ENGLISH GRAMMAR

English Grammar A Short Guide Graham Tulloch

2 This book was prepared in the English Discipline of the Flinders University of South Australia and printed by Flinders Press 1990 Graham Tulloch FURTHER READING This is intended as a basic and simple guide to English grammar For a more detailed introduction with exercises see JR Bernards excellent book A Short Guide to Traditional English Grammar Sydney Sydney University Press l975 to which I am much indebted For a longer study read Randolph Quirk and Sidney Greenbaum A University Grammar of English London Longman 1973 and for a very detailed very complex and very expensive treatment of the subject see Randolph Quirk Sidney Greenbaum Geoffrey Leech and Jan Svartik A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language London Longman 1985

3 PARTS OF A WORD A word can be divided into its STEM the basic part of the word containing its meaning and its INFLECTIONS the endings added to indicate such things as that a noun is PLURAL or a verb is in the past tense Examples Stem dog walk Inflections s in dogs ed in walked PARTS OF A SENTENCE SUBJECT The subject is the person thing or topic which the sentence deals with To discover the subject ask who or what before the verb eg in the sentence The house stands on the hill what stands on the hill Answer the house Examples The house stands on the hill It overlooks the plain PREDICATE The predicate is all of the sentence except the subject Examples The house stands on the hill It overlooks the plain OBJECT The object is the person thing or topic upon which the subject carries out the action of the verb To discover the object ask who or what after the verb eg the house overlooks what Answer the plain Examples The house overlooks the plain I see him clearly He watches himself carefully In some cases a whole clause can act as object Example He said that the Green Knight was really orange Sometimes we apparently have two objects Where one of these can alternatively be expressed by placing to before it it is called the indirect object For example instead of He gave me the book we can say He gave the book to me Here the book is the direct object and me the indirect object COMPLEMENT

4 After the verb to be there is no object since the noun which follows refers to the same thing as that which precedes the verb the subject The noun following the verb to be is called the complement Examples I am a man This is the question CLAUSE There are two kinds of clauses principal or main clauses and subordinate or dependent clauses Principal Clauses A group of words which includes a subject and a finite verb and makes a complete statement Examples I am a man The house stands on the hill When I come home I will let the cat in The following are not principal clauses because they do not make a complete statement which can stand by itself Which is a problem That the house is standing on the hill When I come home The house which stands on the hill Subordinate Clause A group of words which includes a finite or non-finite verb but does not make a statement which stands by itself Examples As soon as the Green Knight entered the room all were astounded He said that the Green Knight was really orange The house which stands on the hill is empty Subordinate clauses can be classified according to their function Adverbial Clause Example As soon as the Green Knight entered the room all were astounded In this sentence the clause fulfills the same function as an adverb such as immediately in the sentence immediately all were astounded Noun Clause

5 Example He said that the Green Knight was really orange The clause fulfills the same function as a noun such as the words in He said the words Relative Clause Example The house which stands on the hill is empty Relative clauses are adjectival in nature The clause fulfills the same role as an adjective such as high-placed in the sentence The high-placed house is empty Clauses can also be classified by whether they contain a finite verb Finite Clause A finite clause contains a finite verb and usually a subject It can be a principal clause or a subordinate clause Examples They say nice things about you principal clause When they say nice things about you they are not lying subordinate clause Non-Finite Clause A non-finite clause contains a non-finite verb but does not contain a finite verb Examples Singing and dancing he moved slowly up the aisle He gave me an invitation to bring you to the party Having eaten all the cakes he began to consume the biscuits Filled with joy he left the room PHRASE A phrase is group of words without a verb Examples It is on the hill He went over the sea PARTS OF SPEECH Examples house noun The house article noun The house stands article noun verb The house stands firmly article noun verb adverb

6 The house stands firmly on the hill article noun verb adverb preposition article noun The empty house stands on the hill article adjective verb adverb preposition article noun It stands on the hill pronoun verb preposition article noun Since it stands on the hill it overlooks the plain conjunction pronoun verb preposition article noun pronoun verb article noun NOUN Nouns can be thought of as names they denote things people abstract ideas Examples The house is old A king was here Virtue is its own reward Accidents will happen ARTICLE The articles are the a an The is called the definite article a and an is called the indefinite article VERB A verb is a quotdoing wordquot It expresses the carrying out of an action With an active verb this action is carried out by the subject Examples It stands I am He adjudicates between the parties concerned Alfred burnt the cakes With a passive verb the action is carried out upon the subject Examples The cakes were burnt by Alfred The Bible is read in many languages Verbs have various qualities Tense This is the feature of the verb indicating when the action took place

7 Examples Present tense It stands Past Tense It stood Future Tense It will stand Aspect This is the feature of the verb which indicates whether the action is was or will be a completed one or a continuous one If the verb is unmarked as to whether it is completed perfect or continuous progressive it is called simple Hence we can draw up the following scheme Simple Present It stands Simple Past It stood Simple Future It will stand Present Perfect It has stood Past Perfect It had stood Future Perfect It will have stood Present Progressive It is standing Past Progressive It was standing Future Progressive It will be standing The present perfect is often know simply as the perfect and the past perfect is sometimes called the pluperfect Voice In English we have the active and the passive voice In the active voice the subject carries out the action of the verb in the passive the action of the verb is carried out upon the subject Examples Active I place Passive I am placed A full complement of passive verbs exists in English The passive is formed with the appropriate tense of the verb to be and the past participle Examples Present Progressive Passive I am being placed Past Perfect Passive I had been placed Future Perfect Passive I will be placed Mood There are three moods in English

8 1 Indicative The indicative mood is the normal one in present-day English PE Example I was going to the pictures 2 Subjunctive The subjunctive mood is much rarer in PE it expresses a hypothetical action Examples If I were going to the pictures I wish I were going to the pictures 3 Imperative The imperative mood expresses an order Example Go to the pictures Finite and Non-Finite Verbs Verbs are either finite or non-finite Non-finite verbs do not include any indication of tense One kind of non-finite verb is the infinitive The infinitive is the basic form of the verb It is often combined with to as in I am going to stand here However the infinitive is not always preceded by to in the sentence I will stand the infinitive is stand Combined with will the infinitive stand makes the finite future tense verb will stand Other non-finite parts of the verb are the participles The present participle is the form of the verb used in constructions like I am going He is combing his hair They are developing rapidly The same form of the verb can also be used as a noun in which case it is called a gerund or verbal noun Examples Developing is not easy Walking is pleasant in the summer or as an adjective in which case it is called a gerundive or verbal adjective Examples The third world is made up of the developing countries She is a growing child The past participle is used in constructions like I have walked She has grown It has developed into a major argument

9 This form is often the same in PE as the past tense cf I walked but not always cf I grew This also appears as an adjective A grown man ADVERB An adverb modifies a verb it indicates how the action of a verb is carried out Examples The house stands firmly She speaks well He dresses beautifully It can also modify an adjective or another adverb The house is very firm She answered most considerately PREPOSITION A preposition connects a noun with or without an article or a pronoun to some other word Prepositions are the quotlittle words of Englishquot Examples It stands on hills The swagman jumped into the billabong England is over the sea She told the good news to him ADJECTIVE An adjective qualifies a noun it describes the attributes of a noun Examples The house stands on the high hill Precious purple prose provokes profound professors PRONOUN Pronouns take the place of nouns Examples It stands on the hill I see myself The house which stands on the hill overlooks the plain That stands on the hill What stands on the hill There are a number of different kinds of pronouns Personal Pronouns These are divided into quotpersonsquot as follows

10 Singular Plural First person I we Second person you thou you Third person he she it they The personal pronouns also include the reflexive and emphatic pronouns These are the same in form but different in function They are myself himself themselves etc Examples Reflexive I see myself People help themselves Emphatic I think myself that it is wrong They themselves want to stay on Relative Pronouns The relative pronouns are as follows People Things Subject who that which that Object whom that which that Possessive whose whose These are used in relative clauses such as Examples This is the man who saw me This is the man whom I saw This s the man whose house I saw This is the man that I saw This is the house that Jack built Demonstrative Pronouns These are This these That those Examples This is the house That is the question They are also used as demonstrative adjectives Examples This man is green That house is red Interrogative Pronouns These are used in questions People Things Subject who what which

11 Object whom who what which Possessive whose Examples Whom did you see Who is that man Which is the right way Whom did you speak to What and which can be also used as interrogative adjectives in which case they can be applied to people Examples Which house stands on the hill Which Prime Minister was drowned What sweet do you recommend CONJUNCTIONS Some conjunctions are coordinating ie joining elements of the same kind like and or but Examples It stands on the hill and overlooks the plain I say this but she says that Other conjunctions are subordinating ie joining a subordinate clause to a main clause like when because since as Examples Since it stands on the hill it overlooks the plain Although I say this she says that When Gawain saw the Green Knight he did not show that he was afraid