Grammar: Groups and phrases

Overview

What do groups and phrases look like?

Groups are simply groups of words as is implied by the name. But a group can consist of just one word or more than one word.

If there is more than one word in a group, then we need to ask the question: how are the words in a group related to one another? The answer is that one word is always the Head word of the group and the other words are Modifiers of the Head word.

If a group consists of just one word then that word will be the Head word of the group:

But if a group consists of more than one word, then one or more words will be modifying the Head word of the group. See how this works for the noun group:

noun group
Modifier	Modifier	Head
the	old	junk

for the verb group:

verb group
Modifier	Head
was	drifting

and for the adverb group:

adverb group
Modifier	Head
rather	aimlessly

But while all groups have a similar structure (a Head and possibly one or more Modifiers), each of the different groups has a different function or role to play in the clause. So, in general terms all groups have a similar structure. They consist of a Head and possibly one or more Modifiers.

Note that the terms Head and Modifier are written with a capital to remind us that they are functional terms.

Tell me more ... What are groups and phrases? What do groups and phrases do? What do groups and phrases look like? What is the structure of groups and phrases?

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