Editing Head-marking language (section)

==In English==
The concepts of head-marking and dependent-marking are commonly applied to languages that have richer inflectional morphology than [[English language|English]]. There are, however, a few types of agreement in English that can be used to illustrate those notions. The following graphic representations of a [[clause]], a [[noun phrase]], and a [[prepositional phrase]] involve agreement. The three tree structures shown are those of a [[dependency grammar]], as opposed to those of a [[phrase structure grammar]]:<ref>Dependency grammar trees similar to the ones that are shown can be found in, for instance, Ágel et al. (2003/6).</ref>

::[[File:Head-marking-he-not-I.png|Head-marking 1]]

Heads and dependents are identified by the actual hierarchy of words, and the concepts of head-marking and dependent-marking are indicated with the arrows. Subject-verb agreement, shown in the tree on the left, is a case of head-marking because the singular subject ''John'' requires the inflectional suffix ''-s'' to appear on the finite verb ''cheats'', the head of the clause. The determiner-noun agreement, shown in the tree in the middle, is a case of dependent-marking because the plural noun ''houses'' requires the dependent determiner to appear in its plural form, ''these'', not in its singular form, ''this''. The preposition-pronoun agreement of [[case government]], shown in the tree on the right, is also an instance of dependent-marking because the head preposition ''with'' requires the dependent pronoun to appear in its object form, ''him'', not in its subject form, ''he''.