Search results for 'tag:Noun phrases tag:Constructions' matching tags 'Noun phrases' and 'Constructions'

Re: One - When is it not ok?

CalifJim — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 23:39:54 GMT

Recall that * means ungrammatical.

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one is always countable.

*coarse sand and fine one; *white sugar and brown one; *fresh milk and spoiled one; *British English and American one; *good knowledge and bad one

But (countable):

a happy child and a sad one; happy children and sad ones; the happy child and the sad one; the happy children and the sad ones

a big shoe and a small one; big shoes and small ones; the big shoe and the small one; the big shoes and the small ones

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The indefinite determiner a, a possessive construction, or an adjective of quantity cannot be followed directly by one; however, an adjective may intervene.

this old one, this one, that new one, that one, the fast one, the warm one, the one, a gold one, *a one, my old one, *my one, Tom's old one, *Tom's one, many new ones, *many ones, several good ones, *several ones, three short ones, *three ones

(these ones, those ones in some varieties of English; *these ones, *those ones in others.)

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With an adjective modifier:

the tall statue and the short one

Father's big shoes and Mother's small ones

the English teacher and the French one

-- The teacher from England and the one from France

With an adjunct:

a book with red trim and (*a) one with blue trim

the chair in the living room and the one in the kitchen

the coat that Lucy bought and the one that she stole

With a noun modifier:

*the clothing store and the hardware one

*a science book and a Latin one

*Father's work shoes and Mother's dress ones

*the chemistry teacher and the physics one

*an elm tree and a maple one

*Kluckin'-Fresh eggs and Lay-Rite ones

*the English teacher and the French one.

-- *the teacher of English and the one of French.

With a complement:

*a way of speaking and one of singing

*the Indian form of English and the Latin American one of Spanish

*a good knowledge of linguistics and a passing one of philosophy

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I have used "and" to connect noun phrases above only for purposes of illustration. The grammaticality of these expressions remains the same even within other structures within sentences, for example,

The tall statue was more beautiful than the short one.

*We planted an elm tree, but not a maple one.

*They shopped at the clothing store in the morning and at the hardware one that afternoon.

Re: passive voice

Huevos — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 23:22:52 GMT

Goodman
How would you classify this sentence then?

Goodman, your sentences are active voice. Their construction is: subject + linking verb (to be), + a noun phrase (predicate nominative). The passive voice, on the other hand, is formed thus: subject + verb to be + past participle of the lexical verb.

Re: not / neither / nor

Anonymous — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 00:09:37 GMT

When looking up tricky constructions or words, one can often go to the dictionary to view its proper usage. For example, www.dictionary.com shows this definition and usage note for nor:

1. (used in negative phrases, esp. after neither, to introduce the second member in a series, or any subsequent member): Neither he nor I will be there. They won't wait for you, nor for me, nor for anybody.
2. (used to continue the force of a negative, as not, no, never, etc., occurring in a preceding clause): He left and I never saw him again, nor did I regret it.

So,

"Usage Note: When using neither in a balanced construction that negates two parts of a sentence, nor (not or) must be used in the second clause: She is neither able nor (not or) willing to go. Similarly, when negating the second of two negative independent clauses, nor (not or) must be used: He cannot find anyone now, nor does he expect to find anyone in the future; Jane will never compromise with Bill, nor will Bill compromise with Jane. Note that in these constructions, nor causes an inversion of the auxiliary verb and the subject (does he ... will Bill ...). However, when a verb is negated by not or never, and is followed by a verb phrase that is also to be negated (but not an entire clause), either or or nor can be used: He will not permit the change, or (or nor) even consider it. In noun phrases of the type no this or that, or is actually more common than nor: He has no experience or interest (less frequently nor interest) in chemistry. Or is also more common than nor when such a noun phrase, adjective phrase, or adverb phrase is introduced by not: He is not a philosopher or a statesman. They were not rich or happy. "

So, or is more common than nor, but nor is still acceptable (even if it sounds weird).
It further becomes clear that not...nor is acceptable when you look at the definition of neither, which is a conjunction for not either.

Re: Questions on sentences

Clive — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 14:03:20 GMT

Hi,
1. Is the underlined part a noun? It's a noun phrase, ie a phrase that gives more information about the noun 'people'.
Is there possibly an ellipted 'to' at work? Yes, you could say 'to make people proud . . . '
What she has done is make people proud of who (whom??) they are. Say 'who'.

2. Can we have an adjective act as a noun? Please see the underlined part
If there should be someone reading this who realize ... that this wonderful of contracts has not been made ... This sentence as written is not grammatical. Did you type it correctly?

3. Is this construction valid and correct? Yes. It's quite literary in style.
Is the word 'power' the subject here? Yes.
To every poor slave of self who really desires it, is given the power to respond in obedience to our Lord ...

Best wishes, Clive

Re: The verb complement in "John tends to get hungry."

ouyang — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 13:57:44 GMT

I think it would be useful for students to understand how these constructions relate to simpler sentence patterns, but I haven't found a rationale for classifying them. As I said, other substitutions imply that my last examples are predicate adjectives, e.g. "He seems to be the owner." -> "He seems in charge." Regardless, the verb definitely appears to be linking the phrase to the subject. However, in a sentence like "He seems to have fixed the TV." the verbal phrase doesn't appear to be a subject complement. I wouldn't call it an adjective or a noun phrase. That's why I find the verb-verbal complement concept intriguing. It would simplify the analysis to say that "seems" and "to have fixed" combine to form a transitive verb phrase that takes "the TV" as its object, giving this sentence a S-V-Object pattern. If the same principle is applied to all infinitives that follow "seem" and "appear", then the infinitive would determine whether the resulting verb phrase was intransitive or transitive.

Grammatical subject and construction with 'it'/'there'

schweedie — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 13:29:42 GMT

Hi, everyone.

I'm wondering if I've understood the concept of 'grammatical subject' in the it-construction correctly and would be grateful for help. For example, in a sentence like, "It lay a dog on the bed" which clearly isn't right - would you call this an attempt to make "it" the grammatical subject? And on a similar note, if we change it into the more correct "There was a dog lying on the bed", does that make "there" the grammatical subject (and "a dog lying on the bed" the object)? Or am I barking up the wrong tree here, and am mixing grammatical subject up with something else?

Also, from what I've read, I gather that the reason for it being wrong to use the it-construction in cases like this is that the actual subject is a noun phrase instead of a clause. Am I right in this?

Thank you in advance.

Re: there is/are going to

Chariot — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 12:05:41 GMT

Thanks everyone. Now I understand that in the "There be" construction, the BE and other verbs that take the place of BE are the main verbs, and the nouns following them agree with them.

Originally I thought "going to do" can be followed by either plural nouns or singular nouns because "do" stands for a verb infinitive. In the case of the verb "be", its infinitive is BE, which is not affected by the countabilitity of the noun that follows. On this basis, the BE in the "there be" and the noun phrase do not necessarily accord, as "going to be" stands between them and both singular and plural nouns are allowed after "be". Therefore I could not find agreement between "there be" and the nouns when "goin to be" comes in between.

noun as modifier

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 09:48:11 GMT

Hi,

What should I do to use the noun phrases like a "goblin cake" where the noun "goblin" modifies "cake" correctly as a compound noun? What should I look for to decide how much or what is allowed in terms of the correctness of this type of compound noun? I see some unusual constructions but seem to be accepted as correct? When a compound noun is correct and when is it not?

If I want the answer to a quiz that was adminitered just before to be given to me, can I say this?

If you have the quiz answer, please write it down on a piece of paper and give it to me.

Does it have to be "the answer to the quiz"? Instead, can I use the compound noun "quiz answer" to say the same thing? If not, why not?

What makes this correct?

What is your study focus?

what is the difference?

Anonymous — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 10:41:16 GMT

I always favored the second construction, but the first construction is also looked to be correct. Is the first one correct in that 'enhancing speaking ability' is a noun phrase? Then, what is to in the first sentence?

1. More attention will be paid to enhancing speaking ability per se instead of ...

2. More attention will be paid to enhance speaking ability per se instead of ..

Re: gerund or verbal noun

CalifJim — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 20:25:23 GMT

All of your examples are gerunds if we stick to modern terminology.

Forget about the terminology verbal noun. It's total garbage!

It has many different definitions, depending on the author and when the grammar book was written.
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The modern definition is given at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verbal_noun

A verbal noun is a noun formed directly as an inflexion of a verb or a verb stem, sharing at least in part its constructions. This term is applied especially to gerunds, and sometimes also to [bare] infinitives and supines [i.e., full infinitives].

That is, there are three types of verbal noun: gerunds, bare infinitives, and full infinitives.

So anything that is a gerund is also a verbal noun, because a gerund is one of the types of verbal nouns.
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The modern definition is echoed at

http://www.ielanguages.com/english.html

Gerunds: [Like participles,] Gerunds are also formed by adding -ing to the verb, but they function as a verbal noun [as opposed to the participle, which is a verbal adjective] and are normally preceded by articles or demonstratives. The singing was excellent.
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A completely different definition is found here:

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O29-VERBALNOUN.html

VERBAL NOUN. A category of noncountable abstract noun derived from a verb, in English by adding the suffix -ing. Like the verb from which it derives, it refers to an action or state: writing in The writing has taken too long; hearing in His hearing is defective. Verbal nouns are frequently combined with the preposition of and a noun phrase that corresponds to the subject or object in a clause: The grumbling of his neighbours met with no response (compare His neighbours grumbled); His acting of Hamlet won our admiration (compare He acted Hamlet). Verbal nouns contrast with deverbal nouns, that is, other kinds of nouns derived from verbs, such as attempt, destruction, and including nouns ending in -ing that do not have verbal force: building in The building was empty. They also contrast with the gerund, which also ends in -ing, but is syntactically a verb.

Note the last (underlined) sentence. By this definition only usages like The neighbors were acting like fools are considered gerunds -- not all the other examples that preceded -- examples that we would all agree are gerunds in current terminology.
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The next definition is more than 100 years old, and I've seen it quoted on this site. Note that it is classified (see the URL) under "Classic Literature". It is useful only as a historic document -- not as a guide to modern English and modern syntactic analysis.

http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/wmbaskervill/bl-wmbaskervill-grammar-parts-nouns.htm

An English Grammar

1896

by W. M. Baskervill & J. W. Sewell

273. It [the gerund] differs from the participle in being always used as a noun: it never belongs to or limits a noun.

It differs from the verbal noun in having the property of governing a noun (which the verbal noun has not) and of expressing action (the verbal noun merely names an action, Sec. II).

[Sec. II. is actually Sec. 11, where nouns are discussed. The discussion of verbal nouns is within a category called Abstract Nouns, so in Section 11 verbal nouns are called by their more specific name: Verbal Abstract Nouns.]

II. The VERBAL ABSTRACT NOUNS Originate in verbs, as their name implies. They may beâ

(1) Of the same form as the simple verb. The verb, by altering its function, is used as a noun; as in the expressions, "a long run" "a bold move," "a brisk walk "
[These are called deverbal nouns in modern terminology -- or 'zero-related nominals' or just 'nouns'.]

(2) Derived from verbs by changing the ending or adding a suffix: motion from move, speech from speak, theft from thieve, action from act, service from serve.
[These,too, are called deverbal nouns nowadays -- or just 'nouns'.]

(3) Derived from verbs by adding -ing to the simple verb. It must be remembered that these words are free from any verbal function They cannot govern a word, and they cannot express action, but are merely names of actions. They are only the husks of verbs, and are to be rigidly distinguished from gerunds (Secs. 272, 273). [These are nouns that end in -ing. They have acquired fixed meanings as nouns, referring to something more concrete than the action of the underlying verb.]

To avoid difficulty, study carefully these examples:

The best thoughts and sayings of the Greeks; the moon caused fearful forebodings; in the beginning of his life; he spread his blessings over the land; the great Puritan awakening; our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting; a wedding or a festival; the rude drawings of the book; masterpieces of the Socratic reasoning; the teachings of the High Spirit; those opinions and feelings; there is time for such reasonings; the well-being of her subjects; her longing for their favor; feelings which their original meaning will by no means justify; the main bearings of this matter.
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It is debatable whether anything whatsoever is to be gained in the study of modern English by resurrecting these older definitions.

CJ