Ordklass

Ordklass, or part of speech, is a grammatical category used to classify words by their functions and distribution in sentences. The concept is central to many languages, including Swedish and English, and serves as a basis for describing how words combine to form phrases and clauses.

Common word classes include nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, determiners (including articles), numerals, prepositions, conjunctions, interjections, and particles. Each class has typical roles: nouns name entities or ideas; verbs express actions, processes, or states; adjectives modify nouns; adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, or other adverbs; pronouns replace nouns; determiners indicate reference; numerals specify quantity or order; prepositions express relationships; conjunctions join words, phrases, or clauses; interjections convey emotion; particles provide functional or grammatical emphasis or mood.

Word classes interact with morphology and syntax. In inflected languages, nouns and adjectives may agree in gender, number, or case; verbs may show tense, aspect, mood, person, or voice. Definitions of classes can vary by language, and some words can shift classes depending on usage (for example, English run can be a noun or a verb). Some languages have many classes, others have fewer but rely on word order or function words to express relationships.

Applications of ordklass include linguistic analysis, language teaching, grammar writing, and natural language processing, where correct tagging of words by class supports parsing and understanding meaning.

See also: grammar, parts of speech, morphology, syntax, language teaching, Swedish grammar.