Participant roles indicate the relations between verbs, predicators, and referring expressions in a sentence. The main participant roles are agent, affected, instrument, and location. The agent is the person carrying out the action, the affected is the thing the action is carried out upon, the instrument is the thing used to carry out the action, and the location is where the action takes place. Examples are provided to illustrate each participant role.

1. Participant Role
UNIT NO: 20

2. Participant Role:
 Definition: Participant roles indicate relations
between a verb and possibly other predicator and the
referring expression in a sentence
 Structure:
verb (predicators)
Participant role
referring expression

3. EXAMPLE:
 John opened the door with a key
verb Open
Participant role
John
Referring expression Door
Key

4. Types of participant role:
AGENT AFFECTED
INSTRUMET LOCATION
Participant
role

5. Agent:
 Definition: The AGENT of a sentence is the person
deliberately carrying out the action describe.
 Example:
1: John opened the door with a key.
2: Mark kill a man by his gun.
Agent:
1: John
2: Mark

6. Affected:
 Definition: The AFFECTED participant is the thing
(not usually a person, although it may be) upon which
the action is carried out .
 Example:
1: John opened the door with a key.
2: Mark kill a man by his gun.
Affected Participant:
1: The Door
2: Man

7. Instrument:
 Definition: The INSTRUMENT is the thing by mean
of which the action carried out.
 Example:
1: John opened the door with a key.
2: Mark kill a man by his gun.
 Instrument:
1: Key
2: Gun

8. LOCATION:
 Definition: The role of LOCATION is played by an
expression referring to the place where the action describe
by a sentence takes place.
 Example:
1: I met with Aslam at railway station
2: Mark kill a man by his gun near police station
 Location:
1: Railway Station.
2: Police station.

9. Examples:
1: Ahmad hit a man by a stick in the playground.
Q: Find out the AGENT, AFFECTED, INSTRUMENT, and
LOCATION in the above sentence?
Agent: Ahmad
Affected: Man
Instrument: Stick
Location: Playground

10. Prepared by:
HAMID
M.Sc Linguistics
1st semester
QUAID-I-AZAM UNIVERSITY
ISLAMABAD