| Dictionary, Encyclopedia and Thesaurus - The Free Dictionary 3,896,852,749 visitors served. |
Dictionary/ thesaurus | Medical dictionary | Legal dictionary | Financial dictionary | Acronyms | Idioms | Encyclopedia | Wikipedia encyclopedia | ? |
Phrase |
Also found in: Dictionary/thesaurus, Legal, Wikipedia | 0.01 sec. |
|
|
phrase
1. Music a small group of notes forming a coherent unit of melody 2. (in choreography) a short sequence of dance movements Phrase the basic unit of speech. Corresponding to the sentence as a basic unit of language, the phrase is a syntactic and phonetic entity with syntactic structure, semantic completeness, and intonational markers. Phrase boundaries are indicated by pauses and by specific intonational features that indicate the end of the phrase. For example, in Russian there is a lowering of tone on the final syllable of a phrase. Phrases are divided into syntagms, which in turn consist of phonetic words and syllables. The laws of the phrase’s sandhi, that is, of the phonetic boundaries of the phrase’s components, function within the phrase. An example is liaison in French—a type of consonant alternation. The concept of the phrase is sometimes synonymous with that of the sentence. The term “phrase” is occasionally used to designate any phonetic and syntactic entity between two pauses. Want to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us, add a link to this page, add the site to iGoogle, or visit the webmaster's page for free fun content. |
|
| Encyclopedia |
| Free Tools: |
For surfers:
Free toolbar & extensions |
Word of the Day |
Help
For webmasters: Free content | Linking | Lookup box | Double-click lookup |
|---|