Dummy subject
Does the sentence need a subject word that names nothing?
Betekenis
A dummy subject is a word that fills the subject place in a sentence without naming anyone or anything. It lets a language build a full sentence even when there is no participant to name or the main content comes later. Some languages require such a word in weather or existence sentences; others can express these meanings without one. State and existence is about what is being said, not about a word filling the subject place. Words left out but understood covers meaningful words left unsaid; a dummy subject is present but names nothing.
Zo herken je het
Look for a subject word that does not point to a person or thing. Check whether it fills a required grammatical place rather than referring back to something or pointing to a place.
In de taal die je leert
English uses a dummy subject, a subject word that fills a required place but names no person or thing. The word it fills this place in weather and time expressions, and in comments whose main content comes later in the sentence. Unstressed there fills the subject place in sentences that introduce something as present or existing, usually with be. These uses of it and there do not refer back to a thing or point to a place.
It is snowing.
It fills the subject place without naming anything.
It is half past six.
There is a clean towel in the bathroom.
There fills the subject place; in the bathroom gives the location.
It is easy to find this shop.
The words to find this shop tell us what is easy.
It is good that you called.
The words that you called tell us what is good.
Learners whose language allows weather or impersonal statements without a subject may write *Is raining or *Is easy to get there. Learners whose language has no empty subject for existence may use it instead of there when introducing something, as in *It is a shop near my house when they mean that a shop exists nearby.