Parts of speech in English

by Elblogdeidiomas.es · Published 23/04/2021 · Updated 18/04/2021

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Parts of speech in English

INDEX OF CONTENTS

Parts of the sentence
Prepositive phrases
Basic sentence structure
Functional types
Words with more than one function

In this article we will try to teach you what are parts of speech in English? In this regard, we must classify English words into 9 basic types called “parts of speech” or “classes of words . ” It is very important that you know how to recognize the parts of the speech. This will help you analyze sentences and understand them. It will also help you to correctly construct sentences.

Parts of a sentence

The basic parts of a sentence in English are the subject, the verb, and (often, but not always) the object. The subject is usually a noun, a word that names a person, place or thing. A verb (or predicate) generally follows the subject and identifies an action or state of being. An object receives the action and generally follows the verb.

Prepositive phrases

Like adjectives and adverbs, prepositional phrases add meaning to nouns and verbs in sentences. A prepositional phrase has two basic parts : a preposition plus a noun or a pronoun that serves as the object of the preposition.

Basic sentence structure

There are four basic sentence structures in English:

A simple sentence is a sentence with a single independent clause (also called a main clause) – Judy laughed.
Compound sentence contains at least two independent clauses: Judy laughed and Jimmy cried.
A complex sentence contains an independent clause and at least one dependent clause: Jimmy cried when Judy laughed.
Compound complex sentence contains two or more independent clauses and at least one dependent clause: Judy laughed and Jimmy cried as the clowns ran past their seats.

Four functional types of sentences

There are four main types of sentences that can be distinguished by their function and purpose:

A declarative sentence makes a declaration: babies cry . (los bebes lloran).
An interrogative sentence asks a question: Why do babies cry? (¿Por qué lloran los bebes?)
An imperative sentence gives instructions or expresses a request or demand: Please, shut up (Por favor, callate).
An exclamatory sentence expresses strong feelings by making an exclamation: Shut up! (¡Cállate!)

Parts of the speech:

Part of speech	Function or job	Example words	Example sentences
Verb	Action or status	(to) be, have, do, like, work, sing, can, must	EnglishClub is a web site. I like EnglishClub.
Name	Thing or person	pen, dog, work, music, town, London, teacher, John	This is my dog. I have lives in my house. We live in London.
Adjective	describe a noun	good, big, red, well, interesting	My dogs are big. I like big dogs.
Determined	limits or “determines” a noun	a / an the 2 some many	I have two dogs and some rabbits.
Adverb	limits or “determines” a noun	quickly, silently, well, badly, very, really	My dog eats quickly. When he is very hungry, he eats really quickly.
Pronoun	replace a noun	I, you, he, she, some	Tara is Indian. She is beautiful.
Preposition	link a noun to another word	to, at, after, on, but	We went to school on Monday.
Conjunction	join clauses or sentences or words	and, but, when	I like dogs and cats.
Interjection	short exclamation, sometimes inserted in a sentence	oh !, ouch !, hi !, well	Ouch! That hurts! Hi! How are you? Well, I don’t know.

Some grammar sources traditionally classify English into 8 parts of speech . Others say 10. Examples of other categorizations are:

Verbs can be treated as two different parts of speech:

Lexical verbs (work, like, run)
Auxiliary verbs (be, have, must)
The determinants can be treated as adjectives, instead of being a separate part of the speech.

Examples of parts of speech

Here are some examples of sentences made with different parts of speech in English:

verb

Stop

Name	verb
John	Works

Name	verb	verb
John	Is	Working

pronoun	verb	Name
She	Loves	Animals

Name	verb	Name	verb
Tara	Speaks	English	Well

Name	verb	adjective	Name
Tara	Speaks	Good	English

pronombre	verbo	preposición	determinado	nombre	adverbio
she	ran	to	the	station	quickly.
ella	corrió	a	la	estación	rápidamente

Pronombre	verbo	adjetivo	Nombre	conjunción	pronombre	verbo	Pronombre
She	likes	big	snakes	but	I	hate	them
A ella	Les gustan	grandes	Las serpientes	pero	yo	odio	las

Words with more than one function

Many English words can have more than one function or be more than one part of speech. For example, to work “trabajar” can be a verb and a noun; but “pero” can be a conjunction and a preposition; well “bien” can be an adjective, an adverb and an interjection. Also, many nouns can act as adjectives.

To analyze the part of speech, ask yourself: “What function does this word play in this sentence?

In the following table you can see some examples . Of course, there is more, even for some of the words in the table. In fact, if you look in a good dictionary, you will see that the word “but” has six tasks to do:

verb, noun, adverb, pronoun, preposition and conjunction

word	part of speech	example
work	noun	My work is easy.
work	verb	I work in London.
but	conjunction	John came but Mary didn’t eat
but	preposition	Everyone came but Mary.
well	adjective	Are you well ?
well	adverb	She speaks well .
well	interjection	Well ! That’s expensive
afternoon	noun	We ate in the afternoon
afternoon	noun acting as adjective	We had afternoon tea.