How to Determine the
Part of Speech
Only interjections (Hooray!) have a habit of standing alone; every other
part of speech must be contained within a sentence and some are even required
in sentences (nouns and verbs). Other parts of speech come in many varieties
and may appear just about anywhere in a sentence.
To know
for sure what part of speech a word falls into, look not only at the word
itself but also at its meaning, position, and use in a sentence.
For
example, in the first sentence below, work functions
as a noun; in the second sentence, a verb; and in the third sentence, an
adjective:
- Bosco showed up
for work two hours late.
- The noun work is the
thing Bosco shows up for.
- He will have
to work until midnight.
- The verb work is the
action he must perform.
- His work permit
expires next month.
- The attributive noun [or
converted adjective] work modifies
the noun permit.
Learning
the names and uses of the basic parts of speech is just one way to understand
how sentences are constructed.
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