communication

definition of morphosyntax

This term is the combination of two words of Greek origin, morpho that means form and syntax that means order. In this way, morphosyntax is the study of words and their different parts in the whole of a sentence.

Morphosyntax is part of linguistics and is the area that focuses on the set of elements and rules built into sentences.

Morphosyntactic analysis of a simple sentence

Any sentence, simple or compound, can be parsed morphologically and syntactically. In its morphological dimension, each of its elements is studied. Thus, in the simple sentence "Luis explained the story to his uncle", the following elements are presented: Luis is a name, explained is a verb, "the" is a determinant, "story" is a name, "a" is a preposition, "su" a determiner and "uncle" a noun. If we carry out the syntactic analysis of the same sentence, the following can be seen: the verb explained is the nucleus of the predicate, Luis is the nucleus of the subject, the story is the direct object and his uncle is the indirect object. With these two examples we have the morphosyntactic analysis of a simple sentence.

Morphosyntax studies the forms and functions of words

Each word has a certain form or morphology (for example, in the sentence "girls study with their friends" the determiners, nouns and verb of the sentence are in their plural form). At the same time, words and their combinations have specific functions (subject, predicate, complement, etc.).

If we talk about morphology, it should be noted that there are eight different categories of words: nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, articles and pronouns. If we refer to the syntax, we will try to analyze what functions each of the different categories of words fulfill, that is, what they are for.

Other parts of grammar

In addition to morphology and syntax, grammar has other parts, such as semantics, phonetics, phonology, or spelling.

- Semantics studies the meaning of words and their relationships (for example, synonymy, antonymy or polysemy).

- Phonetics studies how the sounds of words are pronounced, while phonology deals with the sound system of each language (for example, Spanish has five vowel phonemes and 19 consonant phonemes).

- Finally, spelling focuses on the rules that govern writing.

Photos: Fotolia - Alla72 / Lorelyn Medina

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