GLOSSARY OF GRAMMAR TERMS - Easy Learning Italian Grammar

Easy Learning Italian Grammar (2011)

GLOSSARY OF GRAMMAR TERMS

ABSTRACT NOUN a word used to refer to a quality, idea, feeling or experience, rather than a physical object, for example, size, reason, happiness. Compare with concrete noun.

ACTIVE a form of the verb that is used when the subject of the sentence does the action, for example, A dog bit him (subject: a dog; active verb: bit). Compare with passive.

ADJECTIVE a ‘describing’ word that tells you something about a person or thing, for example, a blue shirt, a big car, a good idea.

ADVERB a word used with verbs to give information on where, when or how an action takes place, for example, here, today, quickly. An adverb can also add information to adjectives and other adverbs, for example, extremely quick, very quickly.

AGREEMENT the matching of words or word endings to the person or thing they refer to. For example, the verb to be has different forms for I, you and he: I am, you are, he is. In Italian you use verbs in the form appropriate to the person doing the action, and articles and adjectives have masculine, feminine and plural forms to match (or agree with) the noun they go with.

APOSTROPHE S an ending (‘s) added to a noun to show ownership, for example, Peter’s car, the company’s headquarters.

ARTICLE a word such as the, a, and an which goes with nouns: the sun, a happy boy, an orange. See also definite article, indefinite article.

AUXILIARY VERB a verb such as be, have and do that is used with a main verb to form tenses and questions.

BASE FORM the form of the verb that has no ending added to it, for example, walk, have, be, go. Compare with infinitive.

CARDINAL NUMBER a number used in counting, for example, one, seven, ninety. Compare with ordinal number.

CLAUSE a group of words containing a verb.

COMPARATIVE an adjective or adverb with –er on the end of it or more or less in front of it that is used to compare things or people, for example, faster, more important, less interesting.

COMPOUND NOUN a word for a living being, thing or idea which is made up of two or more words, for example, prime minister, mobile phone, home truth.

CONCRETE NOUN a word that refers to a physical object rather than a quality or idea, for example, ball, school, apples. Compare with abstract noun.

CONDITIONAL a verb form used to talk about things that would happen or would be true under certain conditions, for example, I would help you if I could. It is also used in requests and offers, for example, Could you lend me some money?; I could give you a lift.

CONJUGATE (to) to give a verb different endings depending on whether its subject is I, you, he and so on, and depending on whether you are referring to the present, past or future, for example, I have, she has, they listened.

CONJUGATION a group of verbs that has a particular pattern of endings.

CONJUNCTION a word such as and, but or because that links two words or phrases, or two parts of a sentence, for example, Diane and I have been friends for years.

CONSONANT a sound made by letters such as b, g, m, s and t. In English y is sometimes a consonant, as in year, and sometimes a vowel, as in any. In Italian isometimes has a vowel sound (ee) and sometimes the consonant sound of y in year, for example, italiano (eetalyano). Compare with vowel.

CONTINUOUS TENSE a verb form made up of to be and the –ing form, for example, I’m thinking; They were quarrelling. Italian continuous tenses are made with stare and the gerund.

DEFINITE ARTICLE the word the. Compare with indefinite article.

DEMONSTRATIVE ADJECTIVE a word used to point out a particular thing or person. There are four demonstrative adjectives in English: this, these, that and those.

DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUN a word used instead of a noun to point out people or things, for example, That’s my brother. In English the demonstrative pronouns are this, that, these and those.

DIRECT OBJECT a noun or pronoun used to show who or what is affected by the verb. For example, in the sentence He sent flowers, the subject of the verb is He (the person who did the sending) and the direct object of the verb is flowers (what he sent). Compare with indirect object.

DIRECT OBJECT PRONOUN a word such as me, him, us and them used instead of a noun to show who or what is affected by the action of the verb, for example, His friends helped him. Compare indirect object pronoun.

ENDING something added to the end of a word. In English nouns have plural endings, for example boy → boys, child → children and verbs have the endings –s, –ed and –ing, for example, walkwalks, walked, walking. In Italian there are plural endings for nouns, verb endings, and masculine, feminine and plural endings for adjectives and pronouns.

EXCLAMATION a sound, word or sentence that is spoken suddenly by somebody who is surprised, excited or angry, for example, Oh!; Look who’s coming!; How dare you!

FEMININE a noun, pronoun, article or form of adjective used to refer to a living being, thing or idea that is not classed as masculine. For example, una (feminine indefinite article) bella (adjective with a feminine ending) casa (feminine noun).

FUTURE a tense used to talk about something that will happen, or be true in the future, for example, He’ll be here soon; I’ll give you a call; It will be sunny tomorrow.

GENDER whether a noun, pronoun or adjective is masculine or feminine.

GERUND in English, a verb form ending in –ing, for example, eating, sleeping. In Italian the gerund ends in –ando or –endo.

IMPERATIVE a form of the verb used to give orders and instructions, for example, Sit down!; Don’t go!; Let’s start!

IMPERFECT a tense used to say what was happening, what used to happen and what things were like in the past, for example, It was sunny at the weekend; They weren’t listening; They used to live in Spain.

IMPERSONAL VERB a verb with the subject it, where ‘it’ does not refer to any specific thing; for example, It’s going to rain; It’s nine o’clock.

INDEFINITE ADJECTIVE one of a small group of adjectives used to give an idea of amounts and numbers, for example, several, all, every.

INDEFINITE ARTICLE the word a or an. Compare with definite article.

INDEFINITE PRONOUN a word like everything, nobody and something which is used to refer to people or things in a non-specific way.

INDIRECT OBJECT a noun or pronoun used to show who benefits or suffers from an action. For example, in the sentence He sent Claire flowers, the directobject (what was sent) is flowers and the indirect object is Claire (the person the flowers were sent to). An indirect object often has to in front of it: He told lies to everyone; He told everyone lies. In both these sentences the direct object is lies and the indirect object is everyone. Compare with direct object.

INDIRECT OBJECT PRONOUN a pronoun such as to me (or me), to you (or you) and to her (or her). In the sentence He gave the chocolates to me and the flowers to her, the direct objects are the chocolates and the flowers (what he gave), and the indirect object pronouns are to me and to her (who he gave them to). In the sentence He gave me the chocolates and her the flowers, the indirect object pronouns are me and her.

INDIRECT QUESTION a more roundabout way of asking a question, for example, instead of Where are you going? you can say Tell me where you are going, or I’d like to know where you are going.

INDIRECT SPEECH the words you use to report what someone has said when you aren’t using their actual words, for example, He said that he was going out. Also called reported speech.

INFINITIVE the base form of the verb, for example, walk, see, hear. It is used after other verbs such as should, must and can. The infinitive is often used with to: to speak, to eat, to live. Compare with base form.

INTERROGATIVE ADJECTIVE a question word such as which, what or how much that is used when asking about a noun, for example, Which colour?; What size?; How much sugar?

INTERROGATIVE PRONOUN one of the following: who, which, whose, whom and what. These words are used without a noun, when asking questions, for example, What do you want?

INTRANSITIVE VERB a verb used without a direct object, for example, The shop is closing; Nothing grows here. Compare with transitive verb.

INVARIABLE the term used to describe an adjective which does not change its form for the feminine or the plural, or a noun which does not change its ending in the plural.

IRREGULAR VERB In Italian, a verb whose forms do not follow one of the three main patterns.

MASCULINE a noun, pronoun, article or form of adjective used to refer to a living being, thing or idea that is not classed as feminine. For example, il (masculine definite article) primo (adjective with a masculine ending) treno (masculine noun).

NEGATIVE a question or statement which contains a word such as not, never or nothing: Isn’t he here?; I never eat meat; She’s doing nothing about it.

NOUN a naming word for a living being, thing or idea, for example, woman, Andrew, desk, happiness.

NUMBER in grammar a verb agrees in number with its subject by being singular with a singular subject and plural with a plural subject, for example, I am a teacher; they are teachers.

OBJECT a noun or pronoun that, in English, usually comes after the verb and shows who or what is affected by it, for example, I (subject) want (verb) a new car (object); They (subject) phoned (verb) him (object). Compare direct object, indirect object and subject.

OBJECT PRONOUN one of the following: me, you, him, her, it, us, them. They are used instead of nouns after prepositions, for example, for me, with us and as the object of verbs, for example, The company sacked him; you’ll enjoy it. Compare subject pronoun.

ORDINAL NUMBER an adjective used to show where something comes in numerical order, for example, first, seventh, ninetieth. Compare with cardinal number.

PART OF SPEECH a word with a particular grammatical function, for example, noun, adjective, verb, preposition, pronoun.

PASSIVE a verb form that is used when the subject of the verb is the person or thing the action is done to, for example, Shaun was bitten by a dog. Shaun is the subject of the sentence, but he did not do the action. Compare with active.

PAST PARTICIPLE a verb form usually ending –ed, for example lived, worked. Some past participles are irregular, for example, gone, sat, broken. Past participles are used to make the perfect, pluperfect and passive, for example, They’ve gone; They hadn’t noticed me; Nobody was hurt. Past participles are also used as adjectives, for example, a boiled egg.

PAST PERFECT see pluperfect.

PERFECT a tense used in English to talk about what has or hasn’t happened, for example, We’ve won, I haven’t touched it. Compare simple past.

PERSON in grammar one of the following: the first person (I, we), the second person (you) or the third person (he, she, it, they).

PERSONAL PRONOUN a word such as I, you, he, she, us, them, which makes it clear who you are talking about or talking to.

PLUPERFECT a tense used to talk about what had happened or had been true at a point in the past, for example, I had forgotten to send her a card. Also called past perfect.

PLURAL the form of a word which is used to refer to more than one person or thing. In Italian, nouns, adjectives, articles, pronouns and verbs can be plural.

POSITIVE a positive sentence does not contain a negative word such as not. Compare with negative.

POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVE a word such as my, your, his that is used with a noun to show who it belongs to.

POSSESSIVE PRONOUN a word such as mine, yours, his that is used instead of a possessive adjective followed by a noun. For example, instead of My bag is the blue one, you can say Mine’s the blue one.

PREPOSITION a word such as at, for, with, into or from, or a phrase such as in front of or near to. Prepositions are usually followed by a noun or a pronoun and show how people and things relate to the rest of the sentence, for example, She’s at home; It’s for you; you’ll get into trouble; It’s in front of you.

PRESENT a verb form used to talk about what is true at the moment, what generally happens and what is happening now; for example, I’m a student; I travel to college by train; The phone’s ringing.

PRESENT PARTICIPLE a verb form ending in –ing, for example, eating, sleeping. Compare with gerund.

PRONOUN a word you use instead of a noun, when you do not need or want to name someone or something directly, for example, it, you, somebody.

PROPER NOUN the name of a person, place or organization. Proper nouns are always written with a capital letter, for example, Kate, New york, the Forestry Commission.

QUESTION WORD a word such as why, where, who, which or how that is used to ask a question.

REFLEXIVE PRONOUN a word ending in –self or –selves, such as myself and ourselves, that is used as the object of a verb, for example I surprised myself; We’re going to treat ourselves.

REFLEXIVE VERB a verb where the subject and object are the same, and which uses reflexive pronouns such as myself, yourself and themselves, for example, I’ve hurt myself; Look after yourself!; They’re enjoying themselves.

REGULAR VERB in Italian, a verb whose forms follow one of the three main patterns. Compare with irregular verb.

RELATIVE PRONOUN one of the following: who, which, that and whom. They are used to specify exactly who or what is being talked about, for example, The man who has just come in is Anna’s boyfriend; The vase that you broke cost a lot of money.

REPORTED SPEECH see indirect speech.

SENTENCE a group of words which usually has a subject and a verb. In writing, a sentence begins with a capital and ends with a full stop, question mark or exclamation mark.

SIMPLE TENSE a verb form made up of one word, for example, She lives here; They arrived late. Compare with Continuous Tense and Perfect Tense.

SIMPLE PAST a tense used in English to say when exactly something happened, for example, We met last summer; I ate it last night; It rained a lot yesterday. In Italian the perfect tense is used in this kind of sentence.

SINGULAR the form of a word used to refer to one person or thing. Compare with plural.

STEM what is left of an Italian verb when you take away the –are, –ere or –ire ending of the infinitive.

STRESSED PRONOUN an object pronoun used in Italian after prepositions and when you want to stress the word for me, him, them and so on. Compare unstressed pronoun.

SUBJECT a noun or pronoun that refers to the person or thing doing the action or being in the state described by the verb, for example Pat likes climbing; The busis late. Compare with object.

SUBJECT PRONOUN a word such as I, he, she and they used for the person or thing carrying out the action described by the verb. Pronouns replace nouns when it is clear who is being talked about, for example, My brother’s not here at the moment. He’ll be back in an hour.

SUBJUNCTIVE a verb form often used in Italian to express wishes, thoughts and suppositions. In English the subjunctive is only used occasionally, for example, If I were you…; So be it; He asked that they be removed.

SUPERLATIVE an adjective or adverb with –est on the end of it or most or least in front of it that is used to compare things or people, for example, fastest, most important, least interesting.

SYLLABLE a unit containing a vowel sound. A word can have one or more syllables, for example, I, o-pen, ca-the-dral.

TENSE a particular form of the verb. It shows whether you are referring to the present, past or future.

TRANSITIVE VERB a verb used with a direct object, for example, Close the door!; They grow wheat. Compare with intransitive verb.

UNSTRESSED PRONOUN an object pronoun used in Italian when you don’t want to put any special emphasis on the word for me, him, them and so on. Compare stressed pronoun.

VERB a word that describes what somebody or something does, what they are, or what happens to them, for example, play, be, disappear.

VOWEL one of the sounds made by the letters a, e, i, o u, and sometimes y. Compare with consonant.