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Antecedent (grammar) In grammar, an antecedent is one or more words that establish the meaning of a pronoun or other pro-form. [ 1] For example, in the sentence "John arrived late because traffic held him up," the word "John" is the antecedent of the pronoun "him." Pro-forms usually follow their antecedents, but sometimes precede them.
Personal pronoun. Personal pronouns are pronouns that are associated primarily with a particular grammatical person – first person (as I ), second person (as you ), or third person (as he, she, it, they ). Personal pronouns may also take different forms depending on number (usually singular or plural), grammatical or natural gender, case, and ...
Binding (linguistics) In linguistics, binding is the phenomenon in which anaphoric elements such as pronouns are grammatically associated with their antecedents. [citation needed] For instance in the English sentence "Mary saw herself", the anaphor "herself" is bound by its antecedent "Mary". Binding can be licensed or blocked in certain ...
The use of pronouns often involves anaphora, where the meaning of the pronoun is dependent on an antecedent. For example, in the sentence That poor man looks as if he needs a new coat, the meaning of the pronoun he is dependent on its antecedent, that poor man. The adjective form of the word "pronoun" is "pronominal".
Generic antecedent. Generic antecedents are representatives of classes, referred to in ordinary language by another word (most often a pronoun ), in a situation in which gender is typically unknown or irrelevant. [1] These mostly arise in generalizations and are particularly common in abstract, theoretical or strategic discourse.
English relative clauses. Relative clauses in the English language are formed principally by means of relative words. The basic relative pronouns are who, which, and that; who also has the derived forms whom and whose. Various grammatical rules and style guides determine which relative pronouns may be suitable in various situations, especially ...
The element in the main clause that the relative pronoun in the relative clause stands for (house in the above example) is the antecedent of that pronoun.In most cases the antecedent is a nominal (noun or noun phrase), though the pronoun can also refer to a whole proposition, as in "The train was late, which annoyed me greatly", where the antecedent of the relative pronoun which is the clause ...
Relative pronouns, like other pronouns in Latin, agree with their antecedents in gender and number, but not in case: a relative pronoun's case reflects its role in the relative clause it introduces, while its antecedent's case reflects the antecedent's role in the clause that contains the relative clause. (Nonetheless, it is possible for the ...