grammatical constituent

6.9

A part of a sentence, for example a word or group of words

noun
/ˈɡræmətɪkəl kənˈstɪtʃuənt/

Specialized

: constituyente gramatical

In the sentence, 'The dog barks', 'the dog' is a grammatical constituent.

Examples

The subject is a grammatical constituent that typically comes before the verb.
A noun phrase can function as a grammatical constituent within a sentence.
Understanding each grammatical constituent helps in analyzing sentence structure.
A grammatical constituent can be a single word or a group of words.
In the sentence, 'The cat sleeps', 'the cat' functions as a grammatical constituent.
A grammatical constituent can be as simple as a single word or as complex as a full clause.
To identify the main clauses, you need to recognize each grammatical constituent in the sentence.

Synonyms

constituent

vsgrammatical constituent

Specialized

2 6.3

A word, phrase or clause that is part of a larger sentence

is the same but makes clear the part is within a sentence

Surface Forms

grammatical constituent singular

grammatical constituents plural

Morphology

grammatical + constituent

The phrase's meaning is directly compositional: 'grammatical' (pertaining to language structure) modifies 'constituent' (a word/phrase/clause within a sentence), yielding a constituent relevant to grammar. This follows a regular adjective + noun pattern found across languages, so a B1 learner who knows both words will readily infer the meaning.

Etymology

Grammatical constituent comes from the simple image of a sentence as a group of building parts: grammatical links to grammar and constituent means a 'part'. So a grammatical constituent is a word, phrase, or clause that acts as a 'part' of a larger sentence.