Adposition
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 An element that combines syntactically with a phrase and indicates how that phrase should be interpreted in the surrounding context; a preposition or postposition.
"Throughout this book, I have assumed that adpositions (prepositions and postpositions) are not lexical categories, but rather functional categories.[…]While this view of adpositions is far from unprecedented, it runs contrary to the more standard generative treatment, championed by Jackendoff (1977: 31-33), in which adpositions constitute a fourth lexical category, filling out the logical space of possibilities defined by the two binary-valued features #43;#92;#33;#47;#92;#33;#92;#33;-#92;#33;#92;#33;#92;mathsfN and #43;#92;#33;#47;#92;#33;#92;#33;-#92;#33;#92;#33;#92;mathsfV."
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"Throughout this book, I have assumed that adpositions (prepositions and postpositions) are not lexical categories, but rather functional categories.[…]While this view of adpositions is far from unprecedented, it runs contrary to the more standard generative treatment, championed by Jackendoff (1977: 31-33), in which adpositions constitute a fourth lexical category, filling out the logical space of possibilities defined by the two binary-valued features #43;#92;#33;#47;#92;#33;#92;#33;-#92;#33;#92;#33;#92;mathsfN and #43;#92;#33;#47;#92;#33;#92;#33;-#92;#33;#92;#33;#92;mathsfV."
Etymology
From ad- + position, from Latin adpositio, from adpositum, past participle of adponere, an alternative form of apponere (“to put near”).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.