In
linguistics
Linguistics is the science, scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure ...
, a copula (plural: copulas or copulae;
abbreviated
An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...
) is a word or phrase that links the
subject of a
sentence to a
subject complement, such as the word ''is'' in the sentence "The sky is blue" or the phrase ''was not being'' in the sentence "It was not being co-operative." The word ''copula'' derives from the
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
noun for a "link" or "tie" that connects two different things.
A copula is often a
verb
A verb () is a word ( part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descr ...
or a verb-like word, though this is not universally the case.
A verb that is a copula is sometimes called a copulative or copular verb. In English
primary education grammar
In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraints, a field that includes domain ...
courses, a copula is often called a
linking verb
In traditional grammar and guide books, a linking verb is a verb that describes the subject by connecting it to a predicate adjective or predicate noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of obj ...
. In other languages, copulas show more resemblances to
pronoun
In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun (abbreviated ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase.
Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the parts of speech, but some modern theorists would not c ...
s, as in
Classical Chinese
Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning
"literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning
"literar ...
and
Guarani, or may take the form of
suffixes attached to a noun, as in
Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
,
Beja, and
Inuit languages
The Inuit languages are a closely related group of indigenous American languages traditionally spoken across the North American Arctic and adjacent subarctic, reaching farthest south in Labrador. The related Yupik languages (spoken in weste ...
.
Most languages have one main copula, although some (like
Spanish
Spanish might refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
**Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries
**Spanish cuisine
Other places
* Spanish, Ontario, Can ...
,
Portuguese
Portuguese may refer to:
* anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal
** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods
** Portuguese language, a Romance language
*** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language
** Portu ...
and
Thai) have more than one, while others have
none
None may refer to:
*Zero, the mathematical concept of the quantity "none"
* Empty set, the mathematical concept of the collection of things represented by "none"
*''none'', an indefinite pronoun in the English language
Music
* ''None'' (Meshuggah ...
. In the case of English, this is the verb ''to be''. While the term ''copula'' is generally used to refer to such principal verbs, it may also be used for a wider group of verbs with similar potential functions (like ''become'', ''get'', ''feel'' and ''seem'' in English); alternatively, these might be distinguished as "semi-copulas" or "pseudo-copulas".
Grammatical function
The principal use of a copula is to link the
subject of a
clause to a
subject complement. A copular verb is often considered to be part of the
predicate
Predicate or predication may refer to:
* Predicate (grammar), in linguistics
* Predication (philosophy)
* several closely related uses in mathematics and formal logic:
**Predicate (mathematical logic)
**Propositional function
**Finitary relation, o ...
, the remainder being called a
predicative expression. A simple clause containing a copula is illustrated below:
The book is on the table.
In that sentence, the
noun phrase
In linguistics, a noun phrase, or nominal (phrase), is a phrase that has a noun or pronoun as its head or performs the same grammatical function as a noun. Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently oc ...
''the book'' is the subject, the verb ''is'' serves as the copula, and the
prepositional phrase
An adpositional phrase, in linguistics, is a syntactic category that includes ''prepositional phrases'', ''postpositional phrases'', and ''circumpositional phrases''. Adpositional phrases contain an adposition (preposition, postposition, or ci ...
''on the table'' is the predicative expression. The whole expression ''is on the table'' may (in some theories of grammar) be called a predicate or a
verb phrase
In linguistics, a verb phrase (VP) is a syntactic unit composed of a verb and its arguments except the subject of an independent clause or coordinate clause. Thus, in the sentence ''A fat man quickly put the money into the box'', the words ''q ...
.
The predicative expression accompanying the copula, also known as the
complement
A complement is something that completes something else.
Complement may refer specifically to:
The arts
* Complement (music), an interval that, when added to another, spans an octave
** Aggregate complementation, the separation of pitch-clas ...
of the copula, may take any of several possible forms: it may be a noun or noun phrase, an
adjective
In linguistics, an adjective (abbreviated ) is a word that generally modifies a noun or noun phrase or describes its referent. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun.
Traditionally, adjectives were considered one of the ma ...
or adjective phrase, a prepositional phrase (as above) or an adverb or another adverbial phrase expressing time or location. Examples are given below (with the copula in bold and the predicative expression in italics):
The three components (subject, copula and predicative expression) do not necessarily appear in that order: their positioning depends on the rules for
word order
In linguistics, word order (also known as linear order) is the order of the syntactic constituents of a language. Word order typology studies it from a cross-linguistic perspective, and examines how different languages employ different orders. C ...
applicable to the language in question. In English (an
SVO language), the ordering given above is the normal one, but certain variation is possible:
*In many questions and other clauses with
subject–auxiliary inversion, the copula moves in front of the subject: ''Are you happy?''
*In
inverse copular constructions (see below) the predicative expression precedes the copula, but the subject follows it: ''In the room were three men.''
It is also possible, in certain circumstances, for one (or even two) of the three components to be absent:
*In
null-subject (pro-drop) languages, the subject may be omitted, as it may from other types of sentence. In
Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
, means ‘I am tired’, literally ‘am tired’.
*In
non-finite clauses in languages like English, the subject is often absent, as in the
participial phrase
In linguistics, a participle () (from Latin ' a "sharing, partaking") is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from ...
''being tired'' or the
infinitive phrase
Infinitive (abbreviated ) is a linguistics term for certain verb forms existing in many languages, most often used as non-finite verbs. As with many linguistic concepts, there is not a single definition applicable to all languages. The word is deri ...
''to be tired''. The same applies to most imperative sentences like ''Be good!''
*For cases in which no copula appears, see below.
*Any of the three components may be omitted as a result of various general types of
ellipsis
The ellipsis (, also known informally as dot dot dot) is a series of dots that indicates an intentional omission of a word, sentence, or whole section from a text without altering its original meaning. The plural is ellipses. The term origin ...
. In particular, in English, the predicative expression may be elided in a construction similar to
verb phrase ellipsis
In linguistics, verb phrase ellipsis (VP-ellipsis or VPE) is a type of elliptical construction and a type of anaphora in which a verb phrase has been left out (elided) provided that its antecedent can be found within the same linguistic context. ...
, as in short sentences like ''I am''; ''Are they?'' (where the predicative expression is understood from the previous context).
Inverse copular constructions, in which the positions of the predicative expression and the subject are reversed, are found in various languages. They have been the subject of much theoretical analysis, particularly in regard to the difficulty of maintaining, in the case of such sentences, the usual division into a subject
noun phrase
In linguistics, a noun phrase, or nominal (phrase), is a phrase that has a noun or pronoun as its head or performs the same grammatical function as a noun. Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently oc ...
and a predicate
verb phrase
In linguistics, a verb phrase (VP) is a syntactic unit composed of a verb and its arguments except the subject of an independent clause or coordinate clause. Thus, in the sentence ''A fat man quickly put the money into the box'', the words ''q ...
.
Another issue is
verb agreement when both subject and predicative expression are noun phrases (and differ in number or person): in English, the copula typically agrees with the syntactical subject even if it is not logically (i.e.
semantically
Semantics (from grc, σημαντικός ''sēmantikós'', "significant") is the study of reference, meaning, or truth. The term can be used to refer to subfields of several distinct disciplines, including philosophy, linguistics and compu ...
) the subject, as in ''the cause of the riot is'' (not ''are'') ''these pictures of the wall''. Compare Italian ; notice the use of the plural to agree with plural "these photos" rather than with singular "the cause". In instances where an English syntactical subject comprises a prepositional object that is pluralized, however, the prepositional object agrees with the predicative expression, e.g. "What kind ''of birds are'' those?"
The definition and scope of the concept of a copula is not necessarily precise in any language. As noted above, though the concept of the copula in English is most strongly associated with the verb ''to be'', there are many other verbs that can be used in a copular sense as well.
* The boy became a man.
* The girl grew more excited as the holiday preparations intensified.
* The dog felt tired from the activity.
And more tenuously
* The milk turned sour.
* The food smells good.
* You seem upset.
Meanings
Predicates formed using a copula may express identity: that the two noun phrases (subject and complement) have the same
referent or express an identical concept:
They may also express membership of a class or a
subset relationship:
Similarly they may express some property, relation or position, permanent or temporary:
Other special uses of copular verbs are described in some of the following sections.
Essence vs. state
Some languages use different copulas, or different syntax, to denote a permanent, essential characteristic of something versus a temporary state. For examples, see the sections on the
Romance languages
The Romance languages, sometimes referred to as Latin languages or Neo-Latin languages, are the various modern languages that evolved from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages in the Indo-European language ...
,
Slavic languages
The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the ...
and
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
.
Forms
In many languages the principal copula is a
verb
A verb () is a word ( part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descr ...
, like English ''(to) be'', German ,
Mixtec
The Mixtecs (), or Mixtecos, are indigenous Mesoamerican peoples of Mexico inhabiting the region known as La Mixteca of Oaxaca and Puebla as well as La Montaña Region and Costa Chica Regions of the state of Guerrero. The Mixtec Culture w ...
,
Touareg
The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berbers, Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to sou ...
''emous'',
etc. It may inflect for
grammatical categories
In linguistics, a grammatical category or grammatical feature is a property of items within the grammar of a language. Within each category there are two or more possible values (sometimes called grammemes), which are normally mutually exclusiv ...
like
tense,
aspect
Aspect or Aspects may refer to:
Entertainment
* ''Aspect magazine'', a biannual DVD magazine showcasing new media art
* Aspect Co., a Japanese video game company
* Aspects (band), a hip hop group from Bristol, England
* ''Aspects'' (Benny Carter ...
and
mood, like other verbs in the language. Being a very commonly used verb, it is likely that the copula has
irregular inflected forms; in English, the verb ''be'' has a number of highly irregular (
suppletive In linguistics and etymology, suppletion is traditionally understood as the use of one word as the inflected form of another word when the two words are not cognate. For those learning a language, suppletive forms will be seen as "irregular" or even ...
) forms and has more different inflected forms than any other English verb (''am'', ''is'', ''are'', ''was'', ''were'', etc.; see
English verbs
Verbs constitute one of the main parts of speech (word classes) in the English language. Like other types of words in the language, English verbs are not heavily inflected. Most combinations of tense, aspect, mood and voice are expressed peri ...
for details).
Other copulas show more resemblances to
pronoun
In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun (abbreviated ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase.
Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the parts of speech, but some modern theorists would not c ...
s. That is the case for
Classical Chinese
Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning
"literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning
"literar ...
and
Guarani, for instance. In highly
synthetic languages, copulas are often
suffixes, attached to a noun, but they may still behave otherwise like ordinary verbs: in
Inuit languages
The Inuit languages are a closely related group of indigenous American languages traditionally spoken across the North American Arctic and adjacent subarctic, reaching farthest south in Labrador. The related Yupik languages (spoken in weste ...
.
In some other languages, like
Beja and
Ket, the copula takes the form of suffixes that attach to a noun but are distinct from the
person agreement markers used on
predicative verb
A predicative verb is a verb that behaves as a grammatical adjective; that is, it predicates (qualifies or informs about the properties of its argument). It is a special kind of stative verb.
Many languages do not use the present forms of the ver ...
s.
This phenomenon is known as ''
nonverbal person agreement
In linguistics, conjugation () is the creation of derived forms of a verb from its principal parts by inflection (alteration of form according to rules of grammar). For instance, the verb ''break'' can be conjugated to form the words ''break'', ...
'' (or ''nonverbal subject agreement''), and the relevant markers are always established as deriving from
cliticized independent pronouns.
For cases in which the copula is omitted or takes
zero
0 (zero) is a number representing an empty quantity. In place-value notation such as the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, 0 also serves as a placeholder numerical digit, which works by multiplying digits to the left of 0 by the radix, usual ...
form, see below.
Additional uses of copular verbs
A copular verb may also have other uses supplementary to or distinct from its uses as a copula.
As auxiliary verbs
The English verb ''to be'' is also used as an
auxiliary verb
An auxiliary verb ( abbreviated ) is a verb that adds functional or grammatical meaning to the clause in which it occurs, so as to express tense, aspect, modality, voice, emphasis, etc. Auxiliary verbs usually accompany an infinitive verb or a ...
, especially for expressing
passive voice
A passive voice construction is a grammatical voice construction that is found in many languages. In a clause with passive voice, the grammatical subject expresses the ''theme'' or ''patient'' of the main verb – that is, the person or thing t ...
(together with the
past participle
In linguistics, a participle () (from Latin ' a "sharing, partaking") is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from ...
) or expressing
progressive aspect
The continuous and progressive aspects ( abbreviated and ) are grammatical aspects that express incomplete action ("to do") or state ("to be") in progress at a specific time: they are non-habitual, imperfective aspects.
In the grammars of many ...
(together with the
present participle
In linguistics, a participle () (from Latin ' a "sharing, partaking") is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from ...
):
Other languages' copulas have additional uses as auxiliaries. For example, French can be used to express passive voice similarly to English ''be''; both French and German are used to express the
perfect forms of certain verbs (formerly English ''be'' was also):
The auxiliary functions of these verbs derived from their copular function, and could be interpreted as special cases of the copular function (with the verbal forms it precedes being considered adjectival).
Another auxiliary usage in English is (together with the
''to''-infinitive) to denote an obligatory action or expected occurrence: "I am to serve you;" "The manager is to resign." This can be put also into past tense: "We were to leave at 9." For forms like "if I was/were to come," see
English conditional sentences
Prototypical conditional sentences in English are those of the form ''"If X, then Y".'' The clause ''X'' is referred to as the ''antecedent'' (or ''protasis''), while the clause ''Y'' is called the ''consequent'' (or ''apodosis''). A conditional ...
. (Note that, by certain criteria, the English copula ''be'' may always be considered an auxiliary verb; see
Diagnostics for identifying auxiliary verbs in English.)
Existential usage
The English ''to be'' and its equivalents in certain other languages also have a non-copular use as an existential verb, meaning "to exist." This use is illustrated in the following sentences: ''I want only to be, and that is enough''; ''
I think therefore I am''; ''
To be or not to be, that is the question.'' In these cases, the verb itself expresses a predicate (that of
existence
Existence is the ability of an entity to interact with reality. In philosophy, it refers to the ontological property of being.
Etymology
The term ''existence'' comes from Old French ''existence'', from Medieval Latin ''existentia/exsistentia' ...
), rather than linking to a predicative expression as it does when used as a copula. In
ontology
In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality.
Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities exi ...
it is sometimes suggested that the "is" of existence is reducible to the "is" of property attribution or class membership; to be,
Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of ph ...
held, is to be ''something''. However,
Abelard
Peter Abelard (; french: link=no, Pierre Abélard; la, Petrus Abaelardus or ''Abailardus''; 21 April 1142) was a Middle Ages, medieval French Scholasticism, scholastic philosopher, leading logician, theologian, poet, composer and musician. This ...
in his ''Dialectica'' made a ''
reductio ad absurdum
In logic, (Latin for "reduction to absurdity"), also known as (Latin for "argument to absurdity") or ''apagogical arguments'', is the form of argument that attempts to establish a claim by showing that the opposite scenario would lead to absu ...
'' argument against the idea that the copula can express existence.
Similar examples can be found in many other languages; for example, the French and Latin equivalents of ''I think therefore I am'' are and , where and are the equivalents of English "am," normally used as copulas. However, other languages prefer a different verb for existential use, as in the Spanish version (where the verb "to exist" is used rather than the copula or ‘to be’).
Another type of existential usage is in clauses of the ''
there is
English grammar is the set of structural rules of the English language. This includes the structure of words, phrases, clauses, sentences, and whole texts.
This article describes a generalized, present-day Standard English – a form of speech an ...
…'' or ''there are…'' type. Languages differ in the way they express such meanings; some of them use the copular verb, possibly with an
expletive pronoun
A dummy pronoun is a deictic pronoun that fulfills a syntactical requirement without providing a contextually explicit meaning of its referent. As such, it is an example of exophora.
Dummy pronouns are used in many Germanic languages, includin ...
like the English ''there'', while other languages use different verbs and constructions, like the French (which uses parts of the verb ‘to have,’ not the copula) or the Swedish (the passive voice of the verb for "to find"). For details, see
existential clause
An existential clause is a clause that refers to the existence or presence of something, such as "There is a God" and "There are boys in the yard". The use of such clauses can be considered analogous to existential quantification in predicate l ...
.
Relying on a unified theory of copular sentences, it has been proposed that the English ''there''-sentences are subtypes of
inverse copular construction
In linguistics, inverse copular constructions, named after Moro (1997), are a type of inversion in English where canonical SCP word order (subject- copula- predicative expression, e.g. ''Fred is the plumber'') is reversed in a sense, so that one a ...
s.
Zero copula
In some languages, copula omission occurs within a particular grammatical context. For example, speakers of
Russian
Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including:
*Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries
*Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...
,
Indonesian,
Turkish,
Hungarian,
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...
,
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
,
Geʽez
Geez (; ' , and sometimes referred to in scholarly literature as Classical Ethiopic) is an ancient Ethiopian Semitic language. The language originates from what is now northern Ethiopia and Eritrea.
Today, Geez is used as the main liturgi ...
and
Quechuan languages consistently drop the copula in present tense: Russian: , ‘I (am a) person;’ Indonesian: ‘I (am) a human;’ Turkish: ‘s/he (is a) human;’ Hungarian: ‘s/he (is) a human;’ Arabic: أنا إنسان, ‘I (am a) human;’ Hebrew: אני אדם, ''ʔani ʔadam'' "I (am a) human;" Geʽez: አነ ብእሲ/ብእሲ አነ ''ʔana bəʔəsi'' / ''bəʔəsi ʔana'' "I (am a) man" / "(a) man I (am)"; Southern Quechua: ''payqa runam'' "s/he (is) a human." The usage is known generically as the zero copula. Note that in other tenses (sometimes in forms other than third person singular), the copula usually reappears.
Some languages drop the copula in poetic or
aphorism
An aphorism (from Greek ἀφορισμός: ''aphorismos'', denoting 'delimitation', 'distinction', and 'definition') is a concise, terse, laconic, or memorable expression of a general truth or principle. Aphorisms are often handed down by ...
ic contexts. Examples in English include
* ''The more, the better.''
* ''Out of many, one.''
* ''True that.''
Such poetic copula dropping is more pronounced in some languages other than English, like the
Romance language
The Romance languages, sometimes referred to as Latin languages or Neo-Latin languages, are the various modern languages that evolved from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages in the Indo-European language f ...
s.
In informal speech of English, the copula may also be dropped in general sentences, as in "She a nurse." It is a feature of
African-American Vernacular English, but is also used by a variety of other English speakers in informal contexts. An example is the sentence "I saw twelve men, each a soldier."
Examples in specific languages
In Ancient Greek, when an adjective precedes a noun with an article, the copula is understood: , "the house is large," can be written , "large the house (is)."
In Quechua (
Southern Quechua
Southern Quechua ( qu, Urin qichwa, es, quechua sureño), or simply Quechua (Qichwa or Qhichwa), is the most widely spoken of the major regional groupings of mutually intelligible dialects within the Quechua language family, with about 6.9 mil ...
used for the examples), zero copula is restricted to present tense in third person singular (''kan''): ''Payqa runam'' — "(s)he is a human;" but: ''(paykuna) runakunam kanku'' "(they) are human."ap
In
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
, the zero copula can be used in
predicative expressions and with continuous verbs (many of which take a copulative verb in many Indo-European languages) — ''He nui te whare'', literally "a big the house," "the house (is) big;" ''I te tēpu te pukapuka'', literally "at (past
locative particle) the table the book," "the book (was) on the table;" ''Nō Ingarangi ia'', literally "from England (s)he," "(s)he (is) from England," ''Kei te kai au'', literally "at the (act of) eating I," "I (am) eating."
Alternatively, in many cases, the particle ''ko'' can be used as a copulative (though not all instances of ''ko'' are used as thus, like all other Maori particles, ''ko'' has multiple purposes): ''Ko nui te whare'' "The house is big;" ''Ko te pukapuka kei te tēpu'' "It is the book (that is) on the table;" ''Ko au kei te kai'' "It is me eating."
However, when expressing identity or class membership, ''ko'' must be used: ''Ko tēnei tāku pukapuka'' "This is my book;" ''Ko Ōtautahi he tāone i Te Waipounamu'' "Christchurch is a city in the South Island (of New Zealand);" ''Ko koe tōku hoa'' "You are my friend."
When expressing identity, ''ko'' can be placed on either object in the clause without changing the meaning (''ko tēnei tāku pukapuka'' is the same as ''ko tāku pukapuka tēnei'') but not on both (''ko tēnei ko tāku pukapuka'' would be equivalent to saying "it is this, it is my book" in English).
In Hungarian, zero copula is restricted to present tense in third person singular and plural: ''Ő ember''/''Ők emberek'' — "s/he is a human"/"they are humans;" but: ''(én) ember vagyok'' "I am a human," ''(te) ember vagy'' "you are a human," ''mi emberek vagyunk'' "we are humans," ''(ti) emberek vagytok'' "you (all) are humans." The copula also reappears for stating locations: ''az emberek a házban vannak'', "the people are in the house," and for stating time: ''hat óra van'', "it is six o'clock." However, the copula may be omitted in colloquial language: ''hat óra (van)'', "it is six o'clock."
Hungarian uses copula ''lenni'' for expressing location: ''Itt van Róbert'' "Bob is here," but it is omitted in the third person present tense for attribution or identity statements: ''Róbert öreg'' "Bob is old;" ''ők éhesek'' "They are hungry;" ''Kati nyelvtudós'' "Cathy is a linguist" (but ''Róbert öreg volt'' "Bob was old," ''éhesek voltak'' "They were hungry," ''Kati nyelvtudós volt'' "Cathy was a linguist).
In Turkish, both the third person singular and the third person plural copulas are omittable. ''Ali burada'' and ''Ali buradadır'' both mean "Ali is here," and ''Onlar aç'' and ''Onlar açlar'' both mean "They are hungry." Both of the sentences are acceptable and grammatically correct, but sentences with the copula are more formal.
The Turkish first person singular copula suffix is omitted when introducing oneself. ''Bora ben'' (I am Bora) is grammatically correct, but "Bora benim" (same sentence with the copula) is not for an introduction (but is grammatically correct in other cases).
Further restrictions may apply before omission is permitted. For example, in the
Irish language
Irish ( Standard Irish: ), also known as Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Insular Celtic branch of the Celtic language family, which is a part of the Indo-European language family. Irish is indigenous to the island of Ireland and was ...
, ''is'', the present tense of the copula, may be omitted when the
predicate
Predicate or predication may refer to:
* Predicate (grammar), in linguistics
* Predication (philosophy)
* several closely related uses in mathematics and formal logic:
**Predicate (mathematical logic)
**Propositional function
**Finitary relation, o ...
is a noun. ''Ba'', the past/conditional, cannot be deleted. If the present copula is omitted, the pronoun (e.g., ''é, í, iad'') preceding the noun is omitted as well.
Additional copulas
Sometimes, the term ''copula'' is taken to include not only a language's equivalent(s) to the verb ''be'' but also other verbs or forms that serve to link a subject to a predicative expression (while adding
semantic content of their own). For example, English verbs like ''become'', ''get'', ''feel'', ''look'', ''taste'', ''smell'', and ''seem'' can have this function, as in the following sentences (the predicative expression, the complement of the verb, is in italics):
(This usage should be distinguished from the use of some of these verbs as "action" verbs, as in ''They look at the wall'', in which ''look'' denotes an action and cannot be replaced by the basic copula ''are''.)
Some verbs have rarer, secondary uses as copular verbs, like the verb ''fall'' in sentences like ''The zebra fell victim to the lion.''
These extra copulas are sometimes called "semi-copulas" or "pseudo-copulas." For a list of common verbs of this type in English, see
List of English copulae
This is a non-exhaustive list of copulae in the English language, i.e. words used to link the subject of a sentence with a predicate (a subject complement).
Because many of these copulative verbs may be used non-copulatively, examples are pro ...
.
In particular languages
Indo-European
In
Indo-European languages, the words meaning ''to be'' are sometimes similar to each other. Due to the high frequency of their use, their inflection retains a considerable degree of similarity in some cases. Thus, for example, the English form ''is'' is a
cognate of German ''ist'', Latin ''est'', Persian ''ast'' and Russian ''
jest''', even though the Germanic, Italic, Iranian and Slavic language groups split at least 3000 years ago. The origins of the copulas of most Indo-European languages can be traced back to four
Proto-Indo-European
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo- ...
stems: ''*es-'' (''*h
1es-''), ''*sta-'' (''*steh
2-''), ''*wes-'' and ''*bhu-'' (''*bʰuH-'').
English
The English copular verb ''be'' has eight forms (more than any other English verb): ''be'', ''am'', ''is'', ''are'', ''being'', ''was'', ''were'', ''been''. Additional archaic forms include ''art'', ''wast'', ''wert'', and occasionally ''beest'' (as a
subjunctive). For more details see
English verbs
Verbs constitute one of the main parts of speech (word classes) in the English language. Like other types of words in the language, English verbs are not heavily inflected. Most combinations of tense, aspect, mood and voice are expressed peri ...
. For the etymology of the various forms, see
Indo-European copula
A feature common to all Indo-European languages is the presence of a verb corresponding to the English verb ''to be''.
General features
This verb has two basic meanings:
*In a less marked context it is a simple copula (''I’m tired''; ''That ...
.
The main uses of the copula in English are described in the above sections. The possibility of copula omission is mentioned under .
A particular construction found in English (particularly in speech) is the use of
two successive copulas when only one appears necessary, as in ''My point is, is that...''. The acceptability of this construction is a
disputed matter in English prescriptive grammar.
The simple English copula "be" may on occasion be substituted by other verbs with near identical meanings.
Persian
In Persian, the verb ''to be'' can either take the form of ''ast'' (cognate to English ''is'') or ''budan'' (cognate to ''be'').
:
Hindustani
In
Hindustani (
Hindi
Hindi ( Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been ...
and
), the copula होना ɦonɑ ہونا can be put into four grammatical aspects (simple, habitual, perfective, and progressive) and each of those four aspects can be put into five grammatical moods (indicative, presumptive, subjunctive, contrafactual, and imperative).
Some example sentences using the simple aspect are shown below:
Besides the verb होना honā (to be), there are three other verbs which can also be used as the copula, they are रहना rêhnā (to stay), जाना jānā (to go), and आना ānā (to come).
The following table shows the conjugations of the copula होना honā in the five grammatical moods in the simple aspect. The transliteration scheme used is
ISO 15919.
Romance
Copulas in the
Romance languages
The Romance languages, sometimes referred to as Latin languages or Neo-Latin languages, are the various modern languages that evolved from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages in the Indo-European language ...
usually consist of two different verbs that can be translated as "to be," the main one from the Latin ''esse'' (via
Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin, also known as Popular or Colloquial Latin, is the range of non-formal registers of Latin spoken from the Late Roman Republic onward. Through time, Vulgar Latin would evolve into numerous Romance languages. Its literary counterpa ...
''essere''; ''esse'' deriving from ''*es-''), often referenced as ''sum'' (another of the Latin verb's
principal parts
In language learning, the principal parts of a verb are those forms that a student must memorize in order to be able to conjugate the verb through all its forms. The concept originates in the humanist Latin schools, where students learned verbs ...
) and a secondary one from ''stare'' (from ''*sta-''), often referenced as ''sto''. The resulting distinction in the modern forms is found in all the
Iberian Romance languages, and to a lesser extent Italian, but not in French or Romanian. The difference is that the first usually refers to essential characteristics, while the second refers to states and situations, e.g., "Bob is old" versus "Bob is well." A similar division is found in the non-Romance Basque language (viz. ''egon'' and ''izan''). (Note that the English words just used, "essential" and "state," are also cognate with the Latin infinitives ''esse'' and ''stare''. The word "stay" also comes from Latin stare, through Middle French ''estai'', stem of Old French ''ester''.) In Spanish and Portuguese, the high degree of verbal
inflection
In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and ...
, plus the existence of two copulas (''ser'' and ''estar''), means that there are 105 (Spanish) and 110 (Portuguese) separate forms to express the copula, compared to eight in English and one in Chinese.
In some cases, the verb itself changes the meaning of the adjective/sentence. The following examples are from Portuguese:
Slavic
Some
Slavic language
The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the Ea ...
s make a distinction between essence and state (similar to that discussed in the above section on the
Romance
Romance (from Vulgar Latin , "in the Roman language", i.e., "Latin") may refer to:
Common meanings
* Romance (love), emotional attraction towards another person and the courtship behaviors undertaken to express the feelings
* Romance languages, ...
languages), by putting a predicative expression denoting a state into the
instrumental case, and essential characteristics are in the
nominative. This can apply with other copula verbs as well: the verbs for "become" are normally used with the instrumental case.
As noted above under , Russian and other
East Slavic languages
The East Slavic languages constitute one of three regional subgroups of the Slavic languages, distinct from the West and South Slavic languages. East Slavic languages are currently spoken natively throughout Eastern Europe, and eastwards to Siber ...
generally omit the copula in the present tense.
Irish
In
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
and
Scottish Gaelic
Scottish Gaelic ( gd, Gàidhlig ), also known as Scots Gaelic and Gaelic, is a Goidelic language (in the Celtic branch of the Indo-European language family) native to the Gaels of Scotland. As a Goidelic language, Scottish Gaelic, as well ...
, there are two copulas, and the
syntax is also changed when one is distinguishing between states or situations and essential characteristics.
Describing the subject's state or situation typically uses the normal
VSO ordering with the verb ''bí''. The copula ''is'' is used to state essential characteristics or equivalences.
:
The word ''is'' is the copula (rhymes with the English word "miss").
The pronoun used with the copula is different from the normal pronoun. For a masculine singular noun, ''é'' is used (for "he" or "it"), as opposed to the normal pronoun ''sé''; for a feminine singular noun, ''í'' is used (for "she" or "it"), as opposed to normal pronoun ''sí''; for plural nouns, ''iad'' is used (for "they" or "those"), as opposed to the normal pronoun ''siad''.
To describe being in a state, condition, place, or act, the verb "to be" is used: ''Tá mé ag rith.'' "I am running."
Arabic dialects
North Levantine Arabic
The
North Levantine Arabic dialect, spoken in Syria and Lebanon, has a
negative copula formed by and a suffixed pronoun.
[
]
Bantu languages
Chichewa
In
Chichewa, a
Bantu language spoken mainly in
Malawi
Malawi (; or aláwi Tumbuka: ''Malaŵi''), officially the Republic of Malawi, is a landlocked country in Southeastern Africa that was formerly known as Nyasaland. It is bordered by Zambia to the west, Tanzania to the north and northeas ...
, a very similar distinction exists between permanent and temporary states as in Spanish and Portuguese, but only in the present tense. For a permanent state, in the 3rd person, the copula used in the present tense is ''ndi'' (negative ''sí''):
:''iyé ndi mphunzitsi'' "he is a teacher"
:''iyé sí mphunzitsi'' "he is not a teacher"
For the 1st and 2nd persons the particle ''ndi'' is combined with pronouns, e.g. ''ine'' "I":
:''ine ndine mphunzitsi'' "I am a teacher"
:''iwe ndiwe mphunzitsi'' "you (singular) are a teacher"
:''ine síndine mphunzitsi'' "I am not a teacher"
For temporary states and location, the copula is the appropriate form of the defective verb ''-li'':
:''iyé ali bwino'' "he is well"
:''iyé sáli bwino'' "he is not well"
:''iyé ali ku nyumbá'' "he is in the house"
For the 1st and 2nd persons the person is shown, as normally with Chichewa verbs, by the appropriate pronominal prefix:
:''ine ndili bwino'' "I am well"
:''iwe uli bwino'' "you (sg.) are well"
:''kunyumbá kuli bwino'' "at home (everything) is fine"
In the past tenses, ''-li'' is used for both types of copula:
:''iyé analí bwino'' "he was well (this morning)"
:''iyé ánaalí mphunzitsi'' "he was a teacher (at that time)"
In the future, subjunctive, or conditional tenses, a form of the verb ''khala'' ("sit/dwell") is used as a copula:
:''máwa ákhala bwino'' "he'll be fine tomorrow"
Muylaq' Aymaran
Uniquely, the existence of the copulative verbalizer suffix in the Southern Peruvian
Aymaran
Aymaran (also Jaqi or Aru) is one of the two dominant language families in the central Andes alongside Quechuan. The family consists of Aymara, widely spoken in Bolivia, and the endangered Jaqaru and Kawki languages of Peru.
Hardman (1978) prop ...
language variety, Muylaq' Aymara, is evident only in the surfacing of a vowel that would otherwise have been deleted because of the presence of a following suffix, lexically prespecified to suppress it. As the copulative verbalizer has no independent phonetic structure, it is represented by the Greek letter ʋ in the examples used in this entry.
Accordingly, unlike in most other Aymaran variants, whose copulative verbalizer is expressed with a vowel-lengthening component, -'':'', the presence of the copulative verbalizer in Muylaq' Aymara is often not apparent on the surface at all and is analyzed as existing only meta-linguistically. However, it is also relevant to note that in a verb phrase like "It is old," the noun ''thantha'' meaning "old" does not require the copulative verbalizer, ''thantha-wa'' "It is old."
It is now pertinent to make some observations about the distribution of the copulative verbalizer. The best place to start is with words in which its presence or absence is obvious. When the vowel-suppressing first person simple tense suffix attaches to a verb, the vowel of the immediately preceding suffix is suppressed (in the examples in this subsection, the subscript "c" appears prior to vowel-suppressing suffixes in the interlinear gloss to better distinguish instances of
deletion that arise from the presence of a lexically pre-specified suffix from those that arise from other (e.g. phonotactic) motivations). Consider the verb ''sara''- which is inflected for the first person simple tense and so, predictably, loses its final root vowel: ''sar(a)-
ct-wa'' "I go."
However, prior to the suffixation of the first person simple suffix -''
ct'' to the same root nominalized with the agentive nominalizer -''iri'', the word must be verbalized. The fact that the final vowel of -''iri'' below is not suppressed indicates the presence of an intervening segment, the copulative verbalizer: ''sar(a)-iri-ʋ-t-wa'' "I usually go."
It is worthwhile to compare of the copulative verbalizer in Muylaq' Aymara as compared to La Paz Aymara, a variant which represents this suffix with vowel lengthening. Consider the near-identical sentences below, both translations of "I have a small house" in which the nominal root ''uta-ni'' "house-attributive" is verbalized with the copulative verbalizer, but note that the correspondence between the copulative verbalizer in these two variants is not always a strict one-to-one relation.
:
Georgian
As in English, the verb "to be" (''qopna'') is irregular in
Georgian
Georgian may refer to:
Common meanings
* Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country)
** Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group
** Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians
**Georgian scripts, three scrip ...
(a
Kartvelian language); different verb roots are employed in different tenses. The roots -''ar''-, -''kn''-, -''qav''-, and -''qop''- (past participle) are used in the present tense, future tense, past tense and the perfective tenses respectively. Examples:
:
Note that, in the last two examples (perfective and pluperfect), two roots are used in one verb compound. In the perfective tense, the root ''qop'' (which is the expected root for the perfective tense) is followed by the root ''ar'', which is the root for the present tense. In the pluperfective tense, again, the root ''qop'' is followed by the past tense root ''qav''. This formation is very similar to
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
(an
Indo-European language), where the perfect and the pluperfect are expressed in the following way:
:
Here, ''gewesen'' is the past participle of ''sein'' ("to be") in German. In both examples, as in Georgian, this participle is used together with the present and the past forms of the verb in order to conjugate for the perfect and the pluperfect aspects.
Haitian Creole
Haitian Creole, a
French-based creole language, has three forms of the copula: ''se'', ''ye'', and the
zero copula
Zero copula is a linguistic phenomenon whereby the subject is joined to the predicate without overt marking of this relationship (like the copula "to be" in English). One can distinguish languages that simply do not have a copula and languages tha ...
, no word at all (the position of which will be indicated with ''Ø'', just for purposes of illustration).
Although no textual record exists of Haitian-Creole at its earliest stages of development from French, ''se'' is derived from French (written ''c'est''), which is the normal French contraction of (that, written ''ce'') and the copula (is, written ''est'') (a form of the verb ''être'').
The derivation of ''ye'' is less obvious; but we can assume that the French source was ("he/it is," written ''il est''), which, in rapidly spoken French, is very commonly pronounced as (typically written ''y est'').
The use of a zero copula is unknown in French, and it is thought to be an innovation from the early days when Haitian-Creole was first developing as a Romance-based
pidgin. Latin also sometimes used a zero copula.
Which of ''se'' / ''ye'' / ''Ø'' is used in any given copula clause depends on complex syntactic factors that we can superficially summarize in the following four rules:
1. Use ''Ø'' (i.e., no word at all) in declarative sentences where the complement is an adjective phrase, prepositional phrase, or adverb phrase:
:
2. Use ''se'' when the complement is a noun phrase. But note that, whereas other verbs come ''after'' any tense/mood/aspect particles (like ''pa'' to mark negation, or ''te'' to explicitly mark past tense, or ''ap'' to mark progressive aspect), ''se'' comes ''before'' any such particles:
:
3. Use ''se'' where French and English have a
dummy "it" subject:
:
4. Finally, use the other copula form ''ye'' in situations where the sentence's syntax leaves the copula at the end of a phrase:
:
The above is, however, only a simplified analysis.
Japanese
![Ja da ya](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/51/Ja_da_ya.png)
The
Japanese
Japanese may refer to:
* Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia
* Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan
* Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture
** Japanese diaspor ...
copula (most often translated into English as an inflected form of "to be") has many forms. E.g., The form ''da'' is used
predicatively, ''na'' -
attributively, ''de'' -
adverbial
In English grammar, an adverbial ( abbreviated ) is a word (an adverb) or a group of words (an adverbial clause or adverbial phrase) that modifies or more closely defines the sentence or the verb. (The word ''adverbial'' itself is also used as an ...
ly or as a connector, and ''desu'' - predicatively or as a politeness indicator.
Examples:
:
''desu'' is the
polite form of the copula. Thus, many sentences like the ones below are almost identical in meaning and differ only in the speaker's politeness to the
addressee and in nuance of how assured the person is of their statement.
:
A predicate in Japanese is expressed by the predicative form of a verb, the predicative form of an adjective or noun + the predicative form of a copula.
:
Other forms of copula:
である ''de aru'', であります ''de arimasu'' (used in writing and formal speaking)
でございます ''de gozaimasu'' (used in public announcements, notices, etc.)
The copula is subject to dialectal variation throughout Japan, resulting in forms like や ''ya'' in
Kansai and じゃ ''ja'' in
Hiroshima (see map above).
Japanese also has two verbs corresponding to English "to be": ''aru'' and ''iru''. They are not copulas but existential verbs. ''Aru'' is used for inanimate objects, including plants, whereas ''iru'' is used for animate things like people, animals, and robots, though there are exceptions to this generalization.
:
Japanese
Japanese may refer to:
* Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia
* Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan
* Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture
** Japanese diaspor ...
speakers, when learning English, often drop the auxiliary verbs "be" and "do," incorrectly believing that "be" is a semantically empty copula equivalent to "desu" and "da."
Korean
For sentences with predicate nominatives, the copula "이" (i-) is added to the predicate nominative (with no space in between).
:
Some adjectives (usually colour adjectives) are nominalized and used with the copula "이"(i-).
1. Without the copula "이"(i-):
:
2. With the copula "이"(i-):
:
Some Korean adjectives are derived using the copula. Separating these articles and nominalizing the former part will often result in a sentence with a related, but different meaning. Using the separated sentence in a situation where the un-separated sentence is appropriate is usually acceptable as the listener can decide what the speaker is trying to say using the context.
Chinese
N.B. The characters used are simplified ones, and the transcriptions given in italics reflect Standard Chinese pronunciation, using the pinyin
Hanyu Pinyin (), often shortened to just pinyin, is the official romanization system for Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin Chinese in China, and to some extent, in Singapore and Malaysia. It is often used to teach Mandarin, normally writte ...
system.
In
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
, both states and qualities are, in general, expressed with
stative verbs (SV) with no need for a copula, e.g., in
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
, "to be tired" (累 ''lèi''), "to be hungry" (饿 ''è''), "to be located at" (在 ''zài''), "to be stupid" (笨 ''bèn'') and so forth. A sentence can consist simply of a pronoun and such a verb: for example, 我饿 ''wǒ è'' ("I am hungry"). Usually, however, verbs expressing qualities are qualified by an adverb (meaning "very," "not," "quite," etc.); when not otherwise qualified, they are often preceded by 很 ''hěn'', which in other contexts means "very," but in this use often has no particular meaning.
Only sentences with a noun as the complement (e.g., "This is my sister") use the copular verb "to be": . This is used frequently; for example, instead of having a verb meaning "to be Chinese," the usual expression is "to be a Chinese person" (; "I am a Chinese person;" "I am Chinese"). This is sometimes called an
equative
The term equative (or equational) is used in linguistics to refer to constructions where two entities are equated with each other. For example, the sentence ''Susan is our president'', equates two entities "Susan" and "our president". In English, ...
verb. Another possibility is for the complement to be just a noun modifier (ending in ), the noun being omitted:
Before the
Han Dynasty
The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–207 BC) and a warr ...
, the character 是 served as a
demonstrative pronoun
Demonstratives ( abbreviated ) are words, such as ''this'' and ''that'', used to indicate which entities are being referred to and to distinguish those entities from others. They are typically deictic; their meaning depending on a particular fram ...
meaning "this." (This usage survives in some idioms and
proverbs
A proverb (from la, proverbium) is a simple and insightful, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and use formulaic language. A proverbial phrase or a proverbia ...
.) Some linguists believe that 是 developed into a copula because it often appeared, as a repetitive subject, after the subject of a sentence (in
classical Chinese
Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning
"literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning
"literar ...
we can say, for example: "George W. Bush, ''this'' president of the United States" meaning "George W. Bush ''is'' the president of the United States). The character 是 appears to be formed as a
compound
Compound may refer to:
Architecture and built environments
* Compound (enclosure), a cluster of buildings having a shared purpose, usually inside a fence or wall
** Compound (fortification), a version of the above fortified with defensive struc ...
of characters with the meanings of "early" and "straight."
Another use of 是 in modern Chinese is in combination with the modifier 的 ''de'' to mean "yes" or to show agreement. For example:
Question: 你的汽车是不是红色的? ''nǐ de qìchē shì bú shì hóngsè de?'' "Is your car red or not?"
Response: 是的 ''shì de'' "Is," meaning "Yes," or 不是 ''bú shì'' "Not is," meaning "No."
(A more common way of showing that the person asking the question is correct is by simply saying "right" or "correct," 对 ''duì''; the corresponding negative answer is 不对 ''bú duì'', "not right.")
Yet another use of 是 is in the ''shì...(de)'' construction, which is used to emphasize a particular element of the sentence; see .
In
Hokkien
The Hokkien () variety of Chinese is a Southern Min language native to and originating from the Minnan region, where it is widely spoken in the south-eastern part of Fujian in southeastern mainland China. It is one of the national languages ...
是 ''sī'' acts as the copula, and 是 is the equivalent in
Wu Chinese
The Wu languages (; Wu romanization and IPA: ''wu6 gniu6'' [] ( Shanghainese), ''ng2 gniu6'' [] (Suzhounese), Mandarin pinyin and IPA: ''Wúyǔ'' []) is a major group of Sinitic languages spoken primarily in Shanghai, Zhejiang, Zhejiang Provin ...
.
Cantonese
Cantonese ( zh, t=廣東話, s=广东话, first=t, cy=Gwóngdūng wá) is a language within the Chinese (Sinitic) branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages originating from the city of Guangzhou (historically known as Canton) and its surrounding ar ...
uses 係 () instead of 是; similarly,
Hakka
The Hakka (), sometimes also referred to as Hakka Han, or Hakka Chinese, or Hakkas are a Han Chinese subgroup whose ancestral homes are chiefly in the Hakka-speaking provincial areas of Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Sichuan, Hunan, Zhej ...
uses 係 ''he
55''.
Siouan languages
In Siouan languages like
Lakota
Lakota may refer to:
* Lakota people, a confederation of seven related Native American tribes
*Lakota language, the language of the Lakota peoples
Place names
In the United States:
* Lakota, Iowa
* Lakota, North Dakota, seat of Nelson County
* La ...
, in principle almost all words—according to their structure—are verbs. So not only (transitive, intransitive and so-called "stative") verbs but even nouns often behave like verbs and do not need to have copulas.
For example, the word ''wičháša'' refers to a man, and the verb "to-be-a-man" is expressed as ''wimáčhaša/winíčhaša/wičháša'' (I am/you are/he is a man). Yet there also is a copula ''héčha'' (to be a ...) that in most cases is used: ''wičháša hemáčha/heníčha/héčha'' (I am/you are/he is a man).
In order to express the statement "I am a doctor of profession," one has to say ''pezuta wičháša hemáčha''. But, in order to express that that person is THE doctor (say, that had been phoned to help), one must use another copula ''iyé'' (to be the one): ''pežúta wičháša (kiŋ) miyé yeló'' (medicine-man DEF ART I-am-the-one MALE ASSERT).
In order to refer to space (e.g., Robert is in the house), various verbs are used, e.g., ''yaŋkÁ'' (lit., to sit) for humans, or ''háŋ/hé'' (to stand upright) for inanimate objects of a certain shape. "Robert is in the house" could be translated as ''Robert thimáhel yaŋké (yeló)'', whereas "There's one restaurant next to the gas station" translates as ''Owótethipi wígli-oínažiŋ kiŋ hél isákhib waŋ hé''.
Constructed languages
The
constructed language
A constructed language (sometimes called a conlang) is a language whose phonology, grammar, and vocabulary, instead of having developed naturally, are consciously devised for some purpose, which may include being devised for a work of fiction ...
Lojban
Lojban (pronounced ) is a logical, constructed, human language created by the Logical Language Group which aims to be syntactically unambigious. It succeeds the Loglan project.
The Logical Language Group (LLG) began developing Lojban in 1987. ...
has two words that act similar to a copula in natural languages. The clause ''me ... me'u'' turns whatever follows it into a predicate that means to be (among) what it follows. For example, ''me la .bob. (me'u)'' means "to be Bob," and ''me le ci mensi (me'u)'' means "to be one of the three sisters." Another one is ''du'', which is itself a predicate that means all its arguments are the same thing (equal). One word which is often confused for a copula in Lojban, but isn't one, is ''cu''. It merely indicates that the word which follows is the main predicate of the sentence. For example, ''lo pendo be mi cu zgipre'' means "my friend is a musician," but the word ''cu'' does not correspond to English ''is''; instead, the word ''zgipre'', which is a predicate, corresponds to the entire phrase "is a musician". The word ''cu'' is used to prevent ''lo pendo be mi zgipre'', which would mean "the friend-of-me type of musician".
See also
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Indo-European copula
A feature common to all Indo-European languages is the presence of a verb corresponding to the English verb ''to be''.
General features
This verb has two basic meanings:
*In a less marked context it is a simple copula (''I’m tired''; ''That ...
*
Nominal sentence
Nominal sentence (also known as equational sentence) is a linguistic term that refers to a nonverbal sentence (i.e. a sentence without a finite verb). As a nominal sentence does not have a verbal predicate, it may contain a nominal predicate, an ...
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Stative verb
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Subject complement
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Zero copula
Zero copula is a linguistic phenomenon whereby the subject is joined to the predicate without overt marking of this relationship (like the copula "to be" in English). One can distinguish languages that simply do not have a copula and languages tha ...
Citations
General references
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* (See "copular sentences" and "existential sentences and expletive ''there''" in Volume II.)
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* Moro, A. (1997
''The Raising of Predicates'' Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England.
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* Tüting, A. W. (December 2003).
Essay on Lakota syntax'. .
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Further reading
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External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Copula (Linguistics)
Parts of speech
Verb types