Sometimes, students spend so much time drawing diagrams that they come to think of them as all there is to grammar.
I’ve actually never had to draw a grammar diagram for school, so this is new (and intimidating) information that’s never even crossed my mind.
diagrams
I feel like maybe I missed something, but I don’t think I’ve seen ‘s’ anywhere else in the chapter? Though I might be missing something.
the clause is linked by coordination to another clause, but neither one is contained inside the other
This actually helps me understand coordinators a lot better
parsing
This is such an interesting way to put this, as I’ve always heard people use parse as a synonym to skim
The modal verbs are can, could, may, might, shall, should, will, would, and must.
So, looking at this again, auxiliary verbs are determined by something with a probability of happening?
This also used to be true of have, and we see remnants of this in fixed phrases like “have you no shame?“. However, it would be strange today to sit in a diner and say something like “have you no decaf?”
So again, english plays fast and loose with its own rules when it’s convenient for the speaker and sounds nicer to the ear?
Note that unlike adjuncts, complements can’t be normally be fronted, except in a few dialects like New York Yiddish English when focusing or stressing the complement (usually expressing surprise or disbelief) :
I’ve actually never heard a New York Yiddish accent, or if I have I can’t recall what it’s like—what is it like, if it’s possible to give more examples?
(4) I know [I should have checked my bank account]. (5) I strongly believe [that the secretary embezzled funds]. (6) I really want [my car running reliably]
So would it be used for things that aren’t confirmed, or things you want that haven’t happened?
are generally the same thing we think of when we think of a ‘complete sentence’
So would it be like the subject-object-verb format that is taught in elementary schools?
A phrasal verb construction
Are there any tips for keeping the tree organized when it starts getting larger like this?
Prepositional phrases are often optional modifiers in the sentence rather than the central elements. Nonetheless, prepositional phrases appear over and over, and so it’s worth examining how these phrases work in some detail.
At first glance, it seems the easiest way to see what these modifiers are is if they talk about location.
Notice, for example, that the meaning of the bare NP cats is not the same as the determined NP the cats
So if it can made a phrase with only one word, it’s safe to say there’s a zero determiner before it?
In (13) the adjective diligent is a modifier of the head noun workers.
So it’s another term for adverbs and adjectives?
As the examples above show, eat can be followed by a noun phrase or by nothing at all
Whiles I still may need more practice with this, again the examples are helpful, I just fear I may not be able to memorize all these rules…
As these examples show, neglected requires exactly one noun phrase to follow it (1a and 1d). It does not permit us to drop the NP (1b) or to replace it with an AdjP (1c). It also doesn’t allow two NP’s (1e) or one NP and one AdjP (1f). All of these permutations, however, are possible with other verbs:
Even with the example getting a lot more complex, I think it’s still keeping me engaged and understanding even though there’s a lot more going on.
futurity
I had to look up if this was a word, and it is… though the first thing that came up was about horse competitions for some reason
Marissa ________ her dog
It seems like the only one that wouldn’t work is ‘walking’
We mark (14) as ungrammatical not because it has no sensible interpretation but because her cannot be understood to apply to Genevieve. If her referred to any ‘her’ other than Genevieve, the sentence would be acceptable.
I was actually taught this in school! I thought the rule didn’t make much sense with how it was explained to me, but this is a bit clearer—pronouns only belongs to the recent, relevant noun, right?
impossible to give a concise and complete definition of what an adverb is, because different adverbs have different properties.
It seems like this would be the most difficult thing to locate due to the vagueness of the concept, if even the rules applied here are even sure fire ways of telling what it is.
Phonemes are a vital part of speech because they are what dictates how a sound of letter or word is distinguished which differentiates the meaning of words
While I was taught different aspects of speech, I’ve noticed New York elementary schools don’t teach phonics. I’ve always had a hard time pronouncing new words, due the English’s system, but I’ve never quite realized that… phonics could be clear and simple to understand if you just learn, and it could make everything so much easier to understand.
Indeed, language is often said to be a combinatorial system, where a small number of basic building blocks combine and recombine in different patterns.
I was initially really concerned about this description, but ultimately it ended up being really easy to understand in combination with the hand out we were given, and I feel like the hand out and this chapter gives a clear understanding of the basic differences in language and the components of this
obscure feature of grammar that students would be unlikely to encounter or care about.
While it may be obscure, I do find myself very interested in these concepts, even if I’m unlikely to run across them. Which feature are ones that we most likely will not see? Are they concepts that are outdated or things that have no bearing on understanding and sentence structure?
.T
There seems to be a space missing on my side, though it may just be my screen!
Speakers of a language vary depending on their geographical origin, class, gender, and ethnicity.
This is very true! A lot of Americans have a hard time understanding different creole or Caribbean dialects, even when the official language of that country is English—a Caribbean wouldn’t understand what a ‘kiki’ anymore than an American would understand what a ‘lime’ is, even when they both mean ‘to hang out’—there are a lot of terms that are used in Trinidadian English that don’t exist in standard English, of either the British or American varieties, and while the written language is very similar to British English, the accepted spoken grammar is a lot different.
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This is perhaps a question about the punctuation used, but it surprised me a bit to see an em-dash used like this. If an em-dash is used traditionally to interrupt a sentence to add more context, or add on extra information at the end, when is a semicolon used when it also can be added to a sentence to add information? Or is this a stylistic choice that depends on the writer, similar to how em-dashes can be used in the place of parentheses and commas?