If you’re here, chances are that you’ve already heard a lot of grammar words while you study English. Among them, you may have heard about nouns, adjectives, adverbs, articles, verbs, prepositions, pronouns, conjunctions, and interjections. In this article, we focus on the subject, verb, and object of a sentence. So, if you’re not 100% sure about what they are or how to find them, read on.
The Subject, Verb, and Object of a Sentence
The subject of a sentence is the person or thing that performs the action described in the sentence or the person or thing that is in the state described in the sentence.
The verb of a sentence is the word used to describe the action or state of the sentence.
Finally, the object of a sentence is the part of the sentence that describes the person or thing that receives the action present in the verb. When we have a linking verb (a verb that describes a state rather than an action such as be, look, seem, smell, taste, become, etc.) in the sentence we call the what comes after it a subject complement.
Analyze the examples below.
| SUBJECT | VERB | OBJECT OR SUBJECT COMPLEMENT |
| I | play | video games. |
| My mother | cooks | wonderful foods. |
| My friends | are | outgoing. |
| Martha and Tom | won | the competition. |
| All people in the theater | applauded | the actors. |
SVO
You have probably noticed that English is a language that follows the word order known as SVO, which means that when we say something in natural, everyday English we almost always say the subject first, which is followed by the verb, which is followed by the object (or subject complement).
This is the prototypical word order in English. So this helps you identify these components in almost all sentences you hear out there.
Subject-Object Inversion in English
However, sometimes people can play with this order and disrupt it a little bit. This happens most frequently for stylistic, literary purposes. It sounds much more formal and unusual. Take a look at the examples below.
Here’s a well-known sentence said by Yoda, from Star Wars “Patience you must have, my young Padawan“. What happens to the word order in this sentence? Take a look:
| OBJECT | SUBJECT | VERB |
| Patience | you | must have. |
In a more natural, everyday English we would say:
| OBJECT | VERB | OBJECT |
| You | must have | patience. |
If you want to master every aspect of English grammar, take a look at our awesome article on the best books to learn English grammar.
