object

Also known as object (traditional grammar), OBJ

grammatical term; argument in a proposition

AI overview

In grammar, an object is a word or phrase that receives the action of a verb or follows a preposition in a sentence. Understanding objects helps clarify how different parts of a sentence relate to each other and what roles they play in conveying meaning.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Wikidata facts

Image: Grammatical objects.svg

Show 1 more fact

short name: OBJ

Sources (5)

via Wikidata · CC0

~6 min read

Article

In linguistics, an object is any of several types of arguments. In subject-prominent, nominative-accusative languages such as English, a transitive verb typically distinguishes between its subject and any of its objects, which can include but are not limited to direct objects, indirect objects, and arguments of adpositions (prepositions or postpositions); the latter are more accurately termed oblique arguments, thus including other arguments not covered by core grammatical roles, such as those governed by case morphology (as in languages such as Latin) or relational nouns (as is typical for members of the Mesoamerican Linguistic Area). In ergative-absolutive languages, for example most Australian Aboriginal languages, the term "subject" is ambiguous, and thus the term "agent" is often used instead to contrast with "object", such that basic word order is described as agent–object–verb (AOV) instead of subject–object–verb (SOV). Topic-prominent languages, such as Mandarin, focus their grammars less on the subject-object or agent-object dichotomies but rather on the pragmatic dichotomy of topic and comment.

Types