part of speech: meaning, definition, pronunciation and examples
MediumTechnical/Educational
Quick answer
What does “part of speech” mean?
A category to which a word is assigned in accordance with its grammatical function, such as noun, verb, adjective, etc.
Audio
Pronunciation
Definition
Meaning and Definition
A category to which a word is assigned in accordance with its grammatical function, such as noun, verb, adjective, etc.
The function or role a word plays in the structure of a sentence; the primary classification system in traditional grammar.
Dialectal Variation
British vs American Usage
Differences
No significant differences in meaning or usage. The concept is identical across varieties. Spelling is consistent ('part of speech').
Connotations
Neutral, technical term in both regions.
Frequency
Slightly more common in British educational materials due to a stronger traditional focus on grammar teaching, but the difference is minimal.
Grammar
How to Use “part of speech” in a Sentence
What part of speech is X?The word X functions as a part of speech.It belongs to the part of speech known as Y.Can you identify the part of speech?Vocabulary
Collocations
Examples
Examples of “part of speech” in a Sentence
verb
British English
- The teacher asked the pupils to *part of speech* the words in the list.
- Can you *part of speech* this unknown vocabulary item?
American English
- Linguists often *part of speech* ambiguous words based on context.
- The software is designed to automatically *part of speech* a corpus.
adverb
British English
- He analysed the sentence, categorising each word *part-of-speech*.
- The words function *part-of-speech* within that clause.
American English
- She explained the concept *part-of-speech* by focusing on examples.
- The data was sorted *part-of-speech* for the study.
adjective
British English
- The *part-of-speech* analysis was crucial for the grammar exercise.
- He has a very *part-of-speech* oriented approach to teaching.
American English
- We need to review the *part-of-speech* tags generated by the parser.
- This is a fundamental *part-of-speech* distinction.
Usage
Meaning in Context
Business
Rarely used, except in the context of communication training or document writing guides.
Academic
Common in linguistics, language studies, and grammar textbooks. Foundational term.
Everyday
Used primarily when helping someone learn a language, discussing grammar, or in educational settings with children.
Technical
Core term in descriptive and prescriptive linguistics, natural language processing (POS tagging), and language teaching methodology.
Vocabulary
Synonyms of “part of speech”
Strong
Neutral
Weak
Vocabulary
Antonyms of “part of speech”
Watch out
Common Mistakes When Using “part of speech”
- Using 'part of speech' to mean 'a segment of a spoken presentation' (correct term: 'section of a speech').
- Confusing it with 'figure of speech'.
- Pronouncing it as 'part-of-speech' with equal stress; primary stress is on 'speech'.
- Using plural incorrectly: 'What is its parts of speech?' (correct: 'What is its part of speech?' for a single word).
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
Traditionally, eight are listed: noun, pronoun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection. Modern linguistics often uses more refined categories (e.g., determiner, particle).
Yes, many words can. For example, 'play' can be a noun ('a theatre play') or a verb ('to play football'). The part of speech is determined by its function in a specific sentence.
It provides a framework for understanding sentence structure, predicting word forms (like adding -ly to form adverbs), and using dictionaries effectively, as they list words by part of speech.
It is the process of automatically assigning a part-of-speech label (like 'NN' for noun or 'VB' for verb) to each word in a text corpus, a fundamental task in computational linguistics and natural language processing.
A category to which a word is assigned in accordance with its grammatical function, such as noun, verb, adjective, etc.
Part of speech is usually technical/educational in register.
Part of speech: in British English it is pronounced /ˌpɑːt əv ˈspiːtʃ/, and in American English it is pronounced /ˌpɑːrt əv ˈspiːtʃ/. Tap the audio buttons above to hear it.
Phrases
Idioms & Phrases
- “(No common idioms use this exact phrase)”
Learning
Memory Aids
Mnemonic
Think of a 'speech' as a sentence. Each 'part' (like a cog in a machine) has a specific job (noun, verb, etc.) to make the whole 'speech' work.
Conceptual Metaphor
GRAMMAR IS ARCHITECTURE (parts of speech are the building blocks); LANGUAGE IS A MACHINE (parts of speech are functional components).
Practice
Quiz
Which of the following is NOT primarily a concern when determining a word's part of speech?