Periphrasis

Periphrasis

In linguistics, periphrasis is a device by which a grammatical category or relationship is expressed by a free morpheme (typically one or more function words modifying a content word), instead of being shown by inflection or derivation. For example, the English future tense is periphrastic: it is formed with an auxiliary verb ("shall" or "will") followed by the base form of the main verb. Another example is the comparative and superlative forms of adjectives, when they are formed with the words "more" and "most" rather than with the suffixes "-er" and "-est": the forms "more beautiful" and "most beautiful" are periphrastic, while "lovelier" and "loveliest" are not. [cite book| title=A Student's Dictionary of Language and Linguistics| last=Trask| first=R. L.| publisher=Arnold| id=ISBN 0-340-65266-7| year=1997| location=London| pages=166]

Periphrasis is a characteristic of analytic languages, which tend to avoid inflection. Even synthetic languages, which are highly inflected, sometimes make use of periphrasis to fill out an inflectional paradigm that is missing certain forms. [cite book| last=Stump |first=Gregory T. |chapter=Inflection |title=The Handbook of Morphology |editor=Andrew Spencer and Arnold M. Zwicky (eds.) |pages=13–43 |year=1998 |publisher=Blackwell |location=Oxford |id=ISBN 0-631-18544-5]

A comparison of some Latin forms with their English translations shows that English uses periphrasis in many instances where Latin uses inflection:

References

See also

* Adposition
* Analytic language
* Compound verb
* Deflexion (linguistics)
* Grammatical particle
* Phrase


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  • periphrasis — (n.) 1530s, from L. periphrasis circumlocution, from Gk. periphrasis, from periphrazein speak in a roundabout way, from peri round about (see PERI (Cf. peri )) + phrazein to express (see PHRASE (Cf. phrase) (n.)) …   Etymology dictionary

  • Periphrasis — Pe*riph ra*sis, n.; pl. {Periphrases}. [L.] See {Periphrase}. [1913 Webster] …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • Periphrasis — Periphrasis, griech., Periphrasie, Umschreibung; in der Rhetorik Figur, wobei man die Merkmale eines Gegenstandes anführt, ohne den Namen desselben zu nennen …   Herders Conversations-Lexikon

  • periphrasis — index digression, indirection (indirect action) Burton s Legal Thesaurus. William C. Burton. 2006 …   Law dictionary

  • periphrasis — *verbiage, redundancy, tautology, pleonasm, circumlocution …   New Dictionary of Synonyms

  • periphrasis — ► NOUN (pl. periphrases) ▪ the use of indirect and roundabout language; circumlocution. DERIVATIVES periphrastic adjective. ORIGIN from Greek peri around + phrazein declare …   English terms dictionary

  • periphrasis — [per′i frāz΄pə rif′rə sis] n. pl. periphrases [pə rif′rəsēz΄] [L < Gr < peri , around + phrazein, to speak] 1. the use of many words where one or a few would do; roundabout way of speaking or writing; circumlocution 2. an expression that is …   English World dictionary

  • periphrasis — /peuh rif reuh sis/, n., pl. periphrases / seez /. 1. the use of an unnecessarily long or roundabout form of expression; circumlocution. 2. an expression phrased in such fashion. Also, periphrase /per euh frayz /. [1525 35; < L < Gk períphrasis.… …   Universalium

  • periphrasis — UK [pəˈrɪfrəsɪs] / US noun [countable/uncountable] Word forms periphrasis : singular periphrasis plural periphrases linguistics the practice of expressing something in a more complicated indirect way than is necessary, or something that is… …   English dictionary

  • periphrasis — noun (plural periphrases) Etymology: Latin, from Greek, from periphrazein to express periphrastically, from peri + phrazein to point out Date: 1533 1. use of a longer phrasing in place of a possible shorter form of expression 2. an instance of… …   New Collegiate Dictionary

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