Grammar – Definition of Grammar
Grammar is a branch of linguistics that is concerned with the analysis and description of the patterns in which the words of a language are arranged in order to convey meaning. In linguistics studies, grammar is used to show a set to convey meaning. In linguistics studies, grammar is used to show a set of rules, which will produce all the well-informed sentences possible in a language.
Grammar provides the vocabulary you need in your study of language by giving names to the kind of words and the parts of a sentence. Grammar concerns itself with the forms word can take and the work, which words do in sentences.
It is the study of how words combine to form larger units that is phrases, clauses and sentences. Sentence is the highest, the clause, the phrases, word and the morpheme.
- Sentence is a group of words which has a subject and predicate and is used as part of a sentence e.g. the boy in black shirt is my friend. Structurally, we look it a sentence as being made up clauses, or a clause. A sentence begins with a capital letter and ends with a full stop. In order to have a sentence someone or something must perform an action.
- Clause: A group of words that has a subject and a predicate and is used as part of a sentence e.g. The man came into the house.
A clause can be either independent, (man or dependent subordinate). Each clause is in turn made up of various parts, each part being assigned specific functions e.g. S = subject, V = verb, C = Complement, O = object, A = Adjunct.
- Phrase: A group of words that does not have a subject or predicate and does not take complete sense e.g. A short fat lady.
- Word: A single unit of language which means something and can be spoken or written e.g. handsome.
- Morpheme: The smallest unit of meaning that a word can be divided into e.g. “nonsense” “non” and “sense”.