Antecedent (grammar)

In grammar, an antecedent is one or more words that identifies a pronoun or other pro-form.^[1] For example, in the sentence "John arrived late because traffic held him up," the word "John" is the antecedent of the pronoun "him." Pro-forms usually follow their antecedents, but sometimes precede them. In the latter case, the more accurate term would technically be postcedent, although this term is not commonly distinguished from antecedent because the definition of antecedent usually encompasses it. The linguistic term that is closely related to antecedent and pro-form is anaphora. Theories of syntax explore the distinction between antecedents and postcedents in terms of binding.

Almost any syntactic category can serve as the antecedent to a pro-form. The following examples illustrate a range of proforms and their antecedents. The pro-forms are in bold, and their antecedents are underlined:

a. Willy said he likes chocolate. - Noun as antecedent

b. My eccentric uncle likes chocolate. He tells everyone to buy him chocolate. - Noun phrase as antecedent

c. Larry was helpful, and so was Kim. - Adjective as antecedent

d. He arrived in the afternoon, when nobody was home. - Prepositional phrase as antecedent

e. Thomas plays soccer in the park. The kids all congregate there. - Prepositional phrase as antecedent

f. Our helpers did it very carefully, and we did it like that as well. - Adverb phrase as antecedent

g. Fred works hard, but Tom does not do the same. - Verb phrase as antecedent

h. Susan lies all the time, which everybody knows about. - Entire clause as antecedent

i. Our politicians have been pandering again. This demotivates the voters. - Entire sentence as antecedent

j. Rob is a dentist and, as such, he fixes teeth. - Noun phrase as antecedent

k. Jemand rief an und bot seine Hilfe an . Sie war sehr freundlich. – Diskontinuierliche Wortkombination als Bezugswort

l. Der Absatz wurde tatsächlich von Sam geprüft , aber Susan weigert sich . – Unzusammenhängende Wortverbindung als Bezugswort

Diese Liste von Proformen und den Arten ihrer Bezugswörter ist keineswegs vollständig, sondern soll lediglich einen Eindruck von der Vielfalt der Ausdrücke vermitteln, die als Proformen und Bezugswörter fungieren können. Während die stereotypische Proform ein Pronomen und das stereotypische Bezugswort ein Nomen oder eine Nominalphrase ist , zeigen diese Beispiele, dass praktisch jede syntaktische Kategorie als Bezugswort für eine Proform dienen kann, wobei die Proformen selbst sehr unterschiedlich sind. ^{[ 2 ]} Die letzten beiden Beispiele sind besonders interessant, da sie zeigen, dass einige Proformen sogar diskontinuierliche Wortkombinationen als Bezugswörter haben können, d. h. die Bezugswörter sind keine Konstituenten . Ein besonders häufiger Proformtyp tritt in Relativsätzen auf . Viele Relativsätze enthalten ein Relativpronomen , und diese Relativpronomen haben ein Bezugswort. Die Sätze „d“ und „h“ oben enthalten Relativsätze; die Proformen „ when “ und „which“ sind relative Proformen.

In manchen Fällen kann der Bezug eines Pronomens unklar sein, da zwei oder mehr vorhergehende Substantive oder Wortgruppen hinsichtlich Zählbarkeit, Genus oder Logik als vorherige Referenz in Frage kommen. In solchen Fällen empfehlen Wissenschaftler, den Satzbau präziser zu gestalten ^{[ 3 ]} oder die Wörter des Bezugswortes zu wiederholen, anstatt nur eine Pronomenphrase zu verwenden, um den unklaren Bezug aufzulösen.

Betrachten wir beispielsweise den Satz: „In der Schachtel war eine Puppe, die aus Ton war.“ Das Wort „die“ könnte sich sowohl auf die Schachtel als auch auf die Puppe beziehen. Um deutlich zu machen, dass die Puppe aus Ton ist, könnte der Satz wie folgt umformuliert werden: „In der Schachtel war eine Puppe, die aus Ton war“, „In der Schachtel war eine Puppe aus Ton“ oder „In der Schachtel war eine Mädchenpuppe, und sie war aus Ton“ (oder eine ähnliche Formulierung).

Bezugswörter können auch dann unklar sein, wenn sie weit von dem Substantiv oder der Wortgruppe entfernt stehen, auf die sie sich beziehen. Bryan Garner nennt diese „entfernte Verwandte“ und führt folgendes Beispiel aus der New York Times an :

"C-130 aircraft packed with radio transmitters flew lazy circles over the Persian Gulf broadcasting messages in Arabic to the Iraqi people that were monitored by reporters near the border."

As Garner points out, “that were…the border” modifies “messages”, which occurs 7 words (3 of which are nouns) before.^[4] In context, the phrase could also modify “the Iraqi people”, hence the uncertainty.

The ante- in antecedent means 'before; in front of'. Thus, when a pro-form precedes its antecedent, the antecedent is not literally an antecedent, but rather it is a postcedent, post- meaning 'after; behind'. The following examples, wherein the pro-forms are bolded and their postcedents are underlined, illustrate this distinction:

a. When it is ready, I'll have a cup of coffee. - Noun as postcedent

b. In her bed, my friend spends the entire morning. - Noun phrase as postcedent

c. It bothered me that she did not call. - Clause as postcedent, example of it-extraposition

d. Two violinists were there, at the party. - Prepositional phrase as postcedent

e. Sam tries to work then, when it is raining. - Clause as postcedent

Postcedents are rare compared to antecedents, and in practice, the distinction between antecedents and postcedents is often ignored, with the term antecedent being used to denote both. This practice is a source of confusion, and some have therefore denounced using the term antecedent to mean postcedent because of this confusion.^[5]

Some pro-forms lack a linguistic antecedent. In such cases, the antecedent is implied in the given discourse environment or from general knowledge of the world. For instance, the first person pronouns I, me, we, and us and the second person pronoun you are pro-forms that usually lack a linguistic antecedent. However, their antecedents are present in the discourse context as the speaker and the listener. Pleonastic pro-forms also lack a linguistic antecedent, e.g. It is raining, where the pronoun it is semantically empty and cannot be viewed as referring to anything specific in the discourse world. Definite pro-forms such as they and you also have an indefinite use, which means they denote some person or people in general, e.g. They will get you for that, and therefore cannot be construed as taking a linguistic antecedent.

• Binding — Association of anaphoric elements
• Generic antecedent – Representatives of classes in a situation in which gender is typically unknown
• Pro-drop language – Language in which certain pronouns may sometimes be omitted