FORM

FORM.
1. In LOGIC, the abstract relations of terms in a proposition, and of propositions in a syllogism.

2. In LINGUISTICS, an inflected variant of a word: men as the plural form of man; see, sees, saw, seen, seeing as the forms of the verb see.

3. In linguistics, a category such as ‘noun’ when analysed in terms of structure (singular man, plural men) and FUNCTION (subject and object of sentence). Items that share characteristics belong to the same form class: the forms happy and careful belong to the adjective form class. Criteria of form are used to identify units and classes of units. Words such as man and information are identified as nouns by the formal criterion (among others) that they can be the main words in a phrase that functions as the subject of a sentence (man in That man looks familiar) or as the object of a preposition (information in This is for your information only). The criterion may be negative: nouns, unlike most adjectives, do not have comparative and superlative forms: there are adjective forms happier and happiest alongside happy, but no corresponding forms for girl. In contrast, notional or semantic criteria identify units and classes by meaning: a noun defined as the name of a person, thing, or place; a verb as a doing word. While such criteria may adequately characterize central members of a class, they are not comprehensive. The notional definition of a noun does not cover such words as action, existence, happiness, temperature that belong to the noun form class on formal criteria. See MORPHOLOGY, PARADIGM.