We rely on language in order to communicate. In its spoken, written and signed forms. I have no experience nor do I possess any expertise in sign-language. As for spoken language, this platform is obviously not appropriate. Written language, however, is a discipline I have worked with, taught extensively and used for personal writings throughout the majority of my adult-life. Based on my prolonged and active involvement with language in its written form, I take the liberty to post related texts on this site.
Phonemes, morphemes, lexemes, syntax, and context are the five elements of language. It is through the joint work of these components, along with grammar, semantics, and pragmatics, that we create meaningful communication. It is not my intent to turn this post into a classroom subject-matter with a barrage of materials to digest for no practical purpose. I would like to highlight instead some functional information regarding grammar, the most important building-block of the structure we call “language”.
And today’s sentence d i s s e c t i o n begins . . .
The integral parts of a sentence we sometimes tend to forget and, as a result, neglect, are: Subject ~ Verb (a.k.a. the Predicate) ~ Object (Direct and Indirect Object)
- In order to identify the subject (italicized in the sample sentences below), we ask the question “who” or “what”:
- The award-winning writer was invited to a book-reading.
- A book-reading was planned in honor of the award-winning writer.
- The verb / predicate is the word that articulates the action of the subject:
- Respectively, “To invite” and “To plan” in the sample sentences above (in their base, or, infinitive forms)
- Any sentence can have a direct and an indirect object all at once, or display only one of the object forms. Neither one of the sample sentences used here have an object. Imagine this example:
- The award-winning author gave away several copies of his debut book. (The italicized sentence part constitutes a direct object.)
- The award-winning author gave his / her audience several copies of his debut book. (The italicized sentence part constitutes an indirect object.)
Next Post: Verb-Subject Agreement, and more . . .