**2. The structure of a query**

## **2.1 Questions … about queries, questions and /or queries**

Let us begin by stating whether a question and a query are the same.

A question is a sort of speech act, with its particular illocutionary force and standard structure.

In ordinary language, it is marked either by a typical intonation (in oral communication) or by a dedicated interpunction, a question mark (in written communication), often together with further markers, such as introductory interrogative lexical items (pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, such as the 5 *wh*), a typical word order (e.g. VSO vs. SVO etc.), some special devices (auxiliary verbs, correlated adverbial or adjectival forms, such as, in English, 'to do', 'ever' vs. 'never', 'any' vs. 'some' etc. ).

'Query' is the term used to define what users enter into a web search engine, in order to retrieve information. Its normal form is that of an item being identified as a query by being placed in a special field designed to be filled in with some subject, key-word or quotation in the context of a search-engine interface. Such a context helps the authors of queries to save time and energy in the self-activation of their queries as such. Formats for queries already serve as devices to make the subject of a query recognisable as such.

In computing, a query language is a language in which queries are passed to and information retrieved from a database or information system.
