A preposition shows a noun’s relationship to something else in space or time. English has many prepositions, some formed by combining words. Prepositional phrases can act as objects, subjects, adjectives, or adverbs. There is debate about ending sentences with prepositions, but usage recommendations are becoming more liberal.
A preposition is a word used to show a noun’s relationship to something else, usually a location in space or time. A preposition is a type of a larger grammatical category called adpositions. Virtually all adpositions in English are prepositions, with a few exceptions that can be used as postpositions, such as therefore and after.
In most languages, the set of prepositions is extremely subject to change and English is no exception. Over time a word can take on meaning as a preposition, or it can lose that meaning and no longer be classified as a preposition. For this reason, “complete” lists of prepositions in any language are a questionable business, although many grammar textbooks still try to provide such a reference. When trying to determine whether a word is a preposition, just look at the role it plays in the sentence: Is it used to demonstrate a spatial or temporal relationship between the subject and object of the sentence, or between two objects? If so, the word is probably a preposition.
Common prepositions include the words: about, above, after, between, around, at, before, behind, under, beside, between, for, down, from, within, within, as, near, of, out, above, out , over, through, to, on, above and with. This is just one example of the many, many prepositions found in English. Many prepositions are also formed by combining multiple words, such as the phrases in front of, in front of, above, above and before. Also, many archaic prepositions are no longer in common use but still sometimes appear in writing or speech, such as between, against, unto, and sans. A word like but or except may be classified by some as a preposition, while others feel that these words are similar to prepositions, but do not strictly belong to that class.
In sentences like four dots and seven years ago or all evidence aside, we see examples of a different type of adposition, known as a postposition. English has few postpositions, and in most cases they can also be used in a prepositional way: we can change our example of apart in the above to be prepositional by simply changing the order, as in, apart from all the tests. A prepositional phrase is formed by combining a preposition with a noun and adding any additional modifiers you may want. In the sentence at work, for example, the word at is a preposition and the noun work combines with it to form a prepositional sentence.
A prepositional phrase can perform a number of functions. It can be the object or subject of a sentence, or it can function as an adjective or adverb. In the sentence Women ran vigorously. for example, the prepositional phrase vigorously acts as an adverb to modify ran. In the sentence Men deny. On the other hand, the prepositional phrase in negation serves as an adjective to modify men.
There is some debate in English as to whether it is acceptable to take the preposition in a sentence away from its object or to end a sentence with a preposition. Different grammarians have different feelings about these issues, even if tensions are high in most cases. Usage recommendations seem to lean towards the liberal as time goes on, with few mainstream grammarians objecting to ending a sentence with a preposition in a case like This is something I can’t stand.
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