Object (grammar)
Encyclopedia
An object in grammar
is part of a sentence
, and often part of the predicate
. It denotes somebody or something involved in the subject's "performance" of the verb
. Basically, it is what or whom the verb is acting upon. As an example, the following sentence is given:
In the sentence "Bobby kicked the ball", "ball" is the object.
"Bobby" is the subject
(the agent, doer, or performer of the action), "kick" is the action, and "ball" is the object (what or whom the action of the verb is acting upon).
The main verb in the sentence determines whether there can or must be objects in the sentence, and if so how many and of what type. (See also Valency (linguistics)
.) In many languages, however, including English
, the same verb can allow multiple different structures; for example, "Bobby kicked" and "Bobby kicked the ball" are both valid English sentences.
objects, and non-prepositional indirect objects. A direct object answers the question "What?", while an indirect object answers the question "To whom?" or "For whom?". An indirect object is the recipient of the direct object, or an otherwise affected participant in the event. There must be a direct object for an indirect object to be placed in a sentence. Some examples:
In many languages, including German
, Latin
, and Classical Arabic
, objects can change form slightly (decline
) to indicate what kind of object they are (their case
). This does not happen in English (except for a few pronouns that do have separate subject
and object forms, such as he versus him); rather, the type of object is indicated strictly by word order
. Also, some objects are treated differently from others in particular languages. In Spanish, for example, human objects have to get a preposition 'a'. This is called differential object marking
.
in some sense. Common forms include:
case
. In many languages, the patient of a ditransitive
verb is marked in the same way as the single object of a monotransitive verb, and is called the direct object. The recipient has its own marking, and is called the indirect object. In Latin and many other languages, the direct object is marked by the accusative case
, while the indirect object is typically marked by the dative case
.
In more isolating language
s such as English
, objects are marked by their position in the sentence or using adposition
s (like to in I gave a book to him). Modern English preserves a case distinction for pronouns, but it has conflated the accusative and the dative into a single objective form (him, her, me, etc., which may function either as direct or indirect objects).
In some languages, the recipient of a ditransitive verb is marked in the same way as the single object of a monotransitive verb, and is called the primary object. The patient of ditransitive verbs has its own marking, and is called the secondary object. Such languages are called dechticaetiative language
s, and are mostly found among African languages.
An object can be turned into a syntactic
subject
using passive voice
, if the language in question has such a construction. In dative languages, the direct object is promoted, while in dechticaetiative languages the primary object is promoted. English
shares this property with dechticaetiative languages, since non-prepositional indirect objects can be promoted:
In the immense majority of languages, where there is a preferred word order in the sentence, the object is placed somewhere after the subject. Analytic languages additionally tend to place the object after the verb, so that it remains separate from the subject.
Grammar
In linguistics, grammar is the set of structural rules that govern the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in any given natural language. The term refers also to the study of such rules, and this field includes morphology, syntax, and phonology, often complemented by phonetics, semantics,...
is part of a sentence
Sentence (linguistics)
In the field of linguistics, a sentence is an expression in natural language, and often defined to indicate a grammatical unit consisting of one or more words that generally bear minimal syntactic relation to the words that precede or follow it...
, and often part of the predicate
Predicate (grammar)
There are two competing notions of the predicate in theories of grammar. Traditional grammar tends to view a predicate as one of two main parts of a sentence, the other being the subject, which the predicate modifies. The other understanding of predicates is inspired from work in predicate calculus...
. It denotes somebody or something involved in the subject's "performance" of the verb
Verb
A verb, from the Latin verbum meaning word, is a word that in syntax conveys an action , or a state of being . In the usual description of English, the basic form, with or without the particle to, is the infinitive...
. Basically, it is what or whom the verb is acting upon. As an example, the following sentence is given:
In the sentence "Bobby kicked the ball", "ball" is the object.
"Bobby" is the subject
Subject (grammar)
The subject is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e...
(the agent, doer, or performer of the action), "kick" is the action, and "ball" is the object (what or whom the action of the verb is acting upon).
The main verb in the sentence determines whether there can or must be objects in the sentence, and if so how many and of what type. (See also Valency (linguistics)
Valency (linguistics)
In linguistics, verb valency or valence refers to the number of arguments controlled by a verbal predicate. It is related, though not identical, to verb transitivity, which counts only object arguments of the verbal predicate...
.) In many languages, however, including English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, the same verb can allow multiple different structures; for example, "Bobby kicked" and "Bobby kicked the ball" are both valid English sentences.
Types of object
Objects fall into classes: direct objects, adpositionalAdposition
Prepositions are a grammatically distinct class of words whose most central members characteristically express spatial relations or serve to mark various syntactic functions and semantic roles...
objects, and non-prepositional indirect objects. A direct object answers the question "What?", while an indirect object answers the question "To whom?" or "For whom?". An indirect object is the recipient of the direct object, or an otherwise affected participant in the event. There must be a direct object for an indirect object to be placed in a sentence. Some examples:
- In "Danielle ate fruit", fruit is the direct object of the verb ate. It corresponds to the accusativeAccusative caseThe accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
of languages with grammatical caseGrammatical caseIn grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates its grammatical function in a phrase, clause, or sentence. For example, a pronoun may play the role of subject , of direct object , or of possessor...
s. - In "They sent him a postcard", him is the (non-prepositional) indirect object of the verb sent (which uses a double-object construction). It typically corresponds to the dative caseDative caseThe dative case is a grammatical case generally used to indicate the noun to whom something is given, as in "George gave Jamie a drink"....
. - In "We listened to the radio", radio is the object of the preposition to, and the prepositional object of the simple pastSimple PastThe simple past, sometimes called the preterite, is the past tense of Modern English. It is used to describe events in the past. It may combine with either or both of two aspects, the perfect and the progressive...
of the phrasal verbPhrasal verbA phrasal verb is a combination of a verb and a preposition, a verb and an adverb, or a verb with both an adverb and a preposition, any of which are part of the syntax of the sentence, and so are a complete semantic unit. Sentences may contain direct and indirect objects in addition to the phrasal...
to listen to. It can correspond to a variety of cases and complementsComplement (linguistics)In grammar the term complement is used with different meanings. The primary meaning is a word, phrase or clause that is necessary in a sentence to complete its meaning. We find complements that function as an argument and complements that exist within arguments.Both complements and modifiers add...
.
In many languages, including German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
, and Classical Arabic
Classical Arabic
Classical Arabic , also known as Qur'anic or Koranic Arabic, is the form of the Arabic language used in literary texts from Umayyad and Abbasid times . It is based on the Medieval dialects of Arab tribes...
, objects can change form slightly (decline
Declension
In linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and articles to indicate number , case , and gender...
) to indicate what kind of object they are (their case
Grammatical case
In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates its grammatical function in a phrase, clause, or sentence. For example, a pronoun may play the role of subject , of direct object , or of possessor...
). This does not happen in English (except for a few pronouns that do have separate subject
Subject (grammar)
The subject is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e...
and object forms, such as he versus him); rather, the type of object is indicated strictly by word order
Word order
In linguistics, word order typology refers to the study of the order of the syntactic constituents of a language, and how different languages can employ different orders. Correlations between orders found in different syntactic subdomains are also of interest...
. Also, some objects are treated differently from others in particular languages. In Spanish, for example, human objects have to get a preposition 'a'. This is called differential object marking
Differential object marking
Differential object marking is a linguistic phenomenon that is present in more than 300 languages; the term was coined by Georg Bossong. In languages where DOM is active, direct objects are divided in two different classes, depending on different meanings, and, in most DOM languages, only one of...
.
Forms of object
An object may take any of a number of forms, all of them nominalNominal (linguistics)
In linguistics, a nominal is a part of speech in some languages that shares features with nouns and adjectives.- Examples :Nominals are a common feature of Indigenous Australian languages, many of which do not categorically differentiate nouns from adjectives.Some features of nominals in some...
in some sense. Common forms include:
- A nounNounIn linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition .Lexical categories are defined in terms of how their members combine with other kinds of...
or noun phrase, as in "I remembered her advice." - An infinitiveInfinitiveIn grammar, infinitive is the name for certain verb forms that exist in many languages. In the usual description of English, the infinitive of a verb is its basic form with or without the particle to: therefore, do and to do, be and to be, and so on are infinitives...
or infinitival clause, as in "I remembered to eat." - A gerundGerundIn linguistics* As applied to English, it refers to the usage of a verb as a noun ....
or gerund phrase, as in "I remembered being there." - A declarative content clauseContent clauseIn grammar, a content clause is a subordinate clause that provides content implied by, or commented upon by, its main clause. The term was coined by Otto Jespersen...
, as in "I remembered that he was blond." - An interrogative content clause, as in "I remembered why she had left."
- A fused relative clauseRelative clauseA relative clause is a subordinate clause that modifies a noun phrase, most commonly a noun. For example, the phrase "the man who wasn't there" contains the noun man, which is modified by the relative clause who wasn't there...
, as in "I remembered what she wanted me to do."
The object in linguistics
In inflected languages, objects may be marked using morphologicalMorphology (linguistics)
In linguistics, morphology is the identification, analysis and description, in a language, of the structure of morphemes and other linguistic units, such as words, affixes, parts of speech, intonation/stress, or implied context...
case
Grammatical case
In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates its grammatical function in a phrase, clause, or sentence. For example, a pronoun may play the role of subject , of direct object , or of possessor...
. In many languages, the patient of a ditransitive
Transitivity (grammatical category)
In linguistics, transitivity is a property of verbs that relates to whether a verb can take direct objects and how many such objects a verb can take...
verb is marked in the same way as the single object of a monotransitive verb, and is called the direct object. The recipient has its own marking, and is called the indirect object. In Latin and many other languages, the direct object is marked by the accusative case
Accusative case
The accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
, while the indirect object is typically marked by the dative case
Dative case
The dative case is a grammatical case generally used to indicate the noun to whom something is given, as in "George gave Jamie a drink"....
.
In more isolating language
Isolating language
An isolating language is a type of language with a low morpheme-per-word ratio — in the extreme case of an isolating language words are composed of a single morpheme...
s such as English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, objects are marked by their position in the sentence or using adposition
Adposition
Prepositions are a grammatically distinct class of words whose most central members characteristically express spatial relations or serve to mark various syntactic functions and semantic roles...
s (like to in I gave a book to him). Modern English preserves a case distinction for pronouns, but it has conflated the accusative and the dative into a single objective form (him, her, me, etc., which may function either as direct or indirect objects).
In some languages, the recipient of a ditransitive verb is marked in the same way as the single object of a monotransitive verb, and is called the primary object. The patient of ditransitive verbs has its own marking, and is called the secondary object. Such languages are called dechticaetiative language
Dechticaetiative language
A dechticaetiative language is a language in which the indirect objects of ditransitive verbs are treated like the direct objects of monotransitive verbs. Etymologically, the first morpheme of the term comes from Greek dekhomai "to take, receive"; the second is obscure, but it is remotely possible...
s, and are mostly found among African languages.
An object can be turned into a syntactic
Syntax
In linguistics, syntax is the study of the principles and rules for constructing phrases and sentences in natural languages....
subject
Subject (grammar)
The subject is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e...
using passive voice
Passive voice
Passive voice is a grammatical voice common in many of the world's languages. Passive is used in a clause whose subject expresses the theme or patient of the main verb. That is, the subject undergoes an action or has its state changed. A sentence whose theme is marked as grammatical subject is...
, if the language in question has such a construction. In dative languages, the direct object is promoted, while in dechticaetiative languages the primary object is promoted. English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
shares this property with dechticaetiative languages, since non-prepositional indirect objects can be promoted:
- Direct object: His colleagues sent him a postcard.
- A postcard was sent to him (by his colleagues).
- Indirect object: His colleagues sent him a postcard.
- He was sent a postcard (by his colleagues).
In the immense majority of languages, where there is a preferred word order in the sentence, the object is placed somewhere after the subject. Analytic languages additionally tend to place the object after the verb, so that it remains separate from the subject.
See also
- Objective (grammar)Objective (grammar)An objective pronoun in grammar functions as the target of a verb, as distinguished from a subjective pronoun, which is the initiator of a verb. Objective pronouns are instances of the oblique case....
- Oblique caseOblique caseAn oblique case in linguistics is a noun case of synthetic languages that is used generally when a noun is the object of a verb or a preposition...
- Prepositional pronounPrepositional pronounA prepositional pronoun is a special form of a personal pronoun that is used as the object of a preposition.English does not have distinct prepositional forms of pronouns. The same set of objective pronouns are used after verbs and prepositions...