Apposition in English Grammar

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Apposition is when you have 2 nouns (or noun phrases) next to each other and
they both refer to the same thing. Each of them provides a bit of information
about each other.

For example, take these basic sentences:

Clark Kent leaped into a phone booth.

Clark Kent is an ace reporter.
Clark Kent is Superman.

We can put two noun phrases in apposition thus:

Ace reporter Clark Kent + leaped into a phone booth.

In other words, we take two noun phrases and use them together. They can
either provide more information (after all, Clark Kent is an ace reporter) or they
can rename each other:

Superman (Clark Kent) + leaped into a phone booth.

Here are a few more examples:

{noun phrase} + {noun phrase}

Her best dish ever, + Farfalle a la Trapanese + is a pasta dish.

Don’t leave your socks on the floor or + our puppy, + Luca, + will eat them.

In the examples above, the apposition means that we have 2 noun phrases next
to each other and both refer to the same thing. The noun phrases are, in other
words, in apposition.

Punctuation
When nouns are in apposition they are usually (although not always) offset with
commas, brackets or dashes.
Diane (doyen of the peripatetic world) got on her bike.

His uncle – the King of England – plotted to have him murdered.

Ace reporter Clark Kent leaped into a phone booth.

In the first example we don’t need to have doyen of the peripatetic world to
understand the sentence so it is optional. We can separate it off with brackets or
commas depending on what our message is.

In the second example we want the extra information to stand out so we use
dashes.

Finally in the third example it is essential that we have both noun phrases for the
sentence to make sense so there’s no need to use any form of punctuation.

* Ace reporter leaped into a phone booth.

* an asterisk means this sentence is ungrammatical

Apposition and TEFL

It’s not normally necessary to specifically teach apposition in class, however as
a TEFL teacher you should be aware of the term and what it means.
Phrases can be joined together by coordinating conjunctions such as and, or and but.
Here are some examples, with the conjoined elements marked in square brackets and the
conjunctions highlighted:

1. This was [totally different] and [much calmer].

2. The students had not met [people with disabilities] or [people in wheelchairs].

What type of phrases are conjoined in these examples?

In (1) we have adjective phrases joined by and, while in (2) we have noun phrases joined
by or.

A conjoined unit like totally different and much calmer does not have a single Head, so in
that way it is different from other phrases. However, it functions within the clause like a
single phrase. Compare:

 This was [totally different].

 This was [much calmer].
 This was [totally different and much calmer].