Keywords
Abstract
This paper analyzes the grammatical roles and semantic characteristics of the most frequent English words, including function words such as the, of, and, to, and be. Drawing on corpus linguistics and grammatical theory, the study identifies how these words operate within English syntax and how their meanings shift depending on context. Despite their brevity and abstractness, such high-frequency words carry significant grammatical weight, acting as determiners, auxiliaries, prepositions, conjunctions, and particles. The analysis contributes to better understanding of English fluency, parsing, and pedagogy, especially for second language learners.
References
• Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S., & Finegan, E. (1999). Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English. Pearson Education.
• Halliday, M.A.K., & Matthiessen, C.M.I.M. (2014). Halliday's Introduction to Functional Grammar. Routledge.
• Sinclair, J. (1991). Corpus, Concordance, Collocation. Oxford University Press.
• Carter, R., & McCarthy, M. (2006). Cambridge Grammar of English. Cambridge University Press.
• Davies, M. (2008–2024). Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA). Available at: https://www.english-corpora.org/coca/
• Nation, I.S.P. (2013). Learning Vocabulary in Another Language. Cambridge University Press.