What is this kind of "___ of ___" syntax called?

Question

I'm wondering what the technical term is for this kind of syntax:
"It is not wrong to say that the use of dairy in cooking results from marketing."
Often I see it in sentences like "the idea of____ stems from X," or "the point of ___ reminds us to..."
Or more generally, "the ___ of _____ (verb)..."
What is this called? Thank you!

Shoe · Answer

The noun of noun construction is called a partitive when used to refer to parts of wholes. For example: a slice of bread, a majority of the people. I am not aware of a term that covers all such specific noun of noun constructions, including the examples you give.
A general term, however, is collocation. So the preposition of collocates with the nouns idea, use and point, as in your examples. Other noun + of collocations include: cause of, love of, fear of, risk of.
Other nouns collocate with different prepositions: cure for, case for, rise in, belief in, information on, report on, etc.
There are more noun+preposition collocations on the excellent 7ESL site.

What is this kind of "_ of _" syntax called?

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