Please comment on the following analysis and answer my queries in question #2. Many thanks.
1. Preparing for the speech, John couldn’t help but feel nervous. (the underlined phrase is a participial phrase functioning as an adjective modifying John.)
2. While preparing for the speech, John couldn't help but feel nervous. (the underlined phrase is a gerund phrase functioning as a noun; but what part of speech is this noun? is it object of the preposition ? can the word while function as a preposition? )
DF
1. Preparing for the speech, John couldn’t help but feel nervous. (the underlined phrase is a participial phrase functioning as an adjective modifying John.)
2. While preparing for the speech, John couldn't help but feel nervous. (the underlined phrase is a gerund phrase functioning as a noun; but what part of speech is this noun? is it object of the preposition ? can the word while function as a preposition? )
DF
Comments
It's a common mistake to confuse function and part of speech. Just remember that 'noun', 'verb', 'adjective', 'adverb' etc. are parts of speech, whereas functions are 'subject', 'object', 'complement', 'modifier', 'predicate' and so on.
BillJ