grammar

the branch of linguistics that deals with syntax and morphology (and sometimes also deals with semantics)

This article is about grammar from a linguistic perspective. For English grammar rules, see English grammar.''linguistics Grammar is the discovery, enunciation, and study of rules governing the use of language. The set of rules governing a particular language is also called the grammar of the language; thus, each language can be said to have its own distinct grammar. Grammar is part of the general study of language called linguistics.The subfields of modern grammar are phonetics, phonology, Morphology (linguistics)morphology, syntax, and semantics. Traditional grammars include only Morphology (linguistics)morphology and syntax.

Types of grammar -

A Prescription and descriptionprescriptive grammar is a grammar that asserts itself as the only correct formulation of a particular language, and rejects any other constructions as wrong. Traditional grammars are typically prescriptive. Prescriptive grammars are usually based on the prestige dialects of a speech community, and often specifically condemn certain constructions which are common only among lower socioeconomic groups, such as the use of "ain't" and double negatives in English languageEnglish. Though prescriptive grammars remain quite common in pedagogy and foreign language instruction, they have fallen out of favor in modern academic linguistics, as they represent only a limited subset of how people actually use a language.

A Prescription and descriptiondescriptive grammar is a grammar that describes the language as it is actually used by people, regardless of whether prescriptive grammars would consider a construction correct or not. Descriptive grammars are bound to a particular speech community, and attempt to provide rules for any utterance considered grammatically correct within that community. For example, in many dialects of English, the use of double negatives is very common, even though prescriptive English grammars explicitly reject double negatives as ungrammatical. A descriptive grammar of a speech community where people acceptably say "I didn't do nothing" will treat that sentence as grammatical, and provide rules that account for it. A descriptive grammar of formal English would rather provide rules for "I didn't do anything."

Traditional grammar is the collection of ideas about grammar that Western societies have received from Greek and Roman sources. Prescriptive grammar is always formulated in terms of the descriptive concepts inherited from traditional grammar. Modern descriptive grammar aims to correct the errors of traditional grammar, and generalize them, so as to avoid shoehorning all languages to the model of Latin. Nearly all materials used in teaching language, however, are still based on traditional grammar.

A formal grammar is a precisely defined grammar, typically used for computer programming languages.

A generative grammar is a formal grammar that can in some sense "generate" the well-formed expressions of a natural language. An entire branch of linguistic theory is based on generative grammars. Generative grammars were popularized by Noam Chomsky.

Development of grammars - Grammars evolve through usage and human population separations. With the advent of written representations, formal rules about language usage tend to appear also. Formal grammars are codifications of usage that are developed by observation. As the rules become established and developed, the prescriptive concept of grammatical correctness can arise. This often creates a gulf between contemporary usage and that which is accepted as correct. Linguists normally consider that prescriptive grammars do not have any justification beyond their authors' aesthetic tastes. However, prescriptions are considered in sociolinguistics as part of the explanation for why some people say "I didn't do nothing", some say "I didn't do anything", and some say one or the other depending on social context.The formal study of grammar is an important part of education from a young age through advanced learning, though the rules taught in schools are not a "grammar" in the sense most linguisticslinguists use the term, as they are often prescriptive rather than descriptive.Planned languagePlanned languages are more common in the modern day. Many have been designed to aid human communication (such as Esperanto or the intercultural, highly logic-compatible artificial language Lojban) or created as part of a work of fiction (such as the Klingon language and Elvish language). Each of these artificial languages has its own grammar.It is a myth that analytic languages have simpler grammar than synthetic languages. Analytic languages use syntax to convey information that is encoded via inflection in synthetic languages. In other words, word order is not significant and morphology is highly significant in a purely synthetic language, whereas morphology is not significant and syntax is highly significant in an analytic language. Chinese languageChinese and Afrikaans languageAfrikaans, for example, are highly analytic and meaning is therefore very context dependent. (Both do have some inflections, and had more in the past; thus, they are becoming even less synthetic and more "purely" analytic over time.) Latin, which is highly synthetic languagesynthetic, uses affixes and inflections to convey the same information that Chinese does with syntax. Because Latin words are quite (though not completely) self-contained, an intelligible Latin Sentence (linguistics)sentence can be made from elements placed in largely arbitrary order. Latin has a complex affixation and a simple syntax, while Chinese has the opposite..

See also - wiktionarypargrammar

:Category:Grammars of specific languages

Grammatical terms -

Adjective

Adjunct

Adverb

Appositive

Article (grammar)article

Grammatical aspectaspect

Auxiliary verb

Grammatical casecase

Clause

Closed class word

Comparative

Complement

Compound noun and adjective

Grammatical conjugationconjugation

Dangling modifier

Declension

Determiner

Dual grammatical numberdual (form for two)

Expletive

Function word

Grammatical gender gender

Infinitive

Measure word (classifier)

Modal particle

Movement paradox

Grammatical modifiermodifier

Grammatical moodmood

Noun

Grammatical numbernumber

Object (grammar)object

Open class word

Parasitic gap

Part of speech

Grammatical particleparticle

Grammatical personperson

Phrase

Phrasal verb

Plural

Predicate (grammar)Predicate (also verb phrase)

Preposition

Personal pronoun

Pronoun

Pseudo-Anglicism

Sandhi

Singular

Subject (grammar) subject

Superlative

Grammatical tensetense

Uninflected word

Verb

Grammatical voicevoice

Grammatical devices -

Affixation

Derivation (linguistics)derivation

Reduplication

Word order

Related topics -

:Category:Grammar frameworks

:Category:Grammars of specific languages

Ambiguous grammar

Analytic language vs. Synthetic language

Categorical grammar

Disputed English grammar

Figure of Speech

Government and binding

-onymList of -onyms

Linguistic typology

List of frequently misused English words

Syntax-----In computer science, the syntax of each programming language is defined by a formal grammar. In theory of computationtheoretical computer science and mathematics, formal grammars define formal languages. The Chomsky hierarchy defines several important classes of formal grammars.

References - Bede Rundle, Grammar in Philosophy, Oxford 1979

External links -

krysstal.com - Grammar Terms

gramster.com - English Grammar Software

figarospeech.com - It Figures-Figures of SpeechCategory:Grammar!*Category:LinguisticsCategory: Grammars? of specific languages!*als:Grammatikbg:Грамат� �каca:Gramàticacv:Грам� �атикаcs:Mluvniceda:Gramm atikde:Grammatikes:Gramáticae o:Gramatikofa:دستور? !زبانfr:Grammairehr:Gramati kaio:Gramatikoia:Grammaticait: Grammaticahe:דקדוקku:Rêz imannl:Grammaticands:Grammatik ja:文法no:Grammatikknn:Gramm atikkpl:Gramatykapt:Gramática ru:Грамматикаsimple: Grammarfi:Kielioppisv:Grammati kth:ไวยากรณ์tp i:Gramatr:Dilbilimuk:Грам� �тикаzh:语法

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