What is a predicative phrase?
What is meant by the 'predicative position' when it refers to a part of a sentence?
Solution 1:
It's not really correct to call it "the predicate position".
It isn't a position. It's a role. It's the head of the clause, which is called the Predicate.
(This, by the way, is more logic than grammar; predicate is a term from Predicate Calculus.)
The logical rule is that every clause has a Predicate (which may be a single word, or a phrase);
the English grammar rule is that every clause has a Verb Phrase (single or phrasal, ditto).
Therefore the prototype predicate is a verb, and in a simple sentence with only one verb, the verb is the predicate, the predicate is the verb, the difference is irrelevant, and Bob's your uncle.
But most sentences are not simple, and most have several clauses, each with its own predicate, which are related to one another in one of many possible ways. This gets complicated fast.
Further, many if not most English predicates are not verbs.
Any Noun Phrase or Adjective Phrase can function as a predicate, too.
These are called Predicate Nouns and Predicate Adjectives.
- Bill is tired, while Mary is full of energy. (2 predicate adjectives)
-
Bill is a psychiatrist, while Mary is a dentist. (2 predicate nouns --
note that singular count predicate nouns also require an indefinite article to mark them) -
This idea is crap, but that idea is not (crap). (2 predicate nouns --
both mass, with no article; but identical, so Conjunction Reduction deletes the second.)
Naturally, the English grammar rule requires a verb, so predicate nouns and adjectives add an auxiliary be verb form, meaningless but necessary, to mark them as predicates and obey the grammar rule. This auxiliary be is "the verb" in the clause, but it is not the predicate.
There are lots of languages where there is no such need for auxiliaries;
in Malay, for instance, adjectives and nouns are simply used like verbs:
- Bambang jalan ke Kuala Lumpur. 'Bambang goes to KL' (jalan = 'go, travel')
- Bambang doktor gigi. 'Bambang is a dentist' (gigi = 'tooth')
- Bambang sakit. 'Bambang is sick'.
So there is not really any predicate "position"; in English, normally the predicate -- or anyway the first auxiliary verb in the verb phrase -- is the second constituent in the sentence. But this is only the normal situation; it is often varied to mark something special, like Subject-Auxiliary Inversion in a question:
- Bill has travelled to Kuala Lumpur.
- Has Bill travelled to Kuala Lumpur?
- Why has Bill travelled to Kuala Lumpur?
Solution 2:
It means it is in the predicate. Take the adjective "red"
The apple is red. red is in the predicative position.
The red apples are good. red is not in the predicative position.