Parts of Speech

What are Parts of Speech?

Every word in English can be categorised according to its function and meaning. These categories are known as parts of speech. A word can be a noun, an adjective or a pronoun depending on the role it plays in a sentence.

There are nine parts of speech

1. Nouns
2. Verbs
3. Adjectives
4. Adverbs
5. Pronouns
6. Articles
7. Prepositions
8. Conjunctions
9. Interjections

1. Nouns

A noun is a word which is used to name a person, a thing, a place or an idea.

Example of Nouns:

1.1 Proper nouns: Proper nouns are specific names given to a person, place or thing. The first letter of each proper noun is capitalised

Examples of Proper Nouns are:

1.2 Common Noun: Common nouns are names which are generic names. They are the opposites of proper nouns.

Examples of Common nouns are:

1. 3 Abstract Noun: Abstract nouns are names given to entities which have no physical form but exist as ideas.

Examples of Abstract nouns are:

1. 4 Collective Nouns: Collective nouns are names given to groups or collections.

Examples of collective nouns are:

1.5 Material Nouns: Material nouns are names given to materials or substances through which other things can be made.

Examples of Material nouns are:

1. 6 Countable Nouns: Countable nouns are nouns which can be counted.

Examples of countable nouns are:

1. 7 Uncountable Nouns: Uncountable nouns are nouns which cannot be counted. These nouns are measured using various systems of measurement.

Examples of uncountable nouns are:

2. Verbs

Verbs are words which represent actions or express the state of being. They form the main part of the predicate. Without verbs, the sentence will make little or no sense.

Examples of verbs are:

2. 1 Transitive Verbs: Verbs which can take one or more objects are known as transitive verbs.

Examples of transitive verbs are:

2.2 Intransitive Verbs: Verbs which cannot take objects are known as intransitive verbs.

Examples of intransitive verbs are:

2. 3 Finite Verbs: A finite verb is that which has a subject and shows the tense in a sentence.

Examples of finite verbs are:

2.4 Nonfinite Verbs: A nonfinite verb is that which neither has a subject nor exhibits tenses in a sentence.

Examples of nonfinite verbs are:

2.6  Helping or Auxiliary Verbs: A helping or auxiliary verb is not the primary verb. It expresses ideas such as tense, mood and nature of the main verb. It is always used before the main verb.

• The verbs which are in italics are main verbs.
• The verbs which are underlined are helping or auxiliary verbs.

3. Adjectives

Adjectives are words which are used to describe nouns or pronouns. They can be used to describe the quality, quantity, size, age and function of the words they qualify.

Examples of Adjectives are:

4.  Adverbs

An adverb is a word which qualifies a verb, an adjective or another adverb.

Examples of Adverbs are:

5.  Pronouns

Pronouns are words used in place of a noun or a noun phrase.

5.1 Personal Pronouns: They are pronouns which represent ‘persons’ in the grammatical sense.

1st Person: I, me, mine, myself, we, us, ours, ourselves 2nd Person: You, yours, yourself

3rd Person: He, she, it, his, hers, its

5.2  Reflexive Pronouns: We use a reflexive pronoun when the actions by the subject affect itself.

Examples of Pronouns are:

6. Articles

Articles are words which accompany nouns. They are adjectives which provide a definition to the nouns.

6.1  Definite Articles: They introduce nouns or noun phrases which have already been mentioned before. They refer to nouns which are definite or specific.

Examples of articles are