Descriptive Grammar Flashcards (Presentations 1-13)

Fill-in-the-blank practice flashcards covering key topics across Descriptive Grammar presentations 1 to 13.

English is classified historically as a Germanic, __________ language.

Indo-European

__________ grammar describes facts of linguistic usage as they are, not as they ought to be.

Descriptive

In morphology, an abstract unit of meaning and fundamental unit of the mental lexicon is called a __________.

lexeme

Operations that put together two or more meaningful elements, such as affixation and compounding, are __________ processes.

concatenative

The subtraction of word material resembling a suffix from an existing form (e.g., editor -> edit) is known as __________.

backformation

Nouns like monk/nun illustrate a morphologically __________ masculine/feminine distinction.

unspecified

Nouns such as friend, teacher, and artist that can refer to both male and female persons are called __________ nouns.

dual-gender

The genitive marker in 'the king of Sweden's decision' illustrates a __________ genitive.

group

Backward textual reference to an antecedent already mentioned is known as __________ reference.

anaphoric

An adjective that directly ascribes a property to the head referent and can occur both pre-head and as subject complement is an __________ adjective.

inherent

In verb paradigms, when different grammatical functions are represented by the same surface form, this is called __________.

syncretism

Modal operators lack non-tensed forms and take a bare infinitive complement, with the exception of __________.

ought

A base-form clause that semantically expresses requests, commands, directives, or instructions is called a __________ clause.

jussive

In constituent structure analysis, the syntactically obligatory element responsible for selecting dependents is the __________.

head

Basic, main/independent, declarative, positive, and thematically unmarked clauses are called __________ clauses.

kernel

Unlike and or or, the coordinator __________ is limited to two coordinated units and cannot recursively join an unlimited series.

but

In valency grammar, a verb requiring three participants/dependents is called a __________ verb.

trivalent

Split subordinator markers such as so/such…that or either…or are classified as __________ subordinators.

discontinuous

Adverbial clauses derived from a clause with be + adjective, past participle, or PP without a verb are called __________ adverbial clauses.

verbless

A yes/no question that implies an expected answer is termed a __________ yes/no question.

conducive

An interrogative in structure that functions as a strong assertive and expects no answer is a __________ question.

rhetorical

Prototypical imperative clauses lack tense inflection and use the __________ form of the verb.

base

Exclamative clauses are introduced by either what or __________.

how

In __________ inversion, only the first verb or operator changes position with the subject.

partial

Full inversion in informal speech is generally avoided except especially after here/there and __________ adverbs.

directional

A dependent selected according to the lexical nature of the predicator that usually cannot be omitted is a __________.

complement

Personal pronouns functioning as direct or indirect objects take the __________ case.

objective

Verb complementation following the pattern S + V + Subject Complement is classified as __________ complementation.

intensive

A verb followed by an adverbial particle that changes the lexical meaning of the verb is a __________ verb.

phrasal

A verb that takes a non-finite verbal complement is known as a __________ verb.

catenative