Search results for 'tag:Countable nouns tag:Gerunds' matching tags 'Countable nouns' and 'Gerunds'

Re: gerund or verbal noun with an article?

Anonymous — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 00:18:50 GMT

Thank you.

I think it would be OK to speak of a pen that he found which belonged to his friend, Joe, like this:

I found a (one) pencil of a student. -- If the situation is that only studnents use pen (unbelievable as it sounds) and he don't know whose pen it is.
I found the pencil of a student. -- If the pen is prior-mentioned or if a student in wherever he is used only one pen, not two pencils ever.

I think your corrected version sounds right but I can't dispel the notion that my versions might be correct too under a right circumstance. I think we are making an instance of the uncountable noun "wailing" and that "instance" notion might get fuzzy if the definite article "the" is used in my opinion (I could be wrong). It seems to be different from something like "He heard the shouting by a skinny young man yesterday evening." Confused.

He heard a fearful wailing of a dog,
or,
He heard a fearful wailing of the dog of the next-door neighbor

gerund or verbal noun with an article?

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 22:13:38 GMT

Hi,

I think I found out the word 'wailing' is an uncountable noun.
If that is so, then is this correct?

A feartul wailing was heard.

He heard a fearful wailing.

I would be more comfortable if I saw something like this:

He heard a fearful wailing of a dog,
or,
He heard a fearful wailing of the dog of the next-door neighbor.

Re: pluralization of a gerund/verbal noun

Mr Wordy — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 03:08:08 GMT

With some verbs, yes. It depends on whether the "-ing" form of the verb is a recognised countable noun. For example, "there was a pounding" is fine, as is "poundings of the heart". On the other hand, "existings" (to pick an example at random) is unnatural because you never talk of "an existing".

I'm not sure there's any way to tell which verbs fall into which category except through experience of the language.

Re: indefinite article before a gerund

Cool Breeze — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 10:49:43 GMT

I am not sure if the following answers your question but I'll say it anyway. Some grammarians don't distinguish between verbal nouns (= complete nouns formed from verbs with the ing ending) and gerunds (= words that are neither verbs nor nouns but resemble both to some extent). Some apply the term "gerund" to both of them. Perhaps your confusion arises from that?

A verbal noun really is a noun in that it can assume all the characteristics any countable noun has. This means that it can have an article, an adjectival attribute (or more than just one) and it can occur in the plural:

The correct speaking of English is easy.

His old writings don't interest me.

Perhaps some of the "gerunds" that bother you or arouse your interest belong to this category? Mixing in your post certainly does.

Some verbal nouns have become part and parcel of the language and are included in dictionaries, like "beginning" for example. In some cases you have a choice: a happy end/ending.

Gerunds can't be preceded by an article or an adjectival attribute because they are not full-fledged nouns. They bear some resemblance to verbs: they can take an object:

Speaking English correctly is easy.

Re: a shouting

Mister Micawber — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 03:40:40 GMT

.
Yours needs fixing: It is a laying aside of some of those things

I find this reclassification into a countable noun not good; it is better as: It is laying aside some of those things that is difficult to do.... Secondary classification (which has nothing to do with gerunds per se) is an epiphenomenon of modification, and thereby separation of kinds. It occurs like this:

It is an exceptionally difficult laying aside of some of those things that is difficult to do...

Modification separates the uncountable process of laying aside into two sorts: difficult ones and not-difficult ones. Hence, 'secondary reclassification'.

Why not just say "an instance of 'gerund'" in most cases that involve this kind of situation?

Definition or observation is not my job with Vincent. I am trying to help him write good, natural English.

When a present participle is not one

Avangi — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 16:59:09 GMT

Hi,

Something seems amiss in the category structure. My understanding used to be that the dictionary entry for a verb begins with the (bare) infinitive, and is typically followed by the present and past participles, and then the present 3rd person singular, or something like that. I always thought of these as building blocks in the formation of different tenses and other forms.

I have no problem calling the present participle a gerund when it serves as a noun, although I formerly thought "gerund" had a much broader definition. But why does it have to stop being the present participle? The infinitive is still the infinitive, regardless of which of several uses it's put to.

If they insist on doing this, why don't they come up with a correspondingly neat name for the present participle when it serves as an adjective?

It seems very strange indeed to say that the present participle cannot serve as the subject of a sentence, when I can see it doing so with my own eyes.

Can anyone justify this unbalanced treatment?? I've been hoping for an epiphany for several months now, and I'm about to give up. To me, it's like saying that an uncountable noun is not singular because "singular" has to do with countables. (This position recently held in a thread)

present participle as noun = (gerund)
present participle as adjective = (??????)

Best wishes, - A.

NOUN

Believer — Wed, 28 May 2008 22:12:14 GMT

Hi,

It has been known to me that a gerund can function as a noun and should or likely to be treated more as an uncountable noun than a countable noun.

Mixing of sugar and flour makes this dough ...

If you want to be specific, I think you could write:

The mixing of sugar and flour makes this dough ...

If you want to indicate the mixing being an instance of it or an example of it, you could write (I think) like this:

A mixing of sugar and flour makes this dough ...

It could be more clear if you write this though (but the above example seems to be correct grammatically too):

An instance of sugar and flour makes this dough ...

It has been to me that a quoted content (I may be wrong but what I call a quoted content is one that has quotation marks around it, whether or not they are done to quote someone's words or to highlight a word/words) can be treated an uncountble noun too.

"-ing" is not needed in your sentence. -- Just the mention of a case to highlight, I think.

The "-ing" is not needed in your sentence. -- Not just mentioning but specificallymentioning, I think.

A "-ing" is not needed in your sentence. -- An example of "-ing" use or an instance of "-ing" use, but this is what gives me trouble. I think whether a word in quotation marks can accommodate an indefinite article is predicated on whether its semantic meaning can embrace it.

So, I think I would be able to say, depending on words, some words that are in quotation marks can accommodate its having an indefinite article, whereas some words that are in quotation marks can't accommodate the use because its semantic meaning and how it is used in sentences make it awkward at best if not wrong to have an indefinite article. Sounds plausible?

Sorry for a long post.

Mistakes made by Chinese Learners

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 14:30:26 GMT

Hi everyone

I just wondered if anyone could help - I have to write a profile of a chinese learner of English (completely made up). In it I must put any difficulties that the learner has in learning English as an L2. I have got so far:

Intonation transfer from L1 may cause them to be perceived as rude/inconsiderate, more serious transfer may affect comprehensiveness.
No inflections in L1 - tenses difficult to learn in L2 as L1 has no true tenses and concept of time is expressed by adverbs/implicit or contextual assumptions.
Difficulty distinguishing [r] & - Does anyone know why this is as I can't find a reason?!!
Prepositions such as 'on', 'in' & 'at' have one chinese translation in many contexts, 'zai' - may be confused resulting in phrases such as 'on Taiwan' instead of 'in Taiwan'.
Use of awkward gerunds e.g. 'no noising', excessive use of verbs ending in 'ing' e.g. 'do not climbing', confusion of 'ed' & 'ing' verbs e.g. 'i am bored' vs 'i am boring' --- all of these errors occur because verbs are not conjugated in chinese, for tense or pronoun.
No equivalent word for 'the' so may be used excessively when not needed e.g. 'The China' or missed out when needed. May also be confused with 'a'/'an'.
Confusion over countable and uncountable nouns, use of 'how much?' vs 'how many?' - leads to phrases such as 'I want a soup' & 'a lot of shoe'. This is due to there not being plurals in chinese - no inflections.

Switching between 'he' & 'she' - Does anyone know why this is?

If anyone can think of anymore it would be greatly appreciated or if anyone knows the answers to my questions about gender switching and distinguishing [r] & this would also help a lot!!

Thank you in advance.

Shannon

Questions about As Much...As clause.

Sabyakgp — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 21:05:14 GMT

Dear Friends,

I have couple of questions (which has been nagging me for a long time) about 'As much...As' comparative clause.

What all (noun (uncountable/countable), adjectives (gradable/non-gradable), infinitive, gerund) we can use in 'As much....as' clause?

'As much <noun (uncountable/countable)> as'

'As much adjectives (gradable/non-gradable)> as'

'As much <infinitive> as'

'As much <gerund> as'

Could you please explain me.

My second query is:

I know that "much" can be used before uncounatble nouns. But I came accross a famous quotation of Mahatma Gandhi.

"Non-cooperation with evil is as much a duty as is cooperation with good"

In the above mentioned sentence, duty is used as a countable noun with as much. Could you plesae explain this?

Best Regards,
Sabya

Re: what could come after a preposition?

CalifJim — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 19:27:38 GMT

The only thing that can come after a preposition to form a prepositional phrase is a noun phrase, usually a noun accompanied by its preceding determiner and perhaps an adjective. A relative clause may be added. The noun itself may be a gerund.

If the element after the candidate for a preposition looks like it's not a noun, then either of these holds:

a. The preposition candidate is not a preposition, but perhaps an adverb or conjunction.
b. The structure after the preposition candidate actually is a noun phrase.

Both of your examples are in the category labeled b.

In your first example bad should be viewed as an adjective used as a noun, 'promoted' to a noun because of the elision of situation or its equivalent, one.

The situation can be seen as a bad situation.
The situation can be seen as a bad one.

In your second example, bad and good are simply abstract uncountable nouns meaning that which is bad and that which is good, respectively.

CJ