Grammar in ESL

Faculty of Education and Languages
HBET2103
Grammar in ESL
Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

HBET2103
GRAMMAR IN ESL
Dr Andrew Ng Hock Soon
Dr Carol E Leon

Project Directors: Prof Dato’ Dr Mansor Fadzil
Assoc Prof Dr Chung Han Tek
Open University Malaysia
Module Writers: Dr Andrew Ng Hock Soon

Monash University Malaysia
Dr Carol E Leon
University of Malaya
Moderators: Dr Saratha Sithamparam

University of Malaya
Assoc Prof Dr Chung Han Tek

Developed by: Centre for Instructional Design and Technology

First Edition, September 2004

Second Edition, August 2013(rs)
Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM), August 2013, HBET2103

All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any form or by any means
without the written permission of the President, Open University Malaysia (OUM).

Table of Contents
Course Guide xi– xvi
Topic 1 Knowledge of Language 1

1.1 Focal Knowledge versus Tacit Knowledge 2
1.2 Understanding Grammar 3
1.3 Grammar versus Usage 7
1.4 Descriptive Grammar 8
1.5 Learning about Grammar 14
Summary 16
Key Terms 16
Self-Test 17
Topic 2 Introduction to Morphology and Syntax 18

2.1 The Word 19
2.1.1 Types of Morphemes 21
2.1.2 Inflectional and Derivational Morphemes 21
2.1.3 Inflectional Morphemes 22
2.1.4 Noun Inflections 24
2.1.5 Verb Inflections 25
2.1.6 Adjective and Adverb Inflections 26
2.2 The Sentence 27
2.3 Grammatical Structure 29
2.4 Linearity and the Principle of Proximity 31
2.5 Constituency 32
2.6 Linguistic Creativity and Ambiguity 34
2.7 Competence and Performance 36
2.8 Syntagmatic and Paradigmatic Relations 37
Summary 40
Key Terms 41
Self-Test 41
Topic 3 Introduction to Phrase Structure Grammar 42

3.1 Phrase Structure 43
3.2 Some Ways to Determine a Phrase 45
3.2.1 Substitution 45
3.2.2 Movement 47
3.2.3 Conjunction 48
3.2.4 Anaphora 49
3.2.5 Phrasal Categories 50
3.2.6 A Notation for Phrase Structure 51

iv  TABLE OF CONTENTS
3.2.7 An Alternative to Trees 53

3.2.8 Trees and Functions 53
3.2.9 Trees and Ambiguity 54
Summary 57
Key Terms 57
Self-Test 57
Topic 4 Parts of Speech 58

4.1 Structure Class versus Form Class Words 59
4.2 Forms with Overlapping Functions 61
4.3 Nouns 62
4.3.1 Noun Subclasses 63
4.3.2 Determiners 64
4.3.3 Pronouns 66
4.3.4 Personal Pronouns 67
4.3.5 Reflexive Pronouns 69
4.3.6 Relatives 71
4.3.7 Interrogatives 74
4.4 Verbs 76
4.4.1 Auxiliary Verbs 77
4.4.2 Modal Auxiliaries 78
4.4.3 Auxiliary Be 80
4.4.4 Be as a True Verb 81
4.4.5 Do 81
4.4.6 Do as a Pro- Verb 81
4.4.7 Do as a True Verb 82
4.5 Adjectives 82
4.5.1 Adjective Subclasses 82
4.5.2 Qualifiers 84
4.6 Adverbs 85
4.7 Prepositions 87
4.7.1 Prepositional Phrases Function as Adverbs 88
4.7.2 Prepositional Phrases Function as Adjectives 88
4.8 Conjunctions 91
4.8.1 Conjunctive Adverbs 93
4.8.2 Subordinating Conjunctions 94
4.8.3 Subordinator 96
4.9 Analysing Form and Function 97
Summary 98
Key Terms 99
Self-Test 99

TABLE OF CONTENTS  v
Topic 5 Phrases 100

5.1 Noun Phrases 101
5.1.1 Determiners 102
5.1.2 Predeterminers and Postdeterminers 104
5.1.3 The Functions of Noun Phrase 104
5.1.4 Subject 105
5.2 Direct Object 107
5.3 Indirect Object 108
5.4 Object of a Preposition 110
5.5 Complement 111
5.6 Verbal Nouns and Noun Phrases 112
5.6.1 Verbal Nouns 113
5.7 Verb Phrase 115
5.7.1 Non-finite Verb Phrases 117
5.7.2 Subject-Verb Agreement 118
5.8 Adverbial Phrase 123
5.8.1 General Characteristics of Adverbial Phrase 124
5.8.2 Formal Features of Adverbial Head 125
5.8.3 Circumstantial Adverbs: Where and When 126
Things Happen
5.8.4 Process Adverbs: How Things Happen 127
5.8.5 Modal Adverbs 127
5.8.6 Degree Adverbs 128
5.8.7 Focusing Adverbs 128
5.8.8 Conjunctive Adverbs 129
5.8.9 Syntactic Functions of Adverbial Phrases 130
5.8.10 Distribution of Adverbs in the Clause 131
5.8.11 Circumstantial Adverbs 132
5.8.12 Adverbs of Manner 133
5.8.13 Modal Adverbs 134
5.8.14 Adverbs in Initial Position 134
5.8.15 Function and Class 135
Summary 136
Key Terms 137
Self-Test 137
Topic 6 Relative Clauses 138

6.1 A Clause 138
6.2 Types of Sentence Structure 140
6.3 Subordinate Clauses 140
6.3.1 Diagramming Subordinate Clauses 143
6.4 Relative Clauses 144
6.4.1 The Form of Relative Clauses 144

vi  TABLE OF CONTENTS
6.4.2 Relative Clauses with Gaps 147

6.4.3 The Grammatical Relations of the NP 152
Containing a Relative Clause
6.4.4 Relative Pronoun Choice 152
6.4.5 Non-Restrictive Relative Clauses 153
6.4.6 The Order of Difficulty of Relative Clauses 155
6.4.7 The Diversity of Relative Clause Types 156
Summary 157
Key Terms 158
Self-Test 158
Topic 7 Sentence Structures 159

7.1 Simple Sentences 159
7.2 Compound Sentences 163
7.3 Complex Sentences 165
7.4 Compound-Complex Sentences 169
Summary 171
Key Terms 172
Self-Test 172
Topic 8 Tense and Aspect 173

8.1 Tense and Aspect 174
8.2 Formal Characteristics of the Tense Aspect System 174
in English the Language
8.3 Meaning in the English Tense-Aspect System 179
8.3.1 Basic Meanings of the Four Forms 179
8.4 Predicting the Future 180
8.5 The Meaning of Tense 181
8.6 Points in Time and Points of Reference 182
8.7 The Present and Past Tenses in English 183
8.8 Meanings Expressed By the Non-Progressive Present 184
8.9 Present and Timeless States 185
8.10 Repeated Events in the Present 185
8.11 Instantaneous Events in the Present 186
8.12 Reference to Past Events 186
8.13 Meanings Expressed by the Non-Progressive Past Tense 187
8.13.1 Definite Events in the Past 187
8.14 The Past Tense with Present and Future Reference 189
8.15 The Meaning of Aspect 191
8.15.1 Perfectivity and Imperfectivity 191
8.15.2 Duration, Boundedness and Agency 193
8.16 The Meaning of the Progressive 196
Summary 203

TABLE OF CONTENTS  vii
Key Terms 203

Self-Test 203
Topic 9 Simple Sentence Patterns 204

9.1 Simple Structures 204
9.2 Sentence Pattern 1 – Intransitive Type 206
9.3 Sentence Pattern 2 – Copula be Main Verbs 209
9.3.1 Pattern 2 Type 1 – Requiring Adverbs of Time 210
or Place
9.3.2 Pattern 2 Type 2 –The Copula be with 212
Adjectival Subject Complement
9.3.3 Sentence Pattern 2 Type 3 – Copula be with Nominal 214
Subject Complement
9.3.4 Copulative Verbs 215
9.3.5 Pattern 2 Type 4 – Non Referential There 217
9.4 Sentence Pattern 3 – The Transitive Type 219
9.4.1 Transitive Verbs with Reflexive and Reciprocal 221
Direct Objects
9.4.2 Distinguishing Between Transitive and Linking 222
Verb Sentence Types
9.5 Peripheral Cases 223
9.6 Passive 224
9.6.1 The Active and Passive Voices 225
9.6.2 Construction of the Passive Voice 227
9.6.3 Related Forms of the Passive 227
9.7 The Passive and Structural Ambiguity 229
Summary 231
Kay Terms 231
Self-Test 232
Topic 10 Transformations 233

10.1 Transformations 234
10.2 Wh-Question Transformation 235
10.2.1 Phrase Structure Rules 235
10.3 Passive Transformation 239
10.4 Verb-Particle Shift Transformation 239
Summary 240
Self-Test 240
References 241

viii  TABLE OF CONTENTS

COURSE GUIDE

COURSE GUIDE  xi
COURSE GUIDE DESCRIPTION

You must read this Course Guide carefully from the beginning to the end. It tells
you briefly what the course is about and how you can work your way through
the course material. It also suggests the amount of time you are likely to spend in
order to complete the course successfully. Please keep on referring to the Course
Guide as you go through the course material as it will help you to clarify
important study components or points that you might miss or overlook.
INTRODUCTION
HBET2103 Grammar in ESL is one of the courses offered by the Faculty of
Education and Languages at Open University Malaysia (OUM). This course is
worth three credit hours and should be covered over 15 weeks.
COURSE AUDIENCE
This course is offered to all students as a prerequisite course. It is a core course
for all students undertaking the Bachelor of Education (TESL) programme. As
English language learners and future teachers, they need to master English
grammar, which is a core component of the language.
As an open and distance learner, you should be able to learn independently and
optimise the learning modes and environment available to you. Before you begin
this course, please confirm the course material, the course requirements and how
the course is conducted.
STUDY SCHEDULE
It is a standard OUM practice that learners accumulate 40 study hours for every
credit hour. As such, for a three-credit hour course, you are expected to spend
120 study hours. Table 1 gives an estimation of how the 120 study hours could be
accumulated.

xii  COURSE GUIDE
Table 1: Estimation of Time Accumulation of Study Hours
STUDY
STUDY ACTIVITIES
HOURS
Briefly go through the course content and participate in initial discussion 3
Study the module 60
Attend three to five tutorial sessions 10
Online participation 12
Revision 15
Assignment(s), Test(s) and Examination(s) 20
TOTAL STUDY HOURS ACCUMULATED 120
COURSE OUTCOMES
By the end of this course, you should be able to:
1." Apply the methods used by linguists such as making hypothesis, analysis
and verification in enhancing your focal knowledge of English grammar;
2." Analyse grammatical structures using tree diagrams;
3." Identify the elements of morphology and syntax;
4." Classify the four major form classes of English words;
5." Identify the types and functions of phrases;
6." Build sentences of different structures; and
7." Describe the paradigm of the tense aspects system in English.
COURSE SYNOPSIS
This course is divided into 10 topics. The synopsis for each topic is presented
below:
Topic 1 distinguishes between tacit knowledge and focal knowledge. An ideal

English language teacher should have more focal knowledge of the language.
Therefore, you must make more effort to improve your focal knowledge of the
English language. This topic also describes the structures of English grammar. In

COURSE GUIDE  xiii
addition, it defines and differentiates between prescriptive and descriptive

grammar.
"
Topic 2 introduces you to morphology (the study of word formation) and syntax
(the technical term for sentence structure). In morphology, you will learn to
analyse word formation such as morpheme, the smallest unit of meaning in a
language. Morpheme is a division of a word into parts (the morphemes). It has
its own meaning and function and occurs with a similar meaning or function as
part of other words in the language.
In syntax, you will learn to analyse the groupings and relationships of words,
phrases and clauses in a sentence. The analysis of syntactical structure involves
certain principles such as the principles of linearity and proximity as well as the
principle of constituency and of grammatically conditioned ambiguity. The
knowledge is necessary for us to become more conscious of something that we
know intuitively already. Even to the second language learner in need of getting
"all the facts of the language" right, the process of learning grammar to some
extent involves getting intuitive linguistic (tacit) knowledge and turning it into
explicit conscious (focal) knowledge.
Topic 3 introduces you to some basic procedures in analysing simple English

sentences. The focus will be on the concept of phrase structure rules and how
sentences are represented in a tree diagram. This is an introductory lesson on
phrase structure grammar and in order to understand the application, we will
use constituency tests to determine whether a string of words are in the same
group. We will also look into alternative ways to represent phrase structure rules
that are shown in labelled brackets.
Topic 4 discusses nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs. These four major form-
class classes of English words are the core of what traditional grammarians called
parts of speech. This lesson will also enable you to understand how words are
classified into these four categories. This is done by using a formula to identify
the chief distinguishing features of the form-class and structure class. In turn, this
will enable you to test words to determine their identities.
Topic 5 introduces the next level of grammatical structure, the phrase, the result
of putting words and morphemes together at the level of the phrase. A phrase
has one part of speech at its core, called the head of the phrase, which gives the
phrase its name, such as noun phrase or verb phrase. The phrase also includes all
the other things that go with the head to form a group. These additional elements
are called modifiers.

xiv  COURSE GUIDE
Topic 6 is about relative clauses, and ways to build them. You will also be guided
to differentiate between independent and dependent clauses. Dependent clauses
may occupy adverbial, adjectival, or nominal (noun) slots in sentences. They are
introduced by words that are indicated as dependent: either subordinating
conjunctions or relatives. In this topic, we will also consider the form, meaning
and function of restrictive and non-restrictive relative clauses.
Topic 7 is about how words and phrases combine to form sentences. We will see
how people use language creatively to make simple sentences and clauses nest
inside other clauses to express complex ideas. Although we will not concentrate
on how to build these sentences in detail, we will focus on analysing the sentence
structure of each sentence pattern and the modifying subordinate clauses. We
will explore a range of possibilities for putting sentences together and develop a
method of describing complicated sentences that occur routinely even in
ordinary conversation.
Topic 8 discusses how tense and aspect are closely related as both are concerned
with the presentation of situations. Tense is defined as grammatically expressed
assignment to situations of „location in time‰ while aspect is defined as
grammatically expressed assignment of „situational focus‰. In the English
language, tense and aspect are tightly interwoven. Therefore, we treat them
together and use a fused tense aspect system. The tense aspect system in the
English language involves eight ordered choices – present, past, future, non-
future, perfect, non-perfect, progressive and non-progressive.
Topic 9 focuses on analysing the grammatical structure of English sentences. The

English language consists of an infinite set of sentences. In order to analyse
English grammar, we have to collect and study all of the possible English
sentences, which would be an impossible task. The first step is to learn how to
analyse the grammatical structure of three simple patterns that underlie almost
all of the sentences in English.
Topic 10 demonstrates how syntactic patterns of a language can be described by

phrase structure rules. However, not all sentence patterns can be described
efficiently by such rules alone. This topic on transformation will elaborate further
phrase structure rules and how these rules are transformed.
TEXT ARRANGEMENT GUIDE

Before you go through this module, it is important that you note the text
arrangement. Understanding the text arrangement will help you to organise your

COURSE GUIDE  xv
study of this course in a more objective and effective way. Generally, the text
arrangement for each topic is as follows:
Learning Outcomes: This section refers to what you should achieve after you
have completely covered a topic. As you go through each topic, you should
frequently refer to these learning outcomes. By doing this, you can continuously
gauge your understanding of the topic.
Self-Check: This component of the module is inserted at strategic locations

throughout the module. It may be inserted after one sub-section or a few sub-
sections. It usually comes in the form of a question. When you come across this
component, try to reflect on what you have already learnt thus far. By attempting
to answer the question, you should be able to gauge how well you have
understood the sub-section(s). Most of the time, the answers to the questions can
be found directly from the module itself.
Activity: Like Self-Check, the Activity component is also placed at various

locations or junctures throughout the module. This component may require you to
solve questions, explore short case studies, or conduct an observation or research.
It may even require you to evaluate a given scenario. When you come across an
Activity, you should try to reflect on what you have gathered from the module and
apply it to real situations. You should, at the same time, engage yourself in higher
order thinking where you might be required to analyse, synthesise and evaluate
instead of only having to recall and define.
Summary: You will find this component at the end of each topic. This component
helps you to recap the whole topic. By going through the summary, you should
be able to gauge your knowledge retention level. Should you find points in the
summary that you do not fully understand, it would be a good idea for you to
revisit the details in the module.
Key Terms: This component can be found at the end of each topic. You should go
through this component to remind yourself of important terms or jargon used
throughout the module. Should you find terms here that you are not able to
explain, you should look for the terms in the module.
References: The References section is where a list of relevant and useful

textbooks, journals, articles, electronic contents or sources can be found. The list
can appear in a few locations such as in the Course Guide (at the References
section), at the end of every topic or at the back of the module. You are
encouraged to read or refer to the suggested sources to obtain the additional
information needed and to enhance your overall understanding of the course.

xvi  COURSE GUIDE
PRIOR KNOWLEDGE
No prior knowledge required.
ASSESSMENT METHOD
Please refer to myINSPIRE.
REFERENCES
The references and suggested further reading are presented in the respective
topics of this course. References are also made to certain websites for you to read
some poems or plays as putting those texts into this module will be unnecessary
as this module will become bulky.
TAN SRI DR ABDULLAH SANUSI (TSDAS)

DIGITAL LIBRARY
The TSDAS Digital Library has a wide range of print and online resources for the
use of its learners. This comprehensive digital library, which is accessible
through the OUM portal, provides access to more than 30 online databases
comprising e-journals, e-theses, e-books and more. Examples of databases
available are EBSCOhost, ProQuest, SpringerLink, Books24x7, InfoSci Books,
Emerald Management Plus and Ebrary Electronic Books. As an OUM learner,
you are encouraged to make full use of the resources available through this
library.

Topic  Knowledge of
1 Language
LEARNING OUTCOMES
By the end of this topic, you should be able to:
1. Distinguish between focal knowledge and tacit knowledge;
2. Describe the structures of English grammar accurately;
3. Define prescriptive and descriptive grammar; and
4. Differentiate between descriptive and prescriptive grammar.
 INTRODUCTION
In this topic, you will be exposed to the importance of focal knowledge and tacit
knowledge in learning a language. As a teacher, you will find that you cannot
teach tacit knowledge to your students. LetÊs say you have two opposing forms
of a word and you not only have to tell your students which one is better but also
why it is better. This is called tacit knowledge. Thus, you must make the effort to
improve your focal knowledge of the language. Your competence as a language
teacher rests upon your mastery of the focal knowledge of the language.
„It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and
knowledge‰
ă Albert Einstein ă
In the study of syntax, it is quite impossible to memorise all the rules but a more
practical and useful approach is to learn how linguists formulate the rules in
order to deal with grammatical structures. Hence, in this module, we seek to
train you to think about language using the same methods that linguists use,
namely, analysis and verification. None of these techniques is particularly
difficult or complicated once you understand how it operates; what is difficult is
breaking away from your traditional methods of dealing with grammar:
memorising and guessing.

2  TOPIC 1 KNOWLEDGE OF LANGUAGE
1.1 FOCAL KNOWLEDGE VERSUS TACIT

KNOWLEDGE
Grammar refers to the linguistic system which exists in the mind of a speaker of a
language or when we say that someone „knows‰ a language. It can also mean a
description of the language system. Furthermore, grammar can refer to an ideal
set of rules or a handbook containing prescriptive rules. Therefore, it is essential
to distinguish the word „grammar‰ in context before judging the meaning
intended. In addition, to know grammar means to have an understanding of both
focal and tacit knowledge.
Focal knowledge is the ability to list the steps to be followed in order to

produce a result. Tacit knowledge is when your information about how to
produce a result is at an intuitive level.
You can probably explain exactly to someone the procedure to follow when
making a cup of iced tea or giving directions to a designated location in a city.
Your knowledge of these actions is both tacit (you can perform them without
thinking about them) and focal (you can describe to someone how to do them).
SELF-CHECK 1.1
Compare these two:
1. They went out for dinner.
2. They gone out for dinner.
Which one of the above is an acceptable English sentence? Why?
The ability to distinguish an acceptable English sentence from an unacceptable

English sentence is performed at the tacit level. Having a good grasp of focal
knowledge enables you to answer the second part of the question correctly.
Having attempted the question above, you should know by now what your level
of knowledge of English is. An ideal English language teacher should have more
focal knowledge of the language.

TOPIC 1 KNOWLEDGE OF LANGUAGE  3
ACTIVITY 1.1
1. What is the difference between tacit knowledge and focal

knowledge?
2. Give an example of a tacit knowledge and a focal knowledge.
3. In your opinion, which of the two types of knowledge is more
important to you as a language teacher? State your reasons.
1.2 UNDERSTANDING GRAMMAR
Figure 1.1: Understanding grammar is important in knowing a language

A basic rule of English specifies that subjects usually precede predicates. To see
why this is so, read the following sentences. Then, repeat them a second time.
The first sentence is easier to understand and remember because it is made up of

meaningful groupings of words which are specified by English grammar. These
groupings of words are called phrases. Example 1 is a sentence, whereas
Example 2 is not. We may find it difficult to keep seven unrelated words in
memory while we are processing new information; putting the same words into
a standard pattern considerably simplifies the operation for us.
Standard patterns differ somewhat from language to language, and linguists

speak of them as being determined by the rules which constitute any given
language (refer to Table 1.1). When linguists attempt to describe the grammar of
a language, they explain the rules that govern the grouping of the words of that
language into meaningful patterns.
Table 1.1: Different Standard Patterns of Different Languages

SELF-CHECK 1.2
Read the sentences in Table 1.1 and compare them to the literal
translation in English. What can you say about the sentence pattern?
However, the rules presented by grammarians are not necessarily laws. There are
bound to be some exceptions to the rule. There are also rules that are about to be
changed. These rules are merely hypotheses, incomplete or imperfect at best,
about how the language system works. For example, grammarians agree that the
rules of English specify not only that the yellow oak tree constitutes a noun
phrase (a string of words that can group together as a single noun) but also that
yellow must precede oak. They also specify how such a phrase should be
pronounced (phonology), where it could occur in a sentence (syntax), what it
means (semantics) and the influence of social context upon the way it is
interpreted (pragmatics).
SELF-CHECK 1.3
Read the following definitions of grammar. Based on these definitions,

write what you understand by the word grammar.
Grammar can be viewed from a few perspectives. It can refer to an abstract

system of rules which presumably exists in the mind of a speaker of a language,
the knowledge that we refer to when we say someone knows a language.
Grammar can also mean a language system which describes the ideal set of rules
prescribing correct and wrong usage of a language.
In this module, we will focus on two kinds of grammatical description:

constitutive and regulative rules. The first involves constitutive (basic) rules,
which describe how our grammatical system operates. These rules are the same
for all speakers of English (e.g. subjects precede verbs in most sentences). The
second involves regulative rules (such as whether to use who or whom in a given
context) which govern the version of English considered appropriate for use by
educated speakers. This version is designated as standard English.
According to prescriptive grammar, language use is either correct or incorrect,

and any educated person should be able to understand at once and follow the
norms of correctness (the regulative rules), which are thought to be preserved in
authoritative reference works such as dictionaries and handbooks. The rules of
grammar, according to this tradition, remind us, for example, that ainÊt I is

wrong, but they may leave us wondering about our options if we find the
„correct‰ alternative, am I not, precise and elaborative.
Another scholarly tradition of grammar is descriptive grammar, whose roots go

considerably further back in history than the prescriptive tradition. This other
tradition views grammar as a utilitarian means of learning to use a language
correctly as well as philosophical inquiry into the nature of language. It is aimed
at recording facts and describing the actual language (constitutive rules) as
comprehensively as possible. It avoids schoolroom traditional grammars.
Descriptive grammarians attempt to set aside their own linguistic prejudices and
accept and describe what they observe. If a community of native speakers of a
language consistently speaks in a particular way, so be it. They do not judge it as
correct or incorrect and only describe the language as it is used or spoken.
SELF-CHECK 1.4
Find three expressions that English speakers regularly use. Which of

these do prescriptive grammarians judge to be incorrect?
Predominantly, contributions from linguistics to the study of English grammar

have come from two schools of thought, structural linguistics and
transformational generative grammar (Klammer et al. 2000). Both these
approaches are descriptive and concerned with analysing data, formulating
hypotheses and verifying the hypotheses through reference and once again to
data. Although the two orientations differ strongly in a number of fundamental
assumptions, we draw on the insights of both structural and transformational
linguists, as well as on those of scholarly traditional grammarians, which might
best be described as a pedagogical grammar concerned first of all with the needs
of students and teachers.
When young children acquire language, they gain the ability to participate in the
social community around them, first with their immediate family and then,
progressively, with the broader section of community. As students, you
participate in a community through spoken and written language. Your linguistic
skills are central to your ability as an effective communicator. In using language,
you must constantly make decisions that determine how well you will
communicate. Most of the time, you have only yourself to rely on, you do not
have time to consult an „expert‰ (a thesaurus, dictionary or friends who know
the rules of Standard English well).
As a language teacher, you may be called upon to assist others in analysing

linguistic alternatives, either informally as a friend or colleague, or more formally
as a peer tutor, classroom teacher, examiner or editor. Whether your goal is to

acquire knowledge about the structure of the English language, to improve your
skills as a speaker and writer, or to master the vocabulary and analytical skills
that are part of the professional competence of classroom teachers, this module is
intended to help you reach your goal.
ACTIVITY 1.2
1. What is grammar?
2. Differentiate between prescriptive and descriptive grammar.
1.3 GRAMMAR VERSUS USAGE

Generally, most living languages, including English, are in a constant state of
change. In fact, a language stops changing only when it is no longer used by
speakers of the language in everyday communication. In other words, a language
stops changing when it is dead. As long as people continue to use a language,
they will change and modify it to their needs.
Many varieties of English have been formed to cater to the needs of different
groups of English speakers. Each group follows a slightly different subset of the
rules by which the language operates, and each bends the rules a bit to meet
specific needs. Over a period of time, the adaptation or creation of one group of
speakers or another may enter the language and become tolerable to all and
becomes the standard version of the language.
Klammer et al. (2000) illustrated the process of standardisation of a language

through the use of the word contact. It began as a noun referring to „the state in
which two things touch one another.‰ Its meaning eventually extended to refer to
„the state of people being in touch (or in contact) with one another.‰ Then,
people in need of a verb meaning „to bring about contact with another person‰
converted the noun contact into the verb to contact, meaning „to get in touch
with someone.‰ Is contact an acceptable verb in this sense? Some people think so
and some do not.
According to Klammer et al. (2000), when the American Heritage Dictionary was
published in 1969, 66 percent of its usage panel voted that, despite its widespread
popular use, a sentence such as „IÊll contact you next week‰ was not acceptable
in writing only produced for formal occasions. Notice first of all, that the experts

did not fully agree that the sentence was unacceptable. Presumably, the 34
percent of the panel who judged contact to be acceptable as a verb had observed
the form in the speech and writing of a substantial number of people whom they
considered to be members of the elite group whose language use sets the
standard for others. When enough of the elite adopt the form, it will become a
part of Standard English.
We consider people as standard speakers so long as they do not use any strongly
stigmatised forms (I seen it, for instance) and their speech contains relatively few
minor violations of speech etiquette (such as, IÊll contact you next week). We
seem to have internalised a threshold of tolerance for secondary grammatical
„errors.‰ Speakers who remain below that threshold in the production of minor
stigmatised items are heard as being standard speakers, despite irregularities that
occur in their speech. Minor items include pronunciations, such as inserting a
/k/ sound in schism or a /t/ in often; grammatical forms, such as saying
different than instead of different from, or even vocabulary choice, like the
substitution of enormity for enormousness.
Dominant social groups more or less voluntarily or involuntarily use language to

mark themselves off from others, allowing only a small amount of deviation from
the norms established for their group, preventing any sort of relaxation of their
standards, and believing that their version of English is the purest, most correct
or best. They overlook momentary lapses in fellow membersÊ speech and remain
generally ignorant that some of the currently acceptable forms they use were
once considered incorrect.
ACTIVITY 1.3
1. „Language stops changing only when it is dead‰. Do you agree

with this statement? Why?
2. Get a good dictionary; find and describe three words that have
changed their meaning over the years.
1.4 DESCRIPTIVE GRAMMAR

The differences in usage occurring in the language used by speakers of English
create problems for linguists who wish to describe the rules of Standard English.
Which version should be used as a model? Whose style of speech should be
followed? What types of sentence structures are acceptable? What are borderline
cases and how do grammarians treat them?
Describing how the language system works is even more complex. For example,
Klammer et al. (2000) points out the difficulty of describing the differences
between two words such as snoring and boring, such as in „the snoring
professor‰ and „the boring professor‰. Are both words participles derived from
the verbs snore and bore? Or have they both become adjectives? If they have,
why is it possible to say „the very boring professor‰ but not „the very snoring
professor‰? Since all speakers of Standard English seem to know that the first is
permissible and the second is not, is it really desirable to describe how the system
operates without accounting for such differences?
Linguists do, in fact, try to describe the difference between these two phrases,
with an argument that runs more or less as follows. It is possible in English to
convert the participle in a sentence like, The professor is snoring (or arguing,
sleeping, fighting) into the snoring/arguing/sleeping/fighting professor. Each of
the words tells something about the professor (each modifies the word
professor). We can say that the words have acquired privileges somewhat like
adjectives (the tall/young/intelligent professor). However, while adjectives can
be compared (She is taller/younger/more intelligent than he is) and qualified
(the quite tall/rather young/very intelligent professor), participles cannot be
compared (She is more snoring than he is, the very arguing couple). Another set
of participles behave more like adjectives e.g. The professor is charming his
students/boring his students. As noun modifiers, they can be qualified (the very
charming professor) and they can be compared (This professor is more boring
than that one).
The differences that exist within standard English sometimes compel linguists to
provide alternative descriptions to explain competing forms. However, the
repeated discovery that language data (like snoring and boring) do not always
fall neatly into a simple grammatical system has resulted in an approach
involving prototype theory that we believe is important in understanding the
nature of grammatical relationships.
SELF-CHECK 1.5
As a competent speaker of English, we should be able to

distinguish acceptable English sentences from the utterances of
unacceptable sentences. Examine the following sentences and
explain which is acceptable and which is not.
1. She doesnÊt have any money to buy the dress.
2. The ate this man cake with his fingers.

In studying grammatical analysis, we learn how forms are categorised so that we

can classify new forms as we encounter them. You already know the names of
most of the categories used in language study such as nouns, verbs, adjectives,
and adverbs, and sorting words into the proper groups would be simple if
membership in each category were an either/or proposition, if a word could
belong to only one part of speech and if it behaved like all other members of that
group. Unfortunately for students of language, this is not the case. Words can
belong to more than one group: we can down (verb) a cup of tea (drink), look
down (belittle) (adverb), walk down (the stairs) (preposition) and talk about the
fourth down (noun) in football. We can also feel down (sad) (adjective) on a bad
day. And not all members of a given group behave identically: most nouns in
English can be made plural (books, cars, pupils), but many cannot (beauty,
competent, wilderness) in ordinary usage.
Contemporary research into the features of cognition and the process by which very
young learners form concepts may help students of language to understand the
nature of grammar and its reasons for the exceptions to grammatical rules. Concepts
are general ideas we have formed about objects and actions in the world around us
based upon our grouping together of similar things into a single class. Current
prototype theory suggests that concepts are not precise categories to which members
belong as some members are better examples of the class than others.
For example, we have a concept of what is named by the word house. If asked to
draw an example, most of us would produce a prototype, a square building with
two windows, a door and a flight of stairs. However, not all houses have stairs
and not all are squares; some are rectangles and some are even hexagons (see
Figure 1.1). Our decision about whether something is a house is based not only
on its form but also on its function.
Figure 1.1: The concept of „house‰

When we begin to try to distinguish between houses and bungalows or flats and
apartments, we begin to see that the concept of a house is really quite complex. A
prototypical house exists, which most of us associate with the label, and we
encounter thousands of varieties that are very much like that prototype.
However, we also have, as part of our knowledge of house, a setting with living
room, dining room, bedroom, bathroom and kitchen, which differ to some
marked degree from the prototype of a house but which we accept as belonging
to the class. It is generally the case that a concept or class will have not only a
clearly defined centre, where members (prototypical cases) exhibit all the
characteristics associated with the prototype, but also indistinct borders, where
other members (peripheral cases) seem to belong, even though they exhibit only
a few of the characteristics associated with the category.
Generally, the educational process indoctrinates us into the features and limits of
the concepts accepted by our culture. Their ill-defined borders present few
problems to us. We accept arbitrary labelling of peripheral examples of things like
houses and flats, and in school, we memorise the infrequent exceptions to
generalised ideas of what comprises a class or category. Many of us, for example,
have learned the striking facts that a whale is a mammal and that a bat is not a
bird. We can learn exceptions such as these as long as we need to memorise only a
few for each category. However, if we were specialising in zoology or botany, we
would be unable to memorise all the examples of mammals, birds or fruits. We
would need to learn the criteria that determine whether something belongs to one
of the classes. Once we have mastered the criteria, we would be able to examine a
new example, observe its features or habits and decide how to classify it.
Language presents us with a fair set of prototypes of any category along with a
substantial number of peripheral examples: items that finally seem to belong to
the category partly on the basis of shared characteristics (family resemblance)
and partly because they do not fit as well into any other category. In other
instances, the same linguistic example may belong to more than one category,
depending upon the context in which it occurs.
Language learners must learn the criteria used to classify various linguistic
forms. The criteria, since they are few in number, can be memorised, and since
the prototype of the class exhibits the largest number of the defining criteria for
that class, the most efficient way to learn the criteria is to associate them with a
prototype. For example, when we come to the classification of parts of speech,
you will see that the word heavy is a prototypical adjective. As shown in Table
1.2, it exhibits the characteristics which are typical of (though not necessarily
always required of) adjectives.

Table 1.2: Characteristics of Prototypes
Characteristics Example
It ends in -y, a suffix added to many funny, happy
words to create adjectives.
It can be made comparative and heavier, heaviest
superlative.
It can be intensified with words. very, rather, or quite
It can be a predicate adjective. It feels heavy.
When it modifies a noun, its meaning Heavy box. The box is heavy.
can be paraphrased by a sentence in
which its noun is the subject and it is
the predicate adjective following the
verb to be.
It can function as an object The weights made it heavy.
complement.
Specifically, we can define any word that has all of these characteristics as an
adjective and if all adjectives shared all of these features, classification will be
easy. One test would enable us to classify all of the members of the category.
Unfortunately, our language is much more complicated than that. Hence, there
seems to be no single feature that all adjectives share. When speakers want to
modify a noun, they can use adjectives or nouns or verb participles or even
adverbs to do the task. When any of these are used over a long period, they may
begin to acquire the characteristics associated with adjectives. The question then
becomes, how many of these traits and which ones must a word exhibit in order
for us to classify it as an adjective? If you try to rely on memorising examples of
adjectives, you will lack a strategy for dealing with exceptions and unusual cases
or with words you have never encountered before. If, on the other hand, you
understand the principles of word classification, you will be prepared to deal
with borderline examples.
Another situation that occurs frequently as we try to decide what to call the
different kinds of words we use to make even the simplest of sentences is
illustrated in the following examples given by Klammer et al. (2000).

The words rock and rocky describe the nouns that follow them, wall and path.
Are both rock and rocky therefore adjectives, like happy? Many traditional
schoolroom grammars would call both words adjectives because both words
modify nouns. Descriptive linguists, however, distinguish between a wordÊs
form (what kind of word it is) and its function (what it is doing in a particular
phrase or sentence). They would agree that both rock and rocky are functioning
as adjectival modifiers; that is, both are being used the way adjectives frequently
are to describe nouns. But only rocky is an adjective in form; rock remains a
noun, even though it is being used in a typical adjectival function. The
descriptive linguist looks at the actual characteristics of each word to determine
in what class it belongs. Rocky has all of the most important traits of an adjective;
for example, it ends in the common adjective suffix -y (like happy), it can be
made comparative and superlative (rockier, rockiest), and it can be intensified
(very rocky, rather rocky). Rock, on the other hand, not only has no adjective
suffix (which isnÊt required of adjectives: red, tall, rich are adjectives without
adjective suffixes), but in addition, it canÊt be made comparative and superlative
(rocker, rockest) nor can it be intensified (very rock, rather rock). Furthermore, it
easily functions as a noun (a heavy rock, on the rock), which rocky canÊt do (a
hard rocky, on the rocky).
ACTIVITY 1.4
Discuss and list at least three words that have the form and
function of a noun and an adjective.
The fact that a wordÊs form and function often contrast is another reason that
understanding English grammar requires learning to think critically and
analytically about language, rather than simply memorising rules and lists.

The grammar of sentences (syntax) is also a barrier to any approach based on rote
learning. Linguists have described only the most regular of those rules for they
do not understand the syntactic rules that account for the structure of English
sentences. It is not possible, therefore, simply to memorise all of the rules. A
more practical and useful approach is to learn how linguists formulate the rules
in order to deal with grammatical structures you have already studied.
Most importantly, understanding the prototypes assist in learning to understand

the principles that enable you to do grammatical analysis independently.
Researchers have discovered that prototypical members of any concept are easier
to understand and remember than are peripheral members and that information
about the prototype is more readily generalised compared to peripheral members
than the reverse. In other words, prototypes can help us identify both other
prototypes and exceptions better.
1.5 LEARNING ABOUT GRAMMAR

The traditional methods of dealing with grammar are by memorising and
guessing. According to Klammer et al. (2000), memorisation provides the mind
with some of the tools and information necessary at higher levels of thinking. In
fact, educated guesses, based on intuition, often provide a productive way to
commence work, one that will become more systematic as it proceeds.
Mathematicians, for example, memorise a body of tables, terms and formulas to
be used in complex reckoning and quick estimates are an essential part of their
way of working. Training in medicine requires doctors to depend on memory
innumerable facts about the human body and the symptoms of disease. Before
experienced physicians reach a diagnosis or make a prescription, they may
follow intuitive hunches that sometimes turn out to be right and sometimes
wrong. Many examples like these substantiate the legitimate roles of
memorisation and guessing in the learning process. Yet in no field of learning do
these two processes constitute the most important means of attaining mastery.
„Ignorant people think itÊs the voice which fighting cats make that is so
aggravating, but it ainÊt so; itÊs the sickening grammar they use‰.
ă Mark Twain ă
The fact is you cannot master English grammar by using rote memory alone.
Students who study grammar by memorising a set of rules so as to be able to
differentiate between right and wrong will eventually find themselves
overloaded with information. When students are slowed down, they complain
about all the exceptions to the rules. Consequently, frustrated students will

blame their instructors, their books, or both and wonder why the rules of the
language are not consistent and orderly.
Similar to memorising, guessing plays an important role in scientific (including

linguistic) inquiry; however, the expertÊs guess is quite different from the
noviceÊs. Scientists begin with a guess called a hypothesis, which is a proposition
they expect to test and prove. More important than the guess itself is the
development of proof. Evidence may prove a guess wrong but if supporting
evidence is found, the hypothesis develops into a theory of how a given system
operates. After it has been tested and verified, the theory is stated as a rule or set
of rules. New learners usually bypass all the speculative steps the linguist has
taken and instead tries to guess what the rule is.
Generally, a studentÊs guess is prone to two types of difficulties. First, verification

must come from an outside authority. The student has an answer and awaits
verification from the instructor or the book. Unfortunately, the inquiry ends for
the student if a guess is confirmed by someone else. The important step of
hypothesis testing is bypassed, and as a result, a second difficulty follows:
students are often at a loss when no one is available to verify their guesses. In a
testing situation, for example, where verification is delayed, students are forced
to decide for themselves whether a guess is correct. Ironically, their judgments
are likely to be based on intuition rather than reasoning, and the more unsure the
students are, the less they trust their intuitions. As a result, they often change
what would have been a correct answer and provide an incorrect one.
Successful learners depend less on memorisation and guessing than do less

successful ones. In studying and during an examination, successful learners
behave more like experts in their fields, always checking their work by reviewing
the steps followed in arriving at answers. Developing the ability to formulate and
verify a hypothesis is more important than having the ability to guess correctly.
Most of the time, students are reluctant to risk forming a hypothesis that may
have to be revised or rejected due to the fact that much emphasis is usually
placed upon correct answers. However, if we are to think positively, there is
often more to be learned from a wrong answer or a hypothesis that needs
revision than from a lucky guess.

ACTIVITY 1.5
1. What is the difference between learning grammar and learning

about grammar?
2. How do you approach the learning of English grammar as a
teacher and as a student?
 This topic has discussed the importance of focal and tacit knowledge in
learning a language. It has also introduced you to the basics of English
language systems, such as word, morpheme and types, sentence,
constituency, analysing grammatical structures and so on.
 Generally, when one attempts to describe the grammar of a language, he or

she will explain the rules that govern the grouping of the words of that
language into meaningful patterns.
 The rules presented by grammarians are not necessarily laws. There are some
exceptions to the rule.
 There are also rules that are about to be changed.
 These rules are just hypotheses, incomplete or imperfect at best, about how
language systems work.
Descriptive grammar Prescriptive grammar

Focal knowledge Tacit knowledge

1. What is the difference between tacit knowledge and focal knowledge? Give
your own examples of tacit knowledge and focal knowledge. In your
opinion, which of the two is more important to you as an English teacher?
State your reasons.
2. The term grammar has been clearly defined in the text. Based on these
definitions, write what you understand by the term grammar. Cite
examples.

Topic  Introduction to
2 Morphology
and Syntax
LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Distinguish between derivational morpheme and inflectional
morpheme;
2. Analyse English word formation, word phrases and sentence
structures;
3. Define linearity and the principle of proximity;
4. Describe syntagmatic and paradigmatic relations; and
5. Distinguish between linguistic creativity and ambiguity.
 INTRODUCTION
In this topic, you will be introduced to morphology (the study of word
formation) and syntax (the technical term for sentence structure). In morphology,
you will learn to analyse word formation such as morpheme, the smallest unit of
meaning in a language. A morpheme is the division of a word into parts (the
morphemes), having its own meaning and function and occuring with a similar
meaning or function as part of other words in the language.
In syntax, you will learn to analyse groupings and relationships of words, phrases
and clauses in a sentence. The analysis of syntactical structure involves certain
principles such as the principles of linearity, proximity, constituency and
grammatically conditioned ambiguity. This knowledge is necessary for us to become
more conscious of something that we know intuitively already. Even to the second
language learner in need of getting „all the facts of the language‰ right, the process
of learning grammar to some extent involves getting intuitive linguistic (tacit)
knowledge and turning it into explicit conscious (focal) knowledge.

TOPIC 2 INTRODUCTION TO MORPHOLOGY AND SYNTAX  19
2.1 THE WORD

Normally, native speakers of a language, or learners of a foreign language, have
a tacit knowledge of that language, which includes its syntax and the basic units
of its grammar. This means that speakers or learners of the language have a good
idea of what a word is.
To illustrate this knowledge, we will consider Passage 1 provided by Bache et al.

(1997). In the passage, the indication of word boundaries, such as empty spaces
between words, has been eliminated. As you read, can you make out the
individual words of the text?
Passage 1
After reading through the text, we can make out the individual words as shown
in Passage 2.
Passage 2
Even if we read casually, we could still identify the words of any language
familiar to us. For some speakers, however, there may be problems of
determining whether well-to-do or HeÊd is made up of one, two or three words.
In writing, word boundaries are signalled by blanks or punctuation marks. In
speech, they are often, though not always, signalled by factors such as the exact
start of stress as in,

20  TOPIC 2 INTRODUCTION TO MORPHOLOGY AND SYNTAX
 see the "meat vs. see them" eat

and/or the variant of speech sound selected as in,
 keeps ticking vs. keep sticking,
where the /t/ is aspirated (pronounced with a puff of air) when it is a word-
initial sound as in the former case. We all know how to signal and interpret word
boundaries in both writing and speech, if only intuitively. And yet, amazingly, it
is very difficult to define what a word is.
ACTIVITY 2.1
1. Write a simple sentence. How many words are there in your

sentence?
2. How do you determine the number of words in your sentence?
3. Read a simple sentence to your friend. Ask him the number of
words that you have read. How does your friend determine the
number of words in your sentence?
In defining a word, meaning is involved in one way or another: policeman means

one thing, family another. However, what is the meaning of the, was and of?
Clearly, these words mean something but their meaning is not as immediately
clear as the meaning of policeman and family, which express relatively concrete
entities (more specifically, persons). Why is it that the policemen are two words
and policeman is one word but both police force and police constable are two
words? Similarly, why are there two separate words in class struggle but only
one in classroom? This shows that words cannot be defined simply as units of
meaning.
Convention is an all important factor in the language userÊs understanding of

words. However, this should not prevent us from trying to describe the words in
English. As the first step towards such a description, grammarians refer to the
smallest meaningful units of language as morphemes. Words such as, un in
uncooperative, police and man in policeman, work and ing in working, and even
-s in attitudes and -ed in encouraged are morphemes.
Examples of free morphemes are the, him, of, to and that. Examples of bound
morphemes are un-, -s, -ing and -ed.

This means that a word consists of one or more morphemes. The precise
identification of words, therefore, largely involves the conventional rules of
morphology i.e. rules describing the structure of words in terms of morphemes.
SELF-CHECK 2.1
1. Think of three examples of free morphemes.

2. Think of three examples of bound morphemes.
2.1.1 Types of Morphemes

There are some basic ways in which speakers construct meaning out of the
resources provided by the English language. The units of meaning considered
fundamental in a language are its morphemes, the components of words.
Morphemes are fundamental in the sense that they cannot be subdivided

into smaller units that have meaning.
In this section, we will look at two different kinds of morphemes: derivational

morphemes used to create new words e.g. [-er] in baker and inflectional
morphemes used to show grammatical relationships e.g. [-s] in bakerÊs.
2.1.2 Inflectional and Derivational Morphemes

Morpheme is a word used by linguists to name the smallest unit of meaning in a
language. In order to differentiate morphemes from words and syllables,
brackets ( ) are used to surround sequences of sounds identified as morphemes
(-est).
If a word cannot be divided into any smaller meaningful components, then

it is a morpheme.
For example, the word readable consists of two morphemes, read and able, the
first of which is also an independent word, read.
An important distinction between derivational and inflectional morphemes is the

nature of the base before and after affixing occurs. When derivational

morphemes are attached to a base, they create words with new meanings: Walk
names an activity, but walker refers to a person who performs the activity.
Figure 2.1: Walking is the activity the walker is performing
When inflectional morphemes are added, the essential meaning and the part of
speech of the word remain unchanged; the appended morpheme simply
contributes additional information about the concept. Both walk and walked are
verbs naming an activity; the latter differs from the former only in tense, the
designation of the time at which the activity took place.
The morphological system which you are familiar with can be used in
constructing and comprehending sentences in English. Learners usually learn
patterns for creating words and rules for fitting new words into the system. For
example, when you learned that the adjective kind is the basis of an adverb
kindly, the pattern helped you recognise other adjective/adverb pairs, like
sweet/sweetly, generous/generously, happy/happily, and rough/roughly. You
are able to create these regardless of whether you have ever heard them spoken.
At some point, you learned to create yet another set of words from the same
material by prefixing {un-}. In fact, an important part of your knowledge of
English is an awareness of which words accept a negative prefix (unkindly,
ungenerously, unhappily) and which do not (unsweetly, unroughly).
2.1.3 Inflectional Morphemes

English has a small set of inflectional morphemes, used every time we speak, to
show grammatical relationships between the words in a sentence. English has
only eight inflectional suffixes: two for nouns, four for verbs and two for
adjectives and adverbs.
Table 2.1 summarises the kind of information supplied by the eight inflectional
morphemes. You are already familiar with homophones in English: two words
that sound alike but have different meanings (won and one, for instance). As you
can see in the table below, it is also possible to have two or more morphemes that
sound alike but have different meanings.
Three different meanings are signalled by the suffix pronounced s: noun plural
(three cats), noun possessive (JanetÊs hat), and verb third-person singular present
tense (Leslie walks). We can differentiate among them by calling them (-S1) for
the plural, (-S2) for the possessive, and (-S3) for the third-person singular present
tense of the verb. For most English verbs, the past-tense and the past-participle
forms are also identical (I owned that book once; I have owned it for some time).
However, since a number of verbs have past participles ending in (-en) (ridden,
eaten, frozen), linguists have named the past participle morpheme (-en) in order
to contrast it with the past tense morpheme (-ed).
Table 2.1: Eight Inflectional Morphemes
ENGLISH INFLECTIONAL MORPHEMES
Morpheme Function Form Combined Form Resulting Word
Nouns
Plural -s book + -s books
Possessive -s Barbara + -s BarbaraÊs
Verbs
Present tense (3rd- walk + -s walks
-s
person singular)
Past tense -ed walk + -ed eat + vowel
walked ate
change
Past participle
-en walk + -ed eat + en walked eaten
Present participle -ing walk + ing walking

Adjectives
Comparative -er big + -er bigger
Superlative -est big + -est biggest
Adapted from Klammer et al. (2000)

ACTIVITY 2.2
How do you differentiate the type of morpheme of the following ăs

form?
Word Type of Morpheme
motherÊs cover
motherÊs day
motherÊs gone
motherÊs ill
2.1.4 Noun Inflections

When we write, the usual kinds of plural are indicated by adding an -s or an -es
to the base form of the noun (map/maps, match/matches). In speech, there are
three different pronunciations of the noun plural morpheme. It occurs as -s in
some words (pads), as -z in others (boys), and as a syllable ending in -ez in still
others (glasses). The choice of which ending to use is determined by the nature of
the preceding sounds. The morphemes (-s), (-z) and (-ez) in speech, and (-s) and
(-es) in written form are known as allomorphs of the noun plural morpheme.
Other allomorphs occur as well. For some words, the plural is signalled by
changing -um to -a (datum becoming data and medium becoming media); for
some, an -en is added (oxen); and for some, the plural is not expressed at all (one
sheep/three sheep). Linguists sometimes refer to this as the zero allomorph.
SELF-CHECK 2.2
Not all speakers of English agree on the occurrence of zero

allomorph. Compare two fish and two fishes, for example. Do you
use both? If so, do they have different meanings?
The noun possessive morpheme has the same -s, -z and -ez allomorphs as the
plural, depending upon the final sound of the word to which it attaches. No
matter which way it is pronounced, it is usually written as an Âs. When a singular
noun ends in s or z, the possessive is pronounced -ez and written Âs (the bossÊs

desk, the cruiseÊs end). The possessive of a plural noun is indicated by a simple
apostrophe after the final s (five daysÊ work).
2.1.5 Verb Inflections

If the subject is a third-person singular noun or pronoun (he, she, it, or nouns to
which these pronouns can refer), the present-tense morpheme has exactly the
same allomorphs as the noun plural: (-s) (sits), (-z) (grows), and a syllable ending
in (ez) (loses). The verb in the sentence I usually sit here is in the present tense,
even though there is no visible morpheme marking it as such. The same is true in
We grow tomatoes, You always object, and They see the point now. These verbs
are identified as present tense, and are not past tense. If the pronoun is changed
to she, the present tense inflection occurs on the verb.
The past tense morpheme, is usually written (-ed), has three common allomorphs
in speech: (-t) (sipped), (-d) (strolled), or a syllable ending in (-ed) (waded).
Other allomorphs, including a change of the vowel in the base (run/ran, eat/ate,
ride/rode) and zero allomorph (cut/cut, hit/hit, put/put), signal past tense for a
large set of irregular verbs in English. No matter what combinations of
allomorphs are used to form the past tense, all are seen as belonging to a single
morpheme, (-ed). Thus, considered morphologically, we could write went as (go)
+ (-ed).
The past participle morpheme is often identical to the past tense (I walked
yesterday/ I have always walked, he cut/he has cut), but for many irregular
verbs, it is the syllable -en (I have eaten; I have ridden). To differentiate it from
the past tense morpheme, linguists label the past participle morpheme (-en), even
though more verbs in English form their past participles by adding (-ed) than by
adding (-en). Below are major allomorphs of the past tense and the past participle
morphemes in English.

Table 2.2 shows forms of verb inflections.
Table 2.2: Forms of Verb Inflections
The fourth inflection, the present-participle morpheme (-ing), has a single form,
always occurring as -ing: walking, singing, calling.
SELF-CHECK 2.3
Discuss the forms of singular in the simple, present, past, present
and participle.
2.1.6 Adjective and Adverb Inflections

The adjective comparative and superlative morphemes (-er) and (-est) are quite
regular but they can be added only to one-syllable or two-syllable words in English.
We have tall, taller, tallest and heavy, heavier, heaviest but not visionary, visionarier,
visionariest. Adjectives of more than two syllables do not accept inflectional
morphemes; for them, entire words, rather than morphological suffixes, are used to
indicate the comparative (more visionary) and superlative (most reluctant).
SELF-CHECK 2.4
1. What is the comparative and superlative form of dark?

2. Discuss the types of inflections for comparative and superlative
adjectives.

Note that the comparative and superlative inflections also appear on a small
number of adverbs: He drove longer and faster than anyone else. Many adverbs,
too, can be compared or made superlative by using more and most (e.g. more
securely, most effectively).
2.2 THE SENTENCE

Grammar includes the study of how words are combined to make up larger
units, such as sentences. Like words, sentences are difficult to define rigidly and
objectively. Yet, we all have intuitive knowledge of what a sentence is. To
appreciate this, let us look at Passage 1 again, where all the conventional markers
of sentence boundaries (such as punctuation and capitalisation of initial letters
after full stops) have been omitted.
Passage 1
There are alternative ways of dividing this text into sentences. Thus, once we
have sorted through and found the individual words of the text, our problem is
still not solved. Now, we have the burden of making sense out of the whole text.
Where does each sentence stop? How do we manage to sort out the whole text
into appropriate sentences as neat as in Passage 2?
Passage 2
Why is „He sniffed that was the uncooperative attitude‰ not a sentence? And no
one would suggest that it is a sentence. Nor would we allow the long sentence,
„that was the uncooperative attitude you might expect from a family that
encouraged their daughter to go around with Yanks‰ to be broken into two
independent sentences, although both contain a verb. While the second part
could conceivably function as a sentence on its own, the first part is clearly
incomplete. It cannot stand alone. It does not follow the conventional agreement
and actually, the two parts are clauses within the same sentence.
In speech, according to Bache et al. (1997), clause and sentence boundaries are
typically signalled and interpreted in terms of tone groups ending with a special
intonational contour e.g. a rise (such as to signal the end of a question or the
continuation from one clause to another) or a fall (such as to signal the end of a
sentence). To get a sense of such intonational signals, one can try reading out the
passage above with the different segmentations proposed.
In speech, we tend to use short utterances like the following but are they
sentences?
(1) Yes!
(2) His turn.
(3) Next!
Although they are perfectly acceptable in both speech and writing (in writing as
a substitute for a spoken utterance), we do not accept them as sentences. It would
help considerably if we treated them as somehow short forms of proper
sentences such as the following:
(4) He says no!
(5) He wants you to go after him.
(6) Is this your book?
However, such full constructions are often awkward and not entirely natural or
appropriate in context and therefore should not be taken as more proper than
those in (1) to (3). We have to accept that not all utterances are sentences. Many
linguists make a systematic distinction between „sentence‰ as a theoretical unit
(defined by grammar) and „utterance‰ as a physical unit (a matter of speech
production). On this view, some utterances can be analysed in terms of sentences
but utterances do not consist of sentences.
Defining a sentence is not an easy task. We usually expect a sentence to contain at

least a verbal component and some other unit, but as we have seen, there are
complications. This means that although we have intuitions about what a
sentence is, and though we are perfectly capable of dividing a text into the
appropriate orthographical or intonational units typically reflecting sentence or
utterance boundaries, it is by no means obvious how actually to define a

sentence. Sometimes, textual units which do not meet this requirement are
treated like sentences in terms of punctuation or intonation, or in terms of their
independence as acts of communication.
Furthermore, there is a complex relationship between clause and sentence.

Somehow, clauses are like sentences in that they usually require a verbal
component and some other unit. So what is the difference between the two?
Clearly, the distinction between clause and sentence is very similar to that
between morpheme and word. A sentence seems to consist of one or more
clauses the way a word consists of one or more morphemes. Sometimes a clause
is also a sentence (and thus resembles free morphemes which are independent
words), sometimes a clause is simply too incomplete or dependent to serve as a
sentence in its own right (and thus resembles bound morphemes, which never
occur independently). While it is possible to consider words to be the basic units
of syntax, the building blocks of larger units, a sentence can be viewed as the
maximal autonomous units permitting syntactic analysis. Sentences and their
internal arrangement of words are the domain of syntax.
2.3 GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE

Our sixth sense about language includes the organisation of words within
sentences i.e. the grammatical structure of sentences, which is not restricted to
the identification of possible words and sentences. Think of the following
example given by Bache et al. (1997):
(7) John kissed the little old woman who owns that shaggy dog.
We probably have not seen an identical sentence completely like (11). Yet no one
has any difficulty in recognising it as a grammatical construction in English. In
other words, there is a right organisation of the 11 words in the sentence: they are
all used in the right place, at the right time. We know the individual words and
their meaning, and somehow we know the kind of relationship they enter into.
To realise that a particular organisation of words in the grammatical structure of
a sentence is not random. Let us look at another example given by Bache et al.
(1997).
(8) old the kissed dog shaggy who John woman little that owns.
Although we have exactly the same words here as in (7), (8) is completely
ungrammatical. It has become a list of unrelated words.

If we consider the possible ways of arranging the 11 different words of (7) and (8)
in a linear sequence, there are various ways to attain grammatical sequence.
There are, to be exact, 39,916,800 different ways of combining 11 different
elements in a sequence (1 x 2 x 3 x 4 x 5 x 6 x 7 x 8 x 9 x 10 x 11). Some of these
alternatives to (11) are of course perfectly grammatical:
(9) John kissed the old woman who owns that shaggy little dog.
(10) John kissed the little woman who owns that shaggy old dog.
(11) John kissed the woman who owns that shaggy little old dog.
We can further expand the combinations and may even accept sequences like the
following:
(12) The shaggy little dog who owns that old woman kissed John.
(13) The old woman who owns little John kissed that shaggy dog.
(14) John owns the old woman who kissed that shaggy little dog.
These sequences are all grammatical (in the sense that the words enter
acceptable, recognisable syntactic relationships), but their meaning may differ
from our conception of what constitutes the normal state of affairs in the world
(Can a dog own a woman? Can a human being own another human being?) and
thus challenge us to think of contexts where it would be appropriate to use such
sentences.
However, even if we are allowed to expand the possibilities of combining the

words in the sentence differently, there are at the very most, maybe about a
hundred possible sentences containing the 11 words in (7). There are millions of
unacceptable ones.
Yet, we all have a rather impressive ability to spot the very few grammatical
sentences and reject all the ungrammatical sequences. This ability presupposes
an intuitive knowledge of the possible syntactic relationships between words. In
other words, we have intuitive knowledge or tacit knowledge of grammatical
structure.

ACTIVITY 2.3
How many possible ways are there to arrange the 10 different words
in the sentence below?
Aminah realised that her father was trying to protect her.
In your opinion, how many will turn out to be grammatical
sentences? Can you be sure of knowing the grammatical sentences?
How?
2.4 LINEARITY AND THE PRINCIPLE OF

PROXIMITY
Language is linear, which denotes that one constituent unit (a speech sound or a
letter, a morpheme, a word, a group of words, a clause, a sentence) always
follows another. In speech language, it takes time and in writing it takes up
space. Grammatical structure is basically a means by which language comes to
terms with, and makes the best of, these basic conditions of time and space.
Precisely from the perspective of linearity, we would expect a sequence of

elements to be either random, with no apparent patterns in the organisation of
the elements, or progressively related, each element receiving its rank according
to its position in the list (in terms of, for example, increasing or decreasing
importance or priority, or according to some convention, such as alphabetical
order). In human language, we see both these main types of linear organisation.
A telephone directory is a good, if fairly artificial, example of progressive
linearity, and so is counting. However, alphabetical and numerical order is also
exploited in many natural expressions, such as:
(15) Minah got many AÂs and BÊs in her finals.
(26) Kamal and Kamil came in first and second, respectively.
(17) They arrived in twos and threes.
(18) Chang bought ten or twelve good books.
In a phrase like Ladies and Gentlemen, etiquette dictates a certain priority.

Progressive linearity is also present in constructions like:
(19) Diva is a bright, even brilliant, scientist.

This reflects an increase of the intensity with which Diva is described.
Random linearity may be present in constructions like the following:
(20) (a) She almost enjoyed the warm stale sweet air.
(b) She almost enjoyed the warm sweet stale air.
(c) She almost enjoyed the stale sweet warm air.
However, the basic randomness of the italicised constructions may be reduced by

considerations of rhythm or by contextual factors.
There is a different, more general, derived sense in which linearity is important

in the organisation of language: since simultaneity of expression is excluded, we
can predict that, in compensation, elements that somehow belong together will
be placed as closely together in the sequence as possible such as sweet, stale and
warm in examples (a) to (c): they belong together because they perform the same
function in the sentence, namely, that of describing air. As they cannot be
expressed simultaneously but are forced into a sequence, they are at least placed
closely together. Given the condition of linearity, it is thus in a sense natural that
words that belong together should be placed together in the sequence of words
making up the sentence. In this way, we can say that the necessary linearity in
the organisation of language leads to the principle of proximity.
SELF-CHECK 2.5
What is the principle of linearity?
2.5 CONSTITUENCY
Grammatical structure usually exploits the principle of proximity to create
groupings of words that belong together. We will explore more of this
knowledge on constituency when we introduce phrase structure rules and tree
diagram in the next topic. For now, let us consider the following short version of
as an example:
(21) Ahmad helped the shaggy old man
In this sentence, the word the is not randomly positioned in relation to the other
words. Rather, it is part of grammatical rules that follows in which it relates more
closely to man than to Ahmad, helped, shaggy or old. Our first impression is that

the order of words in this example seems to violate the principle of proximity:
man is further away from the than Ahmad, helped, shaggy and old. However,
upon closer examination, it appears that the, shaggy, old and man all belong
together in a group (according to the principle of proximity) and as such enter a
„joint‰ relationship with helped and Ahmad at a higher level.
The sentence describes an instance of helping (expressed by helped) in which

there are two participants: one who performs the picking (Ahmad) and one who
receives the kiss (the shaggy old man). There is thus an indication that the
sentence can be divided into three parts or constituents: [Ahmad], [helped] and
[the shaggy old man]. The interpretation of [the shaggy old man] as a group of
words belonging together is supported by the fact that if we want to move one of
the words relative to [Ahmad] and [helped] and preserve the meaning of the
three individual parts of the sentence, we normally have to move them all:
(22) The shaggy old man helped Ahmad.
(23) Man helped Ahmad the shaggy old.
Another interesting feature suggests that [the shaggy old man] is an integrated unit is
that we can replace it by one word representing the whole group and that we can use
it as the answer to a question about the identity of the person Ahmad helped:
(24) Ahmad helped him.
(25) „Who did Ahmad help?‰
„The shaggy old man.‰
When we group together certain words which share a function, it is often

referred to as a constituency. Structure in language can be described in terms of
constituency: complex language units (like the sentence) consist of a number of
constituents which, in turn, may consist of lower-level constituents. Language
structure is thus multilayered or hierarchical.
Despite strong inclination for proximity in language, this principle may be

overridden by other considerations. Compare the following two sentences:
(26a) Ahmad is washing his car.
(27b) Is Ahmad washing his car?
Example (26a) expresses an activity in progress (is washing) enacted by someone

(Ahmad) and involving an object (his car). It thus seems reasonable to divide the
sentence into the following parts: [Ahmad], [is washing] and [his car]. That is and
washing form a group seems intuitively right. Nevertheless, it is possible to
move one of the words without moving the other, as in example (27b), where is is
moved up in front of Ahmad.

The physical separation of the two words does not in any way impair the sense
that they belong together in a group, as a constituent. The „broken relationship‰
seems closely related to the communicative difference between the two examples:
the first sentence is a statement, the second is a question. It thus seems that
communicative function is a factor which may override the principle of
proximity. The term usually applied to a „broken relationship‰ in language is
discontinuity: in the second example, Is and painting form a discontinuous group
to serve a specific communicative purpose.
When we discuss syntax, it means that we are dealing with the relationship
between the units of a sentence, more specifically the various constituency
groupings (continuous as well as discontinuous) that the units enter. Like
morphology, syntax is part of our intuitive linguistic knowledge.
SELF-CHECK 2.6
1. What is the relationship between principle of linearity and

constituency?
2. What is „broken relationship‰ in constituency?
2.6 LINGUISTIC CREATIVITY AND AMBIGUITY

Our knowledge of language of syntactical structures or syntax involves the
ability to recognise various word order patterns when we see them: we all know
how to use them whenever we engage actively in communication. According to
Generative Grammar, all human beings possess the ability to understand and
produce new sentences, sentences which have never been uttered or heard
before, simply by using the familiar patterns of syntax and the lexicon i.e. the
words of the language. Some of the examples discussed in the preceding sections
are examples of this kind: not many native speakers of English are likely to have
come across them before. In this technical sense, language is creative: although it
contains a finite number of building blocks (the words in the lexicon), the rules
for their legitimate combination are such that an infinite number of sentences can
be produced. Maximal flexibility in matching expression and meaning thus
materialised.
Another example of the open-endedness of language is the lack of isomorphism

i.e. the lack of a one-to-one relationship between the units of language and the
items of the world that we discuss and refer to, using language. A good example
of this is that most nouns can be used to refer to more than just one particular

item in the real world: in appropriate contexts an expression like the car can be
used about any car, not just one car. Furthermore, car is so general in meaning
that it appropriately covers a fascinating range of past, present and future
vehicles. The units of language can be said to have a generic potential.
The principle diversity of meaning we sometimes encounter in a single

expression also known as ambiguity is an important factor in language which is
evident when we consider examples like the following (taken from Bache et al.
1997), which have been the object of much attention in linguistic debate:
(28) Old men and women are invited to the party.
(29) Flying planes can be dangerous.
(30) She wants to marry a Norwegian who is rich.
(31) He left his wife to deal with the creditors.
(32) The girl found a book on Main Street.
In Old men and women are invited to the party, the expression [Old men and
women] refers either to a group of old men and old women or to a group of old
men and of women of any age (young and old alike), depending on whether we
interpret the adjective old as a modifier of men and women or of men alone.
In Flying planes can be dangerous, [Flying planes] is either a word-like nominal

expression for aeroplanes with primary stress on the first word (like police force)
or it is a clause-like expression with primary stress on the second word referring
to instances of the activity of flying a plane. The ambiguity arises because the
normal concord rules are neutralised in can: when Flying planes is a word like
nominal expression it takes the plural (as in e.g. Flying planes are dangerous);
when it is a clause-like construction on a par with to fly a plane, it takes the
singular (as in e.g. Flying planes is dangerous).
The example, She wants to marry a Norwegian who is rich shows that sometimes
there are different interpretations of referring expressions: either [a Norwegian
who is rich] refers to a particular person or it refers to anyone who qualifies as a
rich Norwegian i.e. any member of the class of rich Norwegians.
In He left his wife to deal with the creditors, the person referred to by He either
lets his wife deal with the creditors (i.e. his wife is the agent of to deal) or he
leaves his wife with the purpose of dealing with the creditors himself (i.e. He is
the agent not only of left but also of to deal).

Finally, in The girl found a book on Main Street, the girl either found a book
about Main Street, or it was on Main Street, of all places, that she found a book.
Either on Main Street is part of a more complex construction a book on Main
Street, in which it describes the subject matter of the book involved, or it is a
more independent construction describing the location where the girl found the
book.
Specifically, the different interpretations of all the examples described above are
related to different syntactic patterns (i.e. alternative relationships between the
units involved) or different uses of the units making up the sentence. The
recognition of ambiguity in such cases is thus a sign that we have a fairly
advanced, if ‰only‰ intuitive, knowledge of syntax and grammar.
2.7 COMPETENCE AND PERFORMANCE

In the preceding topic, we have discussed tacit and focal knowledge. In fact,
speakers of a language do have a high degree of linguistic sensitivity and tacit
knowledge of their own language. In other words, they have what is often
referred to as linguistic competence. Not only are they capable of identifying
grammatical units like words and sentences, they also recognise complex
syntactic patterns and attach appropriate meanings to them, as witnessed in
cases of ambiguity. Most important of all, they know how to use their intuitive
knowledge whenever they engage in communication. More technically speaking,
they know how to turn their linguistic competence into actual linguistic
performance. Generally, few speakers of a language are capable of describing
their focal knowledge in defining the relevant units and patterns of language in a
rigid, principled manner.
The inborn knowledge which speakers have of a language comprises much more
than knowledge of its formal properties i.e. linguistic competence. Intuitively, we
know not only how linguistic expressions are structured but also how to use
them appropriately in different contexts or situations and in relation to our
communicative intentions. For example, speakers of English know how to be
formal or informal in their verbal interaction with other speakers. They also
know how to describe events as located in time, how to elicit information, how to
refer to things and persons, and so on. In short, they have knowledge of how to
do things with linguistic structures. The overall intuitive knowledge that
speakers have of a language and of how to use it in context is called their
communicative competence.
In describing a language, we are concerned with syntactically and semantically

well-formed sentences as well as the appropriateness of sentences in a given

context. For example, the near equivalent sentences, „You must make your
payment by 31 May‰ and „Your payment must be made by 31 May‰ are both
syntactically and semantically well-formed but in some contexts only the passive
sentence is appropriate, in others only the active. To account for a native
speakerÊs choice of one rather than the other, we need the concept of
communicative competence, which combines linguistic competence with context.
2.8 SYNTAGMATIC AND PARADIGMATIC

RELATIONS
In this section, we shall focus on the knowledge of paradigm relations (choice
relations) which is a specific example of the kind of knowledge that native
speakers of a language seem to have. It is an important aspect of their linguistic
and communicative competence.
Language is of necessity linear but has syntactic structure imposed on it which

exploits and overrides the linearity. Consider a sentence like the following:
(33) Samad teaches literature.
This sentence has a relatively simple syntactic structure involving the horizontal
relationship between the constituents [Samad], [teaches] and, [literature].
According to the rules of English grammar, we interpret the sentence as a
statement to the effect that Samad is the one who teaches and literature is the
subject taught. From a cross-linguistic, universal point of view, there is no
necessary single arrangement of constituents to express this particular piece of
information. In other languages, it may be expressed through a different
arrangement of the constituents making up the sentence, corresponding to, for
example, Teaches Samad literature or Samad literature teaches, which are
ungrammatical in English. The kind of horizontal relationship that can be
established between the constituents of a sentence is often referred to as
syntagmatic.
Each of the constituents in the syntagmatic relationship in Samad teaches

literature might have been more complex, thus adding to the overall complexity
of the sentence:
(34) The tall man is teaching English literature.
In the second, we replace [Samad] with [The tall man], [teaches] with [is
teaching] and [literature] with [English literature]. The basic structure of the two
sentences is the same. Further complexity is of course possible:

(35) The very beautiful young Indian woman whom you met at the supermarket
last night could have been teaching advanced English literature.
In this sentence, there are again three main constituents corresponding to those
in the two first examples: [The very beautiful young Indian woman whom you
met at the supermarket last night], [could have been teaching] and [advanced
English literature]. This means that despite the wordiness of this example, its
basic structure is like that of Samad teaches literature ă there are three main
constituents only.
The three examples discussed above have structural similarity which shows that
although language is linear, thus calling for the syntagmatic, horizontal
arrangement of the constituents in the sequence that we recognise as a syntactic
structure, there is at the same time, a vertical dimension to language.
A sentence is not just a sequence of elements or units which enter some sort of
horizontal relationship. Rather, a sentence contains a number of slots which may
be filled in different ways for different communicative purposes. Thus, at one
level, the three examples contain the same number of slots, namely, three but
these slots are filled with constructions of different lengths and complexity. The
constructions which are possible in a particular slot (e.g. teaches, is teaching and
could have been teaching) enter a choice relation: they are all candidates for a
particular function at a particular point, and the choice of one excludes the
others. The relationship between the possible constructions in a particular slot is
often referred to as paradigmatic.
To conclude, the implication of all this is that the linearity of language should be
viewed in terms of a sequence of slots, each an important hallmark, at which the
language user has a choice of expression. Language is both syntagmatic and
paradigmatic.
Sometimes, the choice of expression for a given slot is a choice of one lexical item
rather than another:
(36) Samad teaches literature.
(37) Samad teaches chemistry.
The paradigmatic choice between grammar and physics in the frame [Samad
teaches....] is a purely lexical choice, with no implication for the other
constituents of the sentence, and therefore not terribly interesting from a
grammatical point of view. Other paradigmatic choices involve grammar:
(38) (a) Samad teaches literature.

(b) Samad is teaching literature.

(c) Samad taught literature.
The choice of verb form in a frame like [Samad literature], where a number of
different forms of the verb teach are possible, must be accounted for. A grammar
of English must provide answers to questions like „Why is teaches but not teach
all right in that particular frame?‰ and „What is the difference between teaches
and taught?‰ or „What is the difference between teaches and is teaching?‰ Such
questions concern inflectional morphology and competing syntactic
constructions.
It is also important to specify in our grammar what types of construction are

possible in particular slots. As we have seen, instead of a name in the first slot
([Samad]), we may have a group of words ([The tall man] and [The very
beautiful young girl last night], respectively), but we cannot normally have a
clause:
(39) That Samad is very competent teaches literature.
In other frames, clauses as well as names and groups of words are perfectly
possible in the initial slot of the sentence:
(40) (a) Samad surprised Jani.
(b) The tall man surprised Jani.
(c) That Samad is very knowledgeable surprised Jani.
The two dimensions of language, syntagmatic and paradigmatic, are closely

interrelated. Thus, the choice of a particular construction to fill a particular slot
may well affect later choices of constructions (and, conversely, the choice of a
construction may be made in anticipation of choices one wants to make later on).
Consider the following pair of sentences:
(41) (a) The tall man teaches physics.
(b) The tall men teach physics.
Here, the choice of the singular noun man in the initial major constituent
necessitates the choice of teaches rather than teach as the second constituent. In
comparison, the choice of the plural noun men in the initial major constituent
leads the speaker to choose teach rather than teaches later on in the sequence.
The term „grammar‰ should be interpreted in a broad sense, covering both the
paradigmatic and syntagmatic dimensions.

Native speakersÊ intuitive knowledge or competence includes knowledge not

only of the syntagmatic dimension of language but also of the paradigmatic
dimension. As with the other aspects of native speaker intuition dealt with in the
preceding sections, it is difficult to describe oneÊs knowledge of language in a
precise, appropriate and objective manner. The aim of this grammar is to provide
such a description of English. Our focus is not simply to teach grammar, because
in the sense discussed in the preceding sections you know a lot of grammar
already. What we want to do is to offer the tools, terminology and insights
necessary for making your knowledge more explicit.
SELF-CHECK 2.7
What are the concepts of syntagmatic and paradigmatic

dimensions? Give appropriate examples.
 Morphemes, the smallest units of meaning in a language, consist of bases and

affixes. Bases may be bound or free.
 Affixes are, by definition, bound; they may precede the base (prefixes) or
follow it (suffixes).
 To analyse morphemes, we divide a word into its meaningful parts (the

morphemes), state the meaning or function of each, and show that each
occurs with a similar meaning or function as part of other words in the
language.
 English has eight inflectional morphemes (morphemes that show

grammatical relationships): two for nouns (plural, possessive), four for verbs
(present tense, past tense, present participle, and past participle), and two for
adjectives and adverbs (comparative, superlative).
 All the remaining morphemes are derivational (morphemes used to create

words in the language).
 In this introduction to syntax, we have shown that speakers of a language

have a high degree of linguistic competence: they have an intuitive, implicit
knowledge of the basic units of grammar and the various relationships these
enter into.

 This linguistic competence includes intuitions about syntax (the principles of

linearity and proximity as well as the principle of constituency which arises
from and overrides the two other principles) and of grammatically
conditioned ambiguity.
 Part of the linguistic competence of language users is also knowledge of

paradigmatic choice relations in language.
Derivational morpheme Morpheme

Inflectional morpheme
1. Define the terms isomorphism and ambiguity. Cite examples to

substantiate your reasoning.
2. What is the difference between linguistic competence and linguistic
performance? Is inborn knowledge similar to linguistic competence? State
your opinion and give concrete examples.

Topic  Introduction
3 to Phrase
Structure
Grammar
LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Describe the patterns or structure of English phrase structure
grammar;
2. Analyse the phrase structure of simple English sentences; and
3. Justify specific analysis of phrase structure.
 INTRODUCTION
In this topic, you will learn some basic procedures in analysing simple English
sentences. The focus will be on the concept of phrase structure rules and how the
sentences are represented in a tree diagram. This is an introductory lesson on
phrase structure grammar and in order to understand the application, we will
use constituency tests to determine whether a string of words are in the same
group. We will also look into the alternative way to represent phrase structure
rules that are shown in labelled brackets.

TOPIC 3 INTRODUCTION TO PHRASE STRUCTURE GRAMMAR  43
3.1 PHRASE STRUCTURE

We have briefly discussed how morphemes combine to build structure to words.
We will now look at the way words themselves combine to form sentences.
When we see a sentence written or hear it spoken, we see or hear a string of
words. (Actually, this is a little misleading. We never really hear strings of words
ă what we actually hear is a constant stream of sound; word boundaries are not
usually obvious in normal speech.) However, the question is whether these
strings of words are indeed strings of words without any internal structure or
whether we can find reasons to assume that words form groups within sentences.
It is, in fact, quite clear that native speakers feel that in English, a sentence is not
just a plain sequence of words. Native speakers can divide sentences into groups
of words which seem to belong together more closely than others. How do we
know sentences have structure? To begin, consider the sentence below.
(1) The motivation programme had helped the primary school pupils to score
higher marks in the spelling test.
Probably everyone reading this module will share the intuition that motivation
somehow modifies programme and together, these words form a natural unit in
this sentence ă motivation programme, similarly, pupilsÊ spelling test forms a
single unit. These groups of words which go together are called constituents. In
other words, we can say that The motivation programme and pupilsÊ spelling test
are constituents in this sentence. A constituent can then form a close group with
another constituent i.e. two constituents can together form a new constituent.
(2) The motivation programme had helped the primary school pupils to score
higher marks in the spelling test.
In the primary school, pupils are given simpler exercises to practise their spelling
skills.
The string the primary school pupils occurs in both sentences. Intuitively, native
speakers of English will judge the primary school pupils to be a constituent in the
first sentence but not in the second. If you do not see this difference, or if you
share the intuition but want to check it, then you can make constituency tests
which can be useful to show up sentences that on account of their syntax have
multiple meanings i.e. structural ambiguity.

44  TOPIC 3 INTRODUCTION TO PHRASE STRUCTURE GRAMMAR
Definition of Phrase Structure
Phrase structure is the division of a sentence into parts or constituents, and the
division of these constituents into subparts. For instance, the sentence „The boy
went to the island‰, as represented in the tree diagram in (3), is made up of two
main constituents, „The boy‰ and „went to the island‰. The second constituent is,
in turn, divided into two parts, went and to the island, which is divided even
further, into to and the island. Sentences have such hierarchical structure, even a
very simple two-word sentence like, Johan slept (4).
(3)
(4)

3.2 SOME WAYS TO DETERMINE A PHRASE
3.2.1 Substitution
One way of determining a phrase structure is by using a substitution test. If you
can substitute in a single word for the group of the words and still preserve the
grammaticality of the sentence, then the group of words is a constituent or
phrase, that is, a „family of words‰; and whatever the group of words/word
cannot be substituted for, then it is not. In The boy went to the island, we can
easily find one-word substitution for The boy.
(5) The boy went to the island.
Table 3.1: Substitution of Subject
The substitution of the parts of the sentence need not preserve meaning, but
grammaticality. The new sentence created by the substitution can mean anything
at all, but it must be a grammatical sentence. The sentences, „Mikhail went to the
island‰, „She went to the island‰, „They went to the island‰ and „The fishermen
went to the island‰ meet this test, so we can conclude that in our original
sentence, The boy, is a constituent.
lf a word sequence in a sentence is a constituent, in that sentencesÊ tree diagram,

the words of the constituent must all hang from the same node, but no other
words can. In (3), the words the boy hang from the node above them labelled NP
(for Noun Phrase) or the Subject.
Now, let us look at some other word sequences in „The boy went to the island‰.
How about boy went? There does not seem to be any single-word substitution for
it.
(6) The boy went to the island.

Table 3.2: Substitutions of Constituents can Produce Ungrammatical Sentences
The results of the substitutions are not grammatical sentences, so they are
marked with an asterisk. Since no substitution seems possible for boy went, we
can conclude for now that it is not a constituent in „The boy went to the island‰.
In (3), there is no node which the words boy went can be attached to.
Constituents can be longer than one word. In tree (3), went to the island is
diagrammed as a constituent; its words all hang from the VP (Verb Phrase) node.
The substitution evidence is derived from the possibility of, went to the island, be
substituted by any single intransitive verb or any transitive verb whose direct
object can be optionally omitted.
(7) The boy went to the island
Table 3.2: Substitution of Intrasitive Verb or Transitive Verb

SELF-CHECK 3.1
1. So far, we have used the substitution criterion to justify as

constituents in „The boy went to the island‰, the sequences The
boy went and to the island. Find substitutions to justify each of
the other word sequences that are diagrammed as constituents
in tree (3).
2. Find substitutions to support calling each bracketed sequence a

constituent.
(a) She put a [very very large] papaya in the basket.
(b) Call [your mother] here.
(c) Matt said [that his brother was an expert].
3.2.2 Movement
A second criterion for finding constituents is the ability of constituents to
„move,‰ in the sense illustrated in (8).

To the island the boy went
The term „move‰ is used when a word can be paraphrased or when we are able
to move a group of words/word to a different place in the sentence. The
movement criterion is actually paraphrasing and requires keeping the meaning
the same, unlike the substitution criterion. The movement shown in (8) is
evidence that to the island is a constituent in „The boy went to the island‰.
Table 3.4: Substitution of Verb

ACTIVITY 3.1
Analyse the sentence (9) above. Is the result supported of the
substitution criterion?
We are confident about calling a group of words a constituent if it is supported

by both the criteria we have tried so far. Below are additional examples of
movement.
(10)
During paraphrasing, there are some function words or free grammatical

morphemes that may disappear and in some cases of movement, like the
disappearance of for. Movements often have this effect of introducing or
eliminating function words or morphemes.
SELF-CHECK 3.2
Find justifications from the movement criterion for calling the
bracketed sequences constituents.
1. [For Samad to fire Wani ] would not be wise.
2. Simo the lion roared with laughter [when her keeper came].
3.2.3 Conjunction
A third test for constituent family (or „constituency‰) is whether the group of
words in the sentence can be conjoined with a similar sequence. In The boy went
to the island, all the constituents can be:
(11) a. The boy and his friends went to the island.
b. The boy went to the island and came back again.
c. The boy went to the island and across the sea.
d. The boy went to the island and the sea-garden.

A case of negative evidence from the conjunction criterion is given in (12).

(12) a. The boy raced into the schoolyard.
b. The boy raced into the and girl dashed out of the schoolyard.
Since the sequence boy raced into the cannot be conjoined with a similar
sequence, the evidence in (12) indicates that it is not a constituent in The boy
raced into the schoolyard.
SELF-CHECK 3.3
Use the conjoin ability criterion to support calling the bracketed
sequences constituents.
1. [A large python] curled around SaraÊs arm.
2. Matt and Moon [tried to convince Jack to join them].
3.2.4 Anaphora
The fourth criterion for constituency is whether the group of words in the
sentence can be the antecedent for a pro-word (i.e. a pronoun or a word with a
similar function). It is generally true that pro-forms can only use constituents for
their antecedents, never non-constituents. The technical term for the relation
between a pro-word (or, more generally, pro-expression) and its antecedent is
anaphora. All the constituents in „The boy went to the island‰ can be justified
under the anaphora test, as you can see in (13), where the italicised pro-
expressions use the bracketed expressions as antecedents.
(13) a. [The boy] went to the island. He was hungry.
b. The boy [went to the island]. He did so in order to see what was on it.
c. The boy went [to the island]. He went there because he had a strong
drive to conquer new challenges.
d. The boy went to [the island ]. In fact, he sailed to it several times
before he got tired of the sailing.

SELF-CHECK 3.4
Use the anaphora test to support the constituents of the bracketed

sequences.
1. Kasim and Mutu [built a tree house].
2. I guess [tomorrow will be fine].
3.2.5 Phrasal Categories

Each constituent recognised by these four criteria belongs to any one of the
following categories: Noun Phrase (NP), Verb Phrase (VP), Sentence (S),
Adjective Phrase (AdjP), and Prepositional Phrase (PrepP). Phrasal categories are
named according to the most important word of the phrase. Noun Phrases (NPs)
are so labelled because they typically contain nouns. Verb Phrases (VPs) always
contain verbs. Adjective Phrases (APs) are so-called because an adjective is the
only required word; intensifiers are optional.
(14)
Prepositional phrases (Prep Ps) contain a preposition and a Noun Phrase.
(15)

3.2.6 A Notation for Phrase Structure

The „tree‰ diagram is used to represent constituent structure. Let us look at the
properties of these diagrams by looking at the tree for „The boy went to the
island‰.
(16)
This diagram includes the following claims: The whole string of words „The boy
went to the island‰ is a sentence (the top „S,‰ which „dominates‰ the whole
sequence of words, makes this claim); the sentence comprises a noun phrase (NP)
the boy and a verb phrase (VP) to the island; the initial NP itself comprises an
article (Art) the and a noun (N) boy; and the VP comprises a verb (V) went and a
PrepP (Prepositional Phrase) to the island, which is itself made up of a
Preposition (prep) over and an NP the island, which is itself made up of an article
(the) and a noun (island).
The tree provides the following information: the word class of each word, the
phrase structure of the whole sentence (what the constituent of words are, and
their hierarchical structure and how they are chunked or not grouped inside each
other), and the phrasal category of each phrase (what kind of phrase for each).
Every branch in a tree must ultimately end in a word or morpheme, and every
word or morpheme must be at the bottom of just one path of any branches
starting from the „S‰ at the top („node‰) of the sentence. The latter requirement
means that a tree like this is illegal (17), despite apparently

(17)
making sense, in a way, because have might be termed both an auxiliary and a
verb. In addition, branches are not allowed to cross each other. Thus, for
„Chocolates, Mikhail loved‰ (18) a tree like this is illegal, even though it makes a
(18)
certain amount of sense, because chocolate functions as the direct object of the
verb loved, and therefore might be thought to belong inside the VP with that
verb. But phrase structure is only one kind of syntactic structure, and there are
other levels and kinds of structure to capture that kind of relation. Phrase
structure trees represent only „continuous‰ constituents.

SELF-CHECK 3.5
Draw trees that correspond to the following labelled bracketing:
1. [S [NP The cattle] NP [VP raced [pp down [NP the hillside ]pp
]VP ] S
2. [S [NP My brother] NP [VP sold [NP a bike] NP] VP] S
3. [S[NP That baker] NP [VP spilled [NP the cream NP] [pp on
[NP the floor] NP]pp] VP] S
3.2.7 An Alternative to Trees

Another way to represent phrase structure is by labelled bracketing. It shows
information as a tree, but in a linear format. As an alternative to tree (16), we can
use the following:
(19) [s [NP The boy]NP [VP went [pp to [NP the island]NP ]pp ]vp]s
In the above representation, every constituent is bracketed with „[ „and‰ ]‰ and

the brackets are labelled. The usual way to label them is with a small label
written just inside and below the left bracket, and just outside and below the
right bracket. Sometimes the right label is left out: [NP The boy]. Full detail can
be included, including marking of the word class of individual words:
[NP [Art The]Art [N boy]N ] NP
Deciding on which representation to use, between a tree and a labelled

bracketing is a matter of convenience. Usually trees are easier to read, but for
very simple structures labelled bracketing is a quick alternative.
3.2.8 Trees and Functions

A tree does not show, directly, information about the function of phrasal
categories, for example, whether a particular constituent functions as subject,
predicate, or direct object. However, it is possible to characterise two of these
functions „configurationally‰. In English, an NP functioning as subject of a
sentence must be in the position circled in example (20).

(20)
A direct object NP in English can be partially defined as any NP in the circled

position in the following tree:
(21)
3.2.9 Trees and Ambiguity

Ambiguous (unclear) sentences have two or more meanings: „Visiting relatives
can be a pain‰ means (a) „Relatives who are visiting can be a pain‰ as well as (b)
„To visit relatives can be a pain.‰ In almost all contexts, ambiguous sentences are
disambiguated by the context, so usually hearers only notice one meaning, but
this does not change the fact that an ambiguous sentence does encode two (or
more) meanings, even if one or more of them are not intended by the speaker.
Certain kinds of ambiguities can be resolved with trees. For instance, Josie
bought the car in the city means either that Josie bought the car located in the
city, or that the buying occurred in the city. In other words, in the city either
identifies which car Josie bought or tells where the purchase was made. A useful
way to think about this is in terms of such a sentence being actually two
sentences, both made of the very same words in the very same order, but with
different phrase structures.
(22a)

(22b)
The sentence represented by tree (22a) answers the question „Which book did
Mikhail sell?‰ The sentence represented by tree (22b) answers the question
„Where did Mikhail sell the book?‰ The key to the meaning is the location of the
PrepP in the book store, inside or outside the NP containing the book. When it is
inside, as in tree (22a), it may be thought of as modifying the noun book. When it
is outside, as in tree (22b), it modifies the little VP sold the book.
Observe that our criteria for phrase family support these two analysis. For tree
(a), all four were successfully applied. We can substitute for, move, conjoin, and
find a proform for the NP the book in the store.
(23) (a) Substitution:

Mikhail sold the book in the store
pens
it
fish
(b) Movement:
The book in the store was sold by Mikhail
(c) Conjunction:
Mikhail sold the book in the store and magazine in park
(d) Anaphora:
Mikhail sold the book in the store. It sold like a hot cake

And for tree (b) we can substitute for, conjoin, and find a proform for the little VP
sold the book, although it doesnÊt seem possible to move it.
(24) (a) Substitution:

lived
stayed
studied
(b) Conjunction:
Mikhail {sold the book } in the store and {sold the magazine} in park
(c) Anaphora:
Mikhail {sold the book} in the store, and he did it there because it was
a decent place to do so.
Josie [bought the car] in the city, and she did it there instead of in the suburbs
because she got a good deal from the saleswoman.
SELF-CHECK 3.6
A. Draw tree diagrams for the following sentences, paying

special attention to the location of PrepPs. Justify your
placement of PrepPs with as many of the four criteria for
phrase family as you can.
1. The cattle grazed on the grass with dullness.
2. My friend put the books inside the drawer.
B. Here are some ambiguous sentences. For each one,

paraphrase it in two different ways to bring out the two
meanings. Some of these sentences can be disambiguated by
means of different phrase structure trees.
1. I donÊt like hot soup and curry.
2. I love flying kites.
3. My teacher loved me more than my brother.
4. I decided on the mountain.

 We have looked at the phrase structure of simple English sentences.
 This topic has introduced you to some basic concepts of descriptive grammar.
This knowledge should come very useful when we discuss sentence structure
in Topic 6, which can help you to simplify the concept of phrase structure.
 We have also discussed and analysed the tree diagrams that represent phrase
structure, and taught you how to determine the structure of a phrase or
sentence.
Anaphora
Phrase Structure
1. Draw trees that correspond to the following bracketing:

(a) [S [NP the cattles] NP [VP raced up [pp down [NP the hillside] pp]
VP] S
(b) [S [NP my brother] NP [VP sold [NP a bike] NP] VP] S
2. Draw tree diagrams for the following sentences, paying special attention to
the location of Pprep. Phrase with as many of the four criteria for phrase
family as you can.

Topic  Parts of
4 Speech
LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Differentiate between structure class and form class words;
2. Classify the four traditional parts of speech, namely, nouns,
verbs, adjectives and adverbs;
3. Verify qualifiers such as determiners, auxiliary verbs, and
qualifiers that modify members of the form classes;
4. Use prepositions to connect noun phrases to other words or
phrases in a sentence; and
5. Use conjunctions and two kinds of pronouns (relative and
interrogative) to combine entire clauses.
 INTRODUCTION
This topic discusses nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs. These four major form
classes of English words are the core of what traditional grammarians call the
parts of speech. This lesson will also enable you to understand how words are
classified into these four categories. This is done by using a formula to identify
the chief distinguishing features of the form class and structure class. In turn, this
will enable you to test words to determine their identities.

TOPIC 4 PARTS OF SPEECH  59
4.1 STRUCTURE CLASS VERSUS FORM CLASS

WORDS
The main parts of speech in English are nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs.
These words are used to label and describe the things and activities we perceive
in the world around us. These words are called content words because they are
considered to contain meaning independent of one another. They have lexical
meaning, the kind of meaning that is given in a dictionary. The best examples of
lexical word meaning are the types of nouns (cat, boy), verbs (play, run),
adjectives (pretty, good) and adverbs (quickly, well).
Structure-class words provide essential information about the form class words
with which they occur and signal the grammatical relationships among them.
Since the primary significance of structure words lies in the grammatical
operations they perform rather than in their lexical meaning, they are called
function words by some linguists, and their grammatical meaning is sometimes
referred to as functional meaning.
Two other differences between the structure classes and the form classes are
significant. The form class words such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs
can undergo important morphological form changes by the processes of
derivation and inflection. In contrast, the members of the structure classes for the
most part show no such changes in form, as is evident in recalling some
examples of prepositions (to, from, of, on), conjunctions (and, or, nor, but), and
modal auxiliaries (must, may, will, can). Each member of these important
structure classes occurs in a single form.
Second, the form classes include extremely large number of members that went
through various processes of word creation and derivation. Therefore, their size
is constantly growing. In contrast, the structure classes typically have a limited,
usually quite small number of members, and that membership is essentially
fixed. The differences between form and structure classes words can be
summarised in Table 4.1.

60  TOPIC 4 PARTS OF SPEECH
Table 4.1: Difference between Form Classes and Structure Classes
Structure words do not usually stand alone. Their association with specific form
classes provides a signal that a member of that class is coming. For example,
determiners (like a) and prepositions (like under) never occur without an
accompanying noun; modal auxiliaries (like would) require a verb to complete
their meaning; and qualifiers (like more) are always followed by an adjective or
an adverb. Once we encounter any one of these structure words, the possible
kinds of words that can follow are reduced. We then listen for the anticipated
noun, or verb, or another form class word. Table 4.2 will help you to differentiate
the major sign for form and structure classes.
Table 4.2: Form and Structure Classes

4.2 FORMS WITH OVERLAPPING FUNCTIONS

We normally divide our experience of the world into two basic categories of
speakers, namely objects and actions. We categorise our universe into the things
that we perceive, on the one hand, and into the actions that those things perform
or undergo, on the other. In English, we use nouns to name things and verbs to
express actions. We assume that these two are separate categories and that there
is no overlapping in between. The traditional grammar defines a noun as „the
name of a person, place, or thing‰ and a verb as „an action‰ help reinforce the
notion that we are dealing with two entirely separate categories.
However, in reality, objects and events exist on a continuum, with unambiguous

objects such as (table) at one end and actions as (throw) at the other end. A little
thought will demonstrate that some nouns name events such as lightning, and
that some words such as flame, name both things and actions. Defining a noun as
„the name of a person, place, or thing‰ does not help differentiate between words
that can occur both as nouns and as verbs. Compare the following:
(1) a. He may play football in Europe next summer. (Verb)
b. The play is on TV3. (Noun)
(2) a. The wind usually blows from the west. (Verb)
b. He suffered three blows to the head. (Noun)
SELF-CHECK 4.1
1. The italicised words in each pair are both identical in form and
related in meaning, how do you decide which ones name an
action and which do not?
2. What are the differences between structural class words and form
class words? Give examples.
3. What are function words and content words? Give examples.

4.3 NOUNS
In English, a single word can serve many different functions; we usually need
clues other than meaning to decide what parts of speech a word can belong to.
One of the clues we depend upon is the word form. In identifying nouns, for
instance, we can discriminate them from other classes by looking at the type of
affixes of the derivational morpheme (consistency, communism). Most nouns can
also be inflected; they can become plural (girl/girls) or possessive (girlÊs). This
ability to inflect helps differentiate between nouns and adjectives that have
identical base forms. In (3a), green functions as an adjective; it does not become
plural in (3b), but it does accept an adjective inflection in (3c):
(3) a. That green hat is not becoming to her.

b. Those green hats are not becoming to her.
c. The greenest hat is the most becoming to her.
Green can also function as a noun, accepting the plural morpheme in contexts
like (4b):
(4) a. That green is darker than this one.

b. Those greens are darker than this one.
However, not all adjectives can both follow a determiner and can be pluralised,
as green does in (2b). We cannot say that happy or those happies but adjectives
that can accept noun inflections have become nouns in English. Deciding
whether such words refer to a quality or a thing does not help us differentiate
reliably between adjectives and nouns. When a word like green functions as an
adjective, as in examples (3a) and (3b), then we say that it names a quality; when
it is functioning as a noun, as in examples (4a) and (4b), we arbitrarily say that it
names a thing, even though the reference in each case is to a quality of colour.

You can test whether a word is a noun by following the tips below.
4.3.1 Noun Subclasses

Nouns are classified as being either common (boy, table, idea, book) or proper
(Tanjong Malim, Perak, Jamal, Proton Saga).
Proper nouns, capitalised in writing, are the names of specific places, persons or
events. It is not difficult to discover that the distinction between common and proper
nouns has grammatical consequences. For example, common nouns can appear after
articles (a, an, the), but proper nouns usually cannot (refer to Table 4.3).
Table 4.3: Nouns
One of the functions of the definite article (the) is to distinguish one thing from
another. Because there is only one holiday called Hari Raya, one city called Kuala
Lumpur, and one famous author named Khadijah Hashim, an article is not
necessary. If for some reason we want to refer to such a unique entity as if there
were, at least in imagination, more than one of them, then we use an article:
(5) a. Do you remember the Hari Raya of 1988?
b. They know only the Kuala Lumpur of the very rich.
c. He spoke of the young Jamal.
Common nouns are subcategorised as count nouns or non-count (mass) nouns.

Count nouns like car, cassette, cousin, refer to things that are considered to be
separate entities. They occur with many and other determiners (words that
function like articles and precede nouns) that make distinctions in number:
a. many pencils, a pencil, every telephone, these cousins
b. one pencil, two pencils, three telephones, four cousins
Non-count nouns, on the other hand, refer to entities that we think of as not
countable but occurring in a mass, such as money, water, electricity, sunshine,
and bread. These nouns occur only in the singular with much and other
indefinite determiners that do not include the notion of number:
a. much money, some electricity, less water, a lot of bread
b. * one money, *two monies, *three waters, *four sunshines
Expressions like a lot of occur frequently with non-count nouns, allowing us to

refer to various amounts of what we canÊt easily count. Similarly, we can preface
non-count nouns with countable ones to form phrases.
4.3.2 Determiners
A determiner is a structure word that precedes and modifies a noun with the
main members of the set being the articles a, an and the. We could define a
determiner, in fact, as „a structure word that can substitute for a/an or the.‰
(Klammer, 2000). The main subgroups of determiners are listed in Table 4.4.
Table 4.4: Main Subgroups of Determiners

The is called the definite article and a/an as the indefinite article. The contrast
between the two is related to knowledge about the noun that the speaker (or
writer) shares with the hearer (or reader). When the is used with a noun, the
hearer presumably knows specifically what is being talked about. When a or an
is used, such knowledge is not assumed. Consider these contrasting examples:
(6) a. Please wash the carpet.

b. Please wash a carpet.
(7) a. Did you see the cat?

b. Did you see a cat?
(8) Petrol is becoming more expensive every year.
(9) Cats are good pets.
Without determiners, cats and petrol refer to any or all cats and petrol but no
specific ones.
Native speakers of English seldom think about the complex grammatical

meanings signalled by determiners or about the intricate patterns governing their
use, for these individuals have acquired an subconscious understanding of how
to use and interpret determiners as part of the natural process of learning the
language as children. People who learn English as a second language are not so
fortunate, however, and many struggle with the English determiner system long
after having mastered most of the other important elements of the language.
In order to use determiners idiomatically, one must, for example, properly

correlate determiners with the count/non-count distinction. As you can see in the
following examples, non-count nouns can occur with the definite article (the) or
without any article, but they never occur with the indefinite article (a/an).

Table 4.5: Possessive Determiners
4.3.3 Pronouns
One of the most striking distinctions between form classes and structure classes
is that form class words (nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs) are subject to
change in form through the addition of derivational and inflectional morphemes.
Structure class words, on the other hand, occur in a single form. Pronouns,
however, are an exception to that generalisation. Although they are structure
words, they depend upon other words for their function and meaning. Many of
them are capable of inflection. We discussed demonstrative and possessive
pronouns in the section on determiners, at the beginning of this topic. We will
end the topic on structure words with a discussion of interrogative and relative
pronouns. And in this section, we will discuss other pronouns: personal,
reflexive, reciprocal and indefinite pronouns.

Pronouns as Noun Phrase Substitutes
A pronoun is traditionally defined as a noun substitute, but that is not exactly

accurate. Consider what happens if we replace the noun in the sentence That old
torn shoes are lying there with a pronoun: *That old torn they are lying there. In
fact, a pronoun can substitute not only for a noun but also for a whole noun
phrase. Replacing the noun phrase that old torn shoes with the pronoun they
results in a grammatical sentence: They are lying there.
However, They are lying there is an unusual sentence, if spoken without any
context, we would have no idea what they refers to. In our actual use of
pronouns, we depend very strongly on either verbal or non-verbal context to
determine meaning. If someone spoke that sentence to you while gesturing
towards an old torn hat, a hammer someone had lost, or some other object, you
would know from that non-verbal gesture what the referent of they was. Or the
referent might be identified verbally by a preceding sentence, as in the following:
(10) a. You know those books we lost? They are lying there.
b. Are you looking for those old torn shoes? They are lying there.
In such cases, we call the words that identify a pronounÊs referent its antecedent.
That hammer we lost is the antecedent for it in (10a); that old torn hat is the
antecedent for it in (10b).
4.3.4 Personal Pronouns

A personal pronoun is used to refer to a noun or noun phrase antecedent or to
stand for a person, place, or thing that has been identified in the nonverbal
context. The first and second-person personal pronouns (I, we and you) are used
to refer to the speaker and other participants in a conversation. The third-person
personal pronouns (he, she, it and they) refer to other persons and things. The
pronouns constitute a small set that are closed, without the possibility of adding
new members to the set by the derivational processes we have discussed.
However, like the form classes, some pronouns do show inflectional changes in
their forms.
All of the personal pronouns except you have distinct forms signalling number,
either singular or plural. Only the third-person singular pronouns have distinct
forms signalling gender: masculine (he/him), feminine (she/her), and neuter (it).
Masculine and feminine personal pronouns are also sometimes used for a few
other kinds of referents. Ships and airplanes are frequently considered feminine
(The Titanic and her guests were all drowned in the deep sea). The neuter gender
form it is used to refer to practically all other non-human referents.
Pronouns inflect for case to show whether they are functioning as subjects of
sentences or as objects of verbs or prepositions, as shown in Table 4.6. The subject
case (traditionally called the nominative case) is considered to be the base form.
As its name implies, the subject case is the form of the personal pronoun used
when the pronoun functions as a subject:
(11) a. They rented an apartment.

b. Borhan revealed that he had enrolled in law school.
In formal usage, the subject case is also used when the pronoun follows be or
certain other verbs that take subject complements. But in informal usage, the
object case is frequent.
Table 4.6: Subject Case and Object Case of Personal Pronouns

(12) Formal a. It is I.
b. That is she.
(13) Informal a. ItÊs me.

b. ThatÊs her.
The object case (also called the accusative case) is used when the pronoun serves
in any object function:
4.3.5 Reflexive Pronouns

When a sentence contains two references to the same noun or noun phrase, one
in the subject and one in the predicate, the second becomes a reflexive pronoun
(one ending in -self or -selves). The reflexive endings serve as a reminder that the
antecedent is to be found within the immediate sentence and not, as is true with
other pronouns, in a preceding sentence or in the nonverbal context. In the
following examples, italics mark words that have the same referent.
(14) a. Azizah appraised Azizah.

b. Azizah appraised herself.
(15) a. Apparently, the dogs freed the dogs.

b. Apparently the dogs freed themselves.
(16) a. Kathijah vowed to Kathijah never again to help a drifter.

b. Kathijah vowed to herself never again to help a drifter.
The forms of the reflexive pronouns are summarised in Table 4.7.

Table 4.7: Forms of Reflexive pronouns
Table 4.8: Forms of Indefinite Pronouns
The indefinites they and you can be paraphrased as „people,‰ „someone,‰ or „no
one,‰ depending on the context. However, because they and you normally refer
to specific persons or antecedents, their use as indefinites tends to be
contradictory. Used as indefinites, the pronouns appear to refer to someone
specific, when in fact they do not.

(17) a. They will stop „the oil for food project‰.

b. The United Nation administration will stop „the oil for food project‰.
In each example, the antecedent for the italicised personal pronouns is an

indefinite pronoun. Grammatically, somebody, nobody, and everyone are
singular, and it would therefore seem to be grammatically correct to choose a
singular pronoun, either his or her, to refer back to them. Sometimes context
makes that decision easy, as in the third example, if we revise it just a bit.
4.3.6 Relatives
We have included a short list of relatives (who, whom, whose, which, that) with
the pronouns because they share an important feature with subordinating
conjunctions. Both subordinating conjunctions and relatives connect a dependent
clause to the rest of a sentence. The clauses connected by subordinators usually
function adverbially in the sentence, that is, modifying verbs, adjectives, adverbs,
or the sentence as a whole. The clauses connected by the relatives (called relative
clauses) function adjectivally within a sentence, modifying nouns as part of a
noun phrase. In the next two examples, the relative clauses are italicised. Notice
that who is used when the relative functions as the subject of its clause and
whom when it is the object of the verb.
[The woman] who married Rusty is an aerospace engineer.
[The woman] whom Rusty married is an aerospace engineer.

Table 4.9: Words which can be used as Sentence Connectors
Like other pronouns, the relative pronoun has an antecedent (an earlier or
preceding noun to which it refers). Here and in the following examples in this
section, the antecedents of relatives are set off in brackets. The woman is the
antecedent for who and for whom. The relative clauses specify which woman is
the topic of the sentences. In addition to referring to an antecedent outside of the
relative clause, a relative has a grammatical function within its own clause. If we
replace the relative pronouns with their antecedents, the difference is clearer:
(18) a. [The woman] who married Rahman is an aerospace engineer.

(who is the subject of married)
b. [The woman] whom Rahman married is an aerospace engineer.
(whom is the direct object of married).
In (18a) who occupies the same position as The woman: the subject slot. In (18b),
whom and the woman are both objects of the verb married.
We will have more to say about how to choose between who and whom when
we discuss relative clauses.
Whose is the possessive form of the relative. Within a relative clause, whose
functions as a determiner, just as a possessive pronoun or noun would do in its
place.

(19) a. [The motorist] whose helmet fell off kept riding.

b. The motorist kept riding. The motoristÊs helmet fell off.
The motorist is the antecedent of whose.
Who, whom, and whose refer to human antecedents and, varying with the speaker,
to some animals. That has a single form, which functions as either subject or object in
relative clauses. It can refer to both human and nonhuman antecedents.
(20) a. [The train trip] that intrigues me most is the visit to the Batu Caves in
Selangor.
(That functions as subject and refers to inanimate noun, trip.)
b [The child] that they adopted spoke his first words at six months.
(That functions as direct object of adopted and refers to human noun, child.)
Which has a single form, which serves in both subject and object function. Its
antecedents are things, animals and sometimes a general idea expressed by the
rest of the sentence:
(21) a. [Those rambutan trees], which belong to our neighbour, bear sweet
fruits.
b. [Chen read all of his notes over the weekend], which amazed his friends.
Some authorities and usage of handbooks consider it an error to use a pronoun

like which without a specific noun or noun phrase as an antecedent. Which and
that have no possessive form.
Whose often refers to inanimate antecedents as well.

(22) a. He threw away [the lock] whose key was missing.
b. The company manufactured [a chip] whose size was as big as a ten cent coin.
Perhaps whose is used because the alternatives seem quite complex. The
alternative to the relatives above would be the lock to which the key was missing
and a chip of which as big as a ten cent coin.
In addition to the relative pronouns already mentioned, where, when, and why
can function as relative adverbs. For example:
(23) a. We visited [the place] where the Portuguese landed.
b. Our great grandparents lived at [a time] when the environment was
less polluted.
c. Please explain [the reason] why you canÊt turn in the assignment.

These relative clauses function adjectivally: They modify the nouns bracketed in
the sentences above. However, the relatives where, when, and why function
adverbially within their own clauses, as you can see if we rephrase the relative
clauses as independent sentences:
(24) a. The Portuguese landed there (or at that place).

b. The environment was less polluted then (or at some time).
c. You canÊt turn in the assignment for some reason.
Most of the words listed in Table 4.10 also function in other ways, including as
interrogatives. When they are relatives, these words have antecedents (a
preceding noun to which they refer). If you find no antecedent, the word may be
functioning as something other than a relative.
Table 4.10: Pronominal and Adverbial Relatives
4.3.7 Interrogatives
The interrogative and relative are structure class words. They are almost
identical members. Often called question words because of their function or wh
words because of their most common initial letters. This short list includes who,
whom, whose, which, what, where, why, when, and how.
Interrogatives begin direct questions. In addition to signalling that a question

will follow, each plays some grammatical role in the sentence that it begins.
Sometimes the grammatical function of the interrogative word is clearer if you
answer the question, substituting an appropriate word for the interrogative.
(25) a. Who left this envelope on my desk? (Question)
b. Someone left this envelope on my desk. (Answer)
(26) a. Which cheesecake did they like best? (Question)

b. They liked this cheesecake best. (Answer)

(27) a. When are you leaving? (Question)

b. You are leaving then/at some time. (Answer)
Interrogatives also function to introduce indirect questions:

(28) a. I wonder who left the envelope on my desk.
b. Tan asked them which cheesecake they liked best.
c. Who left the envelope on my desk?
ACTIVITY 4.1
Fill in the appropriate interrogative pronoun as specified:

- did you see? (human object)
- did he steal? (human possessive)
- is going on? (non-human subject)
- told you that? (human subject)
- do you want? (implied choice-object)
- can I trust? (human object)
- is better? (implied choice-subject)
- is his problem? (non-human subject complement)
- shall I say is here? (human subject)
- costs more? (implied choice-subject)
SELF-CHECK 4.2
Interrogative pronouns are used to seek the identity of a noun

phrase. Other interrogative words are used to elicit other kinds of
information. What information is being sought in each of the
following?
 Where is she?
 Why canÊt you do it?
 When does the movie begin?

4.4 VERBS
Verbs are traditionally defined as words that „express action,‰ a characteristic
that seems to be true of the most prototypical of verbs. For example, sit, speak,
see, sing, read, write. However, as we have found out in earlier discussion, this
meaning is based on a criterion that does not help us to distinguish between
verbs and words that are or can be nouns naming actions, like attack, delivery,
departure, storm, or lightning.
Words can also be classified as verbs if there is an agent (someone who does
something) performing an action (the thing done), as in The baby ate. Verbs can
be states (The cat lays before the fire) and conditions (The house remained
unlocked over the weekend). When a noun is used as a verb, the verb means that
someone or something behaves in some way like the thing named by the noun
(You must dog their footsteps) or uses the thing named in an activity (He will
head home at five oÊclock).
Since it is impossible to identify all verbs as actions or all actions as verbs,

speakers use other clues, as well. Form helps us to identify verbs. Some verbs are
recognisable by form because they have been created from other parts of speech
with derivational verb making morphemes (falsify, enrage).
Verbs are also recognisable because of their ability to change form through
inflection, by taking endings that indicate third-person singular (eats), past tense
(ate), past participle (eaten), and present participle (eating). But in isolation,
without a context, it is impossible to tell whether words like book/books and
head/heads are nouns or verbs. They contain no derivational morphemes, and
the inflectional suffix {-sl could be either the noun plural or the verb present-
tense marker. In such cases, the function of the word is helpful, for verbs behave
in ways that other words cannot. They can be negated (The baby didnÊt eat);
many can be made into commands (Eat!); and all can follow a modal auxiliary
(You must eat).

To test for verbs you can try the following tips.
Verb Subclasses
Another important distinction among the members of this form class is the
contrast between transitive, intransitive, and linking verbs. Grammarians classify
a verb into one or more of these subclasses based on the verbÊs ability to enter
into relationships with other major elements of a sentence.
4.4.1 Auxiliary Verbs

Auxiliary verbs either signal that a main verb is coming or serve as a substitute
for the verb phrase. By affecting the form of the main verb and altering its
meaning in systematic ways, auxiliary verbs also play an important role in the
intricate grammatical patterning of the main verb phrase, which we will discuss
in this topic. Table 4.0 lists the modal auxiliaries and gives the main forms of
have, be, and do, which have a number of inflections: number (present and
plural), tense (past and present), and participle {-en} and {-ing} forms.

4.4.2 Modal Auxiliaries

The modal auxiliaries always precede the main verb, as well as any other
auxiliaries that are present.
(29) a. The fireworks display should begin in five minutes.

b. Rahim may want another helping of strawberries.
Table 4.11: Modal auxiliaries which precede the verb forms
(30) a. That awful noise must have lasted for three hours.
b. On January 2, she will have been serving as chancellor for ten years.
In the first two examples, the modals are followed immediately by the main
verbs begin and want. In (30a), the modal is followed by another auxiliary verb,
have, and then by the main verb, lasted, and in (30b) the modal is followed by
two other auxiliaries, have and been, as well as the main verb, serving.

ACTIVITY 4.2
Why donÊt linguists consider the nine modal auxiliaries can, could,
will, would, shall, should, may, might and must as true verbs?
Below are some properties of modal auxiliary verbs in general:

(i) Have a verb making morpheme.
(ii) Occur with a present tense morpheme.
(iii) Occur with a past tense morpheme.
They cannot:
(i) Occur with a past participle morpheme.
(ii) Occur with a present participle morpheme.
(iii) Be made into a command.
(iv) Be made negative.
Auxiliary Have
Auxiliary have always occurs before the past participle {-en} form of another verb
to express the perfect (completed) aspect of the verb. When have is in the present
tense it creates the present perfect form of the verb:
(31) a. A bright green bird has nested there.
b. The critics have written their reviews.
When in the past tense, the auxiliary have creates the past perfect form:
a. A bright green bird had nested there.
b. The critics had written their reviews.
Have as a True Verb
In addition to being an auxiliary, have also functions as a true verb, having many
different meanings, including:
(32) Q: Who has the dictionary?
A: Kathijah has the dictionary.

SELF-CHECK 4.3
1. Which modal carries the meaning of necessity? Past ability?

Advisability?
2. Give some examples of sentences that demonstrate these
meanings.
3. What meanings are conveyed by could in the sentence She could
swim ten miles?
4. One of the few grammar rules explicitly handed down from one
generation to the next is the rule about can and may: can is for
ability, may is for permission.
5. To what extent do you think this rule is in effect in modern
English usage?
4.4.3 Auxiliary Be
Auxiliary be has two main functions. One is to express the progressive (on going)
aspect of the verb. It occurs before the present participle {-ing} form of the main
verb to create either the present progressive form when be is in the present tense:
(33) a. Halimah is playing squash again.
b. The football players are lifting weights.
or the past progressive form when be is in the past tense:
(34) a. Halimah was playing squash again.

b. The football players were lifting weights.
Its other auxiliary function is to precede the past participle of another verb to
create the passive form.

4.4.4 Be as a True Verb

Like have, be can function as a true verb, as well as an auxiliary. In its non
auxiliary functions, be or (copula be) links its subject to a phrase in the predicate
that describes or identifies the subject:
(36) a. That gas station is open.
b. The club members were mostly business people.
4.4.5 Do
As an auxiliary verb, we employ do in a number of grammatical processes, which
we will study in later topics. For example, we use do when we create certain
kinds of questions:
(37) a. He leaves tomorrow.
b. Does he leave tomorrow?
(38) a. She wants some of these delicious chocolates.

b. Does she want some of these delicious chocolates?
Do is also used to form negatives:

(39) a. They want that wall-sized television after all.
b. They donÊt want that wall-sized television after all.
and emphatic statements:
(40) a. The moon looks like a big pizza pie tonight!

b. The moon does look like a big pizza pie tonight!
4.4.6 Do as a Pro-Verb
In its other auxiliary use, the relation of do to verbs is similar to that of pronouns
to nouns: You could call do in this function a „pro-verb.‰
(41) a. We want that trophy more than they do.
b. IÊll taste your raw beet casserole if Farid does.
In the first example, do stands for want that trophy, and in the second, does
substitutes for tastes your raw beet casserole.

4.4.7 Do as a True Verb

As a true verb, do has a variety of meanings, including:
(42) a. Jamil will do the work without complaining. (To perform)

b. A full nightÊs sleep did you a lot of good. (To cause)
(43) I wonder what Mariam does after college.

(To work at, especially as a vocation)
(44) In Lot 101, we learned to do eyes and cheeks.

(To apply cosmetics to)
(45) Shirley did her living room in Neo Baroque.

(To decorate)
(46) We all helped to do the dishes.

(To wash)
4.5 ADJECTIVES
Nouns and verbs are the most important building blocks of language; all other
words are supplementary to them in some way, acting either as relational links
or as modifiers. Most students learn that adjectives, for example, are words that
stand for a quality and modify or describe nouns, and most adjectives do. We
might think first of prototypical examples like a red shirt, a tall man, friendly
dog, a serious case. But not all words that modify nouns are adjectives, and not
all adjectives modify nouns.
4.5.1 Adjective Subclasses

Adjectives can be subclassified according to how they can be used in sentences.
Adjectives are called attributive when they occur before a noun, usually
attributing (ascribing) a quality to that noun:
our sleepy child

the hot sun
Adjectives are called predicative when they occur in the predicate of a sentence
and without a following noun:

(47) a. Our child is sleepy.

b. The sun became hot.
Try the following tips to test for adjectives:
Most adjectives can be used as both attributives and predicatives, but some
function exclusively one way or the other. For example, (Klammer et al., 2000)
the adjectives entire, outright, and utter can be used only in the attributive slot, as
the following examples illustrate:
(48) a. The entire plane disappeared. b. *The plane was entire.
(49) a. Jalal told an outright lie. b. *The lie was outright.
(50) a. He spoke utter nonsense. b. *The nonsense was utter.
The adjectives aghast, alive, and afraid, in contrast, normally function only as
predicatives.
(51) a. Our teacher was aghast.

b. *Our aghast teacher continued to lecture.
(52) a. That spider looked alive.

b. *I saw an alive spider.

Some predicative adjectives accept or even require complements, that is, phrases
that complete them:
(53) a. Our cat seems to be afraid of that dog.

b. Our cat seems to be afraid.
(54) a. My brother is fond of frozen yogurt.

b. *My brother is fond.
In contrast to afraid, which can occur with or without the complement of that
dog, fond requires a complement like of frozen yogurt.
Adjectives that are only attributive or only predicative will not fit in both slots of
the adjective test frame, since the first position is attributive and the second is
predicative. Nevertheless, we identify them as adjectives because they meet other
adjective tests, and they do not fit into any other form class.
Most adjectives are gradable; that is, we can arrange them on a scale of intensity
that we indicate with qualifiers: somewhat late, rather late, very late, extremely
late.
However, some adjectives donÊt seem to be gradable. For example, double,

triangular, nuclear, and vertical donÊt normally occur with a qualifier: *The
nuclear reactor was very nuclear, *The vertical pole was rather vertical. And
other non-gradable adjectives seem by their meaning to defy comparison or
qualification: dead, mortal, eternal, and endless, for example, and adjectives with
technical meanings, such as hydrochloric and paleozoic.
Other adjectives that have traditionally been non-gradable are also undergoing
change in their meanings. Can you use sincere, honest, round, single, and empty
with qualifiers like rather, very, more, and most?
4.5.2 Qualifiers
Qualifiers usually precede adjectives or adverbs, increasing or decreasing the
quality signified by the words they modify (more colourful, less frequently).
(55) The handsome man seems very/quite/rather handsome.

Table 4.12: Examples of Qualifiers which Precede Adjectives or Adverbs
SELF-CHECK 4.4
1. Can you think of any other prefixes that turn a positive adjective
into a negative one? How do we know which prefix goes with
which adjective? Which is the one that people are likely to use if
theyÊre not sure?
2. Which of the following adjectives are gradable and which are non-
gradable? Are there any that are debatable? reversible, speculative,
quiet, special, intentional, supreme.
4.6 ADVERBS
In talking about the world around us, we use nouns as a major category, naming
what we perceive. Verbs, which describe what those things are doing, are also
major categories. Adjectives act in a secondary way, telling what nouns are like.

According to Klammer et al., (2000), adverbs are even further removed from
tangible experience; they modify verbs (Sue swims quickly), adjectives (BillÊs car
is mechanically sound), other adverbs (Andrew drove incredibly fast), and even
whole sentences (Obviously, someone ate the rest of the pizza).
Factor that contributes to the complexity of adverbs is some overlapping of form

between adjectives and adverbs. Words like fast and slow once had different
adjectival and adverbial forms, but in the course of the development of English,
the differences between them disappeared, and the two forms became identical:
(56) That driver likes a fast track. (Adjective)
(57) DonÊt drive so fast. (Adverb)
(58) The students are slow learners. (Adjective)
(59) Go slow. (Adverb)
Slow has developed a new adverb form, slowly, one which alternates with slow.
Both of the following are correct:
(60) a. He drives too slowly. (Adverb)

b. He drives too slow. (Adverb)
Inflectional and derivational morphemes overlap, as well. Adverbs and

adjectives are used to compare, either by using inflectional morphemes (she
speak faster, she speak fastest of all) or by using more and most (more slowly,
most slowly). Although the suffixes (-wise) and (-ways) are reliable markers of
adverbs derived from nouns (lengthwise, clockwise, dollarwise, sideways), as is
the derivational suffix (-ward[s], afterward[s], forward[s], backward[s]), they are
relatively rare.
(-ly) is the most common adverb-making morpheme used to create adjectives

(friendly, lovely, leisurely). Hence, this derivational suffix does not by itself
provide a reliable means of distinguishing between adverbs and adjectives. We
will attempt to clarify the distinction between these two (-ly) morphemes at the
end of our discussion of adverbs.
Mobility is one characteristic of adverbs that is not shared by other parts of

speech. Although their normal position is immediately after the verb or at the
end of the sentence, it is often possible, for emphasis and stylistic effect, to move
adverbs about within a sentence. In fact, the mobility of adverbs is one of their
most distinctive characteristics.

(61) a. He drove through the town slowly.

b. He drove slowly through the town.
c. Slowly he drove through the town.
As adverbs can almost always occur last and because they are usually not
essential to the sentence, the frame sentence for identifying adverbs is a complete
sentence, to which a single word, if added must be an adverb.
To test for adverbs you can try the following tips.
4.7 PREPOSITIONS
Prepositions are reliable indication that a noun is coming. They occur before (in
„preposition‰ to) a noun phrase (a noun and its modifiers, if any). Together, the
preposition and noun phrase comprise a prepositional phrase:
in the attic up the path
after lunch since Chinese New Year
below that street sign for a very good reason
The noun or noun phrase following the preposition (such as the attic in in the
attic) functions as the object of the preposition. Prepositions connect their noun
phrase objects to some other word or phrase in a sentence, thereby modifying
that other word or phrase by adding information of the sort provided by adverbs
(place, time, manner, and such) or by adding the kind of descriptive information
usually supplied by adjectives.
the voice of the people (Adjectival: modifies the noun voice)
hurried to the store (Adverbial: modifies the verb hurried)
sorry for the interruption (Adverbial: modifies the adjective sorry)
When prepositional phrases function as adverbs, they are called adverbial

modifiers, and when their role is similar to that of adjectives, they are called
adjectival modifiers. In each of the following examples, the preposition serves as
a link to the verb that the prepositional phrase modifies:
4.7.1 Prepositional Phrases Function as Adverbs

(62) a. Our visitors [strolled] along the river. (Place)
b. The game [starts] after the awards presentation. (Time)
c. Sandra [scales] steep cliffs without fear. (Manner)
When they function adjectivally, prepositional phrases modify a noun or noun

phrase.
4.7.2 Prepositional Phrases Function as Adjectives

(63) a. Mrs. Chan owns [the house] with the tile roof.
b. [The class] after lunch is the most difficult.
With the tile roof tells which house is being referred to, and after lunch specifies
which class is the most difficult.
Is there a prototypical preposition? The prepositions that express relationships of

place and direction (such as in, on, under, over, up, toward) seem to provide the
clearest examples of what a preposition is.

Table 4.13a: Single Word Prepositions

Table 4.13b: More than One Word Prepositions - Phrasal Prepositions
But one of the most frequently occurring prepositions is of, which usually
expresses nothing about location or direction. Without trying to specify a precise
group of the prepositions, the Table above lists some of the most common
prepositions. For convenience, we have divided the prepositions in our chart into
two groups: simple, those that consist of a single word, and phrasal, those that
consist of more than one word (along with, in case of, on top of).

SELF-CHECK 4.5
1. Tell what noun phrase function is signalled by the preposition in
each of the following sentences:
(a) DonÊt open a can of worms.
(b) He felled the tree with an axe.
(c) He went to the party with his brother.
(d) IÊll see you at noon.
(e) It flies like an arrow.
(f) She said to meet her near the fountain.
(g) The car disappeared over the hill.
(h) The dog ran into the yard.
(i) They prepared for their exams.
(j) We met them on the slopes.
2. Preposition use is highly unpredictable and may even vary from

region to region within the United States. Do you wait on line or
in line? Do you become sick to your stomach or sick at your
stomach? Are you aware of other fluctuations in preposition use?
4.8 CONJUNCTIONS
Conjunctions are structure class words and there are two types: coordinating and
subordinating conjunctions. All of the conjunctions have the function of joining
grammatical structures. However, each group does so in quite distinctive ways.
It is advisable to memorise the set of coordinating conjunctions. There are not
many, and nothing about their form or behaviour will help you identify them. If
you know which conjunctions are coordinators, you can use tests to differentiate
between the much larger sets of remaining ones, such as conjunctive adverbs and
subordinating conjunctions.

Coordinating Conjunctions
The prototypical coordinating conjunction (and no doubt the most frequently

used) is and. The other common members of the group are but, or, yet, nor, for,
and so. Coordinators join grammatical structures of similar form, transforming
them into a single grammatical unit. They join words,
(64) John and Mary
phrases (sequences of words that can substitute for a noun, verb, adjective, or
adverb),
very tasty but rather fattening
under the stairway or in the closet
washed by the rain and dried by the sun
or entire clauses (sequences of words containing both a subject and a predicate).
(65) if she won the lottery and if her junk bonds tripled in value.
When single words or phrases are joined, the result is a phrase. When two
sentences are joined by coordinating conjunctions, the result is a compound
sentence.
(66) a. Pak Lah had an anger outburst, but his sister ignored him.
b. Kamala stayed home, for she had work to do.
c. Jasmine was tired, so she went to bed early.
Correlative conjunctions are coordinating conjunctions (and, or, but) paired with
other words that extend the meaning of the first: both. . . and, either. . . or,
neither. . . nor, and not only. . . but also.
Like the other coordinators, the correlative conjunctions connect syntactic units
that, according to convention, have the same grammatical form: a single word
can be joined to a word, a phrase to a phrase, or a clause to a clause.
both students and faculty
(Two nouns)
not only composes the music but also writes the lyrics
(Two verb phrases)

either before the movie or after the party

(Two prepositional phrases)
neither basking in the sun nor napping in the shade
(Two verb phrases)
Most of the coordinating and correlative conjunctions can join any kind of
grammatical units words, phrases, clauses, or sentences but some have a more
limited distribution. The coordinators for, yet, and nor (unless accompanied by
neither) join only sentences.
(67) a. She hasnÊt called us, nor has she written.

b. She has neither called nor written.
c. But not: *She hasnÊt called nor written.
The correlative pair Âboth. . . andÊ does not join complete sentences but can join
any of the other structures that occur within sentences:
(68) He offended both his friends and his teachers. (Two noun phrases)
(69) Both because he was tired and because he had no money, Jalil decided to
spend the evening with a good book. (Two dependent clauses)
4.8.1 Conjunctive Adverbs

Conjunctive adverbs are on the periphery of both conjunctions and adverbs.
They are like conjunctions, in that they connect and signal relationships between
two sentences; they are like adverbs in the kinds of meaning they express:
Contrast
however, instead, nevertheless, on the contrary, on the other hand, still
(70) MaryamÊs friends made reservations at an expensive restaurant; however,

they couldnÊt
really afford to eat there.

Addition
also, besides, furthermore, in addition, moreover
(71) My driverÊs license has expired; furthermore, my road tax has lapsed.
Cause and effect
accordingly, as a result, consequently, hence, so, therefore, thus
(72) The electricity is off; as a result, everything in the freezer has rotted.
Example or restatement
for example, that is
(73) Rashid is a serious collector of jazz recordings; for example, he owns

practically everything Sheila Majid ever recorded.
Time
afterward(s), earlier, finally, in the meantime, later, meanwhile, then
(74) On the way to work, I received a speeding ticket; afterwards, I had a flat tire.
The clauses joined by conjunctive adverbs retain their status as independent

sentences. They are punctuated with either semicolons or periods, as though they
contained no conjunction at all:
(75) a. We are going to go to the karaoke; afterwards, we will visit you.

b. We are going to go to the karaoke. Afterwards, we will visit you.
4.8.2 Subordinating Conjunctions

Coordinators, correlatives, and conjunctive adverbs join sentences or parts of
sentences that are grammatically equivalent. In contrast, subordinating
conjunctions (or subordinators) create complex sentences by joining
grammatically unequal elements: a subordinate (or dependent) clause to a main
(independent) clause.

Table 4.14: Different Types of Conjunction
Subordinate clause is one that cannot stand alone as a sentence; it begins with a
word that makes it dependent upon some other clause. The main clause of a
sentence is the clause that can stand alone; it is complete on its own. (The reverse
arrow in the examples that follow means „is derived from‰ or „comes from‰
whatever follows it.)

4.8.3 Subordinator
(76) a. He shortened his talk so that they could ask questions.
b. So that they could ask questions, he shortened his talk.
(77) a. He shortened his talk; consequently, they could ask questions.

b. Consequently, you may ask questions; I came early.
c. I came early; you may, consequently, ask questions.
The subordinate clause so that they could ask questions, is adverbial, and like
other adverbials, it can be moved to a different position in the main clause.
Consequently, they could ask questions cannot be moved to precede He
shortened his talk. However, because the conjunction itself is adverbial, it is
movable.
SELF-CHECK 4.6
1. Draw trees for the following sentences and talk about how to
map them onto surface structures:
(a) They were invited for dinner with Paul and Paulette.
(b) She likes Billy JoelÊs music, and so do I.
(c) She does not believe the reports, and neither do I.
(d) Jun wore a dress, and Ken a suit.
2. Test your ability to apply what you know. Suppose that your
students produce the following sentences. What errors have they
made? How might their attention be drawn to the errors?
(a) *Either Hana or Julia are going to be the president next year.
(b) *I couldnÊt go to a university in my country, and my sister
couldnÊt go too.
(c) *The doctor couldnÊt be found anywhere, and the nurse
either.
(d) *You didnÊt ask me, neither I asked you.
(e) *Bill can play tennis, and John can.
(f) *Fred paid Bill and Bill paid Fred, respectively.

4.9 ANALYSING FORM AND FUNCTION

When members of a form class occur in prototypical functions, we often have
little trouble in identifying them, even when some signals of class membership
are ambiguous. For example, consider the following two sentences:
(78) a. He had two runs yesterday.

b. This car runs well.
Because the noun plural suffix {-s} and the third person singular present tense
suffix {-s} are identical, the word runs can be either a noun or a verb. By looking
at it in isolation from the sentences in which it is used, we cannot tell which form
class it belongs. (When we say that its signals of class membership are
ambiguous, we mean that the suffix {-s} could be either a verb inflection or a
noun inflection.)
However, when we analyse the word runs in the context of each sentence in
which it occurs, we can quickly resolve the ambiguity by replacing the
ambiguous form runs with other words, prototypical nouns or verbs that belong
to only one category.
Table 4.15: Word Analysis
Adjective Noun Verb

a sharp knife a steel knife a sharpened knife
the young teacher the philosophy teacher the snoozing teacher
that rusty truck that delivery truck that loaded truck
some white papers some mathematics papers some stacked papers
an old lantern a kerosene lantern a shining lantern
two fresh flowers two spring flowers two wilting flowers
your soft blanket your cotton blanket your woven blanket
As these examples illustrate, the same function (in this case, the adjectival
function) can be performed by members of several different form classes. Why
not just go ahead and call them all adjectives? First of all, the purpose of
grammatical analysis is to discover the natural classes into which words fall.

Table 4.16
 The vast majority of words in the English language belong to one of the four
major form classes: nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. Not only are there
far too many members of each of the groups for you to memorise, but every
day, new form class words are being created, thereby expanding these open-
ended categories still further.
 By examining prototypical and peripheral members of each group, linguists

have identified specific features of form (derivational and inflectional
morphemes) and function (typical positions and frequently co-occurring
words) that mark nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs which enable us to
recognise them.
 For the most part, the structure classes are small, closed sets with little lexical
meaning whose members tend to occur in a single form. Their primary
function is to signal grammatical structure and relationships.
 Determiners are cues to and supply aspects of meaning for a following noun.
 Articles (a/an and the) are prototypical for the entire determiner group.
 Auxiliaries accompany or substitute for main verbs and signal important

elements of grammatical meaning within the intricate verbal system. The
modals and have, be, and do constitute the main English auxiliaries.
 Qualifiers accompany adjectives and adverbs, either increasing or reducing

the intensity of the quality denoted by the form class word.
 Very provides a useful prototype of this class of structure words.

 Prepositions function to connect their object noun phrases to other parts of

the sentence. A preposition with its noun phrase object constitutes a
prepositional phrase, which may function as either an adjectival or adverbial
modifier.
 The personal, reflexive, reciprocal, and indefinite pronouns have a close

grammatical relationship with nouns and noun phrases. Many of them,
unlike prototypical structure class words, undergo changes in form similar to
those that characterise nouns.
 Coordinating conjunctions join grammatically equivalent units whole

sentences and their parts. Conjunctive adverbs connect complete sentences,
signalling the logical relationships between them. Subordinating conjunctions
link subordinate clauses as adverbial modifiers to verbs, adjectives, adverbs,
and whole sentences. Relatives link relative clauses to the nouns or noun
phrases they modify. Interrogatives introduce direct and indirect questions.
Content words Function words

Determiners
1. Differentiate between structure class and form class words. Cite examples
to substantiate your points.
2. In your opinion what is the best way to test verbs? Do we have rules or
procedures that minimise our problems? What are they and how?

Topic  Phrases
5
LEARNING OUTCOMES

1. Describe the structure and function of noun phrases;
2. Describe the structure of verb phrases;
3. Describe the structure of adverbial phrases; and
4. Apply the structures of English noun, verb and adverbial
phrases correctly.
 INTRODUCTION
The next level of grammatical structure is the phrase, the result of putting words
and morphemes together at the level of the phrase. A phrase has one part of
speech at its core, called the head of the phrase, which gives the phrase its name,
such as noun phrase or verb phrase. The phrase also includes all the other things
that go with the head to form a group. These additional elements are called
modifiers. If you look again at sentence in previous discussions, you will see that
all the constituents we identified happened to be phrases. Phrases may occur
together to make larger groupings, of course. The combination of a noun phrase
followed by a verb phrase has special status: it is called a clause. The noun phrase
and the verb phrase of the clause are also referred to as the subject and the
predicate of the clause. Some clauses can stand all by themselves and are called
independent clauses; others must attach to another clause and are called
dependent clauses. Clauses may then combine into a larger constituent called a
sentence.

TOPIC 5 PHRASES  101
5.1 NOUN PHRASE

Nouns are the heads of bigger family called noun phrases. Other words such as
the modifiers are descriptive of the noun, like adjectives, prepositional phrases,
and relative clauses. There are other modifiers of the noun that serve more to
limit it, identify it, or place it appropriately in a conversation. These modifiers are
part of what we call the determiner system. For example, the phrase in (1) below
is a noun phrase:
(1) the blue ribbon in her hair.
ribbon is the head noun, blue is an adjective, and in her hair is a
prepositional phrase, both describing encounter. The and her, on the other
hand, are parts of the determiner system. In example (2),
(2) the first dog which travelled in space.
Noun phrases may take many different forms, so it is not easy to give absolute
rules about the determiner system. Nevertheless, we can use the formula below
as a guideline for talking about the determiner composition of noun phrases:
First, we should know that the most important element and must be in a noun
phrase is the noun itself. Some nouns, like noncount or proper nouns, may be the
only element of their noun phrase: Love makes the world go round, Tanjong
Malim is a beautiful district. Some noun phrases may have only a determiner and
a noun: The floor is wet, his uncle is visiting. Some may have a determiner, a
predeterminer, and a noun: She is such a pain in the head, I know all the players.
Some may have a determiner, a postdeterminer, and a noun: His many friends
came to the party.
Predeterminer + Determiner + Postdeterminer + Noun = Noun Phrase
First, we should know that the most important element and must be in a noun
phrase is the noun itself. Some nouns, like noncount or proper nouns, may be the
only element of their noun phrase: Love makes the world go round, Tanjong
Malim is a beautiful district. Some noun phrases may have only a determiner and
a noun: The floor is wet, his uncle is visiting. Some may have a determiner, a
predeterminer, and a noun: She is such a pain in the head, I know all the players.
Some may have a determiner, a postdeterminer, and a noun: His many friends
came to the party.

102  TOPIC 5 PHRASES
5.1.1 Determiners
Many noun phrases consist of only a determiner and a head noun. The most
common determiners are articles, demonstratives, possessive pronouns and
quantities.
Articles help to specify the status of the noun they occur before. Compare the
following examples,
(i) an apple and the apple.
(ii) a book and the book.
The article the in the book / the apple refer to a specific book / apple and not just
any other book or apple. The article the is called as the definite article and the
article a / an the indefinite article. When the is used with a noun, the listener and
the speaker (reader / writer) presumably knows specifically the noun being
talked about. When a / an are used, such a knowledge is not assumed.
The use of the articles a / an depends on the pronunciation of the noun that
follows it. If the pronunciation of the noun begins with the vowel a, e, i, o and u,
we use the article an. Otherwise, we use the article a.
ACTIVITY 5.1
1. Are an honour and a use exceptions to the rule governing the

choice of indefinite article?
2. Why do you think there is fluctuation in standard English
between a and an before a noun that begins with the sound h
in an unstressed syllable: a/an historical event, a/an
hysterical patient, a/an hypothesis?

Demonstratives function like the definite article with two differences: they
indicate the location of the noun relative to the speaker, and there is a cross
referencing rule that requires number agreement with the noun they modify. To
indicate that the noun is near the speaker, and to indicate that the noun is far
from the speaker. See examples below:
this cat (singular, near the speaker)

these cats (plural, near the speaker)
that cat (singular, far from the speaker)
those cats (plural, far from the speaker)
Possessive pronouns are another category of determiner: my life, your idea, his
ring, their reason. Quantities are the fourth major kind of determiner: many,
several, enough, few, little, much, any, some, no, two, for example. One other
kind of determiner is a possessive noun phrase. You may wonder how we can
use a noun phrase as part of a noun phrase, but that is typical of the nesting,
hierarchical nature of language. Consider the noun phrases in (3) below:
(3) (a) The teacherÊs advice.
(b) My teacherÊs advice.
(c) That teacherÊs advice.
(d) Those teachersÊ advice.
In (3) each case, advice is the head noun of the noun phrase, but the determiner is
the possessive noun phrase.
SELF-CHECK 5.1
1. Think of sentences in which we use any as a determiner. Do

you notice any restriction on its use? (Hint: we donÊt say */
have any books.)
2. What is the head of each of the following noun phrases? What
kind of determiner does each have?
(a) your insecurity
(b) this explanation
(c) the very important package

5.1.2 Predeterminers and Postdeterminers

Predeterminers and postdeterminers occur around the determiner, either before
or after. Some common predeterminers are all, half and both. Predeterminers
may be followed by the preposition of: all (of) the people, half (of) the class, both
(of) the students. What and such are also considered predeterminers: what a
party, such a fool, although their use is restricted to the indefinite article
determiner. We cannot say*what the party or *such my fool.
In addition, postdeterminers also state quantities and are called postdeterminers

when they follow a determiner. Some common ones are cardinal numbers (one,
two, three...), ordinal numbers (first, second, third...), and indefinite quantities
like several, many, few.
Some examples of noun phrases with postdeterminers are my few friends, the
first call, those many years, his six children. There are some words that express
quantity that can be used as predeterminers, determiners, or postdeterminers. It
is often the case that a wordÊs label is not inherent to the word, but rather it is
derived from the way the word functions in a particular context. If you want to
know what a word is in a noun phrase, you can try the noun test.
ACTIVITY 5.2
1. Show how the word many can be used as a determiner or a

postdeterminer.
2. Show how all can be a predeterminer or a determiner.
5.1.3 The Functions of Noun Phrase

We have discussed how to identify nouns and noun phrases and label their parts;
the next step is to understand how they function in sentences. You can think of
each sentence as a story in which noun phrases play different roles. The most
common functions of noun phrases are subject, direct object, indirect object,
object of a reposition and complement. You will come to understand more about
these functions as we discuss the other parts of the sentence, because they are
primarily relational terms; that is, they describe how noun phrases interact with
other parts of the sentence. The objective at this point is to learn to identify them
in sentences.

5.1.4 Subject
We are very familiar with subject, which is a common grammatical term, and
most of us have some hunch about what it is but it is surprisingly hard to define.
When we refer to the subject noun phrase of a sentence, we often mean the doer
of the action. In the sentences in (4), the subject noun phrase is underlined.
(4) (a) Maria left very late..
(b) The horse jumped over the fence.
(c) My boys caught the balloons.
However the doer of the action might not be the subject, as in (5),
(5) (a) The hall was built by the contractor.
(b) The test was graded by the evaluator.
and often there is no „doer‰ expressed at all, as in (6).
(6) (a) This meeting is a chaos.
(b) All my many attempts at climbing the hill failed.
One of the consistent ways of identifying the subject noun phrase of a sentence is
by its location. It is almost always the first noun phrase in the sentence and the
one that immediately precedes the verb. In this way, you can identify the subject
noun phrases in all of the above sentences. Generally, a subject NP in English
occurs as the first NP to the left of VP, provided that the NP is immediately
dominated by the top S as in the trees below.

Tree 1
Tree 2
However, there are also sentences without the subject, for example when we give
commands. However, all formal standard English sentences must have a subject,
grammatically speaking. That is, there must be a noun phrase preceding the verb.
For example, if we look out the window and see water falling from the sky, we
must express this event by using a subject. Since there is no real subject, we use a
„dummy‰ or „placeholder‰: ItÊs raining. All speakers of English know that this
subject is just a „dummy,‰ so no one ever asks WhatÊs raining? Similarly, we use
the word there as a dummy in sentences like There are too many people on this
bus. Some grammarians call these placeholder words expletives.

SELF-CHECK 5.2
1. Remember that whatever is not the subject of the sentence is the

predicate. Identify the subject and the predicate of each of the
following sentences. (Remember too that subjects are noun
phrases, not just nouns!)
(a) The playful child frightened the pony.
(b) My cat hid in the cupboard.
(c) Mrs. Waters just left.
2. Which of the following have placeholder subjects? How do you

know?
(a) Can any be interpreted in two different ways?
(b) There is where I left my purse.
(c) It is snowing.
5.2 DIRECT OBJECT

The definition of direct object from the perspective of traditional grammar eludes
much the same way subject does. It is often thought of as the „receiver of the
action,‰ which is helpful sometimes, as in the sentences of (7), where the
underlined noun phrases are direct objects.
(7) (a) The boy hit the ball
(b) The comedians entertained the crowd.
(c) My aunt grilled the fish.
Again, the receiver of the action might not be the direct object, as in (8),
(8) (a) Maria received a raise.
(b) The ball was hit by the boy.
or the direct object might not be the receiver of the action, but rather comes into
being as a result of the action, as in (9).

(9) (a) My sister wrote an essay.

(b) She invented the stage.
(c) They built a house.
Occasionally, it is helpful to use meaning as the criteria to identify direct objects.

But again, location is probably a more reliable test of whether a noun phrase is a
direct object. Direct objects usually come immediately after the verb. An
additional important test for direct objects is the passive test. We will learn about
passives in a later topic, but for now you can see how the test works by
comparing the two sentences in (10).
(10) (a) The guard threw the ball.

(b) The ball was thrown by the guard.
A noun phrase following a verb is likely to be a direct object, as in (10a), if you

can make a corresponding passive sentence just like (10b) without changing the
basic meaning.
5.3 INDIRECT OBJECT

Indirect object is also not easy to define. Indirect objects almost always refer to
the object which is, in some way, indirectly affected by the action. In the
following sentence, the girl is the indirect object.
(11) Jamal gave an apple to the girl.
Jamal is the subject, an apple is the direct object, and the person affected by this
action is the girl, the indirect object. Indirect objects are often preceded by the
word to as in (11), or the word for, as in (12).
(12) Radi sewed a dress for Rani.
In (12), Rani is the indirect object. There is a very useful test for identifying the
indirect object in a sentence, called indirect object inversion. You will notice in
(13) that it is possible to rearrange the sentences of (11) and (12) by dropping the
word to or for and moving the indirect object to the position immediately after
the verb.

(13) (a) Jamal gave the girl an apple.

(b) Radi sewed Rani a dress.
In sentences like (13), we say that the girl and Rani are inverted indirect objects.
We have not changed any of the meaning of the sentences, nor have we altered
the relationships that hold among the noun phrases. Graphically, indirect-object
inversion looks like this:
[Verb + Direct Object + {for} + Indirect Object] [Verb + Indirect Object + Direct
Object] to
The is not a perfect formula and tends to work better with indirect objects
preceded by to rather than for. However, it is one more criterion to use in
deciding whether to call a noun phrase an indirect object.
It is important to know that the designation indirect object is controversial. Many

linguists disagree with this traditional definition. For some, only the inverted
version is called an indirect object, whereas the noun phrase following to or for is
merely an object of a preposition.
ACTIVITY 5.3
Which of the following sentences have indirect objects? Which are

inverted indirect objects?
(a) Kamal gave Maria a present for her birthday.
(b) The professor taught those students linguistics.
(c) Kamal gave Sami a second chance.
(d) Johan cooked dinner for his folks.
(e) Jamal read this book to Ali.

5.4 OBJECT OF A PREPOSITION

Noun phrases that are objects of prepositions are easy to recognise if you know
what a preposition is. We will have much more to say about prepositions in a
later topic, but for now we can say they are words that indicate the relationship
of the following noun phrase to the rest of the sentence. Those relationships are
many, including location, direction, accompaniment and purpose. Prepositions
link with a following noun phrase to form a constituent called a prepositional
phrase. All the phrases in (14), are prepositional phrases, and the underlined
noun phrases are objects of prepositions.
Notice that once again we see a phrase nested inside another phrase.
(14) (a) in the barn (location)
(c) towards the fire (direction)
(d) with an escort (accompaniment)
(e) for a good reason (purpose)
The prepositional phrase (14) can be illustrated in the tree below.

As we mentioned earlier, you would not be wrong to call noun phrases following
to and for objects of prepositions, as long as you also recognise that they have the
special property of being able to move to another location in the sentence and
drop their prepositions that is, they have the capacity for inversion. Only indirect
objects can do this, as evidenced by the ungrammaticality of sentences like those
of (15).
(15) (a) Ali studied chemistry for a reason.
(b) * Ali studied a reason chemistry.
(c) Tunku drove his car to the reunion.
(d) *Tunku drove the reunion his car.
5.5 COMPLEMENT
Some noun phrases do not authorise independent entities in a sentence. Rather,
they serve to describe another noun phrase of that sentence. These noun phrases
are called complements. Consider again the two sentences below.
(16) (a) Jani saw the dean.
(b) Jani was the dean.
You could discover the first one without difficulty; the dean is a direct object. It
receives the action (to the extent that seeing is an action), and it works in the
passive test: The dean was seen by Jani. In the second sentence, the dean fails the
passive test and is not the receiver of an action. In fact, it is not a separate person
at all, but a way of describing Jani. In this sentence, the dean is called a
complement, and since it describes the subject of the sentence, it is called a
subject complement. (It may also be called a predicate nominative or a predicate
nominal.) Now consider the underlined noun phrases in (17):
(17) (a) They considered the student a genius.
(b) They declared her assistant a champion.
In these sentences, the underlined noun phrase describes the direct object, and so
it is called an object complement.

SELF-CHECK 5.3
1. Pick out the objects of prepositions in the following sentences.

(a) IÊll meet you near the fence after school.
(b) Larry cut the bread with a knife.
(c) Put the box in the drawer under the sink.
2. Identify the complements in the following sentences. Tell whether

they are subject complements or object complements.
(a) The earthquake was a frightening experience.
(b) You are my best friend.
(c) Everyone considered James an honest person.
3. Are the following sentences identical in structure?

(a) The teacher taught Sami a lesson.
(b) The teacher considered Sami a fool.
What is the grammatical function of each noun phrase in these

sentences?
5.6 VERBAL NOUNS AND NOUN PHRASES

One kind of noun that deserves special attention is a verbal noun. It is difficult to
recognise verbal nouns as nouns because their meanings tend to be actions rather
than things. These are words that are built from verbs, but they exhibit many of
the properties of nouns. There are two kinds of verbal nouns: gerunds and
infinitives.
Gerunds are verbs with the suffix {-ing}, for example, laughing, coughing,
playing. Why are they called nouns? One reason we call them nouns is that they
can be heads of noun phrases, with many of the unusual modifier that occur with
nouns. Look at the noun phrases below:
(18) (a) His laughing annoyed her.
(b) All that coughing is disturbing the musicians.
(c) The childrenÊs quarrelling made me nervous.

In these sentences, we see that gerunds can occur with determiners such as
possessive pronouns, demonstratives, and possessive noun phrases, as well as
with predeterminers.
5.6.1 Verbal Nouns

Verbal nouns are abstract nouns, hence the determiner system is somewhat
limited, as is the case with all abstract nouns. Nevertheless, we can see that the
gerunds in the above examples are clearly the heads of noun phrases. Noun
phrases with gerunds as their heads are called gerundive phrases. Gerundive
phrases may be further expanded with modifiers, like manner, place, or time, as
in the sentences of (19).
(19) (a) His whistling is like music.
(b) All that shouting in the audience is disturbing the musicians.
(c) The studentsÊ quarrelling all weeks made me very tired.
Gerundive phrases also perform the typical grammatical functions of noun

phrases.
They may be the subject of the sentence, as we see in the sentences (19). They can
be direct objects, as in the sentences of (20).
(20) (a) She loves his whistling which is like music.
(b) The musicians donÊt like all that shouting in the audience.
(c) I couldnÊt stand the studentsÊ quarrelling.
They can be objects of prepositions, as in the sentences of (21).

(21) (a) She is good at singing classical songs.
(b) The musicians are upset over all that shouting in the crowd.
(c) I was disturbed by the childrenÊs quarrelling.
Gerundive phrases can also be complements:

(22) (a) His most loving trait is his whistling.
(b) The cause of the noise is all that shouting in the crowd.
(c) The reason for my irritation was the childrenÊs quarrelling.
We see that gerundive phrases behave more or less the way other noun phrases
do.

The other type of verbal noun is called an infinitive. Infinitives are verbs with the
word to in front of them: to talk, to love, to run, for example. These may serve as
the heads of noun phrases called infinitival phrases. These too exhibit many of
the properties of noun phrases. Although they are not as versatile as gerundive
phrases, they may be subjects, direct objects, and complements, as can be seen in
the sentences of (23).
(23) (a) subject: To give up now would be foolish
(d) direct object: Everyone desires to live in peace
(e) complement: His first instinct was to run away
SELF-CHECK 5.4
1. Can gerundive and infinitival phrases become indirect objects?

2. Find the gerundive phrase in each of the following sentences.
State what its grammatical function is in the sentence.
(a) You learn by studying every day.
(b) Hiking in the woods is fun.
(c) We donÊt mind leaving early.
(d) Thank you for not smoking in my car.
(e) The most exciting activity at camp is swimming in the lake.
3. Find the infinitival phrase in each of the following sentences. State
what its grammatical function is in the sentence.
(a) The important thing is to print your name legibly.
(b) She prefers to work alone.
(c) His goal in life is to make a lot of money.
(d) To bailout now would be a mistake.
(e) Rose liked to bask in the sun.

5.7 VERB PHRASE

We have examined the roles of all the players in the sentence story. In this
section, we will examine what they are doing or what is being said about them.
The constituents that express this part of the story are verbs and verb phrases.
When we are looking at what the roles are doing then we are looking at the
actions or specifically the verb in a sentence. You will see that it may occur with
modifiers. The verb and its modifiers make up a constituent known as a verb
phrase. The verb is the head of the verb phrase and the permissible modifiers
depend on the subcategory of main verb. The most important subcategories of
main verbs are intransitive, transitive and linking.
Intransitive verbs are those that can be all by themselves in their phrases. They
may have modifiers, but they donÊt require them. The sentences in (24) all have
intransitive verbs.
(24) (a) The children cried.
(b) The game stopped.
(c) Her body swayed.
(d) The roof leaked.
We could add modifiers to these verbs, additional words that told something
more about the action, such as in the sentences of (25).
(25) (a) The children cried at the horrible picture.
(b) The game stopped when the referee collapsed.
(c) Her body swayed to the music.
(d) The roof leaked when it rained.
Yet, intransitive verbs do not need additional modifiers. They may stand all by
themselves and constitute their own verb phrase. Therefore, we can say that cried
in the first sentence of (24) is an intransitive verb. It is the head of its verb phrase,
and it makes up the entire verb phrase.
Transitive verbs, on the other hand, require a following noun phrase, as in the
sentences of (26).
(26) (a) The ball picker threw the ball.
(b) His teacher bought a new car.

(c) Samah sold insurances.
We talked about these required noun phrases in the preceding chapter: they are
the direct objects. Then, transitive verbs are those verbs that require direct
objects, and it is sometimes said that transitive verbs transfer their action onto the
direct object. If we removed the direct object noun phrases from the sentences in
(26), the sentences would be incomplete. The transitive verb and its direct object
make up the verb phrases in the sentences of (3). Again, we could include other
modifiers in the verb phrase, but the only two that are required are the verb and
the following noun phrase.
SELF-CHECK 5.5
What is the verb phrase in each of the following sentences? Is the verb
transitive or intransitive? How do you know?
(a) The bell rings at 5:00 p.m. every day.
(b) Those children play all afternoon.
(c) Cats catch mice by instinct.
(d) The cynic snickered.
(e) His answer surprised us.
(f) Keith caught a cold last week.
The third important subcategory of main verb is copulative or linking verb.

Linking verbs do what their name suggests: they link a subject with a description
of that subject. The one linking verb that we have encountered so far is verb be.
When this verb is the main verb, it is linking, as in the sentences below:
(27) (a) The student was poor.
(b) The vegetables are in the pot.
(c) I am fine.
There are many types of constituents that can follow a linking verb, including
adjectives, prepositional phrases, and noun phrases. Linking verbs never stand
alone in their verb phrase since, after all, their function is to „link‰ the subject to
something else. There are other linking verbs in English as well, most of them
used to describe senses or perceptions. The sentences of (28) illustrate some
copulative or linking verbs.

(28) (a) Marley feels tired.

(b) My cat seems lazy.
(c) The soup tastes sweet.
(d) This milk smells sour.
(e) He became rich.
ACTIVITY 5.4
State whether the underlined verb in each of the sentences below is

intransitive, transitive or linking.
(a) Linda lost her contact lens.
(b) He feels your pain.
(c) The lawyer seemed nervous.
(d) I question your motives.
(e) We smelled smoke.
5.7.1 Non-finite Verb Phrases

In our description of the verb phrase, we have been assuming that the verb of the
phrase carries tense, and so we can call it a finite verb phrase. Nevertheless, it is also
possible to have a verb phrase in which the verb is in one of its non-finite participle
forms and there is no tense expressed. These are called non-finite verb phrases and
often occur at the beginning of a sentence. Non-finite verb phrases are like other verb
phrases in terms of their modifiers. They may have direct objects, prepositional
phrases or any other modifier that appears in finite (tensed) verb phrases.
(29) (a) Having abandoned his friends, the pirates felt reassured.
(b) Smelling the gas, the lady started to laugh.
(c) Dismissed from the army, the man ran amok.
(d) Having finished the assignments, we relaxed.
The non-finite verb phrases do not have subjects of their own; they have to
„borrow‰ the subject from the rest of the sentence. For example (29a), we know
from the rest of the sentence that the pirate abandoned his friends, the lady
smelled the gas, the man was dismissed from the army, and we finished the
assignments. One common non-standard usage involves a non-finite verb phrase

that cannot borrow the subject from the rest of the sentence. These are the famous
dangling participles. Below are some examples given by Barry (1998):
(30) (a) Running for the bus, my book fell in the mud.
(b) Having eaten dinner, the roast turkey was put in the refrigerator.
(c) Dismissed from class, the parents picked up their children.
(d) Worried about opposition, the editorial was censored.
The meanings of these sentences are not hard to figure out, but technically the
non-finite verb phrases „dangle‰ because the book did not run for the bus, the
roast turkey didnÊt eat dinner, the parents were presumably not the ones
dismissed from class, and the editorial was not worried.
SELF-CHECK 5.6
1. What is the finite verb phrase in each of the following sentences?
What is the non-finite verb phrase?
2. Which of these non-finite verb phrases are dangling participles?
Can you rephrase the sentences so they donÊt dangle?
(a) Having written the best poem, the prize was given to Mary.
(b) Being a sloppy writer, IanÊs notes were hard to read.
5.7.2 Subject-Verb Agreement

We have discussed noun phrases and verb phrases and now we can talk about an
important cross-referencing rule of English called subject-verb agreement or
compatibility between subject and verb. The noun phrase of the clause or
sentence is called the subject, and the verb phrase is called the predicate. All
sentences, then, are made up of subjects and predicates. The rule of subject-verb
agreement states that the verb of the predicate must agree with the subject noun
phrase in person and number. By number, we mean if the subject is a singular
noun phrase, the verb must be singular too. All of the following sentences are
incorrect because they violate number agreement.
(31) *(a) The girl save her money.
*(b) My cats is eating.
*(c) They is on the table.
Person is also important to the agreement rule. Person refers to the function of
the noun phrase or pronoun in the conversation: first person is the speaker (or

writer); second person is the person spoken to; and third person refers to
anything spoken about. In more concrete terms, the pronouns I and we are first
person, you is second person, and any noun phrase or pronoun that is being
spoken about is third person. All subjects have both person and number. For
example, I is first person singular, we is first person plural.
ACTIVITY 5.5
1. What is the person and number of the subject in each of the

following sentences?
(a) All people need compassion.
(b) You should take a break.
(c) This dog is a stray.
2. Which of these would you judge to be in violation of the subject

verb agreement rule?
(a) She bring her lunch every day.
(b) They expects to leave tomorrow.
(c) She dislikes dishonest people.
We should give proper attention to the rule of subject-verb agreement when we

write, but in many cases the verb stays the same for all subjects, regardless of
person and number. In simple past tense, for example, we donÊt have to think
about which verb goes with which subject, because the verb doesnÊt change its
form. One case that does require special attention is the verb to be, because it
changes more than other verbs do. In simple present tense, for example, there are
three different forms:

To be also requires special notice in the simple past tense. Unlike any other verb
in the language, it has two different forms from which we must choose.
SELF-CHECK 5.7
1. What makes these violations of the standard English rule of

subject-verb agreement?
(a) They was laughing at me.
(b) You is supposed to be my friend.
2. Give the standard English version of these sentences. Are there

any differences in meaning between the standard and the non-
standard version of each sentence?
Apart from verb to be, subject-verb agreement needs special attention to the
simple present tense verb. As we know, most verbs in the simple present tense
are in the base form. But if the subject is third person singular, we must add the
suffix -s to the base form of the verb. The cat eats the fish versus The cats eat the
fish. (Note that ăs mark as plural, but verbs as singular!). It only carries
information that is already expressed in the subject, and it upsets what is
otherwise a neat pattern. But standard English still requires us to use it. We
usually have no trouble recognising when a subject is third person, but we
sometimes have trouble recognising whether the subject is singular or plural.
There are situations where it might be difficult to determine whether a subject

contains more than one noun phrase. If it is a compound noun phrase with and,
we treat the subject as plural: The boy and the girl are studying. But the
agreement requirement is different if there are two noun phrases joined by
(either) or, or (neither) nor, as in (41), often called a disjunction.
(32) (a) Either Ali or Abu is picking me up.

(b) Neither Ali nor Abu works here.

(c) You or the boys are expected to show up.
In (32), we might be inclined to think of these subject noun phrases as plural also,
but standard English requires us to view them separately and impose the
following rule: the noun phrase closest to the verb determines the agreement. If
you look again at the sentences of (32), you will see how that works. Sometimes
following this rule gives rise to sentences that are awkward to the ear, like Either
he or I am to blame, and we might avoid the problem by rephrasing the sentence:
Either he is to blame or I am, for example.
The next set of sentences illustrates another situation in which it may not be clear
to us what the number of the subject is.
(33) (a) One of the lecturers requires a term paper.
(b) Each of the boys receives a gift.
Even though the subjects are one of the lecturers and each of the boys, it is only
the head of the noun phrase that determines the agreement. That means the verb
must agree with one and each, both of which are singular. This is an especially
difficult rule to follow for two reasons. First, the meaning of the subject may be
plural, as in each of the boys; second, we are used to thinking of the noun phrase
right before the verb as the subject. This rule of agreement goes counter to our
intuitions about how English works and so it is often violated, especially in
speaking. The same problem arises if the head of the noun phrase is a singular
noun, as in the non-standard sentences in
(34) (a) The range of responses were interesting.
(b) The intelligence of the children amaze me.
(c) The use of cameras are prohibited.
A third situation that goes counter to our intuitions about subject-verb agreement
is in sentences that begin with there. Consider the pairs of sentences in (35) and
(36).
(35) (a) A file is on the table.
(b) There is a file on the table.
(36) (a) Three files are on the table.

(b) There are three files on the table.

The meaning of each pair in (35) and (36) are the same; the only difference is that
in the second sentence of each pair, the subject has been moved behind the verb
and the expletive there has been put in its place. No matter whether it has been
moved or not, the subject noun phrase determines the agreement on the verb. But
there is a strong temptation to treat there as if it were the subject. This results in
non-standard but very common sentences like ThereÊs three books on the table,
where thereÊs is a contraction of there is.
Subject-verb agreement is not a difficult rule for us to follow as long as it doesnÊt

collide with other things we know and expect about English:
Ć We expect the subject to appear before the verb;
Ć We expect the grammatical number and the meaning number to be the same;
Ć We expect that if there is more than one noun phrase in the subject, the verb
will be plural.
These are all reasonable expectations, and they work most of the time for English.
But there are instances in which the standard rule of subject-verb agreement
requires that we set aside those expectations and „figure it out‰ instead. We are
more successful at this in writing, since we have time to reflect, and less
successful in speaking, because we speak and formulate our thoughts
simultaneously.
SELF-CHECK 5.8
Each of these sentences violates the standard English rule of subject-

verb agreement. State what the violation is and what leads people to
make the error. What is the standard version of each sentence?
(a) Neither my mother nor my father are going.
(b) Either Sue or I are supposed to respond.
(c) ThereÊs too many people in this room.
(d) Each of you have to take the exam.
(e) One of the dogs keep barking all night.
We have discussed noun phrases and verb phrases which are the basic building
blocks of sentences, an important threshold in the study of English grammar. It is
important for us to understand what they are made of and how they behave as a
grounding knowledge in how the language works generally.

5.8 ADVERBIAL PHRASE

An adverb may act as the head of a larger construction called an adverbial
phrase. Adverbial phrases perform exactly the same functions as single adverbs
but contain modifiers of the adverb. One type of adverbial phrase that we have
mentioned before contains an intensifier, essentially an adverb modifying an
adverb, as in
(37) (a) Lokman speaks rather fast.
(b) Proceed very cautiously.
Adverbial phrases may also be formed with adverb complements, words that
complete the meaning of the adverb, as in:
(38) (a) Luckily for us, the package arrived early.
(b) Matt works harder than a dog.
(c) She walked (as) gracefully as an angel.
There are other constructions that perform adverbial functions that are neither
adverbs nor adverbial phrases.
SELF-CHECK 5.9
1. Identify the adverbial phrase in each of the following:

(a) The cubs rather quickly learned to catch rabbits.
(b) The lion runs faster than the hyena.
(c) This tailor very meticulously removed the stitches.
(d) The crowd shouts as loudly as a bomb.
2. For each phrase you identified above, tell which is the head
adverb and which are the modifiers.
The structure of the AdvP is similar to that of the AdjP; that is, it is composed of
three elements: head (h), modifier (m) and qualifier (q). These elements combine
to form the following four basic structures:

The head element is always taken by an adverb. The modifier is realised typically
by grading and intensifying adverbs, as in these examples. It is also, less
frequently, modified by descriptive adverbs (delightfully clearly) or by
quantifiers (ten miles across). The qualifier expresses a different type of meaning
from that of the modifier, as it does in AdjP. It expresses the scope or context of
the meaning expressed by the head (e.g. early in the morning); alternatively, it
can serve to define the modifier more explicitly (e.g. more correctly than before).
It is for this reason that qualifiers of adjectives and adverbs are mostly realised by
embedded groups and clauses, whereas modifiers are usually realised by words.
5.8.1 General Characteristics of Adverbial Phrase

The general characteristics of adverbial phrase that distinguish it from other
phrases are as follows:
(a) It conveys a wide variety of types and subtypes of meaning.
(b) It carries a wide variety of syntactic functions.
(c) It can occupy many different positions in clause structure, when
functioning as adjuncts and disjuncts.
(d) They are very frequently optional in the sense that they can be omitted
without the clause becoming ungrammatical. For this reason we say that,
when they function as adjuncts or disjuncts of a clause, adverbial phrase
typically play a "non-inherent" role in clause structure, as distinct from the
roles of "process" and "participant" which are "inherent" in any situation.
(e) Both adjective phrase and adverbial phrase share the characteristic of being
realized frequently by the head alone, as "simple" group structures.
Adverb is an extremely mixed word class. Practically any word that is not easily
classed as noun, adjective, verb, determiner, preposition or conjunction, tends to
be classified as adverb. In order to describe the grammatical features of adverbs,
it is useful to establish a certain number of classes and subclasses among them,
from either a functional or a semantic point of view. Whichever of these two

criteria is chosen, reference has to be made constantly to the alternative one. The
following are some formal features of English adverbs.
5.8.2 Formal Features of Adverbial Head

Morphologically, English adverbs are simple, derived or compound.
(a) Simple forms

These are one syllable or two syllable words of native origin not marked for class:
down, up, out, over, in, below, above, often, always, ever, never, once,
twice, also, back, away, off, soon, else, now, then, there, here, far, where,
when, why, how. . .
(b) Derived forms

Those formed from adjectives by the addition of the suffix {-ly} include:
happily, freely, slowly, proudly, honestly, cheerfully, etc.
Those formed from nouns by the addition of {-wise}, {-ways}, {-wards}, include:
clockwise, moneywise, profitwise, businesswise; lengthways, crossways,

backwards, frontwards, homewards, inwards.
A small group of adverbs beginning a indicate mainly position or direction:
aback, aboard, about, above, abreast, abroad, across, adrift, again, aground,
ahead, along, alongside, aloof, aloud, amiss, apart, apiece, around, ashore,
aside, askance, askew, astride, away.

Another small set of adverbs has {be-} as first syllable, also indicating
position or direction:
before, behind, below, beneath, besides, between, beyond.
(c) Compound forms

Some of these are shortened forms of Prepositional Phrase:
downhill, downstairs, downstream, downtown, downwind, downriver;

indoors, inland, inshore, inside, instead, offside, off-limits, off-centre, up-
country, up-state, upriver, overboard, overhead, overseas, overnight, over-
all, overland, overleaf, overmuch.
Others are combinations of other classes of words:
however, moreover, nevertheless, somewhere, anywhere, nowhere,

everywhere, anyway, anyhow, elsewhere, herewith, thereof, whereabouts,
hereby.
5.8.3 Circumstantial Adverbs: Where and When

Things Happen
Space
Position:
(39) (a) Put the books here/outside/upstairs.
(b) An away match.
Direction:
(40) (a) Push it inwards/down/through/out/away.
(b) The trip back.
Distance:
(41) DonÊt go too far/near/close.
Time
Moment:
(42) They will be playing tomorrow/sometime/then/soon/ later.
Frequency:
(43) The mailman came once/daily/frequently/now and again.

Duration:
(44) (a) They didnÊt stay long.
(b) We spoke briefly.
Relation:
(45) (a) The bus will arrive soon.
(b) The taxi hasnÊt arrived yet.
Sequence:
first, secondly, next, then, lastly, finally.
5.8.4 Process Adverbs: How Things Happen
Manner:
(46) (a) The witness spoke hesitantly.

(b) The thief looked round suspiciously.
Respect:
(47) The concert was a success artistically but not financially.
5.8.5 Modal Adverbs

Possibility:
(48) You are certainly right. Perhaps IÊm wrong.
Restriction:
(49) That is hardly true. It is only a half truth.
Necessity:
(50) The walls were necessarily/compulsorily pulled down.
Volition:
(51) The management has reluctantly/unwillingly raised my wages.
Viewpoint:
(52) We are in good shape financially, and health wise, too.

Emphasis:
(53) He is plainly/obviously just a miser. Indeed he is.
Judgment:
(54) The teacher has wisely/rightly/understandably resigned.
Attitude:
(55) Thankfully it didnÊt rain. Hopefully it will be fine tomorrow.
5.8.6 Degree Adverbs

Comparison:
(56) Sheila is more/the most/less/the least industrious as a student.
Intensification:
(57) She lives all alone but seems quite happy.
Attenuation:
(58) That is somewhat/slightly/a little surprising.
Approximation:
(59) There were about/roughly/more or less 20 people there.
5.8.7 Focusing Adverbs

Restriction:
(60) That is merely a detail. He is solely interested in money.
Reinforcement:
(61) Even a child knows that. ItÊs obvious, as well.

5.8.8 Conjunctive Adverbs

Logical connection
Sequence:
(62) First itÊs important to get a job and secondly to save.
Equation:
(63) You must take plenty of food, and likewise warm clothes.
Reinforcement:
(64) The house is small and furthermore has no garden.
Conclusion:
(65) It was a tiring trip, but altogether very interesting.
Apposition:
(66) WeÊve got two pets, namely a rabbit and a canary.
Result:
(67) IÊve lost my job and so/consequently have no money.
Alternation:
(68) Take an umbrella, otherwise youÊll get wet.
Contrast:
(69) He wants to live abroad, or rather anywhere away from home.
Opposition:
(70) The theatre is expensive; letÊs go to the cinema instead.
Concession:
(71) What you said was true; however/nevertheless it was unkind.
Transition:
(72) Now, you listen to me! Now then, what do you propose?

5.8.9 Syntactic Functions of Adverbial Phrases

Adverbial phrases, whether simple (head element only) or complex (with
modifier and qualifier elements), realise the following syntactic functions as
elements of phrase and clause structures. In this section, adverbial phrase will be
exemplified by the head element alone, that is to say, by adverbs.
Table 5.1: Syntactic Functions as Elements of Phrase and Clause Structures

Since clause adjuncts, disjuncts and conjuncts are syntactic elements that can be
realised not only by AdvP but also by PrepP, and finite or non-finite clauses,
some grammarians group all of these classes of realisations under the general
name of ‰adverbials‰.
5.8.10 Distribution of Adverbs in the Clause

The mobility of Adverbs
Adjuncts or disjuncts are more mobile but adverbs occupy fixed positions
depending on their functions, as the following examples show:
(73) Officially, the man couldnÊt have been elected a president.

The man officially couldnÊt have been elected a president
The man couldnÊt officially have been elected a president.
The man couldnÊt have officially been elected a president.
The man couldnÊt have been officially elected a president.
The man couldnÊt have been elected officially a president.
The man couldnÊt have been elected a president officially.
Not all adjunctive or disjunctive adverbs are equally mobile. The choice of
position is determined by:
Ć Its type (circumstantial, modal, degree, etc.);
Ć The scope of its meaning (whole clause or part of a clause);

Ć The degree of emphasis the speaker wishes to give to it; and

Ć The general information structure of the clause.
5.8.11 Circumstantial Adverbs

Adverbs referring to the place and time in which a material process occurs are
most frequently placed after the verb or at the end of the clause, as in the
examples given above.
Indefinite time adverbs such as sometimes, originally, eventually, immediately,

finally, recently, previously can be placed in end, middle or initial position:
(74) (a) We take a long walk sometimes.
(b) We sometimes take a long walk.
(c) Sometimes we take a long walk.
(74a) is the normal unmarked position, (74b) focuses on the process take, and
(74c) on the whole of the clause.
Some adverbs of frequency such as always, never, seldom, hardly ever, often,
rarely, sometimes, usually, tend to occur in mid-position, between Subject and
Predicator or between operator and main verb. The word often may also focus on
the whole clause, in initial position:
(75) (a) We always spend our weekends together.(*Always we spend...)
(b) We have never been to the place. (*Never, we have. . .)
(c) Men are often successful in business. (Often women are. )
The adverbs of negative import never, seldom, rarely, hardly ever are
occasionally fronted and followed by subject operator inversion for purposes of
emphasis, though this structure is formal in style:
(76) (a) Rarely do we find such kindness nowadays.
(b) Never in my life have I heard such crazy story!
Frequency adverbs are rarely found in cleft clauses, but we may note the following:
(77) It is not often (that) you get a chance like that.

The adverbs still, yet, already express certain time relationships which are
described in structures below, their position may vary:
(78) (a) She is still sad. She is sad still.
(b) As yet we have received no reply.

(c) We have as yet received no reply.
(d) We have received no reply as yet.
(e) IÊve already been there. IÊve been there already.
The examples given of these three adverbs show that their scope of meaning
extends to the process or the whole predicate and for this reason they normally
occur in middle or end position. Exceptionally, still and already are placed in
initial position as Âsentence AdjunctsÊ, where the scope includes the subject as
well:
(79) (a) WeÊve discussed many times, but still we canÊt agree!
(b) YouÊre very good! Already youÊve completed three jobs.
Here the adverbs have emphatic modal value and are spoken with strong stress.
Nevertheless, we recommend caution in the use of this structure.
Finally we may observe the similarity of meaning of still and yet in a be + to

infinitive structure:
(80) A cure for AIDS is still / yet to be found.
5.8.12 Adverbs of Manner

Adverbs referring to the manner in which a process occurs are placed most
frequently at the end of the clause, as in He speaks Malay fluently, not ÂHe
speaks fluently Malay. If the object is long, and the adverb is a single word, the
object is placed at the end, as in He speaks fluently several oriental languages. If
the adverb is modified or qualified as a group, it may still occupy end position,
according to the principles of end-focus and end-weight, even if the object, too, is
long:
(81) (a) He speaks Malay fluently.
(b) He speaks several oriental languages as well as Malay very fluently
indeed.
Manner adverbs include many {-ly} items: carefully, easily, correctly, nicely,
cheaply, politely, peacefully, urgently, etc.

5.8.13 Modal Adverbs

Modal adverbs are typically placed in mid position or after be, since they tend to
focus on the process expressed by the verb. Other examples are:
(82) (a) They will probably get a raise next month.
(b) He is supposedly a rich man.
(c) The independence movement is allegedly gaining strength.
The tendency to occupy mid position extends also to adverbs of degree and
intensification:
(83) (a) I absolutely forgot to tell you.
(b) He completely shouted at me!
(c) I entirely disagree with you.
5.8.14 Adverbs in Initial Position

When an adverb is placed at the beginning of a clause, its meaning extends to the
whole clause and not simply to the predication or to an element of the
predication. In this position, the meaning may be of two broad kinds:
(a) It may function as an element within the clause and have the same status as
the other elements, though referring to all of them together, as in:
(84) (a) Gradually, the rising sun appeared over the distant horizon.
(b) Unexpectedly, a fresh breeze began to ruffle the surface of the sea.
In this way, the scope of the adverb ranges more widely over the clause than it
would do in mid or end position:
(85) (a) The rising sun slowly appeared over the distant horizon.
(b) The rising sun appeared slowly over the distant horizon.

Adverbs share this syntactic role, usually termed‰sentential adjunct‰, with other
classes of unit.
(b) Other adverbs occur in initial position but are considered, both syntactically
and semantically, to be outside the clause, and are usually called
‰disjuncts‰. Semantically, disjuncts express either the speakerÊs attitude to
what he is saying:
(86) (a) Honestly, I donÊt believe you.
(b) Confidently, the new plan will lead to some improvements.
or a comment on the truth or the value of what is said:
(87) (a) Undoubtedly, the success is due to your efforts.

(b) Very sensibly, they are going to buy a smaller car.
Many adverbs can be used as both disjuncts and adjuncts; the following are used
as adjuncts of manner:
(88) (a) I spoke frankly to him.
(b) He behaved very sensibly.
It is therefore important to distinguish the two meanings of the two functions.
5.8.15 Function and Class

Since there is rarely a one-to-one relationship between function and class, many
words can realise more than one syntactic function e.g. altogether:
(89) (a) He owes me a hundred dollars altogether. (adjunct)
(b) I think you are altogether wrong. (mod. of adj)
(c) There were a lot of interesting people at the party, so altogether we
had a very good time. (conjunct) later:
(90) (a) There will be another performance later. (adjunct)

(b) The later performance will be at midnight. (mod. of noun)
(c) The performance later will be a better one. (qualifier of noun)
This blurred quality of some English words, due partly to the relative lack of
class markers in the language, makes it difficult to assign them exclusively to one
class. For example long is considered as two words belonging to two different

classes. We shall refer to the adjective „long‰ in a long street and to the adverb
‰long‰ in DonÊt stay long. The following lexical items can be treated in this way,
as is shown in the examples that follow them:
lean, clear, close, dear, direct, early, fast, first, fine, flat, hard, high, late, light,
long, loud, quick, sharp, tight, daily, weekly, etc., aloof, alone, alike, adrift,
afoot, aground.
Table 5.2: Syntactical Functions in Adverbs and Adjectives
In these four pairs of clauses, the italicised words realise a syntactical function
which is typical of the class to which we have assigned it. In the case of fast and
direct, the meaning is the same, whether it refers to a process or a person, but in
the case of late and clean, the semantic references differ: A late plane is not a
plane which arrives late, but one which leaves at a later hour. Clean as an adverb
in I clean forgot intensifies the process of forgetting (I completely forgot),
whereas clean as an adjective denotes an attribute antonymous to dirty.
 When we try to study the structure of English sentence, we can analyse the
structure by examining the phrase.
 A phrase is a small group of words and morphemes grouped together. A

phrase has one part of speech at its core, called the head of the phrase, which
gives the phrase its name, such as noun phrase or verb phrase. The phrase
also includes all the other things that go with the head to form a group.
 Phrases may occur together to make larger groupings which can be a

combination of a noun phrase followed by a verb phrase to form a clause.
 The noun phrase and the verb phrase of the clause are also referred to as the
subject and the predicate of the clause. Some clauses can stand all by

themselves and are called independent clauses; others must attach to another
clause and are called dependent clauses.
 Clauses may then combine into a larger constituent called a sentence.
 English sentence structures can be analysed by using a tree diagram to

represent their syntactical structures which will be discussed in the next
topic.
Complement Indirect object
1. Why do you think there is fluctuation in English between ‰a‰ and "an"
before a noun that begins with the sound "h" in an unstressed syllable: a/an
historical event, a/an hysterical patient, a/an hypothesis?
2. Show how the word "many" can be used as a determiner or a
postdeterminer. Show how "all" can be a predeterminer or a determiner.

T op i c  Relative
6 Clauses
LEARNING OUTCOMES

1. Define the meaning of clauses;
2. Describe the different forms of relative clauses, such as
restrictive and non-restrictive clauses;
3. Differentiate between relative clauses and subordinate clauses;
4. Provide the diagramming of subordinate clauses;
5. Rank the order of difficulty of relative clauses; and
6. Illustrate the diversity of relative clause types.
 INTRODUCTION
In this topic, you will learn about relative clauses and ways to build them,
differences between independent and dependent clauses and some sentences in
which they occur. Dependent clauses may occupy adverbial, adjectival or
nominal (noun) slots in sentences. They are introduced by words that mark them
as dependent: either subordinating conjunctions or relatives. In this topic, we will
also consider the form, meaning and function of restrictive and non-restrictive
relative clauses.
6.1 A CLAUSE
A clause is traditionally defined as „a string of words containing both a subject
and a predicate‰. Sentences may contain a single prototypical clause with just
one subject and one predicate. These are called simple sentences. Sentences can

TOPIC 6 RELATIVE CLAUSES  139
include more than a single clause. Each of the following three examples contains
two or more clauses. Mark each clause that you can identify.
(1) I would be grateful if you would remove your coat from my chair.
(2) After I had paid for a new house, I certainly could not respond generously
when you asked me for a donation.
(3) Karim watched cartoons whenever he was nervous about an exam.
In example (1), I would be grateful is one clause, and you would remove your
coat from my chair is the second. How can you tell? The key is to recognise the
subject and predicate in each clause. I is the subject of the first clause, and would
be grateful is its predicate; you is the subject of the second clause, and would
remove your coat from my chair is its predicate.
Example (2) includes three clauses:

(i) I (subject) had paid for a new house (predicate);
(ii) I (subject) certainly could not respond generously (predicate); and
(iii) you (subject) asked me for a donation (predicate).
Example (3) contains two clauses:

(i) Karim is the subject of the first and watched cartoons is its predicate;
(ii) he is the subject of the second, and was nervous about an exam is its
predicate.
From analysing these sentences, we can say that clause and sentence do not
always refer to the same thing. Some sentences contain more than one clause,
and some clauses are not independent sentences.
In sentence (3), whenever is a subordinator; when it is removed, one of the two

clauses can stand alone as a sentence. When they are combined in the single
version given above, the second clause loses its independent status. The word
whenever subordinates it, or makes it dependent upon the main clause. Thus,
example (3) is a single sentence containing two clauses; the dependent clause
supplies material that explains something about the main (or independent) one:
Karim watched cartoons (Independent clause)

whenever he was nervous about an exam. (Dependent clause)
Both clauses are finite; that is, each contains a finite verb, a verb that is inflected
to show tense. In (3), the verb watched is in the past tense.

140  TOPIC 6 RELATIVE CLAUSES
We have identified Karim watched cartoons as an independent clause because it

can stand alone as a sentence; whenever he was nervous about an exam is also a
clause which contains a subject and a finite verb, but since it cannot stand alone
as a sentence, it is considered a dependent clause.
ACTIVITY 6.1
1. What is a clause?
2. What is the difference between an independent and dependent
clause?
6.2 TYPES OF SENTENCE STRUCTURE

At the discourse level, we use sentences that are usually related to topics whether
in conversation or in written essays. The speaker arranges them in a logical order
to make it easier for the listener to understand what is being said. Arranging
sentences to follow one another is one of the ways of suggesting the relationship
between ideas, but syntax, the internal organisation of a sentence, provides us
with others, including a variety of methods by which we attach one proposition
(or statement of an idea) to another, connecting them with words that explicitly
mark the nature of their relationship. There are many types of sentences that we
can use when we are engaged at the discourse level.
6.3 SUBORDINATE CLAUSES

We have identified a class of structure words as subordinating conjunctions:
words that join two clauses, making one of them dependent upon (or
subordinate to) the other. Most but not all of the clauses formed by these
conjunctions are adverbial clauses. They provide the kind of information usually
supplied by simple adverbs. In the examples that follow, the subordinate clause
is italicised. Notice that each is a finite clause containing a subject and an
inflected verb phrase:
(4) Time
(a) She always puts the books back on the shelf after she has read them.
(b) When the goal was scored, the crowd cheered.

(5) Place
(a) The police car stopped where a crowd had gathered.
(b) Where AliÊs grandfather lived, everyone loved fishing.
(6) Manner
(a) The audience remained seated as though they expected an encore.
(b) Matt felt conspicuous on the stage as if everyone were watching him.
(7) Cause
(a) The clock is slow because the battery was weak last night.
(b) Since the lamb is not fully cooked yet, dinner will be delayed.
(8) Condition
(a) He decided to buy the books although his money was running low.
(b) If they do not repair this properly, it will not last a minute.
In general, most adverbial clauses can be moved about in their sentences.

Movement results not only in stylistic variety but also in a change in emphasis.
Notice how the focus shifts when the clause is moved in the two versions of the
same sentence below:
(9) (a) I will pay for the damage because the accident was my fault.
(b) Because the accident was my fault, I will pay for the damage.
There is nothing wrong with either version. The natural order of (a) focuses on
the speakerÊs willingness to pay for the damage. Moving the dependent clause to
the beginning, as in (b), not only focuses on who was at fault, but it also allows
the statement to unfold in a chronological progression cause first and effect
second giving the sentence a logical order you may prefer.
Grammarians sometimes use the terms dependent clause and subordinate clause
interchangeably.

Table 6.1: Adverbial Dependent Clauses or Subordinate Clauses
ACTIVITY 6.2
Combine the sentences below using a subordinating conjunction. You

may refer to Topic 4 for the list of conjunctions.
1. Ahmad fell asleep during the exam.
He had gone to bed very early the night before.
2. Hashim packed an extra battery in his camera bag.
The battery in his bag went dead.
3. Kamila bought the book.
Kamil had recommended it.

6.3.1 Diagramming Subordinate Clauses

Tree diagrams can help to make clear the structure of complex sentences with
subordinate clauses. They reflect the fact that complex sentences include at least
one independent clause and one dependent clause. A phrase marker for a
complex sentence will include an S symbol for each clause, as you can see in Tree
Diagram 1, a graphic analysis of the sentence Johan slept soundly when Jalil
began his story.
The uppermost S in Tree 1 represents the independent (main) clause Johan slept.
The second S represents the subordinate clause when Jalil began his story. Notice
that the second S and, to its left, Sub Con (for subordinating conjunction) are
immediately below the symbol AdvP. That part of the phrase marker tells us that
an adverbial phrase (AdvP) here consists of a subordinating conjunction (when)
followed by a clause (Jalil began his story).
Tree 1
Adapted from Kaplan (1995)

6.4 RELATIVE CLAUSES
6.4.1 The Form of Relative Clauses

English has a rich system of relativisation with only a few restrictions on the kind
of noun phrase that can be relativised or replaced by a relative pronoun. For
example:
Relative clauses are embedded sentences that modify phrasal categories (NP, S,
AdjP, PrepP, VP).
(10) Modifying an NP:
The vases which are on the table contain flowers.
(11) Modifying a clause:
ItÊs hot outside, which makes swimming exciting.
(12) Modifying an Adjective Phrase:
IÊm delighted, which I know youÊre not.
(13) Modifying a Prepositional Phrase:
The computers are in the cupboard, where they should be.
(14) Modifying a Verb Phrase:
Susan ate the raw fish, which I would never do
The reason they are called „clauses‰ is that they have the structure of a prototype
sentence: subject NP and predicate Verb Phrase. In (10), the relative clause which
are on the table is composed of the subject NP which and the tensed predicate VP
are on the table as illustrated in Tree 2:

Tree 2
A relative clause usually contains a relative pronoun such as, who, whom, which
and that.
(15) (a) The friend with whom I travelled in Africa is here.

(b) The books which I lent you are due back.
(c) The stamp that I bought in 1987 is now worth $995.
One kind of relative clause, called restrictive, modifies only NPs. Non-restrictive
relative clauses, which are semantically different from restrictive ones, can
modify any kind of constituent (including NPs). We will look first at restrictive
relative clauses.
As noun modifiers, restrictive relative clauses are inside NPs, modifiers of the
head noun.

We say the form NP + Relative Clause is an NP because it has a head N, and on

the basis of familiar criteria for constituency-substitution, movement,
conjunction, anaphora, and function (Refer to Topic 3).
(16) Substitution:
(a) The woman who has 16 children left early.
(b) I left early.
(c) Ramlah left early.
(17) Movement:
(a) The police arrested the woman who has 16 children.
(b) The woman who has 16 children was arrested.
(18) Conjunction:
Ramlah objected to the woman who has 16 children and the men who have
4 wives.
(19) Anaphora:
The women who have 16 children replied that they had not been informed.
(20) Function:
As subject:
The woman who has 16 children left early.
(21) As direct object:

The police arrested the woman who has 16 children.

The antecedent of a relative pronoun is commonly the immediately preceding

NP. In these examples, the subject NP of the relative clause is the relative
pronoun who, whose antecedent is the women. (That is, the one who has 16
children is the woman mentioned immediately before the relative clause.)
There is one situation in which a relative pronoun does not refer to an

immediately preceding NP. Relative clauses can be extraposed.
(22) (a) The man who lives in that big house is here.
(b) The man is here who lives in that funny house.
In both (a) and (b), the antecedent of who is the man, which is adjacent to it in (a),
but not in (b).
ACTIVITY 6.3
Underline the relative clauses in the following sentences. In each

sentence, state the relative pronoun and its antecedent.
(a) The manager was the one who seemed to be in charge.
(b) This is the cat that caught the rat.
(c) The tutor whom I complained to the dean about is angry.
(d) Samad ordered the books about which Jaanah had boasted to him.
(e) The little boy who was trying to sell cookies came by.
The NP in which a restrictive relative clause resides is made up of a determiner

and a common noun (or a plural common noun without determiner), and the
relative clause.
6.4.2 Relative Clauses with Gaps

Because the relative pronoun always occurs at the beginning of a relative clause
(or in a PrepP that is clause-initial, as in the friend [with whom I travelled]), some
relative clauses are harder to recognise as clauses, because they do not have
canonical word order. In A man whom I met offered me a job, the subject NP of
the relative clause whom I met is I, the direct object NP whom having been
moved to the front of the relative clause as shown below.

The forms of prototype relative clauses are those in which the relative pronoun
functions as subject, or in which a determiner relative pronoun is in a subject NP.
In other types, the relative pronoun can be thought of as moved from its logical
position, just as with the wh-questions discussed earlier.
Prototype relative clauses (bold) Prototype relative clauses (bold)

(Relative pronoun, or its immediate
phrase, functions as subject)

ACTIVITY 6.4
Which of the following sentences containing relative clauses have

gaps that is, relative pronouns have been moved? For those that do,
write out the sentence inserting a blank space where the gap appears
and draw an arrow to the moved relative pronoun. In some cases, a
phrase containing the relative pronoun may be moved, not just a
relative pronoun alone.
Examples:
(A) This is the store that has those great chocolate chip cookies.
(No gap; relative pronoun that functions as subject.)
(B) This is the store that Acme Management bought.
(a) This is the cat that caught the rat.

(b) This is the man whom I met yesterday.
(c) This is the cracked pipe which I told you about on the phone.
(d) This is the leaky garage roof about which I was complaining.
(e) This is the class to which I was referring in my report.
(f) This is the park ranger whom I wrote that awful letter to.
(g) The painting that Barbara did of the market needs reframing.
(h) Cats who scratch furniture will be banned from the living room.
Relative pronouns can be moved across an indefinitely long stretch: Look at the
sentence below.
This is the student who Matt thought Noeh said Zainal believed Ann had gotten
engaged to -------------

The tree diagram for this example shows its structure more clearly:
Tree 3
Adapted from Kaplan (1995)

SELF-CHECK 6.1
Draw tree diagram for the following sentences containing relative

clauses. Leave gaps at sites from which any item is moved, and draw
arrows to their derived position. Use triangles to abbreviate where
details are irrelevant to the relative clause.
Example: An old farmer sold me a durian which he had plucked
(24) The chocolate which Param bought for Rita has a rich filling.
(25) Ramlah was the one who proposed the engagement.
(26) Bala showed us the ground on which we would be playing.
(27) The girl whose book I borrowed winked at me.
(28) The man who Ramaan thought Bala said the chairman had fired
has filed suit.

6.4.3 The Grammatical Relations of the NP Containing

a Relative Clause
The NP containing a relative clause can occur wherever any NP can, and can bear
any grammatical relation.
(29) As subject:
The guy who Ellen flirted with called her up.
(30) As direct object:
Mr. Gold bought a truck which had an extended cab.
(31) As indirect object:
We sent the teacher whom we admired most a long stemmed rose.
(32) As object of a preposition:
(a) This is the room which we took the test in.
(b) This is the room in which we took the test.
(33) As predicate nominative:
Frank is a guy who you can always count on.
(34) As object complement:
We consider Sally an administrator who always listens.
6.4.4 Relative Pronoun Choice

What determines which relative pronoun ă who, whose, whom, which and that ă
is used? The choice between who, whom and whose depends on the grammatical
function of the pronoun: if the pronoun functions as subject, the choice is who, if
it functions as possessive determiner, the choice is whose, and if it has another
function, the choice is whom.
a. Relative pronoun functioning as subject:
The man who opened the window
b. Relative pronoun functioning as possessive determiner:
The man whose book was stolen
c. Relative pronoun functioning as direct object:
The man whom you met

d. Relative pronoun functioning as object of preposition:

The man to whom we sent the proposal
This simple rule is complicated by the fact that for most speakers of English other
than the most prescriptively judgemental, in most situations of use (other than
the most formal ones), who is used instead of whom in relative clause initial
position.
(a) The man who you met.
(b) The man who we sent the proposal to.
The choice between who(m) and which is easy; who(m) is used with a human
antecedent, which with a nonhuman one.
(35) (a) The man who(m) I recommended.
(b) *The man which I recommended.
(c) The apartment which we rented.
(d) *The apartment who(m) we rented.
That is an alternative for both who and which.

(36) (a) The man that I recommended.
(b) The apartment that we rented.
With animals that we often interact closely with, like household pets, speakers
differ in preferring who or which. Depending on whether you attribute human-
like qualities to your cat, dog, or horse, you can accept or reject the following:
(37) (a) I have a kitten who is always crawling onto my lap.
(b) Fido is one dog who can always be counted on to wag his tail at
intruders.
(c) Flicka is a horse who cannot really be trusted with kids.
6.4.5 Non-Restrictive Relative Clauses

Contrast the following:
(38) (a) Sheila Majid, who is a singer, is coming to visit.
(b) A woman who is a singer is coming to visit.

The pauses or intonation breaks indicated by the commas in (a), and their
absence in (b), are significant. They distinguish two types of relative clauses
which have different kinds of meanings. Example (a) contains a non-restrictive
relative clause whereas example (b) a restrictive relative clause. How do these
constructions differ? In form, non-restrictive relative clauses are bracketed by
pauses or intonation shifts.
Restrictive relative clauses are not. In meaning, restrictive relative clauses

provide information essential to the identification of the referent of the head
noun, while non-restrictive relative clauses provide less important, even
parenthetical, information. More precisely, restrictive relative clauses narrow
down the set of potential referents for the modified NP (the antecedent for the
relative pronoun), thus restricting it, as it were; while non-restrictive relative
clauses modify NPs with a unique referent, so narrowing down is not possible.
Besides the phonological difference and the semantic difference, grammatical

differences exist between restrictive and non-restrictive relative clauses. As we
saw, restrictive relative clauses permit the relative pronouns who, whom, which,
and (under the traditional analysis) that, but non-restrictive relative clauses do
not allow that.
(39) Restrictive relative clause:

The woman that is a singer.
(40) Non-restrictive relative clause:

(a) Sheila Majid, who is a singer, . .
(b) *Sheila Majid, that is a singer, . .
Restrictive relative clauses cannot modify singular proper nouns, but non-
restrictive relative clauses can.
(41) Restrictive relative clause:
*Sheila Majid who is a singer. . .
(42) Non-restrictive relative clause:

Sheila Majid, who is an artist, . . .

Finally, only non-restrictive relative clauses can modify sentences, Verb Phrases,
Prepositional Phrases, or Adjective Phrases.
(43) Modifying a sentence:

(a) Restrictive:
*Today is Saturday which means we go swimming.
(b) Non-restrictive:
Today is Saturday, which means we go swimming.
(44) Modifying a Verb Phrase:

(a) Restrictive:
*Sheila reads mysteries which many artists do.
Sheila reads mysteries, which many artists do.
Except when the proper noun is used as a common noun: The Sheila Majid
who lived in Kuala Lumpur. not the one from Singapore.
(45) Modifying a Prepositional Phrase:

(a) Restrictive:
*The toys are in the box where they will remain.
The toys are in the box, where they will remain.
(46) Modifying an Adjective Phrase:

(a) Restrictive:
*IÊm happy which I know youÊre not.
IÊm happy, which I know youÊre not.
6.4.6 The Order of Difficulty of Relative Clauses

We have examined four basic types of relative clauses:
SS ă Subject of the embedded sentence is identical to the subject of the main

clause. For example:
The boy who tells the story is my neighbour.
OS ă Subject of the embedded sentence is identical to the object of the main

I know the boy who tells the story.

SO ă Object of the embedded sentence is identical to the subject of the main

The man who(m) you met is my teacher.
OO ă Object of the embedded sentence is identical to the object of the main

I read the book that you mentioned.
SELF-CHECK 6.2
Can you think of an example for each of the relative clauses?
(a) SS
(b) OS
(c) SO
(d) OO
6.4.7 The Diversity of Relative Clause Types

So far we have dealt only with relative clauses modifying the subjects and direct
objects of main clauses. Such a perspective belies the complexity that actually
exists. Table 6.2 illustrates the diversity of English relative clause structures.

Table 6.2: Sentences for the Various Relative Clause Structures in English
In addition to the above structures, the possessive determiner whose can

relativise any noun functioning as a subject, direct object, indirect object, object of
a preposition, or predicate noun, giving us in effect 40 distinct relative clause
structures in English.
(Adapted from Celce-Murcia Larsen-Freeman, 1999)
 In this topic, we explored the syntactic diversity of restrictive and non-

restrictive relative clauses in English.
 Learners often face difficult challenges of trying to master relative clauses,

where to place the relative clause in relation to the head noun, which relative
pronoun to choose, the internal structure of relative clauses, and so on.

 However, many studies strongly suggest that instead of trying to learn all
possible patterns for relative clauses, we would do well to discover which
patterns we most likely need for our own oral or written discourse in English.
Complex sentences Compound-complex sentences

Compound sentences
1. Create compound sentences with the following coordinating conjunctions

"either⁄or‰, „so‰, „for‰ and „or". Construct tree diagrams to show the
structure of these four sentences.
2. State the four typical sentence patterns in English. Cite examples for each
pattern.

Topic  Sentence
7 Structures
LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Describe the concepts of sentence structures in English; and
2. Construct English sentence structures.
 INTRODUCTION
In the previous two topics, we learned about the structures of words and phrases.
In this topic, we will see how these words and phrases combine to form
sentences. We will see how people use language creatively to make simple
sentences and clauses nest inside other clauses to express complex ideas.
Although we will not concentrate on how to build these sentences in detail now
we will focus on analysing the sentence structure of each sentence pattern and
the modifying subordinate clauses. We will explore a range of possibilities for
putting sentences together and develop a method of describing complicated
sentences that occur routinely even in ordinary conversation.
7.1 SIMPLE SENTENCES

Simple sentences are sentences that are made up of one clause. These simple
sentences are not difficult to analyse, and we have seen a lot of them in the earlier
discussions. Simple is actually a technical definition that does not imply anything
about the length of the sentence nor its complexity in other ways. For example,
sentence (1) is a simple sentence but sentence (2) is not:
(1) Kamal slept.
(2) The fat lady with the blue ribbon in her hair sought advice at the beginning
of the semester from the students in my literature class.

160  TOPIC 7 SENTENCE STRUCTURES
A simple sentence has one subject and one predicate, and is comprised of two
constituents ă a noun phrase and a verb phrase. The basic structure of sentence
(1) can be described easily with Tree 1. For this diagram and those that follow,
we will use the same abbreviations as the previous examples.
S = sentence
NP = noun phrase
VP = verb phrase
PrepP = prepositional phrase
Prep = preposition
Tree 1
For the first, the NP and the VP are only one word a piece; for the second, the NP
and the VP have multiple word constituents within them. The fuller structure of
the subject noun phrase in sentence (2) is represented by Tree (2).
Tree 2

TOPIC 7 SENTENCE STRUCTURES  161
These examples are used to give you initial concepts of complex sentence
structures. We have discussed the phrases earlier and for the purpose of
introducing the sentence structures we will put triangles in their places. Detailed
discussions of all the phrases will be done in the next unit. Tree 2 is to give you a
good idea of how complex structures of one clause can be.
SELF-CHECK 7.1
1. What is the structure of each of the following noun phrases? It
might be helpful to put brackets around the constituents.
Remember that constituents may nest inside other constituents.
(a) The hotel on the hill.
(b) The woods to the left of the cemetery.
2. Draw a tree diagram of the verb phrase of each of the following

sentences:
(a) I respect the students in my literature class.
(b) We may meet at the end of the day.

Table 7.1 illustrates the most typical simple sentence patterns in English
Table 7.1: Simple Sentence Patterns in English

Tree Diagram 1 and Tree Diagram 2 are very useful tools for both describing and
discovering the structure of sentences. Sentences themselves do not directly reveal
their structure, since the words simply follow one after the other. The tree structures
show what groups into a constituent and how constituents nest inside other
constituents. We know that everything in a sentence must be part of some
constituent which, in turn, bears a particular relationship to the other constituents of
the sentence. Creating a tree diagram with all its interconnecting branches guides us
in understanding how those constituents are related. The end result is a visual
representation that lays out the multi-dimensional complexity of the sentence.
7.2 COMPOUND SENTENCES

Compound sentences are sentences that are made up of two or more clauses
joined together by coordinating conjunctions. Each clause connected to another
by means of a coordinating conjunction is considered to be a main clause and has
equal status with the clause(s) with which it forms the compound. (3) is an
example of compound sentence:
(3) Speaking programmes are useful, but they do not fix all pronunciation
errors.
Neither can she read nor can she write the musical notes.
Compound sentences may have more than two conjoined clauses, as in (4):
(4) Maniam cried and Mutu laughed, but Maika remained quiet.
It closed on Sunday and it closed on Monday, so we cancelled the order.
SELF-CHECK 7.2
1. Create compound sentences with the following coordinating

conjunctions:
 Either⁄or, so, for and or.
2. Add a third conjoined clause to each of the following compound

sentences:
(a) Kasim got there late consequently he couldnÊt find a parking
space.
(b) My old friends came to my party and they cheered me up.

Compound sentences can also be conveniently represented by tree structures,

such as the ones below, where cc is a coordinating conjunction:
Tree 3
Tree 4
Tree Diagram 5
ACTIVITY 7.1
1. Draw tree diagrams for the sentences in (4). How did you decide
to represent correlative coordinating conjunctions?
2. Draw a tree diagram for the second sentence of (5).

7.3 COMPLEX SENTENCES

Complex sentences are sentences that contain at least one subordinate clause
(and no conjoined main clauses). These may contain any number of noun clauses,
adverbial clauses, and relative clauses. We have seen many examples of
sentences that contain one of these subordinate clauses. Below are some
examples of sentences that contain two:
(5) The student that won the award knows that her peers love her.
Johan kept playing the video game which Jasni gave him until he fell down.
Using the abbreviations NC (noun clause), AdvC (adverbial clause), and RC

(relative clause), we can draw tree diagrams to represent the structure of these
sentences. Let us begin with the subject noun phrase of the first sentence: the
student that won the award. That is the whole subject noun phrase, but part of it
is a relative clause describing the head noun phrase the student.
Diagrammatically, it looks like this:
Tree 6
The verb phrase of the same sentence contains a transitive verb and an object
noun clause, and can be represented diagrammatically as:
Tree 7

The clause structure of the whole sentence is shown below:
Tree 8
SELF-CHECK 7.3
1. Construct two different sentences with the following structure:
Tree 9
2. Construct two different sentences with the following structure:
Tree 10

A sentence can have any number of subordinate clauses combined in a variety of

ways. Sentence (6) and (7) have three and four subordinate clauses respectively.
(6) The student who was sick came to class because she knew that the exam
was near.
(7) The fat lady who was waiting noticed that the guard that was on duty
expected clients to take their tickets before they could pay their bills.
SELF-CHECK 7.4
Which of the following sentences are compound and which are

complex?
(a) Everyone laughed when he came on stage.
(b) The guards who collected the most money were praised by his
boss.
(c) The rod is long but the ladder is short.
(d) Although it was still early, Kasim felt that he should leave.
(e) That he became an engineer reflects well on his family.
(f) The patient said that the nurse who had treated her was good.
(g) The show was long over, yet the crowds remained.
If you try to analyse the structure of each sentence in (6 and 7), you will quickly
realise that some of the subordinate clauses are nested within others. For
example, in the first sentence, the verb phrase contains two subordinate clauses,
one nesting within the other. The tree diagram associated with this verb phrase is
given in (12):

Tree 11
Each sentence of (8) also has one subordinate clause nested within another:
(8) The cat that chased the rat that ate the cheese ran away.
Before he learned that dancing was fun, Kasim hated party.
SELF-CHECK 7.5
1. Identify the subordinate clauses of the sentences of (8) and tell

which is nested within which. Use tree diagrams if they help you
see the structure.
2. Draw the tree diagram of the subject noun phrase of the
following sentence:
Politicians who trust people who buy them presents are foolish.
Now consider the following sentences:

(9) Their father knew that Lena would succeed and Bakrin would fail.
It surprised me that the guitarist could sing and the dancer could play the
guitar.
The new element here is that the subordinate clauses are compound. Subordinate
clauses, like any other constituent, may be conjoined with coordinating
conjunctions to form compounds. The structure of the first sentence of (9) is as
follows:

Tree 12
As a whole, the sentence is still considered to be complex, since the

compounding does not occur between two main clauses, but rather within a
subordinate clause.
7.4 COMPOUND-COMPLEX SENTENCES

We have discussed simple sentences, compound sentences and complex
sentences. The one remaining type is a sentence which is compound while at
least one of the clauses contains at least one subordinate clause. This type of
sentence is compound-complex. The sentences below are compound-complex.
(10) Joel smiled but Phyllis knew that he was upset.
(11) Mariam was tired, so she left before the show began.
We can represent these sentences diagrammatically as shown in Tree 13 and

Tree 14, respectively:
Tree 13

Tree 14
Every sentence in English is in one of these four types: one clause alone or some
combination of clauses, either bearing equal status to one another or one
subordinated to another. Clauses can combine in infinite variety. They may get
too complicated to be easily understood. However, there is no fixed limit to the
number of clauses that can be combined or the number of times clauses can nest
within others in a particular sentence.
ACTIVITY 7.2
Which of the following are complex and compound-complex sentences?

1. We agreed that you would fix the faucet or that you would
replace the sink.
2. Karan knew the words to the song, but she forgot them when she
started to sing.
3. Tom did not file a tax return nor did he alert the IRS that he was
leaving the country.
4. The weather was rainy, yet we had a lovely vacation at the beach.
At this point you should be able to describe any English sentence, from its
highest level of organisation to its lowest. You can determine how the clauses are
arranged and what roles they play within the sentence. You can identify the
constituents within each clause and describe the relationships they bear to one
another, and you can identify the individual parts of speech that are the building
blocks of sentences. You are also in a position to recognise many of the
differences between Standard English and its various non-standard varieties and
to understand the array of factors that lead people to use non-standard grammar
in their own usage.

 There are four types of sentence structures: simple, compound, complex, and
compound-complex. Using these different types of sentence structures allows
you to add variety to your writing.
 The four types of sentence structures are:

(i) Simple Sentence
A simple sentence is one independent clause with no subordinate
clauses. This sentence contains a subject and a verb and expresses a
complete thought.
Eg: Last monsoon season was unusually wet
(independent clause)
(ii) Compound Sentence

A compound sentence is formed with two or more independent clauses
with no subordinate clauses. A comma and a conjunction will most
likely join these clauses, though a semicolon may also join sentences.
Eg: Last monsoon was extremely wet, but February was even wetter.
(independent clause) (independent clause)
(iii) Complex Sentence

A complex sentence contains one independent clause and one or more
dependent clauses. A dependent clause may precede, follow, or be
„embedded‰ within the independent clause.
Eg: Rain finally dropped after many farmers had left the area.
(independent clause) (dependent clause)
(iv) Compound-Complex Sentence

A compound-complex sentence contains at least two independent
clauses and one or more dependent clauses.
Eg: Although the speaker finally came, many students had already left the
(dependent clause) (independent clause)
auditorium, and the others who remained were upset by the delay.
(independent clause)

Copula Intransitive sentence

Copulative Verbs
1. Analyse the following sentences by focusing on the verbs and the phrase
types in the predicates. State sentence pattern type and draw tree diagrams
for each sentence.
(a) Those women are grave-diggers.
(b) The festival was a success.
(c) My three sisters remained good friends.
2. State the rules to distinguish between the copulative verb and the copula
ÂbeÊ. Construct ONE sentence for each type and construct a tree diagram to
show the difference.

Topic  Tense and
8 Aspect
LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Describe the paradigm of the tense-aspect system in the
English language;
2. Describe the formal characteristics of the tense-aspect system;
and
3. Explain the meanings expressed by the tense and aspect
system such as present, past, future, non-future, perfect, non-
perfect, progressive and non-progressive.
 INTRODUCTION
Tense and aspect are closely related categories in that both of them relate to the
presentation of situations. Tense is defined as grammatically expressed assignment
to situations of Âlocation in timeÊ and can be illustrated, for example, by using the
inflection {ăs}, the speaker instructs the listener to identify a situation that applies at
the moment the utterance is made, and in using the inflection {-ed} in the second to
identify a situation that applies before this moment.
Aspect is defined as grammatically expressed assignment of Âsituational focusÊ and

can be illustrated for example by using the auxiliary was and the inflectional ending
{-ing} in the first of these, the speaker instructs the listener to select an internal
focus, i.e. a perspective of viewing the situation as unfolding. In using the simple
verb form in the second example, the speaker instructs the listener to select an
external focus, i.e. to view the situation from without, as a complete unit. In English,
tense and aspect are tightly interwoven. We, therefore, treat them together and
operate with a fused tense aspect system. The meanings belonging to this system
may be expressed by a verbal inflection, an auxiliary or a combination.

174  TOPIC 8 TENSE AND ASPECT
8.1 TENSE AND ASPECT
According to Celce (2000), the auxiliary of a non-imperative English sentence must

have either a modal or a tense marker (which a later rule specifies as either past or
present), and it may have several optional components: phrasal modals, perfect
aspect, and progressive aspect. The expression „future tense‰ was viewed as
inappropriate, since, in English, finite verb stems are not inflected to express future
time. In other words, English does not have a future tense, but it does not mean that
English speakers cannot speak about future events. They use other relevant
structures such as modals, phrasal modals, and adverbials of time.
In this topic we will study the form, meaning, and use of the English tense-aspect
system at the sentence level. Sentence-level use is the way most teachers first
introduce the forms. However, it is necessary to appreciate its application at the
suprasentential or discourse level in order to fully explain the various patterns of
tense-aspect combinations that occur.
When discussing forms at the sentence level, we will introduce a tense and show
students how that tense contrasts with others, and how it fits into the system as a
whole. In order to see how the system functions, we first describe its form and
suggest a core meaning for each of the tenses and aspects of the system. Later, we
will illustrate how the core meaning applies when tenses are used by themselves
and when they are integrated with one or both aspects. Finally, we contrast the uses
of some of the most perplexing combinations.
8.2 FORMAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE TENSE-

ASPECT SYSTEM IN THE ENGLISH
LANGUAGE
The distinction between tense and aspect is a very controversial issue. Many
English teachers would say that English has 12 „tenses‰ (Celce-Murcia & Larsen-
Freeman) or 16 tenses (Bache, 1997). However in the introduction of this topic, we
have stated that English has only two tenses, which relate to time, and aspect.
Celce-Murcia & Larsen-Freeman (1999) list the two tenses, present and past, along
the vertical axis in Table 8.1. They also include the future on this list of tenses as
well, for although there is no verb inflection for future time, any description of the
English tense-aspect system needs to account for what form-meaning combinations

TOPIC 8 TENSE AND ASPECT  175
do exist that relate to future time. The four aspects-simple (sometimes called zero
aspect), perfect, progressive, and their combination, perfect progressive ă are
arrayed along the horizontal axis. The tense-aspect is illustrated by the
combinations of the irregular verb write and the regular verb walk.
Table 8.1: Celce-Murcia & Larsen-Freeman (1999), the 12 combinations of tense and aspect
From Table 8.1, Celce-Murcia & Larsen-Freeman (1999) believe that the traditional
12 „tenses‰ are actually 12 combinations of tense and aspect. They are named by
combining a tense with an aspect or aspects, such as present perfect or past perfect
progressive. Only the forms in the first column receive their names by first
specifying the aspect simple and then the tense, such as simple present.
The simple present remains in its base form (write, walk) with one exception, that
is,-the third person singular form, which is made by adding an {-s} to the verb
(writes, walks). The present perfect is formed with the verb have (has for third
person singular) and the past participle, here symbolised by {-en}. It is important to
remember that {-en} is only a symbol. Sometimes the past participle does indeed
end in {-en}, as does our example of the irregular verb, written. Other times, the past
participle is identical to the past tense form of the verb, as you can see in our other
example, where the regular verb walk has the past participle walked. The present
progressive form (sometimes called the present continuous) combines a form of the
be verb (am, is, are), depending on the person and number of the subject, with the
present participle, an {-ing} form. Finally, the present perfect progressive can be
seen to be a combination of the perfect form with have + {en} and the progressive
form with be +{-ing}. In this case, the be verb of the progressive carries the {-en}
perfect ending. In other words, it is in its past participle form, been.

Reading down Table 8.1, you can see that the various combinations with past tense
and aspect pattern in much the same way as the present tense. The past tense in its
simple form in English is formed by using its past irregular form, as in the irregular
verb in our chart, wrote, or with a regular verb such as walk by adding an {-ed} to
give us walked. One difference from the simple present is that the form of the
simple past remains invariant for all persons and numbers. The past perfect form is
made with the past form of the have verb (i.e. had) followed by the past participle
of the main verb. The past progressive form combines the past form of the be verb,
here in two forms ă first and third person singular form was and all the other
persons and numbers with were followed by the present participle. The past perfect
progressive is formed with the past form of the have verb (i.e. had) followed by the
past participle of the be verb (i.e., been) and the present participle of the main verb,
here writing or walking.
For the future time in our matrix, we use the modal will, since there is no future
tense that appears as a marking on the verb in English. However, English uses a
number of ways in addition to the use of will to indicate that an action or event is to
take place in the future. The future adheres to the same patterns as the present and
past in terms of its combination of aspect markers: will with the base form for the
simple future, will + have + -{-en} for the future perfect, will with be + {-ing} for the
future progressive, and will + have + {-en} + be + {-ing} for the future perfect
progressive.
Bache (1997) provides 16 tense-aspect forms in English, as applied to the verb

happen such as the following. It is important to remember that this list contains
instructions reflecting the basic semantics of the tense-aspect system. As we have
seen, specific constructions may express derived meanings and/or have special
uses, depending on actional and aspectual properties.
(1) The present happens

[Present [situation]]
Tag a situation of ÂhappeningÊ on to world-now.
(2) The past happened

[Past [situation]]
Tag a situation of ÂhappeningÊ on to world-before-now.
(3) The present future will happen

[Present [future [situation]]]
Tag on to world-now and then look ahead to a situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(4) The past future would happen

[Past [future [situation]]]

Tag on to world-before-now and then look ahead to a situation of

ÂhappeningÊ.
(5) The present perfect has happened

[Present [anterior [situation]]]
Tag on to world-now and then look back at a situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(6) The past perfect had happened

[Past [anterior [situation]]]
Tag on to world-before-now and then look back at a situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(7) The present future perfect will have happened

[Present [future [anterior [situation]]]]
Tag on to world-now, then look ahead to a future time and finally look back at
a situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(8) The past future perfect would have happened

[Past [future [anterior [situation]]]]
Tag on to world-before-now, then look ahead to a posterior time and finally
look back at a situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(9) The present progressive is happening

[Present [progressing [situation]]]
Tag on to world-now, and then look here at a simultaneously progressing
situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(10) The past progressive was happening

[Past [progressing [situation]]]
Tag on to world-before-now and then look here at a simultaneously
progressing situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(11) The present future progressive will be happening

[Present [future [progressing [situation]]]]
Tag on to world-now, then look ahead to a future time and finally look here at
a simultaneously progressing situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(12) The past future progressive would be happening

[Past [future [progressing [situation]]]]
Tag on to world-before-now, then look ahead to a posterior time and finally
look here at a simultaneously progressing situation of ÂhappeningÊ.
(13) The present perfect progressive has been happening

[Present [anterior [progressing [situation]]]]

Tag on to world-now, then look back at an anterior time and finally look at a
situation of ÂhappeningÊ progressing simultaneously with the anterior-present
period (i.e. towards recent time).
(14) The past perfect progressive had been happening

[Past [anterior [progressing [situation]]]]
Tag on to world-before-now, then look back at an anterior time and finally
look at a situation of ÂhappeningÊ progressing simultaneously with the
anterior-past period (i.e. towards the past time).
(15) The present future perfect progressive will have been happening
[Present [future [anterior [progressing [ situation]]]]]
Tag on to world-now, then look ahead to a future time, then look back at an
anterior time and finally look at a situation of ÂhappeningÊ progressing
simultaneously with the future-anterior period (i.e. towards the future time).
(16) The past future perfect progressive would have been happening
[Past [future [anterior [progressing [situation]]]]]
Tag on to world-before-now, then look ahead to a posterior time, then look
back at an anterior time and finally look at a situation of ÂhappeningÊ
progressing simultaneously with the posterior-anterior period (i.e. towards
the posterior time).
SELF-CHECK 8.1
1. Apply the following verbs to the system advocated by i) Celce-

Murcia & Larsen-Freeman (1999) and ii) Bache (1997).
(a) Run
(b) Read
(c) Sleep
2. What are the differences between tense-aspect forms provided

by Celce-Murcia & Larsen-Freeman (1999) as compared to the
one provided by Bache (1997)? Discuss. Which one do you
prefer? Why?

8.3 MEANING IN THE ENGLISH TENSE-ASPECT

SYSTEM
This is an exceedingly important dimension in helping students manage the tense-
aspect system. If students are able to develop a feel for the meanings conveyed by
components of the system, they will have a tremendous advantage in learning to
cope with the boundary problems introduced earlier and discussed in detail below.
As we have asserted earlier, understanding the semantics of the tenses in terms of

time is inadequate. In English, there are many ways of talking about events in the
future. Many students find it difficult to decide which form to use in a particular
situation. As an example, for forms and meaning, here we explain the differences
between four main forms which we use when talking about future time.
8.3.1 Basic Meanings of the Four Forms

Most students know that „will‰ and „going to‰ are used to talk about future time in
English. However, we also use the present progressive („be‰ + {ing}) and the
present simple tense. Here are the basic rules (see Table 8.2).

Table 8.2: Basic Rules of the Four Forms
8.4 PREDICTING THE FUTURE

In predicting what we think will happen in the future, we should choose the form
based on how certain you are. If we are not sure, it is fine to use „will‰, but if we are
nearly certain about something, it is best to use „going to‰:
For example,
(17) a. I think it will rain.

(IÊm not sure, but it looks like it might.)
b. ItÊs going to rain.
(IÊm sure itÊs going to rain; I can see black clouds in the sky.)
We could cite many other examples. The point is that in order to understand the
meaning of the tenses, we must go to a deeper level of abstraction than that of
temporal meaning. By so doing, we will see what core meaning underlies the use of
the future tense in the preceding example sentences and in all other sentences in

which it occurs. The core meaning of a particular form is the meaning that is most
central, primary, or invariant (Hatch and Brown 1995 cited in Celce-Murcia &
Larsen-Freeman 1999). We begin by analysing the core meanings of the tenses with
simple aspect.
Thus, one of the reasons for displaying the tense-aspect combinations in this
manner is to demonstrate that the 12 or 16 „tenses‰ are simply combinations of
tense and aspect. Since the perfect and progressive aspect markers contribute
consistent meanings regardless of tense, in effect, ESL students have to learn only
the form and meaning of the three tenses (in their simple form) and the two aspects
(perfect and progressive) to develop an understanding of the tense-aspect system of
English. This is why we say that by viewing the tenses and aspects as a system, the
learning burden is lessened.
8.5 THE MEANING OF TENSE

Tense is defined as the linguistic expression of time relations realised by verb forms.
Time is independent of language and is common to all human beings. Most
grammarians conceptualise it, as being divided into past time, present time and
future time. Tense systems are language specific and vary from one language to
another as you have seen in Malay and English. Tenses distinguish in the ways that
reflect temporal reference. In English, for instance, it would be erroneous to imagine
that the Past Tense reflects exclusively to events in past time, that there is a Present
Tense to refer exclusively to events in present time and a Future Tense (e.g. modal
will/would) to refer exclusively to events in future time. In the following examples,
the forms often thought to correspond to past and future time reference,
respectively, in fact, refer to the moment of speaking. For example:
(18) a. I thought you were in the hall.
b. Will you park there, please?
c. I was wondering whether you needed a drink.
On the contrary, the ÂPresent TenseÊ forms used in the following examples do not
refer exclusively to the moment of speaking, for example:
(19) a. These trees look dead in drought.
b. We leave for Kuala Lumpur tonight.
c. Temperatures rise to 100 degree F.

In addition to tense forms of verbs, other linguistic forms, particularly adverbs of

time such as now, then, tomorrow and prepositional phrases such as in 2004 can
make reference to time; English, in fact, relies extensively on such words to make
the temporal reference clear.
8.6 POINTS IN TIME AND POINTS OF

REFERENCE
Tense is how we express events that occur at points situated along the linear flow of
time. Within the linear flow, a point of reference must be established, with respect
to which past events precede and future events follow. The normal, universal and
therefore unmarked point of reference is the moment of speaking. This is the ÂnowÊ,
which is implicitly understood in everyday interaction. It can be diagrammed as
follows:
UTTERANCES
Past Now Future
Speech Time
The Present Moment
Further distinctions such as "remote past" and "immediate future" can then be
additionally made.
SELF-CHECK 8.2
Construct dialogue in context to demonstrate:
(a) Remoteness past; and
(b) Immediate future.

8.7 THE PRESENT AND PAST TENSES IN

ENGLISH
In everyday use, Âat presentÊ and Âat the present timeÊ have a wider application than
simply to the present moment of speech time. Thus, the example Sun rises in the
east includes in its time reference the present moment but also past and future time.
It can be diagrammed in the following way:
UTTERANCES
Past Now Future

Sun rises in the east
------------------------------------Present ----------------------------------
Present time in this sense can therefore mean (a) at all times, or (b) at no particular
time. The grammatical tense used in the examples above is the unmarked form,
having no modification, consisting of the lexical verb alone with no grammatical
meaning beyond that of ÂverbÊ. Thus, it can cover a wide range of temporal
references. We can retain the traditional term present or non-progressive present for
convenience, rather than the term non-past preferred by some grammarians. It is
with the recognition that as a tense it only rarely has a direct relation to speech time.
The non-past as an alternative term to present tense is based on the following

reasoning: while the present tense can refer to future time as in We leave for Penang
tomorrow. When do we arrive? It cannot normally be used with a time expression
which refers specifically to an event in the past: *I listen to that story last week
instead of He listened to that story last week. The unmarked form therefore can be
used to make specific reference to a future event but not normally to a past event.
The English past tense is the morphologically and semantically marked form.
Morphologically, the vast majority of verbs have a distinctive past form, and
semantically in that the Past Tense refers to an action that is visualised as remote,
either in time (He listened to that story last week) or as unreality (I wish we were on
the beach). We have, consequently, in English, an unmarked tense, which we shall
call the Present and a marked tense which is the Past.
Tense is a category realised by inflection on the verb and English language, strictly
speaking, has no Future Tense. Against this view it might be argued that, in spoken
English at least, the enclitic form {ÂII} corresponding to shall and will is very similar
to an inflection (Downing et al., 1992). More important, however, are the form-
meaning relationships: first, shall and will belong to a set of modal auxiliaries and

can express meanings other than reference to future time, such as willingness in
Will you sit here? and request for instructions as in Shall I wash your car?
Furthermore, will has its own past form would; and finally, future time can be
referred to by a number of grammatical and lexical forms.
We shall examine in the following sections the meanings expressed by the present
and the past tenses, the various ways of referring to future events, and the status of
the Present Perfect.
ACTIVITY 8.1
1. To what extent do the Present and Past Tenses of English

correspond to the present and past time?
2. What grammatical devices are used in English to refer to future
events, and how is the choice between these conditioned by the
way the speaker visualises the future events?
8.8 MEANINGS EXPRESSED BY THE NON-

PROGRESSIVE PRESENT
Stative verbs such as be, seem, belong, or dynamic verbs, such as kick, eat, write
express the verb in the non-progressive present tense differently. In other words,
the meaning of non-progressive depends on whether the verb is being used
statically or dynamically, since many verbs lend themselves to both interpretations.
Stand in The hut stands on a hill, for instance, expresses a state, whereas the phrasal
verb stand up is used dynamically in All the soldiers stood up.
In general, dynamic but not static meanings occur after do in pseudo-cleft

sentences:
(20) a. What the children did was stand up.
b. What the house does is stand on a hill.

8.9 PRESENT AND TIMELESS STATES

Meanings of the Present static verb can express timeless statements, that is,
statements which apply to all time, including speech time. These include scientific,
mathematical and descriptive statements, as in the following examples:
(21) a. Cat is a mammal.
b. Gold has a relatively low melting point.
c. Two and two make four.
d. Silk feels smooth to the touch.
Humans usually engage in activities whose time span is not endless, e.g. know,
seem, belong. They are nevertheless states, in which no change or limitation into the
past or future is implied:
(22) a. He knows Penang quite well.
b. This land belongs to the Keretapi Malaysia.
c. Those exercises look difficult.
Here, too, the temporal reference includes speech time.
8.10 REPEATED EVENTS IN THE PRESENT

A series of events which cover an unspecified time can be expressed by dynamic
verbs to show the Present. Speech time is not necessarily or even usually included;
such statements are, however, valid at speech time:
(23) a. He sleeps in the hall.
b. Many families lose their homes in floods.
c. They spend most of their time studying.
Adjuncts of time, frequency, place, destination, etc., often accompany statements in

the Present which express repeated or recurrent events. Indeed, many such
statements as They spend most of their time are incomplete without a
circumstantial specification.

8.11 INSTANTANEOUS EVENTS IN THE

PRESENT
In certain situations, the event coincides, or is presented as coinciding, with the
moment of speaking, and without having any duration beyond speech time. The
present is used in such situations, which are classified as specific types:
Performatives:
(24) I warn you that this knife is sharp.
Exclamations with initial directional adverb:
(25) Off they fly!
Commentaries:
(26) Santokh passes and Mokhtar heads the ball into the net!
Demonstrations:
(27) I place the coffee in the cup, stir gently, and then sip slowly.
8.12 REFERENCE TO PAST EVENTS

The Present can be used to refer to past events in certain limited ways: (Downing et
al., 1992)
(a) In newspaper headlines
(28) Hard Cash sends back a blank Czech. (Pat Cash beats Ivan Lendl at
Wimbledon)
(29) Thousands flee persecution.
The effect of the Present in such cases is to dramatise the event, making it appear
before the readerÊs eyes as if it were in fact an instance of the instantaneous Present.
(b) In relating incidents
(30) He was only an average athlete, and then unexpectedly he wins two
Olympic medals.
(31) I was just about to go to work when all of a sudden thereÊs a knock at the
door and Samad rushes in.
This use of Âhistoric presentÊ is used by a desire to achieve dramatic effect, in this
case in order to highlight the main point in a narrative by bringing it into the
moment of speaking. Instances of the historic present in casual conversation tend to
be inserted into discourse containing Past Tenses and are often preceded by an

Adjunct signalling immediacy such as suddenly or all of a sudden.
(c) In reporting information: with verbs of communicating (say, tell) and of

perception (see, hear, understand), the use of the Present implies that the
reported information is still operative, even though the communicative
process took place in the past. If a past verb is used, e.g. said, announced, the
present validity of the information is not stressed:
(32) a. The RTM forecasts heavy showers in the north Peninsula.
b. Pak Samad says he has changed his tyres.
c. I understand that you would like to move to Tanjong Malim.
SELF-CHECK 8.3
Write five sentences to represent a state or event. If it is an event, is it

repeated, instantaneous, past or future?
8.13 MEANINGS EXPRESSED BY THE NON-

PROGRESSIVE PAST TENSE
The global meaning of the Past Tense in English is to demonstrate ÂremotenessÊ or
distancing from the moment of speaking, whether in time, towards the past, or with
regard to potential or hypothetical events which have not yet occurred in the
present or the future.
8.13.1 Definite Events in the Past

Non-progressive Past Tense is used to refer to a past event or state; the Past in
English contains two semantic features:
(a) To visualise the event as having occurred at some specific time in the past.
(b) To show the event was completed in the past, and a gap in time separates its
completion from the present.
These features are illustrated in the following examples:

(33) a. I bought some biscuits yesterday.
b. Tun Perak was born in Pahang.
c. He lived in Kuala Lumpur until 1890 and spent the rest of his life in
exile.

The criteria require a fairly rigid distinction in English between what can be
expressed by the Past and what can be expressed by the Present Perfect. The
meanings of specific occurrence, completed event and disconnectedness from
present time are not normally expressed by the Present Perfect; the above examples,
for instance, are unacceptable with the verb in the Perfect:
(34) a. *I have bought some biscuits yesterday.
b. *He has been born in Pahang.
c. *We have met four years ago.
Adjuncts of specific past time such as yesterday and in 2002 naturally combine well
with the Past, but not with the Perfect, since their function is to signal the past
moment in time explicitly.
We do not need to specify a past occurrence by means of an Adjunct, however, as

long as we have a specific time in mind and can assume that the hearer understands
this, from inference or from the situational context, the Past Tense can be used
alone, as in:
(35) a. Did you see that object coming down?
b. You didnÊt tell me you met Maria at the mall.
c. Did Kamal remember to buy the books?
The events referred to in these examples are situationally definite; the definiteness
of the event being in many cases confirmed by the definiteness of the participants
(that object, my letters) or the circumstance (at the mall).
The definiteness of the event expressed by the Past does not require that the time in
question be specified, only that it is mentioned. For this reason, even unspecific
adverbs such as once, when and conjunctions such as while and as soon as can
introduce Past Tense verbs:
(36) a. Latif knew football from the KL club.
b. When did you learn Swahili?
c. While we walked along, he told me about his assignment.
d. As soon as they saw us, they came to greet us.
SELF-CHECK 8.4
What is the meaning of progressive and non-progressive aspects?

8.14 THE PAST TENSE WITH PRESENT AND

FUTURE REFERENCE
The Past Tense can refer to time zone other than the past in the following three ways:
(a) In reported speech or thought: after a reporting verb in the Past Tense, the
reported verbs in the dependent clauses are also in the Past. This phenomenon
is known as ÂbackshiftÊ (Downing et al., 1992). Present Tense forms are
optional as in She said she would/will be glad to see us, as long as the
situation is still valid, and are sometimes preferred when a resulting temporal
contrast would be undesirable, as in:
I didnÊt realise that you were/are the president of the tennis club.
(b) In polite requests and enquiries the Past form ÂdistancesÊ the proposed action,
so making the imposition on the listener less direct:
(37) a. Would you just sit here, please?
b. Did you want to tell me now?
c. I wondered whether you needed a drink.
(c) Hypothetical subordinate clauses express a counterfactual belief or
expectation on the part of the speaker. The Past in such expressions was
originally a subjunctive whose only relic remains in the form were for all
persons of be.
(38) a. He speaks as if he owned the house.
b. If only we had more time!
c. I often wish I were richer.
Referring to future events

Future events cannot be referred as facts, as past and present situations, since events
in the future have not yet happened. We can predict with more or less confidence
what will happen, we can plan for events to take place, express our intentions and
promises with regard to future events.
Here we simply outline the main syntactic means of referring to future events as
seen from the standpoint of present time.
ÂSafeÊ predictions
These are predictions which do not involve the subjectÊs volition, and include
cyclical events and general truths. Will + infinitive is used, shall by some speakers
for „I‰ and ÂweÊ:
(39) a. Jamila will be nineteen tomorrow.
b. The best will soon be with us.

Prediction of generalities can include speech time:
(40) If people have the opportunity, theyÊll take it.

Will/Shall + Progressive combine the meaning of futurity with that of limited
duration, at the same time avoiding the implication of promise associated with
these modals when the subject is „I‰ or ÂweÊ:
(41) a. IÊll be seeing him tomorrow at about ten.
b. We shall be studying your application shortly.
Programmed events
Future events seen as certain because they have been programmed can be expressed
by the Present + Time Adjunct or by due to + infinitive:
(42) a. Our holidays start next Saturday.
b. The sun sets at 20.15 hours tomorrow.
c. She is due to retire in two monthsÊ time.
Intended events
Intended events can be expressed by be + going to + infinitive, or simply by
the Present Progressive + Time Adjunct:
(43) a. I am going to try to get more information about this.
b. Pete says heÊs changing his job next month.
Imminent events
An event which is seen as occurring in the immediate future is expressed by
be + going to or by be about to + infinitive:
(44) a. It looks as if thereÊs going to be a storm.
b. This company is about to be taken over by a multinational.
A prediction or expectation oriented to past time is expressed by these same forms

in the past:
(45) a. ItÊs not what I thought it was going to be.
b. She looked as if she was about to collapse.
Future anterior events

A future event anterior to another event is expressed by the Future Perfect:
(46) a. The programme will have ended long before we get back.
b. By the time he is twenty-two, heÊll have taken his degree.

Otherwise, the Future Perfect expresses the duration or repetition of an event in the
future. The addition of the Progressive emphasises the Âstretching outÊ of the
sequence.
(47) a. WeÊll have lived here for ten years by next July.
b. WeÊll have been living here for ten years by next July.
8.15 THE MEANING OF ASPECT

As you have seen, tense is primarily related to the event at speech time, or to a
reference point in the past. Aspect is concerned with the internal character of the
event as it is presented by the speaker; it focuses on such contrasts as durative
(extending in time) or non-durative, whether the event is seen in its initial stage or
its final stage, whether it is completed or uncompleted. We have already had
occasion to refer to the stative/dynamic contrast in describing the meanings of the
tenses in English and to the perfective/imperfective contrast expressed to some
extent in some complex verb phrases. Having fewer aspectual inflections, English
has fewer aspectual choices than some languages. The one obligatory choice is that
of the progressive (is/was going) versus the non-progressive forms (goes, went).
We shall treat progressiveness as a type of imperfectivity, or incompletion.
Perfectivity is not to be confused with the Present Perfect as in the aspects.
8.15.1 Perfectivity and Imperfectivity

The term „perfective aspect‰ is used to indicate that the situation expressed by the
predication is viewed as a single whole, without attention being drawn to the
separate phases that make up that situation. Certain uses of the Present (Jamal
passes the ball; We start tomorrow) can be considered perfective or zero aspect. The
problem is that habitual meanings, which are a form of imperfectivity (He works at
night; He works on and off), are expressed in English by the same base form of the
verb, the imperfectivity being conveyed by circumstantial expressions (at night, on
and off) or deduced from the co-text (On Saturdays he works on the night-shift. He
gets home at 8 a.m., has breakfast and goes to bed).
With past time reference, a perfective interpretation is equally dependent on

outside information. The verb spoke, for instance, in the sentence He knew he spoke
too fast can have a perfective interpretation if it is understood to refer to one specific
occasion, but an imperfective interpretation if it is understood as repeated, that is
that he habitually spoke too fast. In many languages, these distinctions would be
signalled morphologically.

Imperfectivity illustrates the internal structure of the event or situation. It is a wide

category, which can include such aspects as habituality, discontinued habit,
iterativity and progressiveness. While habituality is signalled by adverbs or the co-
text, and interactivity partly by lexical items in verb phrase complexes (kept on
shouting) and by phrasal verb particles (he hammered away), English does have a
specific form to express discontinued habit or state. This is the lexical auxiliary used
to + infinitive as in He knew he used to speak too fast
Expressing discontinued habit or state used to + infinitive is illustrated in the

following examples:
(48) a. Faris used to be a friend of mine.
b. There used to be trees all round this square.
c. This car used to belong to my sister.
d. An old house used to stand on this hill.
e. We used to visit each other quite often.
This structure has the following features:

(a) It is used with both stative verbs (be, remain, stand) and dynamic verbs
(speak, call) to express either a state or a series of events which were
discontinued before speech time.
(b) It is particularly helpful in being able to express, without an accompanying
time Adjunct, the fact that the state or habit no longer occurs. The time
expression can be added; for instance, many years ago can be added to all the
above examples, but the implicit meaning of not any longer is so strong that
an additional expression is unnecessary.
(c) It is used to make an event into a sequence of events, that is a habit. In other
words, it makes a potentially perfective expression into an imperfective one.
(49) i. He visited me. He used to visit me.

ii. We went to the theatre. We used to go to the theatre.
(d) It is not to be confused with be used to + {-ing} ( = Âbe accustomed toÊ + {-ing})
as in He is not used to working late hours.

To illustrate the meaning of used to + infinitive, below are some statements, the first
as an elliptical response:
(50) ÂYouÊre the football player,Ê Duli said. ÂThe Premier League. You played with
the Terengganu Club.Ê
ÂUsed to. DonÊt play anymore.Ê
SELF-CHECK 8.5
1. What is perfectivity and imperfectivity?

2. Differentiate between perfect tense and perfectivity.
3. What are stative and dynamic verbs?
8.15.2 Duration, Boundedness and Agency

We can understand the meanings expressed by the progressive in English, and the
restrictions on its use by elaborating on the stative/dynamic distinction already
made in treating the verb. We are concerned mainly with the duration or non-
duration (punctuality) of the verbal situation, whether or not it is agentive and
finally, whether or not it is bounded by an end point.
Static verbs
States are durative, in that they last throughout time; they are unbounded in that no
end point is implied in the verb itself, and they do not have agentive Subjects.
Static verbs can be grouped into the following classes:
Relational verbs: be, belong, consist, cost, depend, own, possess, seem sound, etc.
Verbs of involuntary perception: see, hear, smell, taste, feel
Verbs of cognition: know, think, understand, recognise, etc.
Verbs of affectivity: like, dislike, hate, detest, love.
Verbs such as stand, lie, live are intermediate between static and dynamic. With
inanimate Subjects a static interpretation is common (The farm lies in a valley, The
monastery stands on the hill); with animate Subjects a tentative interpretation
would be normal in They were lying on the beach, They were standing in the rain,
He lived till the age of eighty-five. When an end-point is established, expressed by a
directional adverb, the situation is evidently dynamic, as in Lie down on the
ground!, Stand up!, HeÊll never live down the disgrace.

Dynamic verbs
Dynamic verbs are classified as either durative or punctual. Durative verbs
represent dynamic situations which extend through time such as rain, read, sleep,
ripen. Punctual verbs do not extend through time: kick, blink, jump, drop.
Durative verbs can be either agentive (play, sing, whisper) or non-agentive (ripen,
grow, rain, snow):
(51) a. The children have gone off to play. (agentive)
b. DoesnÊt she sing beautifully? (agentive)
c. Weeds grow even faster in this climate. (non-agentive)
d. Grapes wonÊt ripen without some sun. (non-agentive)
Punctual verbs can likewise be either agentive (kick, hit, swat, jump) or
non-agentive (drop, blink, sneeze, explode):
(52) a. I smacked his face with a newspaper. (agentive)
b. The dog jumped out of the window. agentive)
c. The weather made me sneeze. (non-agentive)
d. The bomb exploded in the car. (non-agentive)
The action of smacking a face is always agentive, whereas that of hitting something
need not be, as in The car hit a tree. Similarly, it is not only animate beings that
jump, but also inanimate such as profits, temperatures, prices and populations. In
this very general outline of verb types, it must be remembered that a great many
verbs can be associated with many different types of Subject and express a wide
variety of situations. Only the most prototypical associations are presented for our
current purpose.
Durative and punctual verbs, both can either have an end-point or have no end-
point, that is, be bounded or unbounded. Here, again, certain verbs, such as boil,
can be either bounded (Âcome to the boilÊ) or unbounded (Âboil continuouslyÊ).
Unbounded verbs can become bounded by means of an adverbial particle (boil
away) or a resulting Attribute (boil dry). Rather than the verb, it is, of course, the
situation as it is expressed linguistically that is bounded (The water has boiled
away) or unbounded (The water is boiling), and a number of devices, including the
adverbial particles of phrasal verbs, expounded or unexpounded Objects,
Progressive aspect and so on, are exploited to establish the differences.

(53) a. I donÊt mind which we have; IÊll let you decide. (durative + bounded)
b. He runs every morning to keep fit. (durative, unbounded)
c. The traffic lights changed to red. (punctual, bounded)
d. The ambulance light flashed, warning motorists to give way. (punctual,
unbounded)
Durative verbs which have an end point are either agentive such as write out, eat
up, decide (bounded activities), or non-agentive such as grow up, improve, ripen
(bounded processes).
Durative verbs without an end-point are either agentive such as sew, whisper and
play (unbounded activities), or non-agentive such as rain, shine, boil (unbounded
processes).
(54) a. Eat up your food! (agentive, durative, bounded)
b. YouÊll find the tree have grown up in your absence. (non- agentive,
durative, bounded)
c. ItÊs not advisable to speak while listening to a lecture. (agentive,
durative, unbounded)
d. She polished her car till it shone. (non-agentive, durative, unbounded)
Punctual verbs which have an end-point are transitions; the agentive type includes
sit down, stop (bounded transitional acts); the non-agentive type includes die, catch
a cold (bounded transitional events).
Unbounded punctual events are momentary, either agentive such as tap, nod, pat
(unbounded momentary acts), or non-agentive such as flash, bounce, flap
(unbounded momentary events). Both types will frequently be interpreted in
context as iterative.
(55) a. I sat down anxiously on the edge of the wall. (agentive, punctual,
bounded)
b. The countryÊs foremost cartoonist died unexpectedly in his home last
night. (non-agentive, punctual, bounded)
c. The child patted the cat. (agentive, punctual, unbounded, probably
iterative)

8.16 THE MEANING OF THE PROGRESSIVE

English has a progressive aspect realised by verbal periphrasis: some form of be and
the {ăing} participle. It combines with both Present and Past Tenses, and also with
the Perfect, with modals, with lexico-modals and with the passive:
(56) a. He is reading Present + Progressive
b. He was reading Past + Progressive
c. He has been reading Perfect + Progressive
d. He will be reading Modal + Progressive
e. He is bound to be reading Lexico-modal + Progressive
f. It is being read Present + Progressive + Passive
The fundamental purpose of the English Progressive aspect is to indicate a dynamic

action in the process of happening. Attention is focused on the middle of the
process, which is seen as essentially dynamic.
Unlike some languages which also have a Progressive, English makes a grammatical
contrast with the non-progressive, as in What are you doing? as opposed to *What do
you do? That is to say, there is an obligatory choice between viewing the action as in
the process of happening (What are you doing?) and not viewing it in this way.
Inherent verbal meanings and the Progressive

The Progressive aspect is essentially dynamic in character, it lends a dynamic
interpretation to whatever verbal action it is applied to. For this reason, not all types
of verbal situation admit the Progressive, and those that do admit it are affected in
different ways.
States and the Progressive

Many stative situations are incompatible with the Progressive. Permanent qualities
such as Peter is tall, states of the weather such as ItÊs quite hot today and relations
expressed by such verbs as own, belong, seem, sound are visualised in English as
invariable and therefore non-dynamic. We would not find instances such as
(Downing et al., 1992):
(57) a. *Peter is being tall.
b. *ItÊs being quite hot today.
c. *He is owning / possessing land in Sabah.
d. *Your hay fever is seeming a bit less severe lately.
e. *That music is sounding too loud

Be and look as copular verbs linking the subject with a temporary attribute are more
versatile and can take on dynamic meanings, often indicating as attitude on the part
of the speaker:
(58) a. Puthu is being unusually patient with the children.
b. You are looking a little unhappy.
Verbs of involuntary perception (see, hear,Ê smell, taste) are incompatible with the
Progressive, whether the subject is the one who perceives (the Experiencer in
semantic terms, such as I in I saw the match on television, we in We heard the radio
commentary), or the thing perceived (the Carrier/Phenomenon, such as this fish in
This fish doesnÊt smell too good, and it in It tastes even worse).
When our senses are subjects, an imperfective interpretation is made possible by

means of can / could with the verb of perception:
(59) a. I can smell something burning. (not ÂI am smelling. . .)
b. We could see the flamingos wheel overhead and (could) hear the noise
of their wings. (not *we were seeing. . . hearing)
See, smell, feel and taste have regular dynamic, agentive uses which combine easily
with the progressive. In such uses these verbs refer to a deliberate action rather than
involuntary perception:
(60) a. IÊm seeing the doctor tomorrow. (visiting)
b. Who will be seeing to the sandwiches? (attending to)
c. Janet must be seeing her friends off. (taking leave of)
d. We have been tasting the pudding.
e. Experts were smelling the fungi in order to identify them.
f. I am feeling the childÊs foot to see if any bones are broken.
Verbs of cognition (know, believe, understand, wonder, suppose, realise) do not

normally admit the progressive:
(61) a. I believe you are right. *I am believing you are right.
b. He knows the answer. *He is knowing the answer.

However, with wonder, suppose and understand the progressive can ÂstretchÊ the
state, while verbs such as understand and realise can combine with the progressive
of begin to express the stretched out initiation of the mental state:
(62) a. IÊm wondering whether it was a good idea after all.
b. IÊm supposing that the money will be returnable without interest.
c. IÊm understanding Arabic a little better now.
d. We are beginning to understand the intricacies of the plan.
e. He is beginning to realise the implications of all this.
Affective verbs (like, dislike, love, hate) do not combine easily with the Progressive,
with the exception of enjoy, which is dynamic. They sometimes occur with the
Progressive, however; the question „How are you liking X?‰ seems to be more
indirect and therefore more polite than the non-progressive „How do you like X?‰:
(63) a. How are you liking your visit to Disneyland?
b. Oh, IÊm just loving it.
c. Frankly, IÊm hating it.
Durative Situations and the Progressive

Durative ÂprocessÊ verbs are already inherently dynamic (dance, write, sew,
whisper, rain, ripen, ache, etc.).The use of the progressive with durative verbs
which have an end-point (decide, write out, grow up, ripen) is to stretch out the
durative phase of the process before the end point:
(64) a. He is deciding about his future.
b. We are writing out the invitations.
c. She is growing up into a beautiful girl.
d. The apricots are ripening well.
Durative verbs which have no end point (sew, whisper, play, rain), including verbs
of bodily sensation (ache, hurt, itch, feel cold), the progressive has the effect of
limiting the duration of the process, so that it includes speech time (or orientation
time if this is in the past):
(65) a. Who is whispering over there?
b. It was raining hard when I left.
c. WhereÊs Ken? HeÊs playing golf.

With this type of verb, unlimited duration is expressed by the simple past. Compare
the following sentences:
(66) a. Lamps were glowing in the dark. Lamps glowed in the dark.
b. Snow was falling gently. Snow fell gently.
c. My back is aching. My back aches.
Acts, Events and the Progressive

With act and event verbs the use of the progressive results in a stretching out
of the verbal action, it becomes a sequence. With transitional events (those which
have an end point, such as arrive, die, catch a cold) and agentive transitional acts
(sit down, catch a ball) the progressive has the effect of stretching out the stage
before the end point:
(67) a. Just as I was sitting down, the dog barked.
b. Hurry! The taxi is arriving.
c. I think I am catching a cold.
d. The old warrior is dying.
With momentary verbs (those which have no end-point, whether agentive such as
tap, kick, fire, or non-agentive such as sneeze, bounce, flash), the use of the
Progressive must be interpreted as a repetition of the act or event. The sequence is
an iterative sequence:
(68) a. Someone is tapping on the wall next door.
b. The soldiers are firing on the rifle range nearby.
c. Why is that light flashing?
d. HeÊs kicking the ball all over the field.
These categories are approximate, rather than absolute. Some actions appear to be
more punctual than others. Some end points appear to be more final than others. It
would, for instance, be unusual to hear HeÊs slamming the door for it is not possible
to keep on slamming a door unless you keep on opening it. Moreover, the type of
subject and/or direct object can also lead to a different interpretation. Arrive, with a
singular subject, will be interpreted as a transitional event, the progressive
stretching the stage previous to the end point, as in, Hurry! The taxi is arriving.
With a plural subject and the progressive, arrive will be interpreted as an iterative
sequence, for example, Hurry! The guests are arriving.

The discourse functions of the Progressive

Since the progressive does not establish time boundaries, it has the effect of
providing a temporal frame around some point of time.
With the present progressive the point of time is typically the ÂnowÊ (What are you
doing? IÊm switching off the answer phone); but it may be interpreted as repeated
as in When he gets out of bed at seven oÂclock, sheÊs already doing aerobics, or as a
historic present as in We finally reach the supermarket and they are just closing the
doors.
Similarly, the past progressive provides a temporal frame without time boundaries
around some point of time or some bounded act or event:
(69) a. At half past five crowds were pouring into the subways. (point of time)
b. When we stopped at the door, Pat was shouting to us. (bounded act)
Within the flow of discourse, especially narrative, the progressive frequently has the
effect of ÂbackgroundingÊ certain information in order to highlight or ÂforegroundÊ
events expressed in the non-progressive past tense. A series of past tenses, by
contrast, will be interpreted as a sequence of events:
When we stopped at the door, Pat shouted to us.
The progressive may be used alone in a situation made bounded by a time

expression (an ongoing process within a situation seen as perfective):
(70) I was working in the garden all afternoon.
Be can be replaced by forms of come and go + {-ing}. The resulting combination can
be both perfective and imperfective:
(71) The soldiers came running across the fields.

SELF-CHECK 8.6
To illustrate the whole combinations of the tense-aspect system in a

more simplified perspective, we will look at it from forms, meaning
and functions. First, we will look at the whole system by analysing the
forms of tenses and aspects as given in the chart below.
Can you provide all the forms, meaning and functions based on the
combinations of the following matrix of aspects, forms and tenses?
The combination of tense aspect forms, as applied to the verb do and be (main verb)
such as in the above table. We should not forget that this list matrix reflects the
basic meaning of form, and function of the English tense-aspect system. The specific
constructions may express derived meanings and/or have special uses, depending
on actional and aspectual properties. For example, some forms of tense aspect of the
simple aspect are provided in the following.
The Simple Aspect

There are two types of the base verb forms; verb do and be (am, is and are). The
other related forms are present, past, tag question, wh-questions, negatives, modals
and passive voices such as in the following examples:

(72) a. We do our job. (present)

b. He does his job very quickly. (present)
c. Do you eat rice? (tag - present)
d. Does he play hockey? (tag ă present)
e. We do not do our job. (present ă negative)
f. We donÊt do our job. (present ă negative ă contraction)
g. DonÊt you do your job? (present ă tag ă negative ă contraction)
h. We will do our job. (present ă modal)
i. Our job is done by them (present ă passive)
j. Our job will be done by them. (present ă modal ă passive)
k. Teaching is our job. (present)
l. Is teaching our job? (tag - present)
m. Teaching is not our job. (present ă negative)
n. Teaching isnÊt our job. (present ă negative ă contraction)
o. IsnÊt teaching our job? (present ă tag ă negative ă contraction)
p. We did our job. (past)
q. He did his job very quickly. (past)
r. Did you eat rice? (tag - past)
s. Did he play hockey? (tag ă past)
t. We did not do our job. (past ă negative)
u. We didnÊt do our job. (past ă negative ă contraction)
v. DidnÊt you do your job? (past ă tag ă negative ă contraction)
w. We would do our job. (past ă modal)
x. Our job was done by them. past ă passive)
y. Our job would be done by them. (past ă modal ă passive)
z. Teaching was our job. (past)
aa. Was teaching our job? (tag - past)
ab. Teaching was not our job. past ă negative)
ac. Teaching wasnÊt our job. (past ă negative ă contraction)
ad. WasnÊt teaching our job? (past ă tag ă negative ă contraction
Organising the tense-aspect system in a very systematic way is very important for
teachers in order to present a suitable teaching syllabus to students.

 Aspect refers to such contrasts as durative/punctual and

perfective/imperfective.
 English has only one obligatory aspectual contrast: progressive/non-
progressive. Progressive is one type of imperfectivity.
 Another, that of discontinued habit or state, is expressed by used to + info.
Progressive are realised by be + {-ing}, combined with the inherent verbal
meaning to produce such effects as the ÂstretchingÊ of the event, repetition of the
event, etc.
 These effects are exploited in discourse.
 Perfectivity is not realised unambiguously in English by verbal forms, but must
be interpreted from the whole clause.
Clause
Subordinating conjunctions
1. What are relative clauses? Show by examples how these clauses are embedded
in sentences. What do relative clauses normally contain?
2. Do clauses and sentences refer to the same thing? Construct sentences that
contain more than one clause and clauses which are not independent
sentences. Can a clause contain a finite verb? Cite examples.

T op i c  Simple Sentence
9 Patterns
LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Explain how copula be, copulative, intransitive and transitive
sentence patterns are formed; and
2. Apply the formation of English sentence patterns accurately.
 INTRODUCTION
The English language consists of an infinite set of sentences. In order to analyse
English grammar, we have to collect and study all of the possible English sentences,
which would be an impossible task. The first step is to learn how to analyse the
grammatical structure of three simple patterns that underlie almost all of the
sentences in English.
9.1 SIMPLE STRUCTURES

The three basic sentence patterns of English are alike in that each reflects the two-
part structure that characterises the simplest sentences of the language. Underlying
such prototype sentences, we discover a noun phrase (NP) functioning as subject
and a verb phrase (VP) functioning as predicate. Look at these examples:
(1) Jimmy slept.
(2) Our neighbourÊs cat is outdoors constantly.
(3) A female cat eyed a bowl of tuna.
In each of these simple sentences, the left-hand constituent is a noun phrase

functioning as the subject. Remember that a noun phrase is either a noun or a group

TOPIC 9 SIMPLE SENTENCE PATTERNS  205
of words that can substitute for a noun, and as the example sentences demonstrate,
any noun phrase can be the subject of a sentence. Thus, the first subject is a single
noun; the others are noun phrases.
The right-hand constituent of the sentence is a verb phrase functioning as its

predicate. Like the noun phrase subjects, the verb phrases in the example sentences
are interchangeable. Any of the predicates may occur with any of the subjects to
form complete sentences.
In some sentences of English, the verb phrase consists solely of a main verb phrase
with its single verb constituting the entire predicate; in others, the main verb phrase
may be accompanied by other words, phrases, and clauses that are called either
complements (because they complete the predicate) or modifiers (because they add
to or modify the meaning of the verb). Complements are required to complete the
verb, and usually modifiers are optional. Note that the verb phrases in the sentences
above are interchangeable. Any of the right-hand constituents may occur with any
of the subjects to form complete sentences.
One of the ways linguists represent the structure of sentences is by drawing phrase
structure trees as discussed in Topic 3. It begins with the largest category, the
sentence, and hypothesises that all sentences are made up of subject noun phrases
and predicate verb phrases. They represent this information in the phrase structure
rule, using a single arrow that means it can be written as or consists of:
S = NP+VP
This general rule describes the basic form of all sentences of English and suggests
that to convey information in English, we create sentences that contain subjects
(either explicit) and predicates. If the order of the constituents is reversed, the
structure is not a grammatical English sentence. If one of the constituents is missing
(*is outdoors all the time), the structure is a sentence fragment.
To draw a phrase structure tree diagram, put the item to the left of the arrow at the
top and branch from it to the items on the right. The branching point (S in this tree
diagram) is called a node; any terminal point in a branch can become a node for
another branching. In a phrase structure tree (or phrase marker), each node and
terminal point is labelled with the name of the syntactic category to which it
belongs.
A phrase structure tree diagram representing the subject predicate structure of each
of these prototypical sentences would look like this:

206  TOPIC 9 SIMPLE SENTENCE PATTERNS
Tree 1
This simple phrase marker describes equally well the underlying structure of all
three of our example sentences. It shows how they are alike in structure. All that
needs to be changed is the specific noun phrase or verb phrase that occurs at the
bottom of the tree.
In the remainder of this topic, we will discuss these distinct kinds of sentences,
numbering them with roman numerals: Pattern 1 uses intransitive verb, Pattern 2
uses copula be (main verb) and the third pattern uses transitive verbs.
9.2 SENTENCE PATTERN 1 – INTRANSITIVE

TYPE
Consider the following examples:
(4) Fish swim.
(5) A telephone is ringing.
(6) Yasser slept (soundly).
(7) The customer complained (persistently).
(8) Chan must have enrolled (rather early).
If you divide each of these sentences to show its constituent structure, you will find
that each contains a noun phrase subject and a main verb followed either by nothing
at all or by an adverb phrase. Notice that the adverb phrases are optional, and there
are no noun phrases or adjective phrases functioning as constituents in the predicates
of these sentences. The verbs are complete by themselves.
The simplest sentences pattern 1 consists of a subject followed by a predicate in

which there is only a main verb followed by optional adverb phrases. The technical
name of the type of verb that can stand alone in the verb phrase and function as the
entire predicate is intransitive. The sentence type gets its name from the intransitive

verb, which is its distinguishing feature.
By extending the branches of the phrase marker, we get a representation of the

constituent structure of the simplest Pattern I sentences like the following:
Tree Diagram 2
The symbol S1 means „Sentence Pattern I‰ and V with the subscript int means
„intransitive main verb‰. Notice that there is no mention of adverb phrases in this
tree diagram. Adverb phrases are optional in Pattern 1; their presence or absence
does not distinguish one of these four types from another. For example, let us take a
look at sentence (6). Omitting soundly from Yasser slept soundly does not change
the structural type of the sentence; Yasser slept is still Pattern 1. Similarly, The
customer complained and The customer complained persistently are both Pattern I
sentences, as are Chan must have enrolled and Chan must have enrolled rather
early.
Only essential constituents are included in the structural formulas that we use to
represent Sentence Pattern 1, remembering that one or more adverbial modifiers
can occur in the predicates of any of the three basic sentence patterns. In the
discussion that follows, we will show how optional adverb phrases are added to the
tree or formula.
A linear method of representing the constituent structure of sentence patterns is by

means of the structural formulas. Here, the sentence constituents are arranged in
the same order as they occur in the basic form of the sentence. The structural
formula for Pattern I sentences (like the ones displayed in the phrase marker earlier)
is the following:
(9) S1 = NP + V int
A telephone + is ringing.
(10) S1 = NP + V int + (AdvP)
A telephone + is ringing + (very loudly)
The formula means that Pattern 1 sentences consist of a noun phrase subject (in this
case, a telephone) followed by an intransitive verb predicate (is ringing).
Intransitive verbs in Pattern 1 sentences can also have one or more adverbial
modifiers, like loudly, persistently, and rather early in the examples at the
beginning of this section. Adverbial modifiers of the verb add information about
how, when, where, why, or how much something happened. Adverbs are the
prototypical modifiers of verbs functioning as adverbial modifiers, supplying the
same sorts of additional meaning to the verb.
In representing the constituent structure of sentences that contain optional

adverbial modifiers, we simply add an adverb phrase (ADVP) branch to the tree
diagram in the predicate or an optional ADVP to the structural formula. A
structural formula for the same sentence, showing the optional adverbial phrase in
parentheses, would look like this:
Tree Diagram 3
You can read the sentence directly from the phrase marker: Yasser is the noun
phrase subject; slept is the intransitive main verb and the only constituent of the
main verb phrase; soundly is an adverb phrase; and together, slept soundly
constitutes the entire predicate verb phrase.
Soundly, very loudly and persistently are considered adverb phrases of manner
(AdvP man) because they add information about the way or manner in which the
action represented by the verbs are carried out. As we will see when we look at
Pattern 2 verbs, adverb phrases of time (AdvP tm) like soon and now, and adverb
phrases of place (AdvP pl) like here and there, sometimes behave somewhat
differently in sentences than do adverbs of manner, so we will include a subscript to
remind you each time which kind of adverb is being used.

There are some ways you can follow to test for intransitive verbs. You can test
whether a verb is intransitive by dividing the predicate into phrases. If all the
phrases except the main verb phrase are optional adverbial modifiers, then the verb
is intransitive.
Tree 4
9.3 SENTENCE PATTERN 2 – COPULA BE MAIN

VERBS
There are four types of Sentence Pattern 2. Each of them uses copula be or linking
verb to link the subject and the predicate. Their structural formulas are as follows:
(11) NP + copula be + Adverb of Place or Time
Mikhail is in Tg Malim now.
(12) NP + copula be + Adjective
Mikhail is hardworking.
(13) NP + copula be + NP
Mikhail is a student.
(14) There + copula be + NP + Adverb of Place or Time
There is something in the box.
These four types can be generated further by adding auxiliary verbs, such as:
(15) NP + must + be + Adverb of Place or Time (modals + be)
Mikhail must be in Tg Malim.
(16) NP + must + have + been + Adverb of Place or Time (modals + perfect)
Mikhail must have been in Tg Malim.
(17) There + must + be + NP + Adverb of Place or Time (modals + be)
Mikhail must be something in the box.

(18) There + must + have + been + NP + Adverb of Place or Time

(modals + perfect)
There must have been something in the box.
9.3.1 Pattern 2 Type 1– Requiring Adverbs of Time or

Place
Look at these examples:
(19) Jesse is outside.
(20) Her job interviews were yesterday.
(21) CherylÊs notebook must have been on the desk.
(22) The reception will be at noon.
If you divide these sentences into their constituents, you will see that they all
contain a noun phrase subject, a main verb be, and an obligatory adverb phrase.
That is, Jesse is outside cannot be shortened to Jesse is. The adverb outside is
essential. (The forms of be, as you recall, are am, is, are, was, were, be, being and
been.)
In Pattern 2 Type 1 sentences, a form of the verb be requires an adverbial

complement that expresses place or time, like outside (AdvP pi) or yesterday (AdvP
tm). Such complements refer to the place or time of the subject, not of the verb.
Contrast the following:
(23) a. The train departs at noon.
b. The reception will be at noon.
In (23a), at noon tells the time of the action represented by the verb (departure). In
(23b), at noon tells the time of the reception (expressed by the subject). Because be
links the subject with its adverbial complement, it is called a copula be or linking
verb.
Pattern 2 Type 1 sentences can be represented with a phrase marker like the
following:

Tree 5
The adverb phrase symbol AdvP is written with a subscript tm/pl to indicate that it
must be an adverbial constituent expressing either time or place. If the adverbial is
one of place (outside, for instance), it would simply be labelled AdvPpl. If the
adverbial constituent is one of time (yesterday), the label would be AdvPtm
The structural formula for Pattern 2 Type 1 sentences is:

(24) NP + copula be + Adv pl
Her examinations + were + last week.
Adverb phrases of place and time include such adverbs as inside, upstairs, here,
away, nearby, then, now, today and tomorrow. Prepositional phrases of time (in the
evening) or place (at the post office) and noun phrases (next week, Sunday) can also
function adverbially. For example, in Type 1 sentences like the following, a
prepositional phrase of time or place, instead of a simple adverb, follows the verb
and functions as an adverb phrase, the first one of place and the second one of time.
(25) a. KassimÊs notebook must have been on the desk.
b. The reception will be at noon.
A Pattern 2 Type 1 sentence with a prepositional phrase following the verb looks
like this when displayed in a phrase marker:

Tree 6
Another example of a Pattern 2 Type 1 sentence is The money was in my wallet all
along. Which of the adverbial phrases in this sentence is the required adverbial
complement, and which is an optional adverbial modifier? To decide which phrase
is necessary, try omitting the first one (The money was all along) and then the other
(The money was in my wallet).
9.3.2 Pattern 2 Type 2 – The Copula be with Adjectival

Subject Complement
Study the following examples:
(26) Sheila is attractive.
(27) His parties were very extravagant.
(28) Borhan is pleasant.
(29) Your brother had been sad in the past.
Notice that the predicate in each sentence pattern contains an adjective phrase
following the main verb, which may or may not be a form of be. In Pattern 2 Type 2
sentences, the verb is unable to stand alone as a complete predicate but requires an
adjective phrase following it: in this sentence pattern, either an adjective (like
attractive) or an adjective with an intensifier or qualifier (like very extravagant). The
adjective phrase follows the verb and describes the noun phrase functioning as
subject (as very extravagant describes his parties). Again, since the verbs serve to
join or link the subject to the descriptive word or phrase in the predicate, they are

called linking verbs (copulative verbs). The adjective phrase that follows them
functions as an adjectival subject complement (or predicate adjective). One meaning
of the word complement, as we have seen above, is „something that completes‰.
The adjective phrase that functions as a subject complement in Type 3 sentences is a
necessary constituent; it completes the predicate, while providing descriptive
information about the subject.
The phrase marker representation of Type 2 sentences looks like this:
Tree 7
The symbol MV with a subscript copula be stands for a linking verb, AdjP refers to
the adjective phrase that functions as the subject complement, beautiful and AdvP
in the bracket shows that it is optional.
The structural formula for Type 2 sentences is the following:
(30) S2 = NP + MV cop be + AdjP

Bill + is + friendly.
You can test the formula for Copulative or Linking Verb with Adjectival Subject
Complement by following the tips below.
Is the main verb followed by an adjective phrase that refers back to and describes
the subject? If the answer is yes, the sentence is Type 2.
For example, in the sentence Kamal looks great or Kamal is great the adjective great
describes Kamal.

9.3.3 Sentence Pattern 2 Type 3 – Copula be with

Nominal Subject Complement
Analyse these sentences, focusing on the verbs and the phrase types in the
predicates:
(31) Those men are savages.
(32) The auction was a success.
(33) My three sisters remained friends afterwards.
These sentences, like those of Type 2, contain copulative verbs that link the subject
with a subject complement in the predicate, but in Type 3 sentences, the copulative
or linking verb is followed by a nominal constituent, that is, a noun phrase
functioning as the subject complement. (Nominal means „functioning as a noun‰.)
The noun or noun phrase that follows a linking verb in Type 3 sentences always has
the same referent as the subject; that is, it always refers to the same person, place, or
thing as the subject noun phrase. For instance, the linking verb are in (31) is
followed by the noun savages, which is functioning as a subject complement. Both
the subject those men and the subject complement savages have the same referent.
They refer to the same people, and the noun savages describes or characterises
those men.
Some grammars call nominal subject complements (like brutes) predicate

nominatives because in languages like Spanish and German, these nouns occur in
the same case (the nominative) as the subject noun. The terms predicate adjective
and predicate nominative are useful in English for distinguishing adjectival subject
complements in Type 2 sentences from nominal subject complements in Type 3
sentences.

Table 9.1: Test for Copulative with Nominal Subject Complement
9.3.4 Copulative Verbs

Copulative verbs are verbs that have a completely neutral, linking role in the
sentence, by simply joining the subject to its subject complement without adding
very much additional meaning, other than grammatical meaning such as tense. One
important linking verb is be in its various forms. In fact, the linking function of
Type 3 verbs can be seen most clearly in the forms of be. Other linking verbs or
copulative (like became and seems in the example sentences) perform the same
linking function as be but add their own individual meanings to the sentence.
The verbs of sense are frequently used as copulative or linking verbs, as in the
following examples:
(34) a. The milk tastes sweet.
b. Your corsage smells wonderful.
c. Borhan sounds hoarse today.
d. His cashmere sweater feels silky.
e. Pathma looked surprised after her victory.
The tree diagram for Sentence Pattern 2 Type 3 is as follows:

Tree 8
To help you recognise copulative verb and copula be with adjectival subject
complement, follow these rules (Table 9.1).
Table 9.2: Tests for Copulative or Linking Verb with Adjectival Subject Complement

9.3.5 Pattern 2 Type 4 – Non Referential There

You have encountered there before as a pro-adverb. As a pro-adverb, it can be used
anaphorically (There we can see the crown jewels) and deictically (its meaning is
understood within the context in which it occurs). One of the manifestations of this
deictic meaning is that it is usually accompanied by some gesture, such as finger
pointing to indicate that it is also a stress.
(35) THERE is the little boy who looks after the sheep.
Deictic THERE calls attention to a location relative to the speaker. Contrast deictic
there with the unstressed there in the next sentence.
(36) There is a little boy who looks after the sheep; his name is Little Boy Blue.
There in this second sentence does not refer to any specific location. It is not
accompanied by any typical gesture, and it does not bear stress. There in the second
sentence is called the non-referential there.
The non-referential there is the subject of the clause; the deictic there is not. To
prove this, we can see that the deictic there, since it is an adverb, can be moved to
another position in the sentence. This is not true of the non-referential there because
as the subject, it is always clause initial:
Deictic there: The little boy who looks after the sheep is THERE.
Non-referential there: * A little boy who looks after the sheep is there.
(Sequencing the words in this fashion forces a deictic interpretation to the
there; that is, such an order is not possible with non-referential there.)
Recall that question tags are made with the subject of a sentence. Only the non-
referential there can be used in the question tag, demonstrating that it is indeed a
subject.
There and Subject Verb Agreement
As a subject, there is followed by a verb, most often the copula verb be and is
influenced by subject-verb agreement. For example,
(37) a. There is a book on the table.

b. There are two books on the table.

Here is the tree diagram and the derivation for the sentence (37b).
Tree 9
It is rather strange that the NP following the verb determines the form of the verb as
the basic property of subjects in English is their power to govern the agreement of
the verb. The explanation for this phenomenon is that the noun phrase following
the verb would have been the subject of the sentence rather than there.
To make matters more complex, there is also considerable variation from speaker to
speaker with regard to the form of the verb, with many speakers opting for a
singular verb when the verb is contracted with there, no matter what the number of
the following noun is:
(38) a. There are two boys and a girl in the room. (First conjunct is plural.)
b. There is a girl and two boys in the room. (First conjunct is singular.)
(39) There are a girl and two boys in the room.
Traditional prescriptive agreement now sounds strange to many native speakers of

English.

9.4 SENTENCE PATTERN 3 – THE TRANSITIVE

TYPE
Study these examples:
(40) Johan hit Bala.
(41) Three cats were licking the plates.
(42) The deodorant refreshes any body.
(43) The man had found a coin in the garbage.
Verbs in Pattern 3 sentences require a noun phrase complement that refers to

something or someone other than that to which the subject noun phrase refers.
None of the other sentence types have this characteristic.
The second noun phrase (NP 2) in prototypical Pattern 3 sentences functions as a

direct object. Verbs like hit and licking that are followed by noun phrases like Bala
and her toes functioning as direct objects are called transitive verbs, from which
Type V sentences derive their name.
The structure of Pattern 3 sentences can be represented by the phrase marker as

follows:
Tree 10

The structural formula for Pattern 3 sentences is the following:
(44) S3 = NP1 + MV tr + NP2

The deodorant + refreshes + any body
The transitive verbs of Pattern 3, such as hit and refreshes, are represented by the
symbol V with the subscript tr for transitive. Notice that the first NP, three cats in
(b) and deodorant in (c) which functions as subject of the sentence, is identified in
the phrase marker and in the formula with (NP1) to distinguish it from the second
NP, the plates and any body in the same examples, which functions as the direct
object and is labelled NP2. The different labels mean that the first NP and the
second NP have separate referents (that is, they name different persons, places, or
things). If, in a position directly following the verb, a sentence contains a second
noun phrase with a referent different from that of the subject noun phrase, you can
be sure that the verb is transitive.
You can follow the tips given in Table 9.3 to test for pattern Type 3.
Table 9.3: Tips to Test Transitive Verbs of Pattern 3

SELF-CHECK 9.2
Identify which of the four functions (main verb, progressive auxiliary,

passive auxiliary, existential) is illustrated with each be in the
following sentences. When be is a main verb, identify the type of
sentence in which it is part of the predicate:
1. The grass along the path was cut Thursday morning while we
were in the hall.
2. The building next to the pump station was one of those that was
destroyed by the fire.
3. The gamblerÊs beard is growing longer before our eyes.
4. The spanner has been lying on the table with the other tools all
the time.
5. Kamari is just being kindful again.
9.4.1 Transitive Verbs with Reflexive and Reciprocal

Direct Objects
Compare the following two sentences:
(44) a. Ali cut the apple with a sharp knife.
b. Ali cut himself with a sharp knife.
The first example is easy to identify as a Type 3 sentence containing a transitive

verb, but what about the second? If we assign subscripts to the noun phrases; is
himself in NP1 or NP2? It clearly refers to the same person as the subject, but cut is
a transitive verb in both instances. The form of the pronoun that should occur in the
direct object position is him, as in The knife cut him.
The reflexive pronoun himself signals that this is an exceptional instance of a direct
object that refers back to the subject. We understand the meaning and structure of
this sentence by analysing it in terms of the prototype transitive sentences: Himself,
even though it renames the subject, occupies the NP2 position of the direct object of
a transitive verb. Other reflexive pronouns that can function as direct objects in this
same way are myself, yourself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, and themselves.
Another case in which the direct object may have the same referent as the subject is
exemplified in the following sentences:

(45) a. The doctors respected each other.

b. My friends and I phone one another regularly.
The reciprocal pronouns each other and one another function much like the
reflexive pronouns to signal a direct object relationship to the verb, referring
back to plural subjects that have the same referents.
9.4.2 Distinguishing between Transitive and Linking

Verb Sentence Types
Notice how the tree diagrams of prototypical Pattern 2 and Pattern 3 sentences
resemble each other:
Tree 11
Pattern 2

Pattern 3
Both have two noun phrases, one functioning as subject and the other as a verb
complement in the predicate. The most easily recognised feature that distinguishes
them however is the fact that in Pattern 2 sentences, the two noun phrases have the
same referent (both are symbolised with NP), whereas in Pattern 3 sentences, the
noun phrases have different referents (as is reflected in the different subscripts on
the NP symbols).
The following tips will help to distinguish between Pattern 2 and Pattern 3
sentences:
(a) Is the verb followed by a nominal subject complement, that is, a noun phrase
that refers to the same person, place, or thing as the subject noun phrase? If so,
the sentence is Pattern 2.
(b) Is the verb followed by a direct object, that is, a noun phrase that has a referent
different from that of the subject noun phrase? If so, the sentence is Pattern 3.
9.5 PERIPHERAL CASES

Differences between Transitive and Intransitive Verbs
The verbs in Pattern 3 sentences are transitive verbs; they must be followed by noun
phrases functioning as direct objects. The verbs in Type 1 sentences are intransitive
the word means „not transitive‰ and they do not have direct objects. Contrast these
examples:

(46) The child rolled the ball slowly.

(47) The ball rolled slowly.
In the first sentence, the noun phrase the ball follows the verb and has a referent
different from the subject noun phrase, the child. The ball is functioning as direct
object of the verb, rolled, which is transitive; the sentence is Pattern 3. In the second
sentence, however, the same verb is used intransitively. In this case, the ball is
subject, and there is no other noun phrase; the sentence fits the Type 1 pattern.
Verbs like roll, which can be both transitive and intransitive, are common in
English.
SELF-CHECK 9.3
Can you think of other words that follow the same descriptions? For
example, cook:
(a) Tony is cooking the beans.
(b) The beans are cooking.
9.6 PASSIVE
The passive voice is an important grammatical structure that appears in every form
of written and spoken English. Knowledge of this construction is vital for reading
and writing English in everyday life.
Passive voice structures are an essential component of English rhetorical structure.

The ability to produce correct passive voice structures is an indispensable requisite
for success in writing English. The passive voice is less usual than the active voice.
The active voice is the „normal‰ voice. This is the voice that we use most of the
time. Verbs are also said to be either active (The executive committee approved the
new policy) or passive (The new policy was approved by the executive committee)
in voice. In the active voice, the subject and verb relationship is straightforward: the
subject is a be-er or a do-er and the verb moves the sentence along. In the passive
voice, the subject of the sentence is neither a do-er nor a be-er, but is acted upon by
some other agent or by something unnamed (The new policy was approved).

9.6.1 The Active and Passive Voices

Verbs can be seen in either active or passive voice where their differences are best
described in terms of meaning:
(i) Active Voice

When a verb is in the active voice, the subject of the sentence performs the
action, and the direct object receives the action.
(ii) Passive Voice

When the verb is in the passive voice, the subject receives the action, and the
doer (agent) of the action is stated in a prepositional phrase - by. The „by-
phrase‰ is used in passive sentences when it is important to know who
performs an action.
The illustration below will give you a better understanding of the passive voice.

Example 1:
Example 2:
Let us look at other examples below:

(48) a. Dinesh eats the orange.
- eats is in the active voice
b. The orange is eaten by Dinesh.
- is eaten is in the passive voice.
The above sentences (a and b) describe the same event and communicate the same
information. In Sentence (a), however, greater attention seems to be paid to Dinesh,
whereas in Sentence (b), focus is placed on the orange.
In the active sentence (a), the subject noun phrase (Dinesh) performed the action,
that is, he was the one who did the eating. However, in the passive sentence (b), the
subject noun phrase (the orange) received the action.
To give a clearer understanding, the orange, which is the receiver of the action in
both sentences, is the direct object in sentence (a) but the subject in sentence (b).
The doer of the action, Dinesh, is the subject of the active sentence (a) but becomes
the object of the preposition {- by} in the passive sentence.

9.6.2 Construction of the Passive Voice

The structure of the passive voice is very simple:
(49) subject + auxiliary verb (be) + main verb (past participle)

The main verb is always in its past participle form:
Look at these examples:
9.6.3 Related Forms of the Passive

Passive sentences can also be seen in other related forms such as:
(i) Present/Past Tense Form
Examples:
(50) a. The orange is eaten by Dolah.
b. The oranges are eaten by Dolah.
c. The orange was eaten by Dolah.
d. The oranges were eaten by Dolah.
(ii) Negative Form of the Present/Past Tense

Examples:
(51) a. The orange is not eaten by Dolah.
b. The oranges are not eaten by Dolah.

c. The orange was not eaten by Dolah.

d. The oranges were not eaten by Dolah.
(iii) Question Form

Examples:
(52) a. Is the orange eaten by Dolah?
b. Are the oranges eaten by Dolah?
c. Was the orange eaten by Dolah?
d. Were the oranges eaten by Dolah?
The tree diagram for passive voice is as follows:
Tree 12

SELF-CHECK 9.4
1. Which of the following clauses are in the active voice and which
are in the passive voice?
(a) The television station reported the results of the election.
(b) An old farmer started the fire.
(c) The baby was frightened by the loud noise.
(d) The deer was killed by the tiger.
(e) My student won the contest.
2. Reconstruct the following sentences into their passive voice
equivalents. (Make sure you preserve the meaning of the original
active clause.)
(a) The little squirrel buried the nuts.
(b) My nasty uncle, Pak Mat, fired the maid.
(c) Sailors consume large quantities of fish.
(d) Good music soothes our souls.
(e) That teacher taught chemistry and physics.
9.7 THE PASSIVE AND STRUCTURAL

AMBIGUITY
To review, the elements of the full passive voice are as follows:
The elements of the truncated passive are as follows:
All of the sentences of (53) are truncated passives; the doer of the action is left
unexpressed.

(53) a. The gates were opened.

b. My complaints were dismissed.
c. The objection was overruled.
d. The news was expected.
Each has an implied doer and we can reconstruct a full passive or active sentence
by supplying an actual doer. But now consider the sentences of (54).
(54) a. The gates were closed.
b. The meat was cooked.
c. My parents were amused all afternoon.
d. The ice cream was melted.
These sentences can also be construed as truncated passives, and we can supply
the implied doer. But there is another structural interpretation of these sentences
that looks like this:
In other words, the sentences of (54) may be thought of as actions, or they may be
thought of as descriptions.
SELF-CHECK 9.5
1. Construct passive sentences in which the following words are

most likely to be interpreted as past participles: agitated, upset,
withdrawn.
2. Use the same words to construct sentences in which they are
more likely to be interpreted as adjectives.

 Simple English sentences have four basic positions that define their structure:
the subject position, the main verb position, the position filled by a required
object or complement, and the position that can be filled by an optional
adverbial modifier.
 There are five types of English sentences in terms of the constituents that occupy
each of these four positions in prototype sentences. (The 0 in position 3 of
sentence Type 1 is called a null; it indicates that this position is empty in
sentences containing intransitive verbs.)
 There are three basic sentence patterns:

ă Pattern 1 ă Intransitive type
ă Pattern 2 ă Copula be main verbs
ă Pattern 3 ă The transitive type
 In English, all sentences can be transformed from one to another to serve the
following purposes:
– To emphasise information,
– To ask questions,
– To issue commands, and
– To fulfil many other functions.
Because words can be added, deleted, or moved about by transformations, it

sometimes becomes difficult to see the basic sentences pattern underlying
transformed sentences.
 Traditional grammars call the verbs passive voice perhaps because the subject of
the sentence may be thought of as passively undergoing the action of the verb.
Such sentences deemphasise the importance of the performer of the action.
Aspect
Perfective Aspect
Tense

1. Construct sentences with past tense verbs with present reference. The
sentences must illustrate "reported speech or thought", "polite requests and
enquiries" and "hypothetical subordinate clauses".
2. What are dynamic verbs? What do they represent? What are their types?
Construct sentences to show whether they are agentive or non-agentive types.

Topic  Transformations
10
LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Interpret simple declarative sentences into interrogative forms; and
2. Describe basic transformational procedures.
 INTRODUCTION
Topic 3 demonstrated how syntactic patterns of a language can be described by
phrase structure rules. However, not all sentence patterns can be described
efficiently by such rules alone. This topic on transformation will elaborate further
on phrase structure rules and how these rules are transformed. For example, the
sentences in (1) are examples of English sentences that cannot be generated by
the phrase structure rules for building sentences:
(1) a. What can Adnin accomplish?

b. What should Ali give Abu?
c. Who will Aliyana call?
The sentences in (1), all of which are questions, are best analysed as systematic
variations of the ordinary (non-question, declarative) sentences in (2), which our
phrase structure rules can generate. Thus, questions are systematically related to
the ordinary sentences:
(2) a. Adnin can accomplish a great deal.

b. Ali should give Abu his phone number.
c. Aliyana will call my father.

234  TOPIC 10 TRANSFORMATIONS
This is somewhat similar to the systematic relationship between, say, singular

book and plural books. That is, given singular form of nouns and a systematic
way of deriving plural forms from singular nouns, the plural forms need not be
stated individually in the lexicon (except in irregular cases, which are relatively
few).
10.1 TRANSFORMATIONS
Transformations mean changing one sentence structure into another sentence
structure: for example, changing an active sentence into a passive sentence.
Transformation does three things:
Similarly, we can also derive questions from declarative sentences. There are
many ways to do this. One way is to have ordinary phrase structure rules
generate the declarative sentences, and then change them into questions by using
transformations. Transformations express changes that may be made in the
structure of sentences generated by the phrase structure rules. For example, let us
look at the following questions which our students typically would have
constructed.
(3) a. Adnin can accomplish what?

b. Ali should give Abu what?
c. Aliyana will call who?
Like the sentences in (2), the sentences in (3) are generated with phrase structure
rules alone. In fact, the same phrase structure rules are largely used to generate
the sentences in (2). A new phrase structure rule for the wh-pronouns (PROwh)
ÂwhatÊ and ÂwhoÊ will be needed: NP ·- PROwh. The sentences in (3) may either
be left as they are or undergo a transformation that moves the elements of these
sentences around and forms the sentences in (1). Nevertheless, they are rules in
the sense that they express patterns in language. The transformation that forms
questions can be expressed as follows.

TOPIC 10 TRANSFORMATIONS  235
10.2 WH-QUESTION TRANSFORMATION

In general, transformations change sentences created by phrase structure rules into
sentences with equivalent meanings but different structures. As such, they give
account for why some sentences seem to be related to other sentences. These changes
are accomplished by adding or deleting words or by rearranging word order.
Wh-question transformations can be stated in the following manner:
Part (a) above tells us that (3a) „Adnin can accomplish what?‰ can be converted into
„Can Adnin accomplish what?‰. Part (b) of the transformation further converts this
into „What can Adnin accomplish?‰, which is (1a). Stop at this point to see that this
transformation correctly converts (3b) into (1b) and converts (3c) into (1c).
Linguists refer to the form of a sentence produced by phrase structure rules alone
as the Deep Structure of a sentence and the form that the sentence has after one
or more transformations has been applied as the Surface Structure of the
sentence. For example, the sentence that has the surface structure (1a) has the
deep structure (3a); the same goes for (1b) and (3b) and (1c) and (3c). Of course,
the sentence (3a) is also a grammatical English sentence as it stands and if we are
describing (3a) by itself, we might say that its deep structure is the same as its
surface structure, even though no transformation was used to form it.
Why do linguists adopt this complicated two-step analysis of the sentences directly by
the phrase structure (PS) rules alone, without making use of transformations at all?
The answer is that no set of PS rules (as they are defined) will allow us to generate all
the sentences in (1) and no ungrammatical sentences. Let us attempt to alter the PS
rules and illustrate why this approach is not workable.
10.2.1 Phrase Structure Rules

First, we need to make use of the PS rule in (4), which was mentioned earlier in
this module. This rule is not part of the problem ă it is needed to generate even
the sentences in (3) where no transformation applies.

To generate the sentences in (1) with only PS rules, we will need to add another
rule to our set of PS rules:
It may appear that the addition of this rule alone is sufficient. For instance, when
added to the PS rules we have already, it allows the set to generate the following
tree structure for sentence 1 (a).
(6)
The problem with the tree structure in (6) is that „accomplish‰ is a transitive verb
(Vt) and therefore, it cannot be inserted under a Vi node. The only rule in our set
that introduces a Vt node is:
Using this rule to generate (1a) creates a different problem. Consider the tree that
uses (7):
(8)

Now, we have an empty NP node (no lexical item has been inserted), which is
not allowed. Inserting something under the node results in ungrammatical
sentences, as in (9):
(9) *What can Adnin accomplish a great deal? Perhaps our dilemma can be
resolved by adding another PS rule to the set:
(10) VP -··- Vt
Now we can generate a tree structure for (1a) that allows us to insert a transitive
verb under a transitive node and does not leave an empty NP node:

(11)
Now that the rule in (10) is in our set, we can combine it with other rules.
Unfortunately, nothing prevents the following ungrammatical sentence from
being generated:
(12)
It should be clear that no set of PS rules can do the job. Thus we need the wh-
question transformation.

To summarise this discussion, we have, in fact, observed that a set of questions in

English beginning with „what‰, „who‰, „why‰and „when‰ lacks exactly one NP
to the right of the verb that would be present in the corresponding declarative
sentence. The wh-question transformation analysis of such sentences describes
the situation correctly, since it stipulated that an NP is moved to the beginning of
the sentence as the sentence is transformed. This kind of fact about syntax is not
easy to be described by PS rules alone.
Having discussed one transformation in detail, we now present two additional

examples of transformations in English. We will not explain the reasons for
proposing these transformations as we did for wh-question transformation
because, in some cases, these reasons are more complicated to describe.
10.3 PASSIVE TRANSFORMATION

In passive transformation, we move the subject NP (the NP that begins the
sentence) to the end of the sentence, insert the preposition „by‰ just before it, and
move the object NP (the NP just after the main verb) to the beginning of the
sentence. Then, we change the verb to the past participle form and insert the
appropriate form of the Auxiliary verb „to be‰ after the subject of an NP. For
example;
(13) a. Ali ate an apple. (Deep Structure, before transformation)

b. An apple was eaten by Ali. (Surface Structure, after transformation)
To remember that, the verb must be a transitive verb, that is, a verb which carries
an object.
10.4 VERB-PARTICLE SHIFT

TRANSFORMATION
In verb-particle transformation, we move the particle (the preposition-like word
immediately to the right of the verb) after the first NP following the verb. Look at
the following example:
(14) a. The surgeon sewed up the wound. (Deep Structure, before transformation)
b. The surgeon sewed the wound up. (Surface Structure, after
transformation)

 This topic briefly discussed three areas in transformational grammar: wh-

question transformation, passive transformation and verb-particle shift
transformation.
For each deep structure below, determine which transformations mentioned in

Topic 10 can be applied. In some cases, more than one transformation can be
applied to the same sentence.
(a) The girl can eat the beans.
(b) The black dog walked up the street.
(c) The millionaire gave the money to the old lady.
(d) The teacher looked up the word.
(e) Everyone will see the show.

REFERENCES  241
References
Aitken, R. (1992). Teaching tenses. UK: Thomas Nelson.
Alexander, L. G. (1988). Longman English grammar. New York: Longman
Azar, B. S. (1992). Fundamentals of English grammar (2nd ed.). New York:

Longman.
Barry, A. K. (1997). English grammar: Language as human behaviour. New

Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Barry, A. K. (2002). English grammar: Language as human behaviour (2nd ed.).

New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Biber, D., Conrad, S., & Leech, G. (2002). Longman student grammar of spoken
and written English. England: Pearson Education Limited.
Crystal, D. (1988). Rediscover grammar. UK: Longman.
Davidson, G. (2001). Phrases, clauses and sentences. Singapore: Learners

Publishing.
Disterheft, D. (2004). Advanced grammar: A manual for students. New Jersey:

Pearson Prentice Hall.
Eastwood, J. (2005). Oxford learnerÊs grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Frank, M. (1986). Modern English – Exercises for non-native speakers. New

Jersey: Prentice Hall Regents.
Hooper, J. S. (1980). A quick English reference. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University

Press.
http://www.hf.ntnu.no/engelsk/staff/johannesson/111gram/lect08.htm
Jackson, H. (1982). Analyzing English: An introduction to descriptive linguistics.

Oxford: Pergamon Press.

242  REFERENCES
Jacobs, G., & Inn, L. W. (2002). Grammar in use. Singapore: Press Ace Pte Ltd.
Kaplan, J. P. (1995). English grammar: Principles and facts (2nd ed.). Englewood
Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Klammer, T. P., & Schulz, M. R. (1992). Analyzing English grammar. Boston:

Allyn & Bacon.
Leech, G. (1989). An A-Z of English grammar and usage. London: Longman.
Leech, G., & Svatvik, J. (1975). A communicative grammar of English. London:

Longman.
Leech, G., Cruickshank, B., & Ivanic, R. (1989). An A-Z English grammar and
usage. China: Longman.
Lester, M., & Beason, L. (2004). Handbook of English grammar and usage. USA:
McGraw Hill.
Lester, M., & Beason, L. (2005). Handbook of English grammar and usage. US:
McGraw–Hill.
Master, P. (1996). Systems in English grammar. NJ: Prentice Hall Regnts:

Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
Noor Azlina Yunus. (1986). A quick English reference. Petaling Jaya: Penerbit
Fajar Bakti Sdn. Bhd.
Osborn, P. (1999). How grammar works. A self-teaching guide. (2nd ed.). USA:
John Wiley & Sons.
Parrott, M. (2000). Grammar for English language teacher. Great Britain:

Cambridge University Press.
Pollock, C. W. (1982). Communciate what you mean: Grammar for high level ESL
students. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Quirk, R., & Greenbaum, S. (1973). A university grammar of English. England:

Longman Group Ltd.
Quirk, R., & Greenbaum, S. (1990). A studentÊs grammar of the English language.
England: Longman

REFERENCES  243
Rozakis, L. (2003). English grammar for the utterly confused. USA: McGraw Hill.
Simpson, R. (2003). Teach yourself English grammar. Great Britain: Hodder

Headline Ltd.
Sinclair, J. (1991). Collins cobuild studentÊs grammar. London: Harper Collins.
Sinclair, J. (1993). Collins cobuild English grammar. London: Harper Collins.
Sinclair, J. (Ed.) (1991). Collins cobuild studentÊs grammar. London: Harper

Collins.
Sinclair, J. (Ed.) (1993). Collins cobuild English grammar. London: Harper

Collins.
Stern, G. (2000). LearnersÊ grammar dictionary. Singapore: Learners Publishing.
Strumpf, M., & Douglas, A. (1999). GoldenÊs concise English grammar. Kuala
Lumpur: Golden Books Centre Sdn. Bhd.
Swan, M. (2005). Practical English usage. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Thomas, L. (1993). Beginning syntax. UK: Blackwell.
Thomson, A. J., & Martinet, A. V. (2006). A practical English grammar. Oxford:

Oxford University Press.
Thornbury, S. (1997). About language – Tasks for teachers of English. UK:

Cambridge University Press.
Woods, E. G., & McLeod, N. J. (1990). Using English grammar: Meaning and
form. UK: Prentice Hall.
Wren, P. C., & Martin, H. (1968). High school English grammar and composition.
Bombay: K. & J. Cooper.
Yule, G. (1998). Explaining English grammar. New York: Oxford University

Press.

MODULE FEEDBACK
MAKLUM BALAS MODUL
If you have any comment or feedback, you are welcome to:
1. E-mail your comment or feedback to modulefeedback@oum.edu.my
OR
2. Fill in the Print Module online evaluation form available on myINSPIRE.
Thank you.
Centre for Instructional Design and Technology

(Pusat Reka Bentuk Pengajaran dan Teknologi )
Tel No.: 03-27732578
Fax No.: 03-26978702


Grammar in ESL

Hochgeladen von

Dokumentinformationen

Copyright

Verfügbare Formate

Dieses Dokument teilen

Dokument teilen oder einbetten

Freigabeoptionen

Stufen Sie dieses Dokument als nützlich ein?

Sind diese Inhalte unangemessen?

Copyright:

Verfügbare Formate

Grammar in ESL

Hochgeladen von

Copyright:

Verfügbare Formate

Faculty of Education and Languages

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Module Writers: Dr Andrew Ng Hock Soon

Moderators: Dr Saratha Sithamparam

Assoc Prof Dr Chung Han Tek

Developed by: Centre for Instructional Design and Technology

First Edition, September 2004

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM), August 2013, HBET2103

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Topic 1 Knowledge of Language 1

Topic 2 Introduction to Morphology and Syntax 18

Topic 3 Introduction to Phrase Structure Grammar 42

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

3.2.7 An Alternative to Trees 53

Topic 4 Parts of Speech 58

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Topic 5 Phrases 100

Topic 6 Relative Clauses 138

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

6.4.2 Relative Clauses with Gaps 147

Topic 7 Sentence Structures 159

Topic 8 Tense and Aspect 173

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Key Terms 203

Topic 9 Simple Sentence Patterns 204

Topic 10 Transformations 233

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

COURSE GUIDE DESCRIPTION

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Table 1: Estimation of Time Accumulation of Study Hours

2." Analyse grammatical structures using tree diagrams;

3." Identify the elements of morphology and syntax;

4." Classify the four major form classes of English words;

5." Identify the types and functions of phrases;

6." Build sentences of different structures; and

7." Describe the paradigm of the tense aspects system in English.

Topic 1 distinguishes between tacit knowledge and focal knowledge. An ideal

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

addition, it defines and differentiates between prescriptive and descriptive

Topic 3 introduces you to some basic procedures in analysing simple English

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Topic 9 focuses on analysing the grammatical structure of English sentences. The

Topic 10 demonstrates how syntactic patterns of a language can be described by

TEXT ARRANGEMENT GUIDE

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Self-Check: This component of the module is inserted at strategic locations

Activity: Like Self-Check, the Activity component is also placed at various

References: The References section is where a list of relevant and useful

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

TAN SRI DR ABDULLAH SANUSI (TSDAS)

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

1.1 FOCAL KNOWLEDGE VERSUS TACIT

Focal knowledge is the ability to list the steps to be followed in order to

Which one of the above is an acceptable English sentence? Why?

The ability to distinguish an acceptable English sentence from an unacceptable

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)

1. What is the difference between tacit knowledge and focal

1.2 UNDERSTANDING GRAMMAR

Figure 1.1: Understanding grammar is important in knowing a language

Copyright © Open University Malaysia (OUM)