copula

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Related to Copulæ: Auxiliary verbs, Copulas

linking verb

Linking verbs (also known as copulas or copular verbs) are used to describe the state of being of the subject of a clause. Unlike action verbs (also called dynamic verbs), they connect the subject to the predicate of the clause without expressing any action.
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copula

Logic the often unexpressed link between the subject and predicate terms of a categorial proposition, as are in all men are mortal
Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005
The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Copula

 

an auxiliary grammatical element of a compound predicate having a weakened lexical meaning and serving to express merely grammatical categories of the predicate, the lexical meaning being expressed by a nonconjugated, usually nominal, element. The verb “to be” is used as a copula in many languages. The presence of a copula may be obligatory, as in English and French; optional, as in Russian and Hungarian; determined by the type of nominal predicate, as in Swahili; or determined by the semantic character of the sentence, as in Khmer. Certain verbs besides “to be” can function as copulas; these verbs, which introduce an additional nuance to the meaning of the elements linked by the verb, include the Russian nachinat’ (“to begin”), stanovit’sia (“to become”), and delat’ (“to do,” “to make”).

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.