understood as “naming” words, that is, it performs the function of naming “people, places or things”.

• A person – Boy, Girl, John, etc
• A thing- House, Dog, etc
• A place- China, America, etc

However, the use of nouns is not restricted to just names of people, places, or things. Nouns also denote abstract and intangible concepts such as an idea, quality, or state. Example: Danger, Happiness, Love, etc.

2) Verbs

The words that you use to describe an action are known as verbs. Hence verbs are generally known as “action” words. Have a look at the given example: Rahul rides a scooter. The verb in the above sentence denotes an action that Rahul performs which is the action of riding a scooter.

However, the idea of verbs as “action” words is somewhat restricted. Many verbs don’t stand for action at all as in the given instance: Rahul seems desperate. We cannot say that the verb ‘seems ‘ refer to an action.

3) Adverbs

In English, an adverb describes a word that alters the meaning of a verb, adjective, or another adverb. Adverbs in a sentence give you more information about the sentence. They are used to express how an action is fulfilled. Adverbs can broadly be categorized into Simple Adverbs, IInterrogative adverbs, and Relative Adverbs.

Remember:

• Most adverbs end with the common ending – ly.
• An adverb that modifies an adjective or another adverb usually goes before it.

4) Adjectives

Adjectives describe the quality of a noun. For example They stay in a beautiful house

The word beautiful indicates or refers to one of the attributes of the house that is described. Hence beautiful becomes the adjective in the above sentence.

A point to keep in mind: Some adjectives can be identified by their ending. Typical adjective endings include: able, al, ful, ic, etc.

You can even try out our other articles on How to Improve Your Vocabulary as well to expand your knowledge base.

Closed Word Classes

1) Determiners

You might have often noticed that nouns are preceded by words like the, a, or an. These words are known as Determiners. They suggest the type of reference that the noun has.

• The determiner ‘the’ is called a Definite Article. It can be placed both before singular and plural nouns. For example The Taxi, The taxis
• The determiner a or an is known as the Indefinite Article. It is used along with a singular noun. Example: A taxi

Apart from these, many other determiners express quantity. These include ‘al’, ‘both’, ‘many’ etc.

2) Conjunctions

These are used to express connections between different words.

Example: John and David are friends. And is used as a conjunction in the given sentence.
The most familiar conjunctions in English are: and, but, and or.

Conjunctions are further divided into two:

• Coordinating Conjunctions: These conjunctions connect elements of equal syntactic structure. Example: Paul and David study together.
• Subordinating Conjunctions: Connects elements of unequal syntactic structure. Example: I left early because I had an interview the next day.

3) Prepositions

Prepositions indicate the relation between different words. They occur before a noun, pronoun, or noun phrase and indicate a direction, time, place, location, and spatial relationship. Common prepositions include across, after, at, before, by, during, from, in, into, of, on, to, under, with, without, etc.

4) Pronouns

If we did not have the pronoun word families we would have to repeat a whole lot of nouns. A word that takes the position of a noun is named as a pronoun. Pronouns can be employed as a substitute for a noun.

• Pronouns are divided into 5 categories:
• Personal Pronouns: I, you, she, etc
• Demonstrative Pronouns: This, these, etc
• Possessive Pronouns: Yours, His, etc
• Interrogative Pronouns: Which, What, etc
• Reflexive Pronouns: Herself, Himself, etc.
• Reciprocal Pronouns: Each other
• Indefinite Pronouns: Few, Nobody, etc.
• Relative Pronouns: Which, Whom, etc.

5) Interjections

Short exclamations like Oh!, Ah! etc are known as Interjections. Even though they have no grammatical value, we often use them in daily speech. Interjections are primarily used to express emotions such as anger, surprise, etc. Given below are a few examples.

Well! That hurts
Hey! Don’t be so clumsy

Remember, an interjection is always followed by an exclamation mark.

Read More:

• English Idioms
• Literary Devices

FAQs on Word Classes

1. How to identify the word classes in a sentence?

A word class is a group of words that have certain common features. To find out the word classes within a sentence it is important that you familiarise yourself with the most common word classes in English. These include nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions, etc.

2. How to classify a word class?

Word classes in English belong to two major categories. These are Open word classes that include nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. The second category is closed word classes that include: pronouns, determiners, interjections, etc.

3. What is the difference between a word class and part of speech?

The term “word class” is analogous to the more conventional term, “part of speech”. Both these terms refer to a group of words that have certain common features.

Conclusion

To understand the grammatical structures of sentences in a better way it’s best if you begin with word classes. Even though comprehending the different word classes may initially be a hectic task, once you master word classes, you will reach the exact meaning or message conveyed by a sentence.

Word classes may be classified as open or closed: open classes (like nouns, verbs and adjectives) acquire new members constantly, while closed classes (such as pronouns and conjunctions) acquire new members infrequently, if at all.

What words are open syllable?

An open syllable is a syllable with just one vowel. That one vowel appears at the end of a syllable. Words like baby (ba/by), raven (ra/ven), silent (si/lent) and robot (ro/bot) all have open syllables as the first syllable. Mono-syllables like she, he, go and so are also considered open syllables.

Open syllable words are open because they are not closed by a consonant. Whereas a closed syllable occurs when a syllable ends with a consonant, resulting in a short vowel sound, e.g., cat, sit, got & wet. The consonant closes these words. Closed syllable words are more prevalent in the English language.

What type of word is open?

Open or unobstructed space; an exposed location.

Which are open classes in English?

The open classes in English are nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.

What are the 9 word classes?

9 Classes of words: nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, determiners, prepositions, conjunctions, Interjections.

What are the 9 parts of speech?

There are a total of 9 parts of speech in English: nouns, pronouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, articles, prepositions, conjunctions, and interjections.

What are the 8 main word classes?

There are eight parts of speech in the English language: noun, pronoun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection. The part of speech indicates how the word functions in meaning as well as grammatically within the sentence.

What are the 8 parts of a sentence?

The eight parts of speech — nouns, verbs, adjectives, prepositions, pronouns, adverbs, conjunctions, and interjections — form different parts of a sentence. However, to be a complete thought, a sentence only needs a subject (a noun or pronoun) and a predicate (a verb).

What is a Category word?

category in British English (ˈkætɪɡərɪ ) nounWord forms: plural -ries. 1. a class or group of things, people, etc, possessing some quality or qualities in common; a division in a system of classification.

What is word classes in English?

Eight “word classes” or “parts of speech” are commonly distinguished in English: nouns, determiners, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and conjunctions. Nouns form the largest word class, and verbs the second-largest.

What is class in one word?

noun. a number of persons or things regarded as forming a group by reason of common attributes, characteristics, qualities, or traits; kind; sort: a class of objects used in daily living.

What are the types of word classes?

English has four major word classes: nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs. They have many thousands of members, and new nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs are often created.

How do you classify words?

In English, words are classified into parts of speech such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. The word function is classified as both a verb and a noun. The adjective functional and adverb functionally are derivations of function.

How do you identify a word class in a sentence?

We use a combination of three criteria for determining the word class of a word:

• The meaning of the word.
• The form or `shape’ of the word.
• The position or `environment’ of the word in a sentence.

What is minor word class?

The minor word classes are often referred to as closed classes. This is because they have relatively few members, which are added to only occa- sionally. For this reason, they have some- times been called function or grammatical words, in contrast to the major parts of speech, called content words.

How do you classify a part of speech?

Traditional grammar classifies words based on eight parts of speech: the verb, the noun, the pronoun, the adjective, the adverb, the preposition, the conjunction, and the interjection.

What is the in parts of speech?

In the English language the word the is classified as an article, which is a word used to define a noun. (More on that a little later.) But an article isn’t one of the eight parts of speech. In short, the word “the” is an article that functions as both an adjective and an adverb, depending on how it’s being used.

What are the 9 parts of speech and their meaning?

Every sentence you write or speak in English includes words that fall into some of the nine parts of speech. These include nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, articles/determiners, and interjections.

What is parts of speech PDF?

Eight Parts of Speech in English Grammar

Part of Speech	Basic Function
Adverbs	modifies a verb, adjective, or another adverb
Adjectives	modifies a noun
Prepositions	shows a relationship between a noun (or pronoun) and other words in a sentence
Conjunction	joins words, phrases, and clauses

What type of speech is the word this?

The word “this” can be used for a variety of purposes and contexts. Basically, it can be classified as an adjective, a definite article, a pronoun, or an adverb depending on how it is used. “THIS” can be categorized under adjectives if it is used to describe a noun.

What is this called in grammar?

We use this, that, these and those to point to people and things. This and that are singular. These and those are plural. We use them as determiners and pronouns.

What type of word is too?

adverb

Does too mean very?

To is a preposition with several meanings, including “toward” and “until.” Too is an adverb that can mean “excessively” or “also.” Just to be clear: two is pronounced the same as to and too, but it can’t be used instead of either of them because it’s a number.

Words in an open class are known as open-class items. Words in a closed class are known as closed-class items….

Verb	be, drive, grow, sing, think
Adjective	big, foolish, happy, talented, tidy
Adverb	happily, recently, soon, then, there
Preposition	at, in, of, over, with
Conjunction	and, because, but, if, or

What is closed in parts of speech?

In English grammar, closed class refers to the category of function words—that is, parts of speech (or word classes)—that don’t readily accept new members. The closed classes in English include pronouns, determiners, conjunctions, and prepositions.

What is opened in parts of speech?

These classes are called parts of speech. We can distinguish between open and closed classes of words. The open classes are nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs. The closed classes are the determiners, prepositions, subordinators and coordinators.

What are the parts of the speech?

There are eight parts of speech in the English language: noun, pronoun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection.

What are the method of teaching grammar?

Different Methods of Teaching Grammar

• Diagramming Sentences. One of the older forms of teaching grammar, diagramming sentences, first appeared in the 19th century.
• Learning Through Writing. This method is often used in schools in the U.S. and Canada.
• Inductive Teaching.
• Deductive Teaching.
• Interactive Teaching.

What is the smallest unit in English?

The Phoneme is the smallest unit of a language that can change meaning.

What is the smallest unit of a sentence?

A morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit in the grammar of a language.

What is the largest unit of language?

sentence

What is a unit in grammar?

A Grammatical Unit is any: Word, Term, or (sometimes) Phrase — which functions as a single individual “Unit” within a Grammatical Device, such as: a Clause, a Phrase, or an Interjection.

Last Update: Jan 03, 2023

This is a question our experts keep getting from time to time. Now, we have got the complete detailed explanation and answer for everyone, who is interested!

Asked by: Bobbie Langworth

Score: 4.1/5
(19 votes)

Therefore, we refer to content words as an «open» class. Nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs are content parts of speech. … Therefore, we refer to function words

function words

In linguistics, function words (also called functors) are words that have little lexical meaning or have ambiguous meaning and express grammatical relationships among other words within a sentence, or specify the attitude or mood of the speaker. … Thus they form important elements in the structures of sentences.

as a «closed» class. Pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions, determiners, qualifiers/intensifiers, and interrogatives are some function parts of speech.

What are the examples of intensifiers?

Intensifiers are adverbs or adverbial phrases that strengthen the meaning of other expressions and show emphasis. Words that we commonly use as intensifiers include absolutely, completely, extremely, highly, rather, really, so, too, totally, utterly, very and at all: She was so upset.

What are the open class words?

In English grammar, open class refers to the category of content words—that is, parts of speech (or word classes) that readily accept new members, as contrasted with closed class, which do not. The open classes in English are nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.

What is not an example of an open content class word?

The closed classes in English include pronouns, determiners, conjunctions, and prepositions. In contrast open class words include nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.

What are open and closed class words?

Word classes may be either open or closed. An open class is one that commonly accepts the addition of new words, while a closed class is one to which new items are very rarely added. Open classes normally contain large numbers of words, while closed classes are much smaller.

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