In
traditional grammar, a
predicate is one of the two main parts of a
sentence, the other being the
subject. The predicate is said to
modify the subject. For the simple sentence "The apple is red,"
The apple acts as the subject, and
is red acts as the predicate. The predicate is much like a
verb phrase.
In
linguistic semantics (notably
truth-conditional semantics), a predicate is an expression that can be
true of something; it expresses a relationship or property of an
argument in a
clause. Thus, the expressions "is yellow" or "is like broccoli" are true of those things that are yellow or like broccoli, respectively. This notion is closely related to the notion of a predicate in
formal logic, which includes more expressions than the former one, such as
nouns and some kinds of
adjectives.
Predicate in traditional English grammar
A predicate is one of the two main parts of a
sentence (the other being the
subject, which the predicate
modifies). The predicate must contain a
verb, and the verb requires, permits, or precludes other sentence elements to complete the predicate. These elements are:
objects (direct, indirect, prepositional),
predicatives,
adverbs:
She <u>dances</u>. (verb-only predicate)Ben <u>reads 'the book
.</u> (direct object)Ben's mother, Felicity, <u>gave 'me
a present.</u> (indirect object without a preposition)She <u>listened 'to the......
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