What is case?

Definition
	Case is a grammatical category determined by the syntactic or semantic function of a noun or pronoun.

Discussion

The term case has traditionally been restricted to apply to only those languages which indicate certain functions by the inflection of

nouns
pronouns, or
noun phrase constituents, such as adjectives and numerals.

Example:

The Latin sentencesCanis hominem mordet ‘Dog bites man’ and Canem homo mordet ‘Man bites dog’, illustrate that differing case endings express the differing functions of the nouns in Latin.

The term is sometimes extended to include such functions expressed by adpositions.

Example (Japanese)

In the following sentence, case is indicated by the case markers ga, ni, and o:

John ga Mary ni hon o yatta

John NOMINATIVE Mary DATIVE book ACCUSATIVE gave

‘John gave Mary a book.’

Source:

Kuno 1973 4–5

Kinds
	Here are some kinds of cases:
	What is abessive case? What is ablative case? What is absolutive case? What is accusative case? What is allative case? What is benefactive case? What is causative case? What is comitative case? What is dative case? What is delative case? What is elative case? What is equative case? What is ergative case? What is essive case? What is genitive case? What is illative case? What is inessive case? What is instrumental case? What is lative case? What is locative case? What is nominative case? What is partitive case? What is prolative case? What is superessive case? What is translative case? What is vocative case?

Generic
	Case is a kind of
	What is a grammatical category?

Sources
	Pei and Gaynor 1954 35
	Crystal 1980 53–54
	Anderson, S. 1985 179–180
	Andrews, A. 1985 71–72
	Mish 1991 211
	Kuno 1973 4–5

Context for this page:

Concept module: case
In overview module: Glossary (Linguistics): C
In modular book: Glossary of linguistic terms, by Eugene E. Loos (general editor), Susan Anderson (editor), Dwight H., Day, Jr. (editor), Paul C. Jordan (editor), and J. Douglas Wingate (editor)
In bookshelf: Linguistics

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library, Version 5.0 published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 2003. [Ordering information.]

Page content last modified: 5 January 2004