Search results for 'tag:Constructions tag:Adverbs' matching tags 'Constructions' and 'Adverbs'

Re: nominative absolute clause..

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 21:39:35 GMT

Yes, it is. This is otherwise referred to in grammar as ABSOLUTE CONSTRUCTION. By definition, it is a reduced adjective or adverb clause that functions as sentence modifier indicating time and causality. This type of construction is commonly used more in writing than in speaking. I hope I've been able to help you in this matter.

Re: Present Perfect (americans)

Diamondrg — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 07:40:10 GMT

Hi, YSchneider. I am not a native speaker and this is indeed a tough grammar point for non-native speakers.

Here is an extract from CGEL*:

Did you lock the front door? [5]

in a domestic situation where it is known that the front door is locked at bedtime every night. In that case, [5] is more or less equivalent to Did you
lock the front door at bedtime? (Incidentally, in [5], "the" in "the front door" is another case of situational definiteness; cfS.Uff.)

--

The ATTITUDINAL PAST, used with verbs expressing volition or mental state, reflects the tentative attitude of the speaker, rather than past time.
In the following pairs, both the present and past tenses refer to a present state of mind, but the latter is somewhat more polite:

Do/Did you want to see me now?
I wonder/wondered if you could help us.

--

Where did you put my purse ? [ 1 ]
Where have you put my purse? [2]

The purpose of both of these questions may be to find the purse; but in [1] the speaker seems to ask the addressee to remember a past action; while in [2] the speaker apparently concentrates on the purse's present whereabouts. There are many such cases.

--

Leaving aside such virtual equivalences, we may now focus on the difference between the two constructions, contrasting the meanings of the simple past given in 4.14 with the following meanings of the simple present perfective:

(a) STATE LEADING UP TO THE PRESENT

That house has been empty for ages.
Have you known my sister for long?

(b) INDEFINITE EVENT(S) IN A PERIOD LEADING UP TO THE PRESENT

Have you (ever) been to Florence?
All our children have had measles.

(c) HABIT (ie recurrent event) IN A PERIOD LEADING UP TO THE PRESENT

Mr Terry has sung in this choir ever since he was a boy.
The province has suffered from disastrous floods throughout its history.

Of these meanings, (a) corresponds to the 'state past' use of the simple past, but differs from it in specifying that the state continues at least up to the present moment (cf: That house was empty for ages - but now it's been sold); (b) corresponds to the 'event past', but differs from it in that the past time in question is indefinite rather than definite (cf: Did you go to Florence (last summer) ?); (c) corresponds to the 'habitual past', but, as with (a), the period identified must continue up to the present.

Note In AmE there is a tendency to use the past tense in preference to the present perfective, especially for the indefinite past; eg: Did you ever go to Florence ? (c/4.13 Note lb], 4.22 Note [a ]).

--

Have you seen the Javanese Art Exhibition? [yet]
Did you see the Javanese Art Exhibition? [when it was here]

The first of these implies that the Exhibition is still open; the second that the Exhibition has finished. From this concern with a period still existing at the present time, it is only a short step to the second implication often associated with the present perfective, viz that the event is recent. The simple present perfective is often used to report a piece of news:

_., , > the news? The president has resigned.

Because of this connotation of recency, B's reply in the following exchange must be considered absurdly inappropriate:

A: Has the postman left any letters? B: Yes, he did six months ago.

Since postmen in general deliver letters daily, the implicit time zone in this case would be no longer than a day.

[Note] In AmE, the simple past is often preferred to the present perfective for the variants of the indefinite past discussed in this section. Compare [6 ], for example, with Did the children come home yet? <esp AmE). Other AmE examples are: I just came back; You told me already; and without an adverb: /*m tired -1 had a long day.

* A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (Quirk et al.]

Re: unexpected visitor

New2grammar — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 03:33:46 GMT

RayH
"Sleepily, as I had almost fallen asleep,..." or
"Sleepily (as I had almost fallen asleep)..."

I don't understand why the adverb is the better choice. I've noticed that native speakers have no problem with the following construction.

Still tired (not tiredly), I walked up the stairs.

Avangi, do you feel the same way?

Re: Adjective

Goodman — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 22:08:07 GMT

Hi Tanit,
I guess it can be both depending on the construction....
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/likely

likely

Adjective

1. tending or inclined: likely to win

2. probable: the likely effects of the tunnel

3. appropriate for a purpose or activity: a likely candidate

Adverb

1. probably or presumably

2. not likely Informal definitely not [Old Norse lÄ«kligr]

USAGE: Likely as an adverb is preceded by another, intensifying adverb, as in it will very likely rain or it will most likely rain. Its use without an intensifier, as in it will likely rain, is regarded as unacceptable by most users of British English, though it is common in colloquial US English.

Participial Construction? (#2)

Gori — Tue, 27 May 2008 23:59:31 GMT

Dear professional teachers and native speakers,

One of the references I encountered says a sentence like the following is a participial construction whose subject is the same between the main clause and the (original) adverb clause. Is it really true? In other words, is the subject in the modifying phrase ("allowing companies to start up such businesses") "Archive services that copy and store information on websites"??

(Example) "Archive services that copy and store information on websites could also become legal under the revised law, allowing companies to start up such businesses."

To me, the phrase "allowing companies to start up such businesses" seems to be modifying the whole main clause ("Archive services...under the revised law") though... Therefore, in my understanding, the sentence can be re-written like this: "Archive services that copy and store information on websites could also become legal under the revised law, which allows companies to start up such businesses." Is my understanding wrong? Someone, please, please help me.

Re: However

Philip — Sat, 24 May 2008 13:52:06 GMT

I'll let someone else tackle the question of adverbs and comma splices.
I would use 'however expensive they may be', which is perhaps a little archaic, but it's the construction common when I was first paying attention to language.

Participial Construction??

Gori — Thu, 15 May 2008 03:34:47 GMT

Dear teachers,

Please tell me if the following sentences are, what is called, "participial construction" or not. Or are these sentences nothing related to "participial construction"? In other words, can the part formed with "When + ~ing" (e.g., When calling, When discussing, When gathering) or "When + past participle" (e.g., When asked) has the same subject as the one in the main clause? In my understanding, a participial construction is established, in principle, only when the subject of the adverb clause and the subject of the main clause are the same though...

Example 1) When calling for roadside service, please have the following information readily available.

Example 2) When discussing our sales performance, he pulls no punches.

Example 3) When gathering speed, this power along with power from a diesel engine is used to operate the motors.

Example 4) When asked about kicking the habit, 60 percent said they could quit if they wanted to.

Someone, please help me explain.

Re: make someone ---ed

CalifJim — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 01:49:41 GMT

The construction to make [someone] [past participle] is not very productive in English.

The reason is that it is, in most contexts, just a roundabout way of use the verb in its active form.

We don't say that we made the workers equipped with safety goggles; we say that we equipped the workers with safety goggles.

Similarly, we don't say:

They made the refugees concealed. / The police made the suspect investigated. / The army made the enemy defeated.

Instead, we say:

They concealed the refugees. / The police investigated the suspect. / The army defeated the enemy.

Nevertheless, if arrangements were made for these things to be done, and the subjects of these sentences did not actually perform the acts expressed by the verb, we could say:

They had the refugees concealed. / The police had the suspect investigated. / The army had the enemy defeated.

(The last of these is not at all likely, of course, in the relevant reading.)

The only cases I can think of where the pattern in question might be used is with the past participles of "psych-verbs" (verbs of psychological state), but even then, there are really very few verbs that work with that pattern. The past participle has to be much more like an adjective than like a verb.

Sometimes Susan makes me depressed. / Sometimes she makes me worried. / Sometimes she makes me nauseated.

Slightly more choices are available if we use an inanimate subject:

Seeing how the elderly suffer makes her depressed.

Or if we prepose "it" and use an infinitive subject at the end:

It made her frightened to see how close the fire approached her house.

It made them relieved to see that the house was saved.

That said, to make someone hated or loved are only 'borderline' possible. The effect can be softened with a plausible context and perhaps some adverbs.

It made the cruel dictator even more hated when he imposed extravagant taxes on the populace.

______

The short answer is no, not usually, and certainly not in the general case.

Verbs

ganesh77 — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 09:38:41 GMT

The list isn't meant to be exhaustive or carefully arranged. Any additions, corrections or further examples would be welcomed.

1 main verbs; lexical verbs (all verbs which are not auxiliaries or modals)

2 action verbs; event verbs; dynamic verbs (a verb which can be used in continuous tenses) i.e. eat, run, talk

3 state of being verbs; existence verbs; state verbs; stative verbs; static verbs (a verb which describes a state and is not usually used in a continuous tense) i.e. be, own, know

4 regular verbs (a verb that has four forms and follows the normal rules)

5 irregular verbs; strong verbs (a verb not following the normal rules for inflection)

6 auxiliary and modal verbs (which make up verbal phrases) â 23 in total

7 linking verbs; copulative verbs; copulas (a verb which links the subject and complement of a clause) i.e. It is warm today.

8 transitive verbs (a verb used to talk about an action or event that involves more than one person or thing, and so is followed by an object) i.e. Sheâs wasting her money.

9 intransitive verbs (a verb used to talk about an action or event that only involved the subject and so has no object) i.e. She arrived.

10 multiword verbs

a type 1 â intransitive [phrasal verbs; adverb particle

b type 2 â transitive (inseparable) [prepositional verbs; preposition particles]

c type 3 â transitive (separable) [phrasal verbs; adverb particle]

d type 4 â transitive (with two inseparable particles) [phrasal-prepositional verbs; first particle is an adverb, second particle is a preposition]

11 compound verbs

12 delexical verbs (a verb which has very little meaning in itself but is used with an object to describe an action) i.e. She gave a small cry.

13 ditransitive verbs (a verb which can have both a direct and indirect object) i.e. She gave me a kiss.

14 ergative verbs (a verb which can be used transitively to focus on the performer of the action, or intransitively to focus on the thing affected by the action) i.e. He boiled the water. The water boiled.

15 reporting verbs; performance verbs; performative verbs (a verb used with a quote or a reported clause to describe what people say or think) i.e. suggest, say, wonder

16 reciprocal verbs (a verb which describes an action involving two people doing the same thing to each other) i.e. They met in the street.

17 reflexive verbs (a verb which is typically used with a reflexive pronoun) i.e. Donât cut yourself with that knife.

18 defective verbs (a verb without all the inflected forms of a regular verb) i.e. modals

19 finite and non-finite

a infinitives

b gerunds; verbal nouns

c participles

20 catenative verbs (a verb that takes other verb forms as objects; found at the head of a series of linked constructions) i.e. We agreed to try to decide to stop eating snacks.

21 causative verbs (a verb that designates the action necessary to cause another action to happen) i.e. The devil made me do it.

Re: Questions about Adverbs and Adjectives

Goodman — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 17:25:45 GMT

BeginStudent,

You will see this type of construction quiet often.

She looks good! = Everything about her is good

This wine tastes terrific. = This wine is terrific

This stationâs music sounds boring. = The music is boring.

When we are working with verbs of senses âfeel, taste, sounds etc..)

Adjectives are acceptably used as adverbs.

She looks well does not carry the same meaning as âshe looks goodâ

If we say âJordan looked sickly this morningâ, people may not know what you exactly mean.