8 Parts of Speech

The single most greatest invention made by man is language, according to me. Just think about it! What would we do without words to guide us? There are many kinds of words that come together to make a meaningful sentence in the English language. As the language evolved, eight parts of speech were identified. You could say that there are eight types of words that you must know about.

Parts of Speech: With Definition & Examples

Thinking about the elements of speech takes me back to my early school days, as I am reminded of the excitement of learning a new language. To be able to express yourself in a coherent fashion and to describe the world around you, words are needed. Here are the 8 parts of speech, that make it possible for us to have a meaningful dialog.

Noun
The most important type of words and perhaps the most abundant of them all are nouns. Noun is a name given to any person or anything in this world. Examples are 'Boy', 'Girl', 'Dog', 'Arthur', 'Rebecca'. They can be specific names of people or places, called special nouns or common nouns which are names of class of things. For example, 'boy' is common noun, while 'Harry' is a special noun. These are just two prime types of nouns.

Pronouns
Another part of speech is a pronoun, which is used in place of a noun. Examples are 'he', 'she', 'I' and 'it'. They can also specify the gender related to a noun.

Adjectives
The words used to describe nouns are called adjectives. Examples are 'good', 'bad' and 'ugly'. They are used to describe qualities of a noun or describe them in more detail.

Verbs
Words that describe 'actions' are called verbs. Examples are 'fighting', 'running', 'swimming', 'jumping' and 'thinking'

Adverbs
To describe actions, you need adverbs. They describe actions in greater detail. Examples of adverbs are 'ferociously', 'lovingly' and 'quickly'.

Conjunctions
To connect clauses of a sentence together, you need conjunctions. Examples of conjunctions are 'and', 'but' and 'because'.

Prepositions
Prepositions are words that connect nouns with other words. They are used to describe the connection between things. Examples of prepositions are 'on', 'at', 'over', 'before' and 'after'.

Interjections
The words used to express strong emotions are called interjections. Examples of interjections are 'Hi', 'Oh' and 'Ouch'.

Our world follows certain causal rules and to describe such a world you need these parts of speech. Every change in this world can be described as an effect of a cause. So most sentences must have a word for the 'doer' (the cause), described by the noun, a word for an action, described by a verb and a word for what is acted upon, described by another noun. To describe the 'doer' you must have adjectives, (to avoid repetition and introduce gender differences you need a pronoun), to describe the action you must have an adverb, to describe the connection between things, you need preposition and to continue saying more you need a conjunction. Lastly, to express the reaction to actions, you need an interjection!