Word types and word classes

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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.

In English grammar, a word class is a set of words that display the same formal properties, especially their inflections and distribution. The term «word class» is similar to the more traditional term, part of speech. It is also variously called grammatical category, lexical category, and syntactic category (although these terms are not wholly or universally synonymous).

The two major families of word classes are lexical (or open or form) classes (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs) and function (or closed or structure) classes (determiners, particles, prepositions, and others).

Examples and Observations

• «When linguists began to look closely at English grammatical structure in the 1940s and 1950s, they encountered so many problems of identification and definition that the term part of speech soon fell out of favor, word class being introduced instead. Word classes are equivalent to parts of speech, but defined according to strict linguistic criteria.» (David Crystal, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language, 2nd ed. Cambridge University Press, 2003)
• «There is no single correct way of analyzing words into word classes…Grammarians disagree about the boundaries between the word classes (see gradience), and it is not always clear whether to lump subcategories together or to split them. For example, in some grammars…pronouns are classed as nouns, whereas in other frameworks…they are treated as a separate word class.» (Bas Aarts, Sylvia Chalker, Edmund Weiner, The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar, 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, 2014)

Form Classes and Structure Classes

«[The] distinction between lexical and grammatical meaning determines the first division in our classification: form-class words and structure-class words. In general, the form classes provide the primary lexical content; the structure classes explain the grammatical or structural relationship. Think of the form-class words as the bricks of the language and the structure words as the mortar that holds them together.»

The form classes also known as content words or open classes include:

• Nouns
• Verbs
• Adjectives
• Adverbs

The structure classes, also known as function words or closed classes, include:

• Determiners
• Pronouns
• Auxiliaries
• Conjunctions
• Qualifiers
• Interrogatives
• Prepositions
• Expletives
• Particles

«Probably the most striking difference between the form classes and the structure classes is characterized by their numbers. Of the half million or more words in our language, the structure words—with some notable exceptions—can be counted in the hundreds. The form classes, however, are large, open classes; new nouns and verbs and adjectives and adverbs regularly enter the language as new technology and new ideas require them.» (Martha Kolln and Robert Funk, Understanding English Grammar. Allyn and Bacon, 1998)

One Word, Multiple Classes

«Items may belong to more than one class. In most instances, we can only assign a word to a word class when we encounter it in context. Looks is a verb in ‘It looks good,’ but a noun in ‘She has good looks‘; that is a conjunction in ‘I know that they are abroad,’ but a pronoun in ‘I know that‘ and a determiner in ‘I know that man’; one is a generic pronoun in ‘One must be careful not to offend them,’ but a numeral in ‘Give me one good reason.'» (Sidney Greenbaum, Oxford English Grammar. Oxford University Press, 1996)

Suffixes as Signals

«We recognize the class of a word by its use in context. Some words have suffixes (endings added to words to form new words) that help to signal the class they belong to. These suffixes are not necessarily sufficient in themselves to identify the class of a word. For example, -ly is a typical suffix for adverbs (slowly, proudly), but we also find this suffix in adjectives: cowardly, homely, manly. And we can sometimes convert words from one class to another even though they have suffixes that are typical of their original class: an engineer, to engineer; a negative response, a negative.» (Sidney Greenbaum and Gerald Nelson, An Introduction to English Grammar, 3rd ed. Pearson, 2009)

A Matter of Degree

«[N]ot all the members of a class will necessarily have all the identifying properties. Membership in a particular class is really a matter of degree. In this regard, grammar is not so different from the real world. There are prototypical sports like ‘football’ and not so sporty sports like ‘darts.’ There are exemplary mammals like ‘dogs’ and freakish ones like the ‘platypus.’ Similarly, there are good examples of verbs like watch and lousy examples like beware; exemplary nouns like chair that display all the features of a typical noun and some not so good ones like Kenny.» (Kersti Börjars and Kate Burridge, Introducing English Grammar, 2nd ed. Hodder, 2010)

Word is a unit of language that serves as a principal carrier of meaning, consisting of one or more spoken sounds or their written representation. One may define a word as the blocks from which sentences are made. Words consist of one or more morphemes that can be of independent use or consist of two or three such units combined under some connection. Words are usually divided into writing by spaces and in many languages. They are differentiated phonologically, as by accent.

Idioms beginning with Words:

• word for word

• word of honour

• word of mouth

• words fail me

• words of one syllable,

• words stick in one’s throat

• words to that effect

• word to the wise

Types of a Word

Word is a speech sound or sequence of speech sounds that typically symbolize and express a message without being divisible into smaller units that can be used separately.

Word is the whole range of linguistic forms generated by combining a single basis with different inflectional elements without altering the part of speech elements.

• Any part of a written or printed expression that normally occurs between spaces or between a space and a punctuation mark.

• The act of speaking or talking verbally. A short comment or conversation

• I just want to have a chat with you.

• A number of bytes that are processed as a unit and convey a quantity of contact and computer work information

• To form phrases, we combine words. Typically, a term serves the same purpose as a word from some other class of terms.

What makes a Word Real Word?

In English, the word has a broad variety of meanings and uses. Yet one of the pieces of word-related knowledge most commonly searched for is not something that can be included in its meaning. Instead, what makes a word a real word is some variant of the question?

Vocabulary is one of English’s most prolific fields of change and variation; new terms are constantly being invented to name or characterize new technologies or developments or to better classify aspects of our rapidly changing culture. Time, resources and personnel constraints would make it impossible for any dictionary to capture a completely comprehensive account of all the terms in the language, no matter how big. Most general English dictionaries are intended to contain only terms that fulfil certain usage requirements in large areas and over long periods (for more information about how words are selected for entry in the dictionary).

Classification of Words

Words are grouped in English into parts of speech. The functional adjective and functional adverb are functional derivations. 

Noun

A noun is an identifying word:

Eg: An individual (man, female, engineer, friend)

Verb

What a person or thing does or what happens is represented by a verb. 

Eg: A case,  An action

Adjective

An adjective is a term that identifies a noun, offering additional details about it. 

Eg: A thrilling adventure

Adverb

An adverb is a word used to give a verb, adjective or other adverb details. They can make stronger or weaker the meaning of a noun, adjective, or other adverbs, and sometimes appear between the subject and its verb.

Eg: She almost lost everything.

Pronoun

In place of a noun that is already recognized or has already been mentioned, pronouns are used. To stop repeating the noun, this is always done. 

Eg: Since she was tired, Laura left early.

Preposition

A preposition is a concept like after, in to, on, and with. Prepositions are normally used in front of nouns or pronouns and illustrate the connection in a sentence between the noun or pronoun and other words.

Conjunction

A conjunction is a term such as and because, but for, if or, and when A conjunction (also called a connective). Conjunctions are used to connect words, clauses, and sentences.

Determiner

A determiner is a phrase that introduces a noun, such as a/an, the any, this, others, or many (as in a dog, the dog, this dog, those dogs, each dog, many dogs).

Exclamation

A word or expression that expresses strong emotions, such as surprise, pleasure, or rage, is an exclamation (also called an interjection). Exclamations sometimes stand on their own.

Word classes are parts of speech. They’re the building blocks that form every sentence ever uttered. They are categorized by the role they play in your sentences.

Everyone agrees on the following four main word classes:

1. Noun
2. Verb
3. Adjective
4. Adverb

There are varying opinions as to whether the following are word classes or word forms. So we went straight to the experts: the Oxford and Cambridge Dictionaries. Per these two highly learned sources, the following are considered word classes also:

1. Pronoun (e.g. I, you, me, we, mine, someone, he, she)
2. Preposition (e.g. at, in, on, across, behind, for)
3. Conjunction (e.g. and, but, when, if, because)
4. Determiner (e.g. a, the, an, this, etc.)
5. Exclamation or Interjection (e.g. oh, ah, wow, ouch)

The four main classes have thousands of members, and new nouns, verbs, and other words are being created every day. Consider the verb “google.” This verb didn’t exist just a few years ago and now it is firmly entrenched in everyday language. Just last month a new noun, “intersectionality” (the study of overlapping social identities and related systems of discrimination), was just added to Dictionary.com. Can you think of any other words that have recently been created and entered your own vocabulary?

Some words, however, can fall in multiple word classes depending on their context:

• Put your money in the bank. (noun)
• He began to bank the airplane into the wind. (verb)
• Come warm up by the fire. (noun)
• He will certainly fire her for coming in late again. (verb)
• A book is a source of endless reading pleasure. (noun)
• Book your holiday plans soon to get the best deal. (verb)
• She loves fast cars. (adjective)
• He’s driving fast to get to work on time. (adverb)
• Her hourly complaints have got to stop. (adjective)
• The weather report is reported hourly. (adverb)

The next step is to use your word classes to form phrase classes, like noun phrases, verb phrases, adjective phrases, etc. But we’ll save that for another post.