syntax

See also: Syntax

English

Etymology

Partly from Late Latin syntaxis and partly from its etymon, Ancient Greek σύνταξις (súntaxis), from σύν (sún, together) + τάξις (táxis, arrangement), from τάσσω (tássō, I arrange).[1] Doublet of syntaxis.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈsɪn.tæks/
  • Audio (Southern England):(file)
  • Homophone: sin tax

Noun

syntax (plural syntaxes or syntaces or (proscribed) syntices)

  1. A set of rules that govern how words are combined to form phrases and sentences.
    • 1988, Andrew Radford, chapter 8, in Transformational grammar: a first course, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, page 410:
        The incorporation of a rule of V MOVEMENT into our description of English Syntax turns out to have fundamental theoretical implications for our overall Theory of Grammar: it means that we are no longer able to posit that the syntactic structure of a sentence can be described in terms of a single Phrase-marker representing its S-structure. For, the postulation of a rule of V-MOVEMENT means that we must recognise at least two different levels of structure in our Theory of Grammar — namely, a level of D-structure (formerly known as ‘Deep Structureʼ) which serves as input to the rule, and a separate level of S-structure which is formed by application of the rule.
  2. (computing, countable) The formal rules of formulating the statements of a computer language.
  3. (linguistics) The study of the structure of phrases, sentences, and language.
    • 2021 May 29, Richard Nordquist, “What Is Headlinese?”, in ThoughtCo[1]:
      [Otto] Jespersen, a language professor known for his expertise in syntax and language development, stated that headlinese is not really grammatical writing.

Usage notes

The joke plural syntices occasionally occurs in blogs (by false analogy with matrix etc.); the rare plural syntaces may also be formed using that analogy. (In Latin, the plural of syntaxis is syntaxes.)

Synonyms

Derived terms

English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European root *teh₂g- (2 c, 0 e)

Translations

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

See also

References

  1. ^ syntax, n.”, in OED Online , Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.

Czech

Noun

syntax f (relational adjective syntaktický)

  1. (linguistics, computing) syntax
    Synonyms: syntaxe f, skladba

Declension

Slovak

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈsin.taks/

Noun

syntax f

  1. (linguistics) syntax

Declension

Declension of syntax
(pattern dlaň)
singularplural
nominativesyntaxsyntaxe
genitivesyntaxesyntaxí
dativesyntaxisyntaxiam
accusativesyntaxsyntaxe
locativesyntaxisyntaxiach
instrumentalsyntaxousyntaxami

Derived terms

Further reading

  • syntax”, in Slovníkový portál Jazykovedného ústavu Ľ. Štúra SAV [Dictionary portal of the Ľ. Štúr Institute of Linguistics, Slovak Academy of Science] (in Slovak), https://slovnik.juls.savba.sk, 2003–2026

Swedish

Noun

syntax c

  1. a syntax, a (formal) grammar

Declension

References