Glossary (Version 8.4)

The description of an inanimate object as though it were a person or living thing.

The way a reader/viewer is positioned by the author through the text, or how a particular ideology is embedded in a text, for example, a feminist perspective.

A unit intermediate between clause and word, consisting of a head word alone or accompanied by one or more dependents. The class of a phrase is determined by the head: a phrase with a noun as head is a noun group/phrase (for example, ‘men’ or ‘the men who died’); one with a verb as head is a verb group/phrase (for example, ‘went’ or ‘had gone’).

The opinion or viewpoint expressed by an individual in a text, for example an author, a narrator, a character or an implied reader.

A word class that usually describes the relationship between words in a sentence:

  • space (for example, ‘below’, ‘in’, ‘on’, ‘to’, ‘under’, and so on: 'She sat on the table.')
  • time (for example, ‘after’, ‘before’, ‘since’: 'I will go to the beach after lunch.')
  • those that do not relate to space and time (for example, ‘of’, ‘besides’, ‘except’, ‘despite’, and so on: ‘He ate all the beans except the purple ones')

Prepositions usually combine with a noun group/phrase to form a prepositional phrase (for example, ‘in the office’, ‘besides these two articles’).

The way a word or language is spoken. This may vary regionally (for example, American English, British English), socially (by social class of speakers, their age, educational background, sexual orientation) and according to the setting (for example, formal, informal).