apposition (n.)

A traditional term retained in some models of GRAMMATICAL description for a sequence of units which are CONSTITUENTS at the same grammatical LEVEL, and which have an identity or similarity of REFERENCE. In John Smith, the butcher, came in, for example, there are TWO NOUN PHRASES; they have identity of reference; and they have the same SYNTACTIC function (as indicated by the omissibility of either, without this affecting the sentence’s ACCEPTABILITY, e.g. John Smith came in/The butcher came in). They are therefore said to be in apposition or in an appositive or appositional relationship. There are, however, many theoretical and methodological problems in defining the notion of apposition, because of the existence of several constructions which satisfy only some of these criteria, and where other SEMANTIC or syntactic issues are involved, as in titles and other designations (the number six, my friend John, etc.). Sometimes the term appositive relative is used as an alternative to non-RESTRICTIVE RELATIVE.