Search results for 'tag:Colons tag:Pronouns' matching tags 'Colons' and 'Pronouns'

(Unknown 22884)OHHH I FINALLY CAN POST!!!

Jen001 — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 01:51:40 GMT

"The Change of the Characteristics in the passage from The Hours"

The passage from the novel The Hours by Michael Cunningham is intriguing. The passage illustrates the difference between the character's characteristics in different time settings: past and present. This difference is clearly shown through the contrasting structure, imagery and language.

The structure reflects the division of the time setting and helps to contrast the different characteristics. The passage has two paragraphs, each describing the character's thoughts and perception about a same place, of the past and present. The length of each paragraph is different; the one from the past is much longer than the other one from the present. This can be related to each of the paragraph's sentence construction. In the first paragraph, about the past, the lengths of the sentences are very long. The first sentence takes eight lines, lengthened continuously within commas, semi-colons and colons. In fact, in one sentence, there are five commas, five semi-colons and a colon. This overly-continued sentence gives a sense of unfiltered, informal, and unrestricted flowing of thoughts. Moreover, the use of brackets, âsome sort of wood(cedar? Camphor?),â seems to be less sophisticated, compared to using dashes or other punctuations of the same function. However, in the second paragraph of the present, the sentence construction is shown contrastingly. The paragraph starts with a short simple sentence: âShe turns down Bleecker, goes up Thomson.â Also, in this paragraph, there are four sentences in six lines, and three of the four sentences are written in simple sentence, including the example above. Although there are a few commas in some of the sentences, there is no semi-colon, but only a colon in the last sentence. The colon is used in a very appropriate way, functioning to introduce the list of âthingsâ, such as âjewelryâ and âjackets.â Thus, within the brief and concise sentence construction, the character in the present appears to be more mature, filtered and sophisticated than in the past. However, as a result of that, the sense of youthful, unfiltered freedom cannot be found anymore in the present.

In addition to the structure, the contrasting imagery of each paragraph demonstrates further differences of the characteristic in the past and present. As both paragraphs are of the same setting, the image of the same place is described at each time. So, the consistent place makes the comparison between the two more distinctive and reliable. The imagery of the place is very vivid in the past, not only within the visual sense, but also within the auditory and olfactory senses, whereas that of the past only relies on the sense of sight. For example, in the past, âthe neighborhoodâ is depicted as âthe center of something new and wildâ in âthe city where the sound of guitars drifted all nightâ and âwhere the stores â¦ smelled the way â¦ Arab bazaars must smell.â This is detail, imaginative and lively, even the âArab bazaarsâ creates a somewhat mystical and adventurous atmosphere. This interesting and passionate depiction is being minimized in the present into three words: an âimitation of itself.â It is now âa watered-down carnival for tourists,â which gives a sense of inactivity and boredom. Also, the stores now âall sell essentially the same things,â such as âsouvenir T-shirts.â This seems to be dull, with no excitement or creativity or passion. This changed imagery, depicted by the character, rather shows the change in the character's perception. The change in perception is demonstrated more clearly within the notion of the âdoorâ and âalley.â In the past, she says, âif you passed through the wrong door or down the wrong alley you would meet a fate,â however, in the present, she âknows that behind these doors, and down these alleys lies nothing more or less than people living their lives.â In the past, she seems to be more concerned with the 'inner' world of thought or imagination. Whereas in the present, she seems to be more grounded in the external world of physical reality. As like the previously discussed change in the sentence structure, she is now more sophisticated, knowledgeable and realistic than the past. Also, as like the image of the place, her perception changed from the creative, interesting and adventurous to the boring, predictable and filtered way. Thus, the contrasting imagery of the past and present reflects the similar change in the character's perception.

While the structure and the imagery convey the distinctive change in the characteristics of the character, the contrasting use of language supports those differences. More specifically, the diction [dash]shown in the past and the present[dash] is comparable. Reflecting the imagery of the varied senses, the words and expressions used in the past are also varied and animated, such as âincense and richâ and âdung-y dustâ describing the smell of the stores. These two expressions, âincense and richâ and âdung-y dustâ are contrasting; they express the diversity of the object. Moreover, the speaker creates a non-existing adjective, âdung-y.â The extra adding of â-yâ grants a more animated image, and it gives a sense of freedom and even somewhat childishness. The âsmellâ is then described as âsomething fruitily, fertilely rotting.â Again, she creates a non-existing adverb, âfruitily,â expressing the scent rather vividly, which would be sour as it ârots.â The other adverb âfertilelyâ contributes to create a sense of abundance and richness of the imagery. However, the use of those two positive adverbs, modifying the negative verb ârottingâ seems to be oxymoron in âfruit[full]â or âfertile,â as well as the use of adjective âdisreputable,â following ânew and wild.â The oxymoron adds an unpredictable sense to the imagery and hence to the depicter's thoughts. On the other hand, in the present, the adjectives used to describe the âcityâ and the âstores,â are ânothing,â âless,â âsame,â and âstill.â All of them are negative and reflect the boredom, dullness and hopelessness. More significantly, the speaker uses the adverb, âGrotesquelyâ before describing how âthe same bars and coffeehouses are still [th]ereâ, showing the character's cynical characteristic. So does the use of the adjective âcheapâ for the goods at the stores. Thus, in the past, the character uses language interestingly [dash] it is diverse, lively and creative [dash] whereas that of the past is inactive, hopeless and cynical. These differences are directly reflecting the character's contrasting, changed characteristic.

The change of the characteristic seems to be abrupt. As a cause, something would have happened to her, that is not shown in the passage. However, an assumption can be drawn within the evidences from the passage. There is a shift in the first paragraph within âHere,â showing the shifted tense from the past to the past perfect. In the past perfect, there is a scene of Clarissa, the major character, and her boyfriend Richard. She seems to appreciate Richard a lot, for example, she does not use the pronoun 'he' for âRichard,â even though he is the only male character. So, in a sentence, Richard is successively repeated three times, âwith Richard, when Richard â¦ when Richard.â Moreover, she describes his appearance in detail; he âwas nineteen,â âa firm-featured, hard-eyed, not-quite-beautiful dark-haired boy with an impossibly long and graceful, very pale neck.â So, to describe Richard, she combines an adjective and a noun to create a single adjective, such as âhard-eyed.â This shows her seriousness about describing him precisely. His âimpossibly longâ and âvery paleâ neck would seem negative, if not for the complementary adjective âgraceful.â Also, the adverb âimpossiblyâ gives a sense of special and unusual feeling for the person. Besides the use of language, the use of punctuation should also be noted. There are many commas, causing the sentences to seem choppy. This would be imitating the feeling of uncertainty and the tension in the situation. The uncertainty of the situation is shown in the line, ââ¦about what? A kiss? Had Richard kissed her, or had she, Clarissaâ¦,â also the tension created as they âhad certainly argued.â Then, the reason for the âargu[ment]â is explained: âClarissa wanted her freedom and Richard wanted, well, too much.â It is notable that as Richard âwanted â¦ too muchâ relating to the âkiss,â the pronoun 'he' is used as âdidn't he always?â In this case, however, the pronoun 'he' seems to more likely indicate every 'man', rather than particularly âRichard.â Thereafter the paragraph ends, and the paragraph of the present starts. It is not sure whether the abrupt change in Clarissa's characteristic is due to âRichardâ or not. Although it is not, it is evident that Clarissa once considered and cared about him quite specially.

Despite of the uncertain reason, the change in the Clarissa's characteristic from the past to the present is shown clearly throughout the contrasting structure, imagery and language. The characteristic includes the thoughts and perception, which were unrestricted, unfiltered, creative and animated in the past; whereas in the present, they are shown restricted, filtered, dull and inactive. The change is extreme, but no particular evidence for the extremity is being suggested, except the short scene with Richard. Thus, this passage not only introduces the setting and the character, but also evokes the reader's curiosity: What has happened to Clarissa?

------------------------------------------------

I really really really appreciate for your help... Thank you..!

Re: Commentary on Hamlet's soliloquy

Clive — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 22:28:49 GMT

Hi,

Where you have put semi-colons, I'd usually use commas. I have also suggested some other changes to your punctuation. My general advice is not to get into the habit of using semi-colons and colons. They can often make tyour meaning more obscure rather than more clear.

You seem to have a very good understanding of this topic. I've broken up your one huge paragraph into two. Are there any other ways you can make your organization clearer to the reader?

Best wishes, Clive

Commentary on "To Be or not to Be"

In this soliloquy Hamlet sparks an internal philosophical debate on the advantages and disadvantages of existence, and whether it is one's right to end one's own life. He first asks himself thoughtfully whether it is nobler to bear the miseries of life or to take arms against them; but since both passive and active resistance are doomed to failure, he regards death as a mean to end oneâs sorrows once and for all. He sees death from a Medieval perspective, as physical liberation from the prison of the body (the âmortal coilâ); but he also symbolizes the doubt of the Renaissance man, concerning the after life. Indeed he faces an obstacle, that is to say the fear of âwhat dreams may comeâ in that sleep of death. If death were like a dreamless sleep, it would be easy to put an end to the misfortunes of life with a single stroke, but since we donât know what to expect in the afterlife, we havenât courage enough commit suicide. He says that the troubles of life are such that no one would willingly bear them, but our cowardice makes us âbear those ills we have / than fly to others that we know not ofâ.

In his soliloquy, Hamlet uses various gramatical structures to express his uncertainty, such as the infinitive forms. His speech takes shape slowly because of its thoughtful nature. The climax is reached when Hamlet lists the injustices and miseries of life, concluding that it would only take a small does his word 'mere' mean 'small' or does it mean 'unimportant'? knife to bring relief. He also uses metaphors, such as that of the mortal coil, that of the unknown country from where no traveller comes back, and that of the opposition between the pale cast of thought and the native hue of resolution. This one in particular helps us understand that for Hamlet courage is the ability to cross the border between life and death; but most people are cowards and this cowardice, through âthe pale cast of thoughtâ, makes us stay alive. The soliloquy elevates Hamletâs individual case to an universal level; this is achieved through the use of the plural pronouns 'we' and 'us', the indefinite 'who', and the impersonal infinitive. Its problematic nature is shown by the insistent use of interrogatives, while the internal struggle within Hamletâs mind is pointed out by the use of images from the battle-field (âslings and arrowsâ, which has become an idiomatic expression, and âto take arms against a sea of troublesâ). In the middle of the soliloquy we can find an enumeration of lifeâs misfortunes; while reflecting upon the nature of death Hamlet uses a repetition (âto die, to sleepâ). Finally, we can find a term from the financial semantic field, âquietusâ.

Part of speech identification

Eagerlearner — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 20:22:31 GMT

Hello, this is my first post here, I like to know these words
kilometer
centimeter

Are those words noun if they are standing alone ? if it's, what kind of noun it's, proper noun or abstract noun or etc ?

After that, I want to indentify the part of speech of the following sentence by using the stanford parser at http://nlp.stanford.edu:8080/parser/index.jsp
if you input,
convert kilometer to centimeter
it gives convert/VB kilometer/NN to/TO centimeter/VB

if you input,
convert 2 kilometers to centimeter
it gives convert/VB 2/CD kilometers/NNS to/TO centimeter/NN

You can refer to the tagset below, my question is, is the first input grammatically correct ? if it's correct the part of speech given by the program seems to be incorrect because
the centimeter should be noun instead of Verb, or am I wrong ? If you add the "2" as the second input the program gives the correct part of speech tagging,
is it because my first input grammar is incorrect ? Thank you.

Reference
1. CC Coordinating conjunction 25.TO to
2. CD Cardinal number           26.UH Interjection
3. DT Determiner                27.VB Verb, base form
4. EX Existential there     28.VBD Verb, past tense
5. FW Foreign word              29.VBG Verb, gerund/present participle
6. IN Preposition/subord.     30.VBN Verb, past participle
218z     conjunction
7. JJ Adjective                 31.VBP Verb, non-3rd ps. sing. present
8. JJR Adjective, comparative    32.VBZ Verb, 3rd ps. sing. present
9. JJS Adjective, superlative    33.WDT wh-determiner
10.LS List item marker          34.WP wh-pronoun
11.MD Modal                     35.WP Possessive wh-pronoun
12.NN Noun, singular or mass    36.WRB wh-adverb
13.NNS Noun, plural              37. # Pound sign
14.NNP Proper noun, singular     38. $ Dollar sign
15.NNPS Proper noun, plural      39. . Sentence-final punctuation
16.PDT Predeterminer             40. , Comma
17.POS Possessive ending         41. : Colon, semi-colon
18.PRP Personal pronoun          42. ( Left bracket character
19.PP Possessive pronoun        43. ) Right bracket character
20.RB Adverb                    44. " Straight double quote
21.RBR Adverb, comparative       45. ` Left open single quote
22.RBS Adverb, superlative       46. " Left open double quote
23.RP Particle                  47. ' Right close single quote
24.SYM Symbol             48. " Right close double quote

Re: Help Me

Philip — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 15:20:53 GMT

Cherrypie10 wrote:
I canât think of a better site name before so Iâve decided to name it after the two of my favorite dogs. Cherry and Pie are two of our family dogs, [;] they're the oldest so they're the one ~~whom~~ I love the most.

Is that correct?

A semicolon keeps it from being a "run-on" sentence.

I would use 'two' rather than 'ones', but many people use the plural form of 'one'.

No relative pronoun is necessary, but I wouldn't use 'whom' when referring to animals.

Re: "and" and comma

Lovek323 — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 12:06:34 GMT

Question 1
Although the question has already been answered, I should like to comment on why arise is the correct choice. The subject of the clause should any difference arise is difference, which is singular and third person. One of the fundamental principles of English grammar is that the subject and verb must agree in number and person. Thus, as the subject is third person singular, the verb must also be third person singular. (A more thorough explanation would discuss number and person.)

For all verbs except to be, number and person only affect the present tense. The -s ending is used for the third person singular and the uninflected (unchanged) form is used for the rest:

My neighbours annoy me.
My dog annoys me.

The uninflected form annoy is used when the subject is a plural noun phrase ("my neighbours" above) or one of the pronouns I, we, you (sg. or pl.), or they. The -s ending is appended when the subject is a singular noun phrase or one of the third person singular personal pronouns (he, she, or it).

Question 2
As has already been pointed out, neither of the proposed sentences was correct. A sufficient response has been given as to the reason behind the choice of a semi colon, even if it was unnecessarily cerebral (just kidding).

Re: conjuction

Pioussoul — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 19:02:59 GMT

Hanuman_2000 wrote:

Hello,I was reading an article on conjuction. It says that a conjuction is a word which merely joins words or sentences.

It further says that relative pronouns and relative adverbs are also conjuctions but they do the other works also.

My doubts are:

1. Are relative pronouns and some adverbs a conjunction? Yes, the latter are sometimes called conjunctive adverbs.

2. What other works do they do?

-----------------

2a. Relative pronouns functions as a conjunction, usually connecting two clauses. For example,

[You are the person] who [asks such fine questions].

2b. As for conjunctive adverbs, they only connect the ideas of two sentences; therefore, a semi-colon is always used in the middle of the two sentences. For instance,

[Such fine questions are complicated]; consequently/as a result/therefore/thus, [few people can explain them clearly].

Re: Right use of semicolon?

Clive — Sun, 04 Jun 2006 01:21:46 GMT

Hi,

I'd just like to add my usual recommendation that semi-colons should be used very seldom. A sentence like this seems to me rather trite for the use of one.

If you make two sentences, the pronoun 'it' seems to tie the second one to the first one adequately.

Best wishes, Clive

is 'it' the sole possible pronoun for animals and objects?

Inchoateknowledge — Thu, 04 May 2006 10:26:39 GMT

The other day I read the following, 'let her rip!' where 'her' replaced 'car'.
also, i read: 'The dog broke his leg.'
ships are referred to as 'she'.
My question is, is it correct to refer to objects and animals as 'he' or 'she'?
Could you please elaborate on this matter - It is a grey area to me?
By the way, does anybody have any objections vis-a-vis my punctuation? The previous sentence meant to imply no threat - it is just a friendly appeal for help.
second question of mine is, how would you punctuate the following sentence: Do you know the answer; this is a 64000 dollar question(?!.) I insist on there being a semi colon in the middle!
Punctuation is my nightmare and is doing my head in.
As I percieve you have to have a massive syntactical background knowledge to master.
Can you recommend a good book that is short and sweet and to the point besides being detailed.

INCHOATE

Re: using ;/prepositions at and by

Grammar Geek — Wed, 29 Mar 2006 22:13:05 GMT

The problem isn't with the semi-colons. It's that odd construction with the Amy and the pronoun I. Is the speaker supposed to be Amy Potter?

Re: however (punctuation)

Teo — Thu, 16 Mar 2006 12:26:51 GMT

http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/runons.htm

Run-on sentences happen typically under the following circumstances*:

When an independent clause gives an order or directive based on what was said in the prior independent clause:
This next chapter has a lot of difficult information in it, you should start studying right away.
(We could put a period where that comma is and start a new sentence. A semicolon might also work there.)
When two independent clauses are connected by a transitional expression (conjunctive adverb) such as however, moreover, nevertheless.
Mr. Nguyen has sent his four children to ivy-league colleges, however, he has sacrificed his health working day and night in that dusty bakery.
(Again, where that first comma appears, we could have used either a period â and started a new sentence â or a semicolon.)
When the second of two independent clauses contains a pronoun that connects it to the first independent clause.
This computer doesn't make sense to me, it came without a manual.
(Although these two clauses are quite brief, and the ideas are closely related, this is a run-on sentence. We need a period where that comma now stands.)
Most of those computers in the Learning Assistance Center are broken already, this proves my point about American computer manufacturers.
Again, two nicely related clauses, incorrectly connected â a run-on. Use a period to cure this sentence.