Sentence Structure
Except in poetry, the subject precedes the object, and the verb must conclude the sentence. In a standard sentence, therefore, the order is usually subject–object–verb (SOV) though object–subject–verb is not uncommon.
Tamil is a null subject language. Not all Tamil sentences have subjects, verbs and objects. It is possible to construct valid sentences that have only a verb - such as muṭintuviṭṭatu ("It is completed") - or only a subject and object, such as atu eṉ vīṭu ("That is my house"). The elements that are present, however, must follow the SOV order. Tamil does not have an equivalent for the word is and the word is included in the translations only to convey the meaning. The verb to have in the meaning "to possess" is not translated directly either. In order to say "I have a horse" in Tamil a construction equivalent to "There is a horse to me" or "There exists a horse to me" will be used.
Tamil lacks relative pronouns, but their meaning is conveyed by relative participle constructions which are built using agglutination. For example, the English sentence "Call the boy who learned the lesson" will be said in Tamil roughly as "That-lesson-learned-boy call".
Read more about this topic: Tamil Grammar
Famous quotes containing the words sentence and/or structure:
“A sentence is made up of words, a statement is made in words.... Statements are made, words or sentences are used.”
—J.L. (John Langshaw)
“Im a Sunday School teacher, and Ive always known that the structure of law is founded on the Christian ethic that you shall love the Lord your God and your neighbor as yourselfa very high and perfect standard. We all know the fallibility of man, and the contentions in society, as described by Reinhold Niebuhr and many others, dont permit us to achieve perfection.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)