Postpositional phrase

A postpositional phrase is a linguistic term for a phrase whose head is a postposition. The term is used in syntax.

Related Topics:
Linguistic - Phrase - Head - Postposition - Syntax

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English has prepositional phrases instead of postpositional phrases, since it does not use postpositions but prepositions, which differs in that it precedes its object. A common term for both prepositions and postpositions is adposition, prepositional and postpositional phrases sometimes commonly called adpositional phrases.

Related Topics:
English - Prepositional phrase - Preposition - Adposition - Adpositional phrase

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In languages with postpositions, for example Basque, Estonian, Finnish, Japanese and Tamil, the morpheme that corresponds to an English preposition occurs after its complement. In these languages, typical adpositional phrases would have adposition at the end in a litteral translation into English. For example:

Related Topics:
Language - Basque - Estonian - Finnish - Japanese - Tamil - Morpheme - Complement

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• The store to
• The house from
• The fence under

(Note that we treat "The X" as a single component in these examples.)

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Such phrases generally act as complements and adjuncts of noun phrases and verb phrases.

Related Topics:
Adjunct - Noun phrase - Verb phrase

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Postpositional phrase: See also ►