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A noun phrase or nominal phrase (abbreviated NP) is a phrase which has a noun (or indefinite pronoun) as its head word, or which performs the same grammatical function as such a phrase.〔For definitions and discussions of the noun phrase that point to the presence of a head noun, see for instance Crystal (1997:264), Lockwood (2002:3), and Radford (2004: 14, 348).〕 Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently occurring phrase type. Noun phrases often function as verb subjects and objects, as predicative expressions, and as the complements of prepositions. Noun phrases can be embedded inside each other; for instance, the noun phrase ''some of his constituents'' contains the shorter noun phrase ''his constituents''. In some modern theories of grammar, noun phrases with determiners are analyzed as having the determiner rather than the noun as their head; they are then referred to as ''determiner phrases''. ==Identifying noun phrases== Some more examples of noun phrases are underlined in the sentences below. The head noun appears in bold. ::The election-year politics are annoying for many people. ::Almost every sentence contains at least one noun phrase. ::Current economic weakness may be a result of high energy prices. Noun phrases can be identified by the possibility of pronoun substitution, as is illustrated in the examples below. ::a. This sentence contains two noun phrases. ::b. It contains them. ::a. The subject noun phrase that is present in this sentence is long. ::b. It is long. ::a. Noun phrases can be embedded in other noun phrases. ::b. They can be embedded in them. A string of words that can be replaced by a single pronoun without rendering the sentence grammatically unacceptable is a noun phrase. As to whether the string must contain at least two words, see the following section. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「noun phrase」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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