How Language Use Varies

1. Some Linguistic Tools How Language Use Varies

2. Word Level Analysis Lexical Categories (Parts of Speech)

3. Lexical Categories

4. Nouns Nouns name people, places, and things. Every noun can further be classified as common or proper. A common noun names general items.

5. Proper vs. Common Nouns The repeated use of proper nouns (i.e. the name of a particular person or place) instead of using appropriate common nouns or pronouns can be a characteristic of a formal written text.

6. Abstract vs. Concrete Nouns Concrete nouns register on your five senses but not abstract nouns, which represent abstract concepts or qualities such as interest, beauty.

7. Abstract vs. Concrete Nouns The frequent use of abstract nouns (i.e. nouns that refer to ideas or concepts) can be a characteristic of a scholarly text.

8. Gender The use of gender-neutral nouns (e.g. chairperson), instead of gender-marked nouns (e.g. chairman) can be an indication of the writer’s attitudes towards women and men in society.

9. Verbs A verb is a word that usually denotes an action (bring, read), an occurrence (decompose, glitter), or a state of being (exist, stand).

10. Tense The use of present tense can underscore the factual orientation or give the impression of universal truths.

11. Voice The use of passive voice (rather than active) can be a way of depersonalizing a text – e.g. highlighting institutional procedures rather than individual concerns. The focus is on the action / process instead of the agent (the person or force) behind the action or process.

12. Transitive vs. Intransitive Verbs The use of a lot of intransitive verbs (i.e. verbs without an object) in a text may indicate the description of actions which exist by themselves, and are not done on objects, things or people. The frequent use of transitive verbs (i.e. verbs which need an object) may indicate the description of actions which have effects on objects, things or people.

13. Adjectives An adjective is a word that tells us more about a noun or a pronoun. An adjective describes or modifies a noun.

14. Adjectives Adjectivesusually answer three questions about the nouns they describe:

15. Adjectives Adjectives can be used in a text as qualitative attributes. By qualifying nouns, they can help express the writer’s feelings and attitudes towards a certain object or issue. The use of more or fewer adjectives can also result in the descriptive richness or sparseness of a text, which in turn can suggest features of a particular genre.

16. Adverbs An adverb is a part of speech that describes or modifies a verb, an adjective, another adverb, clause, or sentence. Adverbsanswer the questions "How?", "When?", "Where?", "Why?", "In what way?", "How much?", "How often?", "Under what condition", "To what degree?"

17. Adverbs The easiest adverbs to recognize are those that end in -ly. Some adjectives end with -ly also but remember that adjectives can modify only nouns and pronouns. Adverbs modify everything else. An adverb can be placed anywhere in a sentence.

18. Adverbs Adverbs or adverbial phrases may indicate circumstance e.g. time, place and manner etc. Like adjectives, adverbs or adverbial phrases that indicate circumstances can give more description to a text.

19. Adverbs Adverbs or adverbial phrases may indicate modality, i.e. degrees of possibility, frequency, obligation, intensity etc.