prepositionspostpositions

Prepositions and postpositions are classes of adpositions—function words that express grammatical relations between a noun phrase and other elements in a clause. They encode spatial, temporal, directional, maker or recipient, possession, and other relations. The key distinction is where the relational marker attaches: prepositions occur before the noun phrase they govern, while postpositions follow the noun phrase.

In languages with prepositions, a prepositional phrase is formed as a preposition plus a noun phrase, as in English in the house, on the table, after the rain. In languages with postpositions, the noun phrase is followed by a postpositional particle or postposition that marks the relation, as in Japanese with particles after the noun to indicate case or function, such as neko o taberu (eat cat) where o marks the direct object; other particles like ni, de mark location or means.

Some languages rely heavily on postpositions, others on prepositions, and some use a combination. The broader term adposition covers both, and linguistic typology often describes languages as prepositional, postpositional, or mixed. In many cases, the choice of pre- or postposing correlates with other grammatical features such as word order and case marking; some languages express the same relation with a preposition, a postposition, or with morphological suffixes on the noun.

Historically, the distinction reflects divergent grammaticalization paths: adpositions can arise from verbs or nouns, and their order relative to the noun phrase can influence syntactic structure and case systems. The study of prepositions and postpositions illuminates cross-linguistic variation in how languages encode spatial and temporal relations.