Question

What is the appositive in the sentence: “My brother Mike is getting to be a big boy.”?

Answer 1

Hint: Appositives can be defined as nouns or noun phrases. They sit next to another noun to rename or explain it in a different way. Commas, brackets, or dashes are often used to separate appositives.

Complete answer:
Apposition is a grammatical construction in which two objects, usually noun phrases, are positioned next to each other, with one identifying the other in a different way than the other. The two elements are said to be in apposition, and one of them is known as the appositive, but determining which one is the appositive involves looking at how the elements are used in a sentence.

As long as it sits beside the noun it describes, an appositive may appear before or after the main noun, at the beginning, middle, or end of a sentence. An appositive is a noun phrase that lacks a subject or predicate and is not a full thought.

Since an appositive is a noun that renames another noun, they're still close together. Here the given sentence is “My brother Mike is getting to be a big boy.” Mike is the appositive since he renames "brother". So, in the above sentence Mike is the appositive.

An appositive may be a single word or a complete sentence.

Note: Appositives are nouns or noun phrases that sit next to another noun to rename or explain it in a different way. The word appositive comes from the Latin word appositive, which means "close." Commas, brackets, or dashes are often used to separate appositives.