Phrase

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Phrase

A phrase is a group of words that form what the dictionary calls 'a conceptual unit' (an idea
contained in a few words). Phrases normally form parts of clauses. A phrase is not a sentence
on its own. phrases do not make sense on their own as they do not have a subject and
predicate.

In syntax and grammar, a phrase is a group of words which act together as a grammatical unit.
For instance, the English expression "the very happy squirrel" is a noun phrase which contains
the adjective phrase "very happy". Phrases can consist of a single word or a complete sentence.
In theoretical linguistics, phrases are often analyzed as units of syntactic structure such as a
constituent.

There is a difference between the common use of the term phrase and its technical use in linguistics.
In common usage, a phrase is usually a group of words with some special idiomatic meaning or
other significance, such as "all rights reserved", "economical with the truth", "kick the bucket", and
the like. It may be a euphemism, a saying or proverb, a fixed expression, a figure of speech, etc.. In
linguistics, these are known as phrasemes.

Phraseme
A phraseme, also called a set phrase, idiomatic phrase, multi-word expression (in
computational linguistics), or idiom, is a multi-word or multi-morphemic utterance where at least
one of whose components is selectively constrained or restricted by linguistic convention such
that it is not freely chosen. In the most extreme cases, there are expressions such as X kicks
the bucket ≈ ‘person X dies of natural causes, the speaker being flippant about X’s demise’
where the unit is selected as a whole to express a meaning that bears little or no relation to the
meanings of its parts. All of the words in this expression are chosen restrictedly, as part of a
chunk.

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Types of Phrases
1.Noun Phrase

A noun phrase co. It functions like a noun in a sentence with all its other determiners that modify
the noun. The noun is the headword of the sentence and others are put after or before the noun.

A noun phrase consists of a noun as the headword and other words (usually modifiers and
determiners) that come after or before the noun. The complete phrase serves as a noun in a
sente

Noun Phrase = noun + modifiers

Examples:

She is wearing a beautiful saree. (as noun/object)

She bought herself a watch. (as noun/object)

The house with cobwebs is abandoned. (as noun/subject)

A man on the roof was shouting. (as noun/subject)

A sentence can also contain more noun phrases.

For example, The girl with green eyes bought a cute cat.

2.Adjective Phrase

An adjective phrase is a group of words along with its modifiers, that functions as an adjective in
a sentence. .An adjective phrase works as an adjective to transform (or tell about) a noun or a
pronoun in a sentence.

Examples:

He is wearing a strong flowery perfume. (modifies perfume)

Cinderella looked gorgeous in her white gown. (modifies cinderella)

He gave me a glass full of wine. (modifies glass)

A boy from Australia won the race. (modifies boy)

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Prepositional phrases and participle phrases also serve as adjectives so we can also call them
adjective phrases when they function as an adjective. In the above sentence

3.Prepositional Phrase

These phrases are the most commonly used phrases. These will be found everywhere, in a
sentence, clause, and even phrases. The preposition phrase always begins with a preposition
and noun and pronoun are its objects. Such as, in the room, from the shop to the library, etc.

The object of a preposition can possess its own modifiers, which also are part of the
prepositional phrase.

Examples:

The women in suffocating attire looked tired and annoyed.

He sat by the rushing river to write his poem.

Let me go to the room.

4.The Participial Phrase/ Verb Phrase/ Adverb Phrase

5.The Gerund Phrase

6.The Infinitive Phrase

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