verbcentric

Verbcentric is an adjective used in linguistics to describe analyses, descriptions, or languages in which the verb lies at or near the center of the grammatical structure and semantic interpretation. In a verb-centric view, the verb often carries the core predicate information and governs the valency of surrounding arguments. Tense, aspect, mood, voice, and agreement frequently attach to or are expressed by the verb, and the surrounding nouns and phrases function in relation to the verb’s argument structure rather than forming an independent center of meaning.

The term is mostly a descriptive stance rather than a fixed typological category. It contrasts with noun-centric or noun-phrase-centric descriptions, where noun phrases or lexical nouns play a more dominant role in organizing referents, themes, and referential hierarchy. In practice, languages can display verb-centric tendencies to varying degrees, especially those with rich verbal morphology or where verb serialization and complex valency alterations are common.

In certain discussions of motion or event encoding, verb-centric descriptions align with analyses where path and event-type information is primarily encoded in the verb, though this use should be distinguished from the related verb-framed vs satellite-framed distinction in motion semantics.

Notes: The term is not uniformly standardized across languages and theories, and its meaning can vary by author. It is most often encountered in discussions of morphology, syntax, and argument structure rather than as an independent language type.