1Grammar A noun or noun phrase involved in the action expressed by a verb.
〔语法〕动作名词，动作名词短语
Example sentencesExamples
Transitive verbs typically have actants that play thematic semantic roles.
We use the term ‘valence’ to describe semantically an actant of the verb, i. e., to describe the semantic role of the actant.
The first metafunction consists of an underlying semantic structure or logical form describing relations between actants fulfilling roles in a process (verb or predicate).
2(in literary theory) a person, creature, or object playing any of a set of active roles in a narrative.
（文学理论用语）（故事中）活跃的人物（或动物、物体）
Example sentencesExamples
These four steps describe the interactions between three actants (abstract representations of characters and their functions): the Subject, the Object and the Sender.
Their most articulate supporters point out that Latour's non-human actants are already articulated by human agents (bacteria is a human/social category).
Successful actor-networks are built by enrolling the heterogeneous actants as active participants in a common project.
As Swapan Chakravorty has observed, the characters in A Chaste Maid in Cheapside are the result of a ‘shuffling [of] the old actants and indices’ of Middleton's earlier plays.
In other words, an actor / actant must be made relevant to others, be made indispensable to others, and be granted consent by others (enrolment).
Definition of actant in US English:
actant
nounˈaktənt
(in literary theory) a person, creature, or object playing any of a set of active roles in a narrative.
（文学理论用语）（故事中）活跃的人物（或动物、物体）
the room has become an actant, a surrogate for the heroine herself
Example sentencesExamples
Successful actor-networks are built by enrolling the heterogeneous actants as active participants in a common project.
These four steps describe the interactions between three actants (abstract representations of characters and their functions): the Subject, the Object and the Sender.
Their most articulate supporters point out that Latour's non-human actants are already articulated by human agents (bacteria is a human/social category).
In other words, an actor / actant must be made relevant to others, be made indispensable to others, and be granted consent by others (enrolment).
As Swapan Chakravorty has observed, the characters in A Chaste Maid in Cheapside are the result of a ‘shuffling [of] the old actants and indices’ of Middleton's earlier plays.