This question is about conditionals
If I had money, I would give it you
If I had money, I would have given it to you
But I've come across people mixing conditional 2 and 3 like
If I was there, I would have done that
What does this statement mean? Is it grammatically correct? I feel it should be like "If I had been there I would have done that."
How do I properly place a comma after a big block-quote? Let's say I have a sentence like this:
The author states: < a big quote goes here. >, therefore...
Since my sentence continues after the quote, it is sometimes necessary to put a comma or some other punctuation mark after the quote. However, sometimes the quote is inserted as a big block of text that is formatted in a special way (like on this site). How do I do it in this case? The following doesn't really seem right to me:
The author states:
Some big quote
goes here.
, therefore...
Answer
You can see just in this forum that sentences are not generally continued after block quotes.
However, it is explicitly stated in the MLA style guide that the sentence preceding a long quote set off by indentation should end with a colon, that the quotation should end with a period, and that the next sentence should continue at the normal indentation after the quotation.
The following shows this...
This is a block quote:
Indent this, then end the sentence with a period.
Continue afterward with another sentence.
I hope this is the right place to ask this, if not please give a feedback.
According to the Wikipedia, the term gerontology is made up from two parts, geron and -logia, which mean respectively "old man" and "study of" in Greek.
I was looking for a hint, why the term has an extra -t. It seems to me that it has some indirect associations with ontology and I thought that might be the reason but couldn't find something concrete.
Thank you in advance.
Answer
Great question! Save for the oral echo, there's no necessary relationship between gerontology and ontology. The t comes from the genitive case.
Here is the Ancient Greek Wiktionary entry for γέρων (geron). Note that, unlike English, Greek has several noun cases, including the genitive γέροντος (gerontos), the dative γέροντῐ (geronti), and the accusative γέροντα (geronta).
Now, think about the meaning of gerontology you suggested. It is the study of old men. In another language, old men might be in the genitive or dative, indicating some relation to the head noun. The root being adapted into English may come from this form. So in that case we would have geront- plus logos, which after adjusting each to fit English paradigms for Greek roots (logos to -logy with -o- as a combining vowel, gerontos or geronti to geront-) results in gerontology.
Odontology behaves in a similar way, with the root being ὀδούς (odous) but changing in the genitive form to ὀδόντος (odontos). (See also orthodontics and other toothy variants.)
More generally, these are examples of classical compounds.
Take the sentence:
Who is the right person to turn to?
I'm not sure whether who or whom should be used in this position.
And why?
I always see whom used in questions. This is not a question, is a statement. Whom sounds correct to me, but I'm not sure if it is and why.
The "rules" I've seen around are all for questions, not for statements. In this case, "whom" seems the object to whom (hehe) the action of "being with" is performed. Is this correct?
Answer
The distinction as I understand it after reading the comments is essentially about the distinction between the possible sentences:
You are with whoever your mind is with.
and
You are with whomever your mind is with.
My answer is that the latter is correct and the former is acceptable in many variants of modern English.
Reasoning
We say, 'You are with him.'
We do not say, "You are with he."
The above is almost universally true, regardless of grammatical terminology.
We can say, 'You are with whom?'
In many varieties of English we can say, 'You are with who?'
We merely have to extend this series in order to arrive at the two sentences I started with.
In common American English usage, these two questions elicit the same response:
These are the usual answers (I was going to say "possible answers" but I can think of a whole host of situations where one could get other answers, e.g. wake up someone in the middle of the night and ask it, the answer might easily be "I don't know" or "maybe" or "hey, just let me sleep!"... but that's neither here nor there... :-)
But consider this: the questions are logically equivalent to:
Here I am not so sure that a "Yes, that's right" response means the same thing to each question. (One could still, however, use "Yes, I do" as @F'x answer in How to answer a negative question without ambiguity? illustrates, to remain valid and unambiguous.)
(As a side note, it is interesting to compare the same question in Chinese, where one literally asks
"Do you have/not have a ticket?" and the common answers are:
...which also removes the ambiguity... while at the same time straying from my original question:-)
So why can I rewrite the questions so that they are essentially equivalent yet expect different answers?
Can "wouldn't" be reduced to the clitic -'dn't when attached to any other pronoun besides y'all, such as she'dn't or you'dn't?
(Appearing for example in "y'all'dn't've" from formal English "you all would not have")
Which is the correct expression, looking to build or looking to building?
Whether you are looking to build. . . .
or
Whether you are looking to building. . . .
Example:
When I called, he came a running.
My first inclination was that it's an article and the participle is being used as a gerund, but that doesn't make sense structurally.
My second is I wonder if it comes from Latin or a Latin-based language influence. For example, European Portuguese puts an "a" between:
He came running. (He came a running)
Ele(He) veio(came) a(a) correr(running).
Update:
What is the story behind "a-" prefix / suffix?
This suggested duplicate question is not in fact duplicate. It doesn't provide a grammatical basis. It doesn't explain what it is. Is a being used as an article or a preposition or something else? It is (couched midway in the third of seventeen paragraphs of one of three answers on the alleged duplicate post) postulated to be a preposition. But this has no basis in grammar because the only prepositional definition of a is per, as in each, because a does not mean on, not in any dictionary from OED to Merriam-Webster to American Heritage or to any other I could find. This other post asks for the story behind a; I'm asking what tenet of grammar justifies using a, which this other post does not illuminate.
My friend told me that you can NEVER use a comma before 'that' but I think you can. Can someone clear this up for us?
How would we classify the phrase "worn out?" I know it can belong to the verb figure of speech, but here I'm interested in the usage where it seems to function as an adjective.
He put on his worn out shoes.
Sorry, I'm a bit confused as to whether I should include a hyphen as well.
I'm guessing that there is some kind of classification for this. I know we have compound nouns, is there a compound adjective or a phrasal adjective?
What is the correct plural form of an abbreviation whose last word starts with 'S' (thus making the last letter in the abbreviation an 'S')?
The example I keep running into is "CMS", an abbreviation of "Content Management System". How would I refer to a group of these beasts?
Answer
I think CMSes is perfectly fine. Some would say CMS's is okay, though I prefer the version without an apostrophe.
I don't agree with CMSs because CMS is an initialism where each letter is pronounced, not an acronym like SCUBA. (Though others might have input on the words initialism and acronym, you know what I mean.)
Should company names be followed by "has" or "have"? It depends on whether a company is treated as a singular proper-noun:
Samsung has gotten itself in a lot of trouble recently.
Or plural proper-noun:
Samsung have stated they don't imitate cooler products.
Are both acceptable?
Answer
A company is a collective entity. When referring to a company by name, it is the overall entity that is being referenced. It is treated as a single thing for the purpose of verb (and pronoun) agreement.
While there are other collectives that may, at times be treated as a plural to reflect the multiplicty of the participants in the activity or characteristic, even when a company is a conglomerate of many smaller companies, the name use is singular.
Time-Warner collects revenue from all of its subsidiaries.
What exactly is the difference in meaning between the two words posit and postulate, besides the fact that the latter one is also used as a noun?
Both words are formal and their definition are quite equal; in some learners' dictionary they're even identical.
postulate/posit: to suggest (something, such as an idea or theory) especially in order to start a discussion
Based on COCA both words are commonly used with theory but postulate is the appropriate word for Khazzoom–Brookes postulate. But since both words posit and postulate are not very regularly used, this is the only hint the corpora gives (and BNC contains even less material).
It doesn't look like there's a general tendency to use one word more commonly for a particular area of expertise, for instance science (e.g. astronomy) or religion (existence, God), except the Khazzoom–Brookes postulate, of course. At any rate, it seems like the words can be interchanged.
I am writing documentation for a code base, and I want my documentation to be as clear and unambiguous as possible. I am searching for the proper term to refer to the position of digit within a number.
Take the number, 00100000, and I want to refer to the position of the 1. So far I have come up with bit "placement"; however, this is unclear as to which direction the bit placement increases, without further explanation. I know that the leading bit is referred to as the "most significant bit", and the rightmost is referred to as the "least significant bit"; therefore, would it make sense to use the term bit "significance", or is there a mathematical term to describe this?
Example of how I plan to use the term: The placement of the 1 is 5, or the significance of the 1 is 5.
Answer
In a positional numeral system, each digit's weight is determined by its position in the numeral.
I have lived my entire life in the United States, and to learn more
about the life my parents had lived as children was an incredible experience.
However, I then asked, "What was an incredible experience?" I realized that there is no noun to define what the experience was. Therefore, would I have to replace "to learn" with the gerund "learning"? Or is the sentence above completely fine? If it is already correct, why?
I feel as if the "to learn more about the life..." does not suffice as a subject for the latter independent clause in the sentence.
Is it correct to omit term in the following sentence? Or must I repeat it like in sentence 2?
The short- and long-term projections are completed.
The short-term and long-term projections are completed.
Why does it sound perfectly natural to say Our flight leaves tomorrow at 6pm but weird to say It rains tomorrow at 6pm? What kind of scenario, if any, could make the rain sentence sound natural?
Answer
In continuation with the surety-prediction advocated in the other responses, you might also argue that we never know with a 100% confidence that the flight actually leaves at 6pm tomorrow.
The technically correct usage would be (and because the flight schedule is present) -
"The flight is scheduled to leave at
6pm tomorrow."
"As per the schedule, the flight leaves at 6pm tomorrow."
But for all purposes of common usage, the sentence you quoted in the question suffices for audience communication.
Regarding your query for the rain situation, the only situation where it would sound appropriate, was it coming from a soothsayer, an oracle or a psychic predicting tomorrow's weather. I guess it is within their business obligations to use such sentences to sound mighty-sure and give themselves an aura of invincibility against nature's vagaries.
From an article titled How to Fake It ‘Til You Make It (Or Become It):
In 2012, [Amy Cuddy] gave a TED Talk on the topic, which went viral and has been watched over 34 million times. She talked about how body language affects how others see us, but also how it changes how we see ourselves. She believes that it’s possible to fake feelings of power until we truly feel more powerful. “Don’t fake it ‘til you make it. Fake it ‘til you become it,” she urged.
A Russian friend asked me to translate the meaning this last sentence, but after thinking about it I realized that I don't actually understand this sentence well enough to translate it. I don't really see what the distinction is between "faking it 'til you make it" and "faking it 'til you become it".
In both cases, it seems that the meaning is to pretend that you are confident about your competence for long enough to actually become confident about your competence. I can't see any meaningful difference, except that "make" rhymes with "fake" and thus sounds more catchy than "become", so it seems like the instruction above basically boils down to the nonsensical "Don't do X. Instead, do X."
What is the distinction between these two things, if any?
In the following sentence, the pronoun I is written capitalized, even if it is not at the beginning of a sentence. Why?
What kind of questions can I ask here?
should I capitalize all the pronouns?
Answer
This Wikipedia article says the following, about why I as pronoun of the first singular person is always written capitalized:
There is no known record of a definitive explanation from around the early period of this capitalisation practice.
It is likely that the capitalization was prompted and spread as a result of one or more of the following:
- Changes specifically in the pronunciation of letters (introduction of long vowel sounds in Middle English, etc.)
- Other linguistic considerations (demarcation of a single-letter word, setting apart a pronoun which is significantly different from others in English, etc.)
- Problems with legibility of the minuscule "i"
- Sociolinguistic factors (establishment of English as the official language, solidification of English identity, etc.)
This happens only with I; other pronouns (including me) are written as any other words, and capitalized when other words would be capitalized.
As in, a conference that is for people in their first year of, say, University.
Say you would open an inn primarily for people who build things.
Would that be called the "Builder's Inn" or the "Builders Inn"?
The word dozen is a collective noun, i.e., singular when we think of them as groups and plural when we think of the individuals acting within the whole. So we might say:
Talking about eggs: "A dozen is probably not enough."
Talking about a party with friends: "A dozen are coming over this afternoon."
So, a dozen roses would likely be considered singular (like a bouquet). We might say, "A dozen roses costs ten rupees," as per subject-verb agreement.
1) However, since we have six dozen, does the modification of the noun by a number change the subject to plural, resulting in cost? Or is it all moot because of the plural roses?
In American English, collective nouns tend to be singular while in British English they may be both. That said, I've seen the suggestion that cost be used, which would be straightforward to me if dozens (plural) were used. From an American perspective, I feel the subject should remain singular when modified by a number: "Three dozen is enough to feed an army," or "Two dozen pizzas is/are too much" (the be verb is interchangeable in the 2nd example).
2) Is sticking with singular in the case above purely my American usage side showing, or is it a shared phenomenon?
Wikipedia states:
When modified by a number, the plural is not inflected, that is, has no -s added.
3) (Main Question) Does this have any bearing on whether the subject is treated as a plural? That is, since a plural is not inflected, could the subject remain singular, or is this irrelevant?
Note this is not a duplicate, since that question is vague and about to be closed and my suggested edit, which is the basis of this question, was rejected.
Answer
Looking at the effective interaction with the dozens, I suggest that the singular is appropriate. You are paying one price for the lot. As such six dozens is being treated as a single collective unit.
Six dozen roses costs 60 rupees. [You are buying one thing]
If you were quoting a price for each dozen, you probably would say
Six dozen roses cost 10 rupees per dozen. [You are buying six things]
In my native language, we can say:
I have dog
Because I don't want to say a dog (one dog, how many dogs) or the dog (that dog, the listener don't care which dog).
p.s. after 3 years later, I have to say, why I ask this question, is I still cannot grasp how to use the right 'article word'. sometimes, a noun will use an article, sometimes, a noun could not(or omit) the article word before it. there aren't a formula for this. So, I have to remember all the time! I feel so frustrate
Answer
Well, first of all, we don't need an article before any noun. I can say:
I like dogs.
As to your question of why, the answer is, "because that is how English works".
The articles perform a discourse function, by indicating new and old information. They often evolve from demonstratives (e.g. "this" and "that"). They evolve independently in unrelated languages. Normally, once an article system becomes a part of a language, it is an all-or-nothing thing. This is not unlike a verbal inflection system, a gender system, or a case system; once the system is in place, it is not optional.
Aside from this, there isn't really a more concrete reason for "why" English works this way.
Normally, a noun clause has the same tense as the main clause, right.
So, I am wondering how about the case in IF condition sentence?
If she were here, I would tell her that I liked/like her.
If she wanted to please me, she would pretend that she was/is happy.
If I were you, I would imagine I was/am going to pass the exam.
If I were you, I would say that I didn't/don't want to join his team.
But, I am quite sure in some cases, verbs should be in the appropriate tense that can describe the situation.
"If you had the sense of humor, you would enjoy what I am talking about."(a case that I am telling a funny story, but you don't understand it)
What do you guys think about the sequence of verb tense in IF condition or subjunctive mood?
I understand the principle behind choosing either 'that' or 'which' but I still find myself struggling to know in certain situations whether to use it or not. For example, "Here is a link to the article, which can be found on the Environment section of the website". Would it be that or which? I would use assume 'which'.
Do any of you have tips/strategies for knowing when to use 'that' or 'which' when writing a sentence?
Thanks
Commenting on a photo which was taken a few years back:
Question:
Is this you?
Should I reply:
Yes, this is a few years back.
or:
Yes, this was a few years back.
Which of the above is correct: is or was?
I faced a problem to answer a negative question, for example, when someone asks you:
Don't you have any money?
It's a yes/no question but how should one answer the question without ambiguity?
When you answer "yes", does it mean "yes, I don't have any money"? or the other way "Yes, I do have money"? the questioner may think you are agreeing to the negative, that yes, you do not have any money.
I know it's better to answer with "on the contrary" but is it possible to answer yes or no?
Answer
Use short answers:
Don’t you have any money? — No, I don’t.
Don’t you have any money? — Yes, I do.
Let context guide the listener:
Don’t you have any money? — No, I gave it all to Lucy.
Don’t you have any money? — Yes, but not enough for this item.
Use quantifiers, or intensifiers:
Don’t you have any money? — None or None whatsoever.
Don’t you have any money? — I have enough.
In Early Modern English, there were specific words for that.
I hope I'm posting this in the correct forum. If not, please direct me to the proper place to move my question. This is my first time using this site since I found it on Google, though I've used some of the answers here as references a number of times before, so please bear with me.
I'm in the process of editing a friend's story, as she is unfamiliar with a lot of grammar and punctuation rules. I've been trying to explain to her why I'm making each edit as I go so that she can learn from the experience.
I've run into a chapter where she's used a similar sentence structure a few times, and I'm not positive that it's incorrect, as I've seen it done plenty of times before, but it just feels wrong to me. If it is incorrect, can you tell me how to explain it to her grammatically so she's less likely to make the same mistake again?
Here are the examples:
The thought that his kind were something to fear or at least be wary of, it was harmful.
The way Jordan was smiling and the lightness in his voice, it was unlike the man he had seen before.
The memory of her face, caught contorted in the middle of a scream, it had haunted him for the first year.
To me it feels like it would be better to remove the ", it" in each case but I don't want to tell her something is incorrect if it works grammatically (though I might mention that it feels more natural without that). If I'm analyzing the sentence structure properly, it seems that the "it" she's using is just simplifying and restating the noun used at the beginning of the sentence, before the comma break ("the thought," "the way," "the memory"), but could using "it" in that manner also apply to other parts of speech that I should warn her about?
Also, are there instances where, with certain formatting changes, the "it" can properly repeat the subject without being grammatically incorrect? For example, I've seen situations where someone would use an ellipsis in place of a comma, but I'm not sure if they mean to trail off and then begin a new sentence with it, or what.
Sorry for the long-winded question. I'd appreciate any answers you may have for me.
Answer
The three sentences use it in different ways.
The thought that his kind were something to fear or at least be wary of, it was harmful.
Although the sentence could dispense with it without significant change in meaning, the pronoun changes the way the idea is conveyed in the sentence (emphasizing the subject, as @pablopaul already noted). Compare:
"The thought that his kind were something to fear or at least be wary of -- it was harmful."
The way Jordan was smiling and the lightness in his voice, it was unlike the man he had seen before.
The it seems more like a "dummy it" (not a useless it) in this case.
The memory of her face, caught contorted in the middle of a scream, it had haunted him for the first year.
I see no useful purpose served by it here.
In general, these examples also suggest a possible carry-over from the writer's native idiom (possibly a non-native speaker of English).
The common interjections "argh!", "aargh!", "aaargh!", etc., is pronounced, as far as I know, the same as "aaa!" For most of my life, however, I (and I imagine many other second language speakers) pronounced it due to its spelling with an audible 'r' and hard 'g', and still do occasionally. In fact, I think this mispronunciation is so common that it has become an accepted alternative, especially when the word is used in humour (as opposed to genuine fright.) I often hear this version from native English speakers.
Questions:
Is it correct to write 'browse easier' and 'search easier'? When I use my Word grammar check, it doesn't correct them.
Edit: Perhaps I shouldn't have mentioned the grammar checker at all. I was looking for verification that the terms above were incorrect. I didn't want to write the following letter until I was sure. After reading your responses here, I sent it. In case you're curious, here it is:
Hello XXXXXXXX,
I am a XXXXXXXX customer who just received your letter promoting the new XXXXXXXX. I'm happy to learn about the changes that are coming. I'm writing because your letter says, "Browse easier" and "search for the shows and movies you love easier". 'Browse more easily' and 'search... more easily' are the way to write those sentences. Perhaps this was an honest mistake because no one who read the letter before it got mass-mailed knew better. In that case, please disregard this e-mail; (you may want to hire a better proofreader.) I'm writing in case XXXXXXXXXX knew it was incorrect but thought its customers needed words to be simplified to the point that they are wrong. We are not stupid. Most of us have an elementary level education, and therefore are familiar with adverbs. Wrong is not more attractive, ie. (XXXXXXincorrectly spelled product nameXXXX), it's just wrong. In the case of customers like me, it actually makes the company sending the letter less attractive.
Just a thought,
(Signed)
How can we explain the difference between these two sentences?
I saw his concert when he performed here.
I saw his concert when he was performing here.
I know that the first sentence refers to a completed action and the second sentence to a continuous action. But if someone asks me when either of the tenses are used, I won`t be able to give any answer. How will I explain to the listener on what to choose and when?
When is it correct to use "If I was" vs. "If I were" in standard English?
Answer
SYNOPSIS: Sometimes it must be “if I was”, but at other times it can be “if I were” — and for some speakers in those cases, perhaps even must be “if I were” in their idiolect.
Sentences with the subordinating conjunction if normally contain two
clauses, each with its own subject and verb. The question asks what to do
about the past-tense be verb in the “if” clause.
Unfortunately, as it’s currently worded the question can have no answer that is
simultaneously all of short, complete, and correct. That’s because it doesn’t
provide enough context to know which one of many possible cases actually
applies here. I must therefore cover them all.
David Maule in his 1988 EFL paper titled ‘Sorry, if he comes, I go’: teaching
conditionals
suggested that English conditionals be broadly classified as one of four
types depending on whether their outcomes were real vs. unreal and
past vs. non-past. (Maule classifies these
based on their “then” part not on their “if” part, and as we shall see,
this is a useful way to organize them.)
Maule discovered that most English conditionals do not fit into the
narrow models typically presented to EFL students learning English.
Christian Jones and Daniel Waller built on Maule’s work with their own EFL paper in 2010,
If only it were true: the problem with the four
conditionals.
The authors sampled a random assortment of conditionals from the British
National Corpus and classified each as being one of Maule’s four categories
listed above. They discovered that the real cases contained patterns in
both the past and the non-past that appeared very frequently in real
English, but which are rarely taught to learners.
The class B “real past” cases fit into three patterns:
Of those three, the final pattern of having past simple in both
clauses was by far the most common of the three. The sample
provided for that case was:
... if you wanted[real] to know the answer ... you had[real] to keep zapping from channel to channel.
Converting that into the first person singular to align with the asker’s question gives us:
If I wanted[real] to know the answer, I had[real] to keep zapping from channel to channel.
And it just one step more to swap out want for be:
If I was[real] interested in knowing the answer, I had[real] to keep zapping from channel to channel.
So here we discover the first of what shall prove to be several answers to
the asker’s question:
These are always conditionals from Maule’s
class B. It would not be grammatical to use “If I were” there.
These “real past” cases happen all the time in real speech and real
writing, as Jones and Waller prove.
Consider this arrangement:
If she was[real] already home when he got there, then she took[real] the bus.
That’s a real past case on both sides, and it would be ungrammatical to use
“If she were” to attempt to mean the same thing. You can also use a modal perfect in the consequent along with that past simple in the “if” part:
If she was[real] already home when he got there, then she must have taken the bus.
If she was[real] already home when he got there, then she will have taken the bus.
Those are all real cases, and you know by the “then” part.
For Class C, the unreal non-pasts, there are many example patterns
provided, but the most common case by far uses “if” with past simple or
with a modal, then some modal in the consequent.
One provided example there is:
... I’d give it a good hiding if it didn’t behave.
However, there are many other Class C patterns, such as:
... if we could get three or four items, that would be very nice.
... if two members of staff happen to fall in love and decide to marry it would be churlish to be appointing blame.
The thing about using the past simple in something like “If it didn’t” is
that without looking further along in the sentence, this alone is not
enough to reveal whether it’s a Class B type that will take a real
consequent or whether it’s a Class C type that will take an unreal one.
Because we use the simple past tense in English for real and unreal conditionals, you normally cannot know whether it’s the unreal case until you hit the “then” portion. But in one unique yet common case, you can, and that is when a singular subject is governing the verb be in the past. That’s because the unreal case uses were no matter whether singular or plural.
So we could say:
If a staff member were to fall in love, it would be churlish to assign blame.
That’s a Class C conditional because the “then” part has a would be in it. But you already knew it was going to be a hypothetical case when you saw the “If a staff member were” in the first half.
Recasting that into the first person singular provides the second answer
to the asker’s question:
If I were to fall in love, it would be churlish to blame me for it.
This special, modally marked form of be is used only for an unreal
hypothetical. It is a relic of the Old English past subjunctive, and it was once used for far more than we use it today.
Here alone can you detect through the morphology of the verb
that it is anything other than the past simple. This is a Class C
conditional because it has an unreal non-past in its consequent: “would be
churlish”
You cannot go wrong by using were for hypotheticals like this, as it has
been the preferred use for centuries, particularly but not exclusively in America. Many careful writers still choose to
observe this distinction: you need but read some recent issue of The Economist magazine from the UK to find plenty of examples of this. Indeed,
English teachers at American schools have been known to mark various hypothetical uses of was as “wrong”, saying that it “should” be were.
However, you should not flinch if — nay, when — you hear someone say
“If I was... I would...” as a Class C conditional in casual speech. This sometimes happens even in educated
speakers and writers, so you should not make anything of it. Some writers prefer not to do that, but unless the person complaining is your English teacher, you shouldn’t let it get to you. (Yes, this is ungrammatical for some people. For others, it is not.)
It could be that those writers or speakers using “If I was...would” in their conditionals have
chosen not to convey the nuance, or perhaps did not consider
such a distinction meaningful in their own speech. Some are even
unaware that the distinction exists.
Because of the redundancy in language where the would in the “then” part gives it away, it’s not really needed anyway; everyone will still know what you mean.
These forms are still unreal cases even when they aren’t modally marked as unreal, singular were. Because in all cases except for this unique case of was/were you cannot ever morphologically distinguish a real case from an unreal one in English, you have to decide whether it’s unreal by looking at the “then” part, not the “if” part (at least, not reliably).
That means you need to train yourself to tell the real case:
If she was[real] already home when he got there, then she took[real] the bus.
From the unreal case:
If she were[unreal] already home when he got there, he wouldn’t have[unreal] to run pick her up himself.
Even when the unreal case uses the past simple not unreal past in the “if” part the way some speakers do:
If she was[“unreal”] already home when he got there, he wouldn’t have[unreal] to run pick her up himself.
That last example above is real in form but it is still unreal in sense because of the would. Some writers disapprove of that style of using was for a hypothetical, but it’s not uncommon, especially in speech.
Moreover, you cannot somehow make it be “less hypothetical” merely by using “was...would”; that’s just as hypothetical as “were...would” for the reasons already stated.
One final common construction uses past perfect in the “if” part and a modal perfect in the “then” part:
If she had been[unreal] already home when he got there, he wouldn’t have had[unreal] to run pick her up himself.
Although that’s a common way to set up a unreal case with perfects on both sides, there are many other ways, including using a non-perfect unreal past in the “if”:
If she were[unreal] already home when he got there, he wouldn’t have had[unreal] to run pick her up himself.
Yes, it’s somehow “unbalanced” with respect to the perfect aspect, but English doesn’t have an obligatory sequence-of-tenses rule like some languages do, and we often use a simple past instead of a perfect one because it’s...simpler that way.
There is one relatively uncommon place where you pretty much do have to use were not was in a conditional, and that is when you use inversion to forgo the word if altogether:
Were[unreal] there any other way, we would have[unreal] found it.
That’s the same as saying:
If there were[unreal] any other way, we would have[unreal] found it.
or even as saying:
If there had been[unreal] any other way, we would have[unreal] found it.
But that last one lends itself to an inverted version:
Had there been[unreal] any other way, we would have[unreal] found it.
The subject–verb inversion is something of a stealth conditional because it doesn’t use the word if. The inversion alone is enough to signal that it’s what used to be called a “subjunctive” use (back when English had an actual subjunctive). It doesn’t have to use be, but if you do use be for it, you should certainly use were. Other verbs in the past tense work the same, with the inversion signalling the conditional:
Had[unreal] they but asked, we would have[unreal] gladly told them.
You’ll find this “subjunctive inversion” style in formal writing, but very rarely if ever in extemporaneous, casual speaking. That’s because inversion isn’t all that normal, so it’s a marked form. Consider how stiffly formal this Steven Brust quote mentioned in this answer sounds:
To be more precise, and state the matter in its simplest form, we believe that were[unreal] any of the events in the previous volume of such a nature that they could be omitted without severe damage to the narrative, we should have omitted[unreal] them to begin with.
― The Lord of Castle Black, by Steven Brust
There instead of writing out the conditional the long way with “if any were”, to be more formal Brust wrote it with inversion: “were any”. (He’s also playing on the modal duality of should, but that’s something else again.)
If you ever get the chance to read English literature from a couple centuries ago or better, you might even come upon conditional inversion used with the bare infinitive in what has historically been called a “present subjunctive” use:
Be ye[unreal] man or mouse, still shall ye say nothing!
That’s using inversion to skip the if, as though it were:
If ye be[unreal] man or mouse, still shall ye say nothing!
Nobody talks that way anymore, and nobody writes that way anymore, either, not unless they intend to represent the speech of centuries long past. Instead we’d just say:
No matter whether you are a man or a mouse, you still will say nothing!
I have related answers here:
Suppose I wrote someone an email and told him something. After a few days, it occurred to me that I forgot to tell him about other things. What is correct in this situation:
or
Answer
I think both the sentences are correct.
The adverb Just is used both in the
simple past and present perfect and in the past perfect tense too. Just means
recently when referring to time. The distinction between American and the British English is being slowly lost. Even in informal or in formal context, there is no difference.
1.I just remembered that I forgot to tell you about other things.
I have just remembered that I forgot to tell you about other thingsBoth the sentences mean the same thing and are grammatically correct.
I have written a letter.
I wrote a letter.
Do they mean the same thing or there is a difference?
If there is a difference then where should I use "have written" and "wrote"? (I'm also talking about every other verbs)
Answer
The tense and aspect are different. "Have written" is present perfect, whereas "wrote" is simple past. This website explains it pretty well.
Present Perfect refers to completed actions which endure to the present or whose effects are still relevant.
Use the past tense to indicate past events, prior conditions, or completed processes.
In these examples, you could say #1 and #3 whereas #2 and #4 are incorrect.
I wrote a letter. Would you like to review it?
I wrote a letter yesterday.
- Which is your most favourite subject in school ?
- What is your most favourite subject in school ?
Which one is acceptable? If both are acceptable, do they have any difference in meaning?
Answer
In short, when the interrogative pronoun which is used, it is asking about something among a group of things.
Note: which can also be used as a determiner.
I've always refrained from using words that weren't necessary to conform with grammar rules and didn't add to the meaning of a sentence. Being a fan of brevity, I don't use the complementizer that unless it is necessary for the sentence to be grammatical or it clears up an ambiguity within the sentence. But I've been told the complementizer that serves a stylistic purpose as well. Exactly what stylistic purpose it serves has always been a mystery to me. Whenever I ask someone, they respond with the frustrating answer "sometimes it sounds better". So what exactly is the stylistic end the complementizer that accomplishes?
For instance:
Raines said (that) this incident was "uncharacteristic of most interactions" between the U.S. and Iranian navies. CNN
Col. Steve Warren said (that) 10 senior ISIS leaders operating in both Iraq and Syria, "including several external attack planners," with designs on attacking western targets, had been killed in airstrikes. CNN
If the complementizer that were inserted into the above sentences, how would that affect the way the sentence is read?
This question is related to another question I asked yesterday,
Does using "that" to introduce a subordinate clause serve any other purpose but to eliminate ambiguity?
Answer
When the piece of text is read aloud, the word that marks the words that follow as reported speech. Consider your examples when read aloud without that - the words that follow "(that)" could be reported speech or direct quotes. In terms of style, that helps avoid this ambiguity.
The strong link between that and reported speech can sometimes also help provide some emotional distance between the messenger and the message. E.g., "Tom said you should go" vs "Tom said that you should go".
My dictionary defines the following:
yarn: thread that has been spun, used for knitting, weaving, etc.
I am unsure of the meaning of the plural form "yarns". To illustrate, I'll use two examples:
A. "He sold yarns of many colours---red, blue, and white."
B. "She found that five yarns corresponded to a width of one centimetre in the knitted fabric."
After consulting with people that speak English well, I get two different answers:
"yarns" refers strictly to several different types of yarn, as the word is used in example A. However, "yarns" can not be used to refer to several threads of yarn as in example B. (This makes the "yarns" somewhat similar to the "peoples".)
"yarns" may refer to both several different types of yarn and several threads of yarn. Both example A and B show correct usage of "yarns".
Which of these definitions of the plural form is correct? (Or maybe the answer is something different?) If "yarns" cannot be used to describe several threads of yarn (as in example B), then what should example B look like? Is the term "threads of yarn" ok?
The text I am writing is rather formal, so I would appreciate answers that are appropriate in a formal context.
Answer
I believe explanation 1 is the better guide.
When you're talking about the same yarn, you'd say "lengths of yarn", but if there were two different kinds of yarn in the same weave, you'd say "the two yarns are interwoven..."
Other examples of nouns that are pluralized only when different types or classes are being referenced: "I favour milder tobaccos", "they deal in plastics", "a large selection of fabrics".
Simple question, should you say "what matters most is that the merger is successful"
or: "what matters most is that the merger be successful"?
Answer
What matters most is that the merger be successful sounds better to me. The subjunctive mood shows that the merger hasn't happened yet and you are expressing a wish for it to be successful.
According to one online dictionary, the apostrophe-s combination is
an ending used in writing to represent the possessive morpheme after most singular nouns, some plural nouns, especially those not ending in a letter or combination of letters representing an s or z sound,
Note the opening, "an ending". Does this mean that an apostrophe COULD NOT be a possessive elsewhere? I have been reading up on the words "bridesmaid" and "groomsman" and according to that same source, the s in the middle is a possessive. (Other sources make the s an "unetymological [which] began to appear by 1794")
I'm asking a theoretical question -- could the word be written "bride'smaid" (and/or "groom'sman") or is there a hard and fast rule that possessives are only indicated at the end of a word? (I have yet to find other words besides bridesmaid(s) and groomsma(e)n to which this would apply)
Can anyone please recommend a better treatment of English parts of speech / word classes than that offered by most traditional grammars?
Many of the latter stick with the sacrosanct 8 of antiquity, or perhaps allow for one or two more, while POS Tagsets may contain many hundreds of tags (catering for subsets such as plural nouns, verb forms etc). Demanding that we stick with eight for sentimental reasons seems like saying 'Let's just have four (chemical) elements, like they used to do, because that's easier.' Some parts of speech — 'function words' — are distinguished according to function — or called adverbs if they show a vague resemblance in some respect and we don't like having more than 8 (or 12 or 24) classes. However, having 750 classes as a working model does seem to be erring the other way.
Does anyone please know of a sensible (Goldilocks!) treatment?
Is it correct to write:
hope you enjoyed the demo and'll consider the idea
Or I must all the way use the entire word for "will" in that phrase?
Thank you in advance for clarifications
Answer
Related: Can I use the “ll” contraction with proper names?
This is the first part of the top answer as written by Marthaª:
Short answer: yes. It'll be understood, and if it's seen as a mistake, it'd be one of register rather than of grammar.
Let's build on that, because while it's only answering the question for proper names, a similar explanation applies even to and.
Yes, as a contraction of "will," 'll can be added to pronouns, proper nouns, and any other word plausibly followed by will where the /wɪ/ sound can be elided in spoken language. In standard lists pronominal forms dominate because they are the ones used most often (I'll, you'll, she'll, and so on), but other formations are possible. (Dan'll show up, the priest'll arrive.) You found a situation where will follows and and can be contracted. Congratulations!
Now, should you write it? Consider these factors:
In short, this is grammatically okay but stylistically carries risks that you should consider.
My boss stated that he noticed the word "weight" is used to refer to the boldness of a character, and stated that he felt this was a new occurrence.
My gut feeling is that this is an old term, derived from the typesetting industry and made popular with the advent of personal computers, desktop and web publishing. I also suspect that the term had something to do with the physical weight of typeset letters, but this is just a supposition.
While Google's n-gram viewer shows a massive increase in "font weight" usage starting around 1985 (which corresponds to the usage spike of the term "desktop publishing"), there were smaller spikes around 1830 and 1932.
A search for the etymology of the use of weight in regards to the darkness of the typeface revealed nothing.
Does anyone know the source of this phrase?
Answer
OED has a draft addition from 1993:
Typog. (a) The heaviness of a fount of type, determined by the thickness of strokes in the individual sorts; (b) the degree of emphasis or blackness of a typeface.
1771 P. Luckombe Hist. & Art of Printing 239 A Fount of Roman Letter, of what Body or Weight soever, is constituted of Lower-case Sorts, Capitals, Double Letters, [etc.].
(along with several other later citations)
It is true that individual letterpress letters would be very slightly heavier if they printed a bolder letter [at the same size], but it's unlikely to be a substantial difference.
OED has a related entry for weight, which I suspect is at its root:
2. Associated with measure and number, esp. in figurative expressions referring to due proportion.
The earliest citation for this use (which would later be applied to type) is from c1250.
The word interrogate is usually pronounced something like in-TEH-ruh-gayte.
But we pronounce the grammatical structure (or at least, I learnt to pronounce it) 'interrogative' as in-tuh-RAU-guh-tive. Excusing my probably inconsistent renderings of the pronunciations, what explains this difference, and why is there such a difference in stress?
This is a follow up from this discussion. I am a patent attorney and some standard sentences that we use include this:
The above-recited and other advantages and features of the disclosure
will become apparent by reference to specific embodiments thereof
which are illustrated in the appended drawings."
I assume a comma should be placed before which, but I am wondering if you could help me understand if it is required or optional?
Also, another sentence I came across goes like this:
Device A sends data to device B which then forwards the data to device
C.
Microsoft Word always complains, seeing it as a restrictive clause and demands a comma or changing which to that. Am I correct in not having a comma?
Answer
In the first example, if the "which" clause were restrictive, some advantage that was not illustrated would not be covered by the patent. Since one expects all possible rights to be claimed, the clause should not be interpreted restrictively, and a comma is required.
In the second example, "device B" is the name of a device, so it is a proper reference. Consequently the "which" clause is non-restrictive, and a comma is required. "That" instead of "which" would be ungrammatical.
Assume that there are 5 apples must be eaten by Jack. When you want to know about how many of the apples are eaten, you may ask Jack, 'how many apples have you eaten?'; But how can I ask the question to make Jack answers, 'I'm eating the fourth apple'?
Just wondering what's the plural form of "noun of noun". Should the 's' be added to the first noun or the second, or both?
Example: we will examine the 'concentration of heavy metal' in this paper.
concentrations of heavy metals.
Does this indicate each heavy metal has more than one concentration?
concentrations of heavy metal.
Only one type of heavy metal, and has many concentrations?
concentration of heavy metals.
Does this indicate there are many types of heavy metals and each has only one concentration?
I found the 3 types of plural forms all exist in academic papers.
Answer
To me,
I am not a chemist.
A documentary drama about the American Wallis Simpson (the influence upon Edward VIII causing him to abdicate the throne of England on 10th December 1936) is titled 'Wallis : The Queen That Never Was'.
The piece is written and directed by Paul Olding, a British writer and director.
Immediately I saw the title, I paused as I would have expected it to say 'who never was', since Wallis Simpson was a person and the usual pronoun regarding persons is 'who', not 'that'.
It is true there is a mixture of concepts, here.
The title is not questioning the historic existence of the person, but is stating that she never became Queen of England. So the title is stating something about the office of Queen. That office was never upon that historic person.
In which case the title of the piece actually means 'The Woman who never became Queen'. And in that case, one would not say :
The Woman That Never Became Queen
but rather :
The Woman Who Never Became Queen
Should not the pronoun be 'who' in this particular case ?
Edit : The Ngram suggested in @Peter Shor 's answer is interesting and I have added 'a/the woman who// a/the woman that' which shows a significantly greater modern weighting for 'the woman who' and an even greater modern weighting for 'a woman who', which is notable for with the indefinite article the phrase, supposedly, becomes less 'specific'.
Edit: The suggested duplicate does not answer my question as this situation is specific to the mixed concept of person and office and it is clear from answers and comments, thus far, that the language is changing in regard, especially, to the use of 'that' and 'who' in relation to women, as can be seen from the Ngram.
I believe that this question has highlighted something interesting happening within the language and I believe that the subject is worth pursuing further.
As I understand it, if X and Y independently have the same friend Z, we should write
Z is a friend of X's and Y's
but if X and Y collectively have Z as a friend (e.g., X and Y are a couple), then we should indicate that by making the possessive "'s" refer to "X and Y" collectively:
Z is a friend of X and Y's
But if Y is me, how do I write the latter? I think the answer is
Z is a friend of X and mine
but it sounds awkward to me (maybe because the possessive in "mine" sounds like it only refers to me, not to X and me). It sounds better to my ear to write
Z is a friend of X's and mine
but this loses the subtlety that X and I collectively have Z as a friend.
I always see
If I could ... I would.
For example,
If I could speak English, I would go to English-speaking countries.
Is there a rule against a conditional clause which contains could, being followed by another could in the main clause?
For example,
If I could speak German, I could understand this essay.
I am a native American speaker but I do not know if the above is actually wrong.
I prefer non-possessive form of the name of the club: photographers club of Detroit. Is it correct?
Is there a single English word for the singular and plural form of the word?
I want to write a java function that gets the singular or plural form of the word based on the count. If count is greater than 1 then plural els singular word. To name the method, I wanted to know if there is any such word.
Is it called the forms of noun?
A friend of mine (we are both non native english speakers, french actually) is writing lyrics and came to me to have an opinion on a sentence, and I actually am not 100% sure about the good answer.
The lyrics go like this :
How could you convince the people?
When you don't even believe in it
The question was about how we could refer to said people in the first sentence.
The three propositions are :
I would totally rule out "Him" because people is plural here. "It" would refer to an object, so it only leaves "Them" available.
Would someone care to elaborate on this?
Thank you all in advance :)
Answer
The pronoun you select must have an antecedent, i.e., a noun the pronoun refers to. Your readers (or listeners) will scan what they've read (or heard) to find a match suitable in number, gender, or person, or some combination.
It won't work because it's singular and neuter, which leaves out people and you respectively. You'll leave the audience wondering if the lyric shouldn't have been something like
Of altruism, how could you convince the people
When you don't even believe in it?
Him is out since it's masculine, singular, and third person, conflicting with plural people and second-person you. If you persist, the audience will be wondering if they missed something like
How could you think John could convince the people
When you don't even believe in him?
Just for fun and completeness, you can't have you be the antecedent unless you use a reflexive pronoun, since the believer and the believed in coincide:
How could you convince the people
When you don't even believe in yourself?
Them does the trick, third person and plural; it's a match for the noun people.
Possible Duplicates:
He didn't know where New Jersey was…
Tense change: previous actions on something that's currently true
My wife and I were disagreeing about this today:
- Did you know Fred was a doctor?
- Did you know Fred is a doctor?
I was arguing for (1) based on what seemed to "sound right." My wife claimed that, since Fred is currently alive and still practicing medicine, present tense should be used. However, we agreed that the negation of these sentences uses was:
I didn't know Fred was a doctor.
Here I think everyone would agree that is would sound wrong!
So which is correct between (1) and (2)? And why? Is this some kind of subjunctive?
Answer
My vote for "is" in both cases, negated or not. If you have the qualification, then you are a doctor.
Compare
Did you know that Fred is a doctor? - Oh, is he? I'd never have guessed.
with
Did you know that Bob was a fighter pilot in the war? - Oh, was he? I'd never have guessed.
Let's define a self-sufficient phrasal verb as a phrasal verb that does not require a complement. For example, "come in" is a self-sufficient phrasal verb because you can say, "Come in!" Analogously, "get by" is a self-sufficient phrasal verb because you can say, "It is not difficult to get by." The test is simple: if you can construct a sentence without any word referred to by the preposition of the phrasal verb, then the phrasal verb is self-sufficient.
Many prepositions are used to form self-sufficient phrasal verbs, but there are some prepositions that seem to be never used in this way, e.g., the preposition "from." If you say, "He comes from," you need to add the location he comes from, so "come from" is not a self-sufficient phrasal verb, and I was unable to find any self-sufficient phrasal verb with "from."
I am looking for a logical, etymological, or historical reason, if there is any, as to why some prepositions, especially the preposition "from," are never used to form self-sufficient phrasal verbs. To put it simply, I want an explanation that is deeper than answers like "that's the way it is" or "that's just how English has evolved." After all, I already know that it is the way it is and that it is how English has evolved. The question is why. I am a curious Japanese student learning English and humbly hope that native speakers can shed some light on this apparent mystery, as I see nothing really special in "from" as compared to "on," "in," "off," "around," etc. and found no explanation in Google.
In high school debate, we have resolutions or topics. This year, our topic is, "Just governments ought to require employers to provide a living wage." In order to form arguments, debaters have to specify whether the topic refers to one government or multiple governments when it says "Just governments ought to".
Some debaters say that because the topic specifies governments plural, it requires debaters to talk about multiple governments. However, there has been discussion that Bare Plurals, or plural nouns that have no number or temporal feature in front of it mandate that it be treated as a psuedo-singular noun. Therefore, under the bare plural interpretation, debaters would only be required to talk about one government.
My question is: which interpretation is correct; the plural interpretation or bare plural interpretation? What are arguments for both? Are there grammar experts that concur on one interpretation or another?
How do you use the term "ditto" when you're expressing the same sentiments,I.e. I told someone,"it was good to see you last week." They responded "ditto,seeing you too." Is this response correct?
Which sounds better?
There is water and butter in my fridge.
There are water and butter in my fridge.
I think it should be: is.
But what if we said:
How much flour and butter is needed to make a pizza?
How much flour and butter are needed to make a pizza?
In that case, I think the plural verb: are, is the correct choice, which means (I think) there is a contradiction between both sentences.
I would like to ask if you would use the adjectives "kind" and "kindly" to describe a book or a film? Or are they used to describe people? Is there a better way of describing a book/film that is not at all dark or depressing?
Thank you!
Answer
If you're looking for terms to describe a book/film that isn't dark, you can use:
light: [Oxford, sense 11]
not serious
or cheerful: [Oxford, sense 2]
giving you a feeling of happiness
You can further expand your options by specifying the tone [Oxford, sense 2]
the general character and attitude of something such as a piece of writing, or the atmosphere of an event
The general tone of the piece was quite positive.
What I've done is plant an idea in your head.
What I've done is chosen the products of several investment companies with proven track records.
I was wondering why the bare infinitive sounds right in the first, but the past participle sounds right in the second.
Usually I find compound adjectives quite straightforward, but I'm not so sure when it comes to the following:
A 210-million-people market
So how should I refer to a market 210 million people large with a compound adjective before the noun?
In the case of the proper noun Ross, which of the following would be correct?
First of all, these questions are a bit related but not what I'm actually asking about:
And this answer to the second question as well as its comment does indicate the problem I'm continually encountering.
I tend to overuse the word just. Sometimes I don't even recognize it but if I carefully re-read my English I often find sentences like:
The problem is, that in all these sentences I don't want to emphasize that I did that recently, just a couple of seconds/minutes ago, or that it might have any connection to the present, i.e. my present actions, although the action indeed just happened of late (and that's why I use the perfect).
In these cases just is meant to be simply or only:
A: Are you gonna eat with us to lunch now?
B: Sure, I only ate an apple and now I'm really hungry.
A: Are you tired?
B: No, I simply closed my eyes for a few seconds trying to focusing on the issues.
While these two sentences are just examples I invented for this question, the first sentence I introduced above is one of those I actually wrote. Regarding this first example, I consulted an American colleague and asked him how would he interpret the sentence
and he answered:
When a native English speaker reads that, they do not understand the 'just' to mean that you recently performed the action - they understand it to me that you 'simply' performed the action. It gives the connotation that you could have done more if you had spent more time on it, but getting it done quickly and easily was more important to you.
So far I'm happy with this answer, but I still have some further questions:
How do British natives interpret that, especially when using the perfect?
How do you (Briton or American) emphasize the other meaning, i.e.
The main purpose of this question is to find out if I should put more focus on phrasing these kind of sentences, i.e. using simple past even for an action happened just now when I want to emphasize only, or if I can go ahead using this sentence structure.
Answer
I use just very often in speech and casual writing. I tend to edit it out of more formal writing. I am a native American English speaker from Tampa and Boston.
To me, it can have both meanings, and I don't think that I have a preference. Your examples are all ambiguous to me. I think that the meaning is often clear from context (don't underestimate the power of context!), as in:
1) I'll be there soon. I just woke up. (recently)
2) I didn't call her. I just sent her an email. (merely)
3) I tried, but I just don't understand. (simply)
I don't see how changing tenses or aspects can help you, except that the future and simple present (always?) rule out the recently interpretation. But all of the following are equally ambiguous to me (sans disambiguating context).
4) I [just ate/am just eating/was just eating/have just eaten/etc.] an apple.
When I want to be crystal clear, I just replace just with merely, only, simply, or suchlike. I think that I less often change just to recently. I think I more often say just now to indicate that I mean recently.
When is it appropriate to use that as opposed to which?
Answer
That and which are interchangeable when introducing integrated relative clauses. Although some grammar mavens (i.e., people who hold forth on such topics but know little or nothing about linguistics) and copy editors will insist otherwise, the rule is completely bogus.
See, for instance, Language Log on that vs which, written by the co-editor of The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language.
Practically speaking, it is not something that any normal person will generally notice or follow in spoken English and it's frequently — and rightly — ignored even in literary writing. So even from that point of view it's not worth worrying about.
[i] Harry looked down at his empty gold plate. He had only just realized how hungry he was. The pumpkin pasties seemed ages ago. (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone)
[ii] Albus Dumbledore had gotten to his feet. He was beaming at the students, his arms opened wide, as if nothing could have pleased him more than to see them all there. (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone)
[iii] The plane crashed killing all 157 passengers aboard. (OALD)
[iv] The black men have long since hidden themselves aboard the Flying Squadron, and I'm not at all convinced that the mob won't content themselves with a redheaded dwarf instead. (Sara Gruen, Water for Elephants)
The examples have an adverb that works as the peripheral modifier. or postmodifier, or postnoun modifier (source: CGEL,p436; English Grammar,Angela Downing, p509; Understanding English Grammar, Koll and Funk, p160), I think.
From the examples, I got the feeling that the adverbs, the modifiers are very similar to adjectives in semantic and syntactic aspects - they seem to have even their own complements like in [iv]. From said aspects, I don’t find any difference between adverbial and adjective. But there seem to be some differences, for they don’t have adjective examples in dictionaries. How do I have to understand that adverbs modify noun phrase and license their own complement.
Answer
In the example [iv], you could say the "aboard" is a preposition. Some dictionaries define ago and aboard as adjective; therefore the interpretation could depend on linguists.
http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/aboard?showCookiePolicy=true
In this dictionary, the part of speech for "aboard" is adverb, adjective, or preposition.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/ago?s=t
Here, it defines "ago" as adjective.
I have observed that there are, at least, two patterns of pronunciation for words ending in -ative:
/eɪtɪv/ (e.g. qualitative)/ətɪv/ (e.g. declarative)Is there a way (other than memorizing them all, of course) to know how a certain word ending in -ative is pronounced?
Answer
You're close. It depends on the stress of the syllable before the -ative. If there is primary or secondary stress, then you have an unstressed a in the -ative. Otherwise, the a would be stressed and get its full /ei/ sound. Note that some words have different pronunciation patterns in different dialects.
Here is a link to all the -ative words in the COCA.