In linguistics, a clitic is a morpheme that functions syntactically like a word, but does not appear as an independent phonological word; instead it is always attached to a following or preceding word. A clitic is either an enclitic, where the clitic is with the preceding word, or a proclitic, which is with the following word.

A clitic joined to a word forms a new phonological word, which respects the usual rules of the language in question (for example, if a word must have one and only one stressed syllable, then a word with a clitic must too). This is regardless of the fact that clitics are often written as separate words.

For example, the articles and the non-emphatic object pronouns in the Romance languages are all clitics. In Spanish:

las aguas ("the waters") = /la'saguas/

lo hicimos ("we made it") = /loi'simos/

dámelo ("give it to me") = /'damelo/

A clitic is not an affix. An affix must be applied on a given part of speech (for example, on verbs), and it may appear inside the word, maybe followed by other affixes, while the clitic attaches to full words of whatever kind, and always on its edges (before any prefixes and after any suffixes).

In the Indo-European languages, some clitics can be traced back to Proto-Indo-European: for example, -k^we is the original form of Latin -que, Greek te, and Sanskrit -ca. This word means "and" and is said after the word being added, e.g. Senatus Populusque Romanus "Senate and People of Rome".

Clitics in various languages:

• Latin: que and, ne (yes-no question)
• Greek: te and, de but, gar for (in a logical argument), oun therefore
• Russian: ли (yes-no question), же (emphasis), не not (proclitic), бы (subjunctive)
• English: 's, marker of the genitive relation of a noun phrase
• Japanese: の no, genitive and associative postposition; は wa (topic marker)
• Dutch: 't definite article of neuter nouns and 3rd person pronoun, 'k 1st person pronoun, je 2nd person pronoun, -ie 3rd person pronoun (this one should not be written as a separate word)

External links

• SIL's Glossary of Linguistic Terms: What is a clitic? (http://www.sil.org/linguistics/GlossaryOfLinguisticTerms/WhatIsACliticGrammar.htm)