Closed-class word
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Closed-classes are so-called because they contain a relatively small number of items to which no new items can normally be added. In English, auxiliary verbs, are a closed class: there are a small number of them, and the list very rarely changes. Contrastingly, an open class, e.g. nouns or verbs, receive (or lose) new items much more rapidly than closed-classes. Other examples of closed-classes are:

• conjunctions
• determiners
• prepositions
• pronouns

The closed classes of the English language, in use hundreds of years ago, would still be easily recognisable by users today.

See also Open class word

The original article can be found at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed-class_word.
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