grammar - What's the subject of "There is my biscuit!" ? And how about "There is one biscuit left"?

What's the subject, grammatically speaking, of these sentences?

1. There is my biscuit!


2. My biscuit is there!


3. There is one biscuit left.

I don't really know how to analyze these. The following observations seem to be relevant, though:

• The verb to be doesn't take an object.


• In the first two sentences, there is a demonstrative pronoun. It is therefore potentially a subject, I think. I don't know what part of speech is taken by there in the third sentence.


• In favour of reading my biscuit and one biscuit as the subjects is that if there were more than one biscuit then, in each case, the verb would become plural (There are my biscuits! etc.)


• In favour of reading one biscuit as the subject of the third sentence is that if we recast it as (the slightly unidiomatic) There remains one biscuit, it seems that one biscuit would have to be the subject.

All of this leads me tentatively towards thinking that my biscuit and one biscuit are the subjects here, but I'm not totally confident about this.

One other possibility: since to be doesn't take an object, does that mean it can have two subjects? In I am he, presumably both I and he are subjects, if neither is an object?

Answer

Sentence 3: Existential Subjects: Words, Phrases and Functions

[A Comparison of Sentences and analysis of Sentences 1 & 2 forthcoming]

There's one biscuit left.

So now the burning question is: What is the subject of this existential sentence? This isn't as easy as it looks. If we want to answer this question we need to really understand what a subject is. And if we want to understand what a subject is, we need to understand the difference between a function in a sentence, and a part of speech, for example a Noun, or type of phrase, for example a Noun Phrase. Being a Noun or Noun Phrase and being a Subject are completely different. A Noun can be a Subject but it can do many other jobs as well. For example, a Noun can also be an Object, a Modifier in another Noun Phrase, or the Complement of a Preposition:

• I like monkeys. (Direct Object)


• I'm a monkey fanatic. (Modifier in Noun Phrase)


• I am scared of monkeys. (Complement of Preposition)

So Nouns seem to be a type of word. The different jobs that a word can do are called functions. The words Subject, Object, Modifier, Complement are all different jobs or functions. There are many other types of function.

Very often we see a group of words, not just one word, doing some particular function in a sentence:

The mice like cheese

Here, the Subject is two words: The mice. The most important word in that group is the Noun mice. We call the chunk of words the mice a Noun Phrase. We can have very long Noun Phrases:

I am a very keen monkey fanatic.

Here a very keen monkey fanatic has the job of Complement of the Verb BE.

This big Noun Phrase has some words in it that seem to work together. For example the word very seems to go together with the word keen. The answer to How keen is he? is Very keen!. In the chunk very keen, the Adjective keen seems to be the main word. This chunk is an Adjective Phrase. So, we have a big Noun Phrase functioning as Complement of BE, and inside the Complement we have an Adjective Phrase functioning as Modifier. So large phrases have smaller phrases inside them. Every phrase always has its own function.

Sometimes we might want to do a test, to see which chunks of words go together in one phrase. One well-known test is to use a substitute word to replace part of a sentence. Usually, if the substitute word replaces a group of words, then that whole group is one phrase and will have its own function. We can do this test with The mice like cheese. Let's use the word They:

They like cheese.

So the word they replaced the words The mice. This shows that the mice is one phrase - a Noun Phrase. It also indicates that The mice has one function - it's the Subject.

There is one very special function we haven't talked about. Us teachers and linguists are a bit naughty; we say things like Subject Verb Object, things like that. Of course Verb is a type of word, not a function! Verbs can have many functions, they can be Subjects, for instance:

To love is the most important thing.

But there is one function that can only be carried out by Verb Phrases (in English). No other words or types of phrase can do this job:

I smoke.

Here the job being done by the Verb (Phrase) smoke is the job of Predicate. In the same way that every sentence in English has a Verb, every English sentence has a Predicate. This is the job that the Verb Phrase does. What I want to show you now, is that the functions of Subject and Object are not equal. The Subject is a far more important and fundamental part of any sentence than the Object. Let's do a substitution test with the sentence:

The mice like cheese.

We know that we can substitute they for The mice. Let's use an auxiliary verb as another substitute word. We know that auxiliaries can 'stand in' for other words in sentences. The sentence is present simple so we need the auxiliary DO. Look what happens to the sentence:

They do.

We can see that both of the words like and cheese have been replaced. This shows that like cheese is one phrase. The head word is the Verb like, so like cheese is a Verb Phrase. The function or job of the Verb Phrase in the sentence is Predicate.

Inside the Verb Phrase (the Predicate) , there is a small Noun Phrase, cheese. The function of cheese inside this Verb Phrase is Complement of the verb. It is a special kind of complement: an Object. This test shows something very important about Subjects that makes them completely different from Objects and other complements. Subjects are outside the Predicate. We can say that they are external to the Verb Phrase. Other complements of the verb are internal complements. They live inside the Verb Phrase and inside the Predicate. If we replace the Verb Phrase, all the Complements of the verb are replaced too. In fact, everything outside of the Subject is part of the Predicate and will be replaced in a substitution test like this.

Hold on a minute! This sounds like the job of Subject is about how sentences are made, how we build them. What about meaning? Subjects must have a special meaning, mustn't they? Some people say that verbs tell us about actions. It is said that the person or people that do the actions are the Subjects. So in Bob punched Nelson, the Subject is Bob. In this sentence this is true, but in many sentences it isn't. In the sentence Bob is a monkey fanatic, Bob isn't doing anything. The sentence is just telling us about a quality or chracteristic of Bob. There's no action here. Let's do a substitution test for this sentence with the pronoun he and the auxiliary verb BE:

He is.

Here we can see that we have a subject and a predicate, even though there's no action and no person doing the action. Ok, so maybe that's not a good test because BE here is used with a stative meaning. How about a sentence like Bob was punched by Nelson. We can ask the question Who was punched by Nelson? The answer will be:

Bob was.

Here we see was being used for was punched by Nelson. Again the sentence has two parts, a Subject Bob and the Predicate was punched by Nelson. Now here Bob wasn't doing the punching, he received the punches. In a passive sentence like this the person doing the action appears in the Verb Phrase. So the semantic role of the Subject in the sentence, what that person does or doesn't do, is not significant in terms of it being the Subject. Notice again that the Subject is external - it's outside the Predicate. We do have names for the person who does something and the person it is done to and so forth. They are called thematic roles. In both sentences Bob was punched by Nelson and Nelson punched Bob, Nelson has the thematic role of agent. Bob has the thematic role of patient.

Subjects, it seems, are indeed about the structure of the sentence. They are about how we build sentences. They are not about meaning, in the sense that they are not about what the Subject is or isn't doing. We have other words to talk about such meaning. Subjects are about grammar, syntax, not meaning.

Let's review what we've looked at. We have talked about how parts of speech and functions are different. We showed that the basic parts of any English sentence are the Subject and the Predicate. Objects and any other complements of the verb are found inside the Predicate. Because the Predicate always has a Verb as it Head, we say that Subjects are external to the Verb Phrase. Objects and any other parts are internal.

Now let's look again at the first example sentence in this post:

There is one biscuit left.

We could ask the question Is there one biscuit left? The answer would be:

There is.

Here the auxiliary verb is is standing in for the whole Verb Phrase. The Predicate therefore is is one biscuit left. These are the words that have been 'replaced' by is. This shows that one biscuit left is internal to the Verb Phrase. It cannot be the Subject here. It must be a Complement of the verb BE. However, we do still see the word There. This shows that There is not part of the Predicate. It must, therefore, be the Subject! In fact in all sentences like this with expletive there as the first word, there is the subject.

For an introduction to constituency tests and all that jazz, I recommend English Syntax and Argumentation Bas Aarts 2008 3rd Edition.

metaphors - Omission of 'like' in a comparison

I started reading the Neuromancer and I'm facing a difficulty, especially in the following excerpt:

Ratz was tending bar, his prosthetic arm jerking monotonously as he filled a tray of glasses with draft Kirin. He saw Case and smiled, his teeth a webwork of East European steel and brown decay.

I assume the second sentence compares his teeth to a webwork [...], however I don't understand why the 'like' keyword is omitted in this construction.
I'd have expected something like "his teeth were like a webwork [...]".

I haven't found anything about that on Google, any idea?

Thanks,

Answer

There are two issues here: grammatical and rhetorical/literary.

Grammatically, in

[1] He saw Case and smiled, h͟i͟s͟ ͟t͟e͟e͟t͟h͟ ͟a͟ ͟w͟e͟b͟w͟o͟r͟k͟ ͟o͟f͟ ͟E͟a͟s͟t͟ ͟E͟u͟r͟o͟p͟e͟a͟n͟ ͟s͟t͟e͟e͟l͟ ͟a͟n͟d͟ ͟b͟r͟o͟w͟n͟ ͟d͟e͟c͟a͟y͟.

the underlined part is a supplement in the form of a verbless clause (CGEL, pp 1359-1360).

As was pointed out in the comments, the meaning is the same as if we had

[2] He saw Case and smiled. His teeth w͟e͟r͟e͟ a webwork of East European steel and brown decay.

More on the vebless clauses below.

Rhetorically, the difference between [1] and [2] on the one hand, and

[3] He saw Case and smiled, his teeth l͟i͟k͟e͟ a webwork of East European steel and brown decay.

on the other, is that [3] uses a simile, whereas [1] and [2] use a metaphor.

More on verbless clauses as supplements, from CGEL, pp 1359-1360. Note that supplements are 'elements which occupy a position in linear
sequence without being integrated into the syntactic structure of the sentence' (p. 1350).

(f) Verbless clause

[28] i The tourists, m͟o͟s͟t͟ ͟o͟f͟ ͟t͟h͟e͟m͟ ͟f͟o͟r͟e͟i͟g͟n͟e͟r͟s͟, had been hoarded onto a cattle truck.
        ii The defendants sat in the dock, t͟h͟e͟i͟r͟ ͟h͟e͟a͟d͟s͟ ͟i͟n͟ ͟t͟h͟e͟i͟r͟ ͟h͟a͟n͟d͟s͟.
       iii The only household chore men excelled at was - d͟r͟u͟m͟r͟o͟l͟l͟ ͟p͟l͟e͟a͟s͟e͟ - taking out the
            rubbish.

In [i] the supplement is comparable in function to a relative clause: compare who were most of them foreigners (or most of whom were foreigners). If the supplement consisted of foreigners on its own, it would be an ascriptive NP (noun phrase), like those in [22] (e.g. Her father, a͟ ͟d͟i͟e͟-͟h͟a͟r͟d͟ ͟c͟o͟n͟s͟e͟r͟v͟a͟t͟i͟v͟e͟, refused to even consider the proposal.); most of them, however, does not function as a modifier in NP structure, so most of them foreigners must be analysed as a reduced clause - one which could not stand alone as a sentence. The supplement in [28ii] could likewise not stand alone, but differs in its internal structure in that their heads is subject. An equivalent integrated construction would have a modifierwith the form of with + verbless clause: with their heads in their hands. The supplement in [28iii], by contrast, could stand alone as a sentence. It is simply a fragmentary main clause (with the illocutionary force of a directive) used as an interpolation.

syntax - Is this sentence correct? "What I want to do is read this book."

"What I want to do is read this book."

Is it correct? Or, can I say:

"What I want to do is to read this book."
"What I want to do is reading this book."

Are all of the three sentences correct?

grammar - "an (among other things) schizophrenic" or "a (among other things) schizophrenic"?

I'm lost on whether I should use "a" or "an" in the part of the sentence: "an (among other things) schizophrenic". How does the part in the brackets affect the rest here?

expressions - When you want to refer to "family" in general, which should be used: "family" or "families"?

I want to confirm the general rule on expressions which refer to generality.

Many reference books say that "you should use "zero article + plural noun" to refer to generality. For example, (1) is better than (2):

(1) Children like animals.
(2) The child likes the animal.

The books say that (2) sounds too formal, so (1) should be used.

According to this suggestion, when you want to refer to "family" in general, you should use "families".

(3) You should consider victims' families.

(4) You should consider patients' families.

However, I have often seen the expressions "the victim's family" or "the patient's family".
When you refer to "family", do you prefer to use the simple noun followed by the definite article?

More specifically, which is better, (3), (4) or (5), (6) when you write an essay or letter?

(5) You should consider the victim's family.
(6) You should consider the patient's family.

subordinate clauses - Use of the phrase "it seems" vs. "it seems that"

On another stackexchange site, I used the following phrasing:

I want to do X. It seems I can only do so when Y.

Someone edited the second sentence:

It seems that I can only do so when Y.

This made me realise that the edited form is perhaps more common -- but is my original phrasing grammatically incorrect? What role does "that" play in the second variation?

word choice - When to use "If I was" vs. "If I were"?

1. If I was...


2. If I were...

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.)

• Class A: real non-past


• Class B: real past


• Class C: unreal non-past


• Class D: unreal past

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 Reals

The class B “real past” cases fit into three patterns:

1. If + present simple, past continuous


2. If + present simple, past simple


3. If + past simple, past simple

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:

You use If I was in the “if” part when the “then” part is in the simple past.

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.

The Unreals

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.

“If only it were true”, “I wish it were true”

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.

Optional were in Class C conditionals

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!

---

Further Reading

I have related answers here:

grammar - What's correct here?

1) "Today the number of referrals passed are 24"

2) "Today the number of
referrals passed is 24"

Please help. Using 'IS' or 'ARE' which is correct?

relative pronouns - "To ensure" vs. "To ensure that" + subject + predicate

Is any of these two sentences incorrect:

-(without that): "To ensure the voters are not influenced by mass-media, the campaign will end 7 days before the elections take place."

-(with that): "To ensure that the voters are not influenced by mass-media, the campaign will end 7 days before the elections take place."

Is the presence of that mandatory?

Answer

I agree with both the previous commentators. WS2 is correct in saying that the relative pronoun here 'that' is frequently elided. I share Hot Licks's view that inclusion of 'that' is stylistically preferable.

Use of the infinitive, always use 'to'?

Which is the correct use:

Thanks for the opportunity of being here?
or
Thanks for the opportunity to be here?

The idea was to use the verb in infinitive.

Answer

I find both to be possible, but "opportunity to be here" sounds more natural to me.

Note that there isn't a general rule: it depends entirely on the particular word that governs it (here, opportunity), and there is no logic to which word prefers which construction: they just have to be learnt.

A particular occasion for the use of objective forms of personal pronouns

Everybody learns in school that in conventional spoken English one uses "objective" forms of personal pronouns (me, us, him, her, them) for "predicate nominatives" where some conventional formal rules call of the "subjective" forms (I, we, he, she, they). Thus "It's me." rather than "It is I." But I only just noticed that there is another context in which even writers who are fastidious about formal rules use the objective forms where the rules seem to suggest the subjective should be used. Thus (quoting from a novel):

"What would you have done, sir?"

"Me? How can I answer that?"

One wouldn't say "Me would have done thus-and-so." but "I would have done thus-and-so." Yet one says "me" rather than "I" in sentences like that quoted above. So what do grammar books say about this and how does one explain it to foreigners learning English?

PS: It is being objected that this is like another question where someone asks why "Not me." rather than "Not I." is used in reply to "Who wants ice cream?". However, I think there are syntactic differences here.

pronouns - "Who(m) will it be?" vs. "Will it be he/him?"

The accepted (and highly upvoted) answer to the question in the question What’s the rule for using “who” and “whom” correctly? states that the easiest way to find out whether to use who or whom is to try with he/him and see which fits.

But that doesn’t seem to fit very well in this case:

1. Who will it be?




2. Whom will it be?

If I replace with he/him there, it becomes:

3. Will it be he?




4. Will it be him?

– and I don’t know which of these is right, either. Is it really true that you can always associate who with he and whom with him? Or does that not always work? And which out of 3 and 4 is correct?

Answer

Check these out: 'Who' vs 'whom': 1, 'Who' vs 'whom': 2

It is usually "Who will it be?" for the reasons given in the second article.

For your second question, I think "Will it be him?" is better. These definitions may be helpful:

he

pronoun used to refer to a man, boy, or male animal previously

mentioned or easily identified.

"Everyone liked my father—he was the perfect gentleman"

him

pronoun used as the object of a verb or preposition to refer to a male
person or animal previously mentioned or easily identified.

"His wife survived him"

How to respond to negative questions (adjectives)?

My friend got me this question:

When somebody asks, "Is it not available?"

Should I say:
(1) "Yes, it is not available." OR
(2) "No, it is not available."?

I know it would be better to use the word unavailable. I checked out another question titled "How to answer a negative question without ambiguity?" But it isn't about adjectives so I'm starting a new question. Thank you!

Is there a term for a sentence with no (or implied) subject? If so, what?

Take this from Nick Cave's song 'Higgs Boson Blues':

She curses the queue at the Zulu. And moves on to Amazonia.

Is there a term for a sentence without a subject, or where the subject is implied from the previous sentence, like

And moves on to Amazonia.

This Quora (https://www.quora.com/In-formal-English-is-it-grammatically-correct-to-use-sentences-without-subjects-as-in-Went-home-late-Ate-biscuits) suggested that imperatives and exclamations often omit the subject, but the above sentence doesn't seem to fit as either of those, as it isn't an direction (like an imperative) or really exclaiming anything.

Is there a term for a sentence that has no subject, or implies the subject from the previous sentence?

Answer

"Sentence fragment", "dependent clause", and "phrase" apply, here. What you have there is improper punctuation of a single sentence.

A "clause" is a section that has subject, verb, and whatever objects are required. A "phrase" is any chunk that holds a distinct meaning as a group. A "sentence fragment" is a clump of words masquerading as a sentence but that can't actually fulfill the requirements. A "dependent clause" requires another clause to function.

Your example's first part can stand alone, but the second part is a "dependent clause" since it 'borrows' the subject of the former to function.

(In this case, the reason the dependent clause appears to be a sentence is that it has been punctuated the way it has. Thus, this isn't a grammatical error but typographical.)

prepositions - "obstacle to developing '" vs "obstacle in developing"?

Which proposition are used after obstacle? I have seen both "in" and "to". what are the difference between them? for example, what is the difference between the following sentences/
There is an obstacle in developing .....
or
There is an obstacle to developing ......

punctuation - Usage of commas and colon in sentence containing lists, and additional clauses

I've used this site to my benefit in the past, and now I have my own question. I have looked through some of the answers (although I admit not every one as I am short on time) and cannot find what I am looking for. Could someone help me regarding punctuation of my sentence?

I find an airplane's symbolic freedom appealing: whether it is soaring through the sky; industriously filling and disgorging passengers; or exultantly defying gravity on take-off, it remains independent and far-reaching in all of its manoeuvres.

Is this correct British English or do I need to change the colon to a comma? Also how is that last tacked on bit?

grammar - Newspaper headlines + is it possible to use present perfect?

I've found these two sentences in newspaper headlines and there are two things I am not sure about:

1. Haas beats Wawrinka
   Tommy Haas claimed the biggest win of the season against Wawrinka. He beats #3 in the World 5-7/ 6-2/ 6-3 and reach the quarterfinal in Rome. On the Foto is Tommy with a icepack after the match. Now he has 1.45 hours rest before the doubles start.
   Source

Do I understand it right that there could be has claimed but because of newspaper style—it is perfect to use shorter past simple? Is it the same like: Three people killed in a car accident? Present perfect would be possible as well but it would be too long for this purpose.

2. Federer forgets he's won the match.
   source

This surprised me a lot. I thought it wasn't possible to use the present perfect in headlines.

• Why do you think the writer decided to use that tense? Was it for emphasis?

For me it is an unusual combination to use the present simple (forgets) and then the present perfect in newspaper headlines. The first is used to keep headlines short; however, in this case it doesn't make sense as it is followed by the longer present perfect construction.

The last thing is that I am not sure whether it is possible to switch tenses whenever I want. I´ll give you an example:

Headline:

Federer beats Djokovic in the 2nd round

The article

Federer has been beaten by Djokovic for the third consecutive time and will not defend his Wimbledon crown. Djokovic beats him easily and didn't allow him any break.

The thing I am not sure about is whether journalists can switch from one tense to another, see the following example: "Djokovic beats.." or whether it is acceptable to do so only in the headlines?

grammar - Can't decide whether to use focus or focuses in this sentence

I feel like I should use "focuses" as using "focus" sounds weird in the following sentence.

Risks are not identified prospectively, i.e. this is a case of “Fighting the Last Battle” syndrome, whereby management focus most on risks that have occurred recently.

Are they both acceptable? I'm not big on the rules of the English language, I tend to just go by what sounds right in my head and here "focus" seems out of place.

I appreciate any feedback.

grammaticality - Is the "one's" and "their" used correctly?

It is important that one’s decision of their own life is respected.

phrasing - "That will have to" vs "Which will have to"

I am not really sure if this sentence is translated correctly into English :

Access keys have been researched and the implementation will be done in a future sprint, that will have something to do with GUI.

1. Is the use of the word "that" in this sentence correct?



2. Can I, or should I, exchange "that" for "which"?

Answer

Access keys have been researched, the implementation will be done in a future sprint which will have something to do with GUI

I would also think about swapping "have something to do with" for "pertain to"

comparative phrase 'more than'

I don't know the meaning of the phrase in this sentence

We are seldom exposed only to a single contaminant in the
environment-but more often than not to a cocktail of chemical

mixture.

How to understand 'more often than not'?

Hyphenation in compounds with abbreviation remarks

So far I understood, that hyphenation should aid readability.

Examples [1, 2]:

North America-based company

A Gaussian mixture model-based approach

We propose spherical Gaussian-based approximations to calculate this analytically.

Although, this never aligned with my understanding of parsing trees, I would still like to apply this rule.

How does it extend to abbreviation remarks?

Gaussian mixture model (GMM)-based approach

Non-negative matrix factorization (NMF)-inspired method

My own understanding of how to parse the words is as follows, which does not seem to be reflected in how hyphens are used:

{
  {
    {

      Gaussian {
        mixture model
      }
    } (GMM)
  }-based
} approach

Answer

Hyphens are used to compose constituents, either words or phrases, to make words. Consequently, to know whether a hyphen is appropriate, you have to know the categories of constituents, not just what the constituents are. Below, I've tried to amend your diagram for "Gaussian mixture model (GMM)-based approach" by adding category (parts of speech) information. NP means noun phrase, N is noun (a word), A is adjective or other noun-modifier (a word), Participle (a word).

{NP
  {A
    {NP
      A Gaussian {N
        N mixture N model
      }
    } (GMM)
  }-Participle based
} N approach  

There are two types of word compounds in the example. A compound adjective (a word) is made by combining a NP (a phrase) and a Participle (a word), and a compound N (a word) is made by combining two Ns (words). For the latter type of compound, a hyphen is often optional.

I'm not sure I see a problem with the hyphenation. I'm worried, though, about the structure of "Gaussian mixture model", which must be a phrase, not a single word, because "Gaussian" is an adjective, and noun-noun compounds can't contain adjectives. But "Gaussian mixture" should be a constituent, because of the interpretation: mixture of Gaussian distributions.

meaning - What's the difference between "general" and "generic"?

What is the difference between them? Do they have different meanings? When should I use "general" or "generic"?

Answer

General is the opposite of specific, whereas generic refers to something which has no unique features.
To use the book example, a general geography book would be one without a particular focus on one area, while a generic geography book would be the same as every other book out there.

Sometimes they can be used interchangeably, but not always.

General

adjective

1. of or pertaining to all persons or things belonging to a group or category: a general meeting of the employees.



2. of, pertaining to, or true of such persons or things in the main, with possible exceptions; common to most; prevalent; usual: the
   general mood of the people.


3. not limited to one class, field, product, service, etc.; miscellaneous: the general public; general science.


4. considering or dealing with overall characteristics, universal aspects, or important elements, especially without considering all
   details or specific aspects: general instructions; a general
   description; a general resemblance one to another.


5. not specific or definite: I could give them only a general idea of what was going on.

Generic

adjective Also, ge·ner·i·cal.

1. of, applicable to, or referring to all the members of a genus, class, group, or kind; general.


2. of, pertaining to, or noting a genus, especially in biology.


3. (of a word) applicable or referring to both men and women: a generic pronoun.


4. not protected by trademark registration: “Cola” and “shuttle” are generic terms.

conditionals - Is this sentence grammatically correct, and is it an example of the subjunctive?

Is this sentence grammatically correct, and is 'your ensuring' here an example of the subjunctive?

"We appreciate your ensuring all workstations are switched off before leaving the office locked at night."

It seems to me that "We appreciate your ensuring" could be swapped out with "We would appreciate it if you ensured", which suggests to me that 'your ensuring' is in the subjunctive mood (given that the subordinate clause of a conditional takes the subjunctive mood).

I'm curious about this because the sentence looks and feels fine to me, but I've never seen an explanation of the subjunctive which included it's appearance in this form (possessive pronoun + gerund).

How can I change the tense of a hyphenated verb?

I'm certain this can't be the only example there is of a hyphenated verb, but it's the only one I can think of right now.

How should one appropriately convert "mouse-over" into the past tense? Should it be "moused-over" or "mouse-overed"?

Also, are there any other verb-preposition combinations like this that could be used as examples?

Answer

The term in question is phrasal verb which is defined as

a phrase which consists of a verb in combination with a preposition or adverb or both, the meaning of which is different from the meaning of its separate parts. ^Cambridge

When changing the tense of a phrasal verb, only the verb is affected, for the simple reason that adverbs and prepositions do not change with tense, as they are not verbs. It is also crucial to note that phrasal verbs do not come with hyphens. However, a number of them can be hyphenated or compounded to function as adjectives or nouns with related or unrelated meanings.

To use your example, the past tense of mouse over would be moused over, while the present participle would be mousing over. You could also hyphenate to make a noun, as in, "The trackball is so bad that a simple mouse-over to the top-left corner of the screen takes more than twenty seconds."

For reference, here is the definition of mouse over:

mouse (verb)
[with adverbial of direction] use a mouse to move a cursor on a computer screen:
mouse over to the window and click on it ^NOAD

---

Some standard phrasal verbs, their tenses and their adjective/noun derivatives:

PHRASAL VERB   PAST TENSE      PRESENT PARTICIPLE     ADJECTIVE/NOUN
brush off      brushed off     brushing off           brush-off
fall out       fell out        falling out            fallout • falling-out

check in       checked in      checking in            check-in
cross over     crossed over    crossing over          crossover
drop out       dropped out     dropping out           dropout
knock down     knocked down    knocking down          knockdown • knock-down
see through    saw through     seeing through         see-through      
shape up       shaped up       shaping up             shape-up
stand by       stood by        standing by            standby
take away      took away       taking away            takeaway
take off       took off        taking off             takeoff • take-off

---

All this said, there are indeed some standard hyphenated verbs (these belong to the larger group of compound verbs, majority of which do not have a hypen, e.g. backstab, broadside, singsong, overtake, bypass, etc.), but these are not verb-preposition combinations, as you indicated. Rather, they terminate in verbs or are wholly verbal in composition. For these species, the tense change affects the word in its entirety. Examples:

COMPOUND VERB     PAST TENSE       PRESENT PARTICIPLE
(with hyphen)
booby-trap        booby-trapped    booby-trapping
flip-flop         flip-flopped     flip-flopping

see-saw           see-sawed        see-sawing
sun-dry           sun-dried        sun-drying
T-bone            T-boned          T-boning

---

However, there exists one (and there may be a few more) true hyphenated phrasal verb (verb-preposition) that is treated wholly as a verb: one-up

PHRASAL VERB   PAST TENSE      PRESENT PARTICIPLE     ADJECTIVE/NOUN
one-up         one-upped       one-upping             one up [on]

It appears, however, that this verb may be a back-formation from the original noun phrase and, later, adjective, one up.

grammaticality - "He didn't know where New Jersey was"

I know the past tense carries the past tense in every dependent clause, but referring specifically to places or to things that are eternal, like the Earth, seems a bit weird and therefore we sometimes (I believe incorrectly) say

He didn't know that New Jersey was actually on the East Coast.

Because it still is. Or

He thought the Earth was round.

So is it square now?

Logically speaking, would you consider the use of past tense here a bit confusing in a day-to-day speech in these examples? Would you instinctively opt for using the present tense?

Answer

Both tenses are OK, but I believe the past tense is a bit more common: it may be somewhat contrary to logic, but it sounds better. Harmony of tenses (if that's what it's called) is a linguistic phenomenon that is not always very logical.

etymology - Is there any etymological relation between "a-hunting" and "ajar"?

While reading this question I recalled hearing the phrase like to go a-hunting on several occasions when someone stylized their speech to sound old-time'y and now I started wondering if there is any relation to other words, like:

• afloat, ajar, apart,


• abroad, aback,


• afoot, aboard, afield,


• aback, afore, afront,
  etc.

While I have little or no idea about their individual etymologies and overall evolution of the language, I perceive this class of words as description of state formed by "a"+attribute where the attribute is more-or-less related to the state (pretty direct relation in afore or afloat, but no so obvious in others like ajar or along, if we even consider the latter to fit in this class as well).

Then we have to go a-hunting. Hunting itself may here be perceived as a noun describing an action, and in that form it would form sort of state description: the person went and is-hunting, or as form of desire/necessity: the person went in-order-to-hunt, with the latter being related to the state-of-being-hunting as well.

My questions are:

• were afloat, abroad, etc written (or spoken) a-broad, a-float at some point of time?



• at the time when to go a-hunting was used, was something like to be a-hunting also used?


• is it just a coincidence, or is there any evolutionary relation between forms like afloat and a-hunting?

Answer

According to Merriam-Webster's Eleventh Collegiate Dictionary (2003), words with an a- prefix fall into two major categories: those in which the prefix reflects the Greek alpha privative for negation, as in abiogenesis, achromatic, and ahistorical; and those derived from Old English a in the sense of "on, in, or at," as in abed, aloud, afire, and atingle. The words abroad, afloat, a-hunting, and ajar fall into this second category of a-prefixed English words, and so are related.

The Eleventh Collegiate further distinguishes four cases of the Old English–derived a- prefix:

a- prefix {ME fr. OE} 1 : on : in : at {abed} 2 : in (such) a state or condition {afire} 3 : in (such) a manner {aloud} 4 : in the act or process of {gone a-hunting} {atingle}

The Eleventh Collegiate indicates that afloat and ajar come from the first subcategory of a- words (the ones where a- signifies "on, in, or at"), noting the following etymologies for them:

afloat adj or adv {ME aflot, fr. OE on flot, fr. on + flot, fr. flot deep water, sea; ...}

and

ajar adj or adv (earlier on char, fr. ME, fr. on + char turn — ...)

It doesn't cover the origins of abroad, but that word seems to follow the same pattern. MW cites a-hunting as an example of the fourth subcategory of words, where a- means "in the process of."

Michael Quinion, Ologies and Isms: Word Beginnings and Endings (2002) offers some additional detail on the sense of a- in words from non-Greek roots:

a- Towards, of, in, into, or at; marking some ongoing process or state; movement onwards or away. {Old English prepositions of or on (sometimes as unstressed an), or the Old English prefix a-.}

The Old English prepositions were originally separate words, but became reduced to a- and attached to the words they once modified. The process can be seen in alive, which in Old English was two words, on līfe, literally 'in life'; others of similar type are aside, akin, and anew. Some examples are verbs derived from Old English a-, which had an idea about it of an action or an intensification of an action: arise, abide, and awake.

Some objectives imply a continuing or active state, and have much the same force as a present participle ending in -ing [cross reference omitted]: ablaze, abuzz, afire, afoot, aglow, astride. Others combine the prefix with a present participle, usually hyphenated; such words imply an ongoing processor activity: a-brewing, a-roving, a-hunting, a-wasting. Though they are mostly now archaic, literary, or dialectal, the form has had a small revival in recent decades, as in Bob Dylan's song lyric The times they are a-changing.

---

As for the other queries asked near the bottom of the posted question:

• It appears that afloat, ajar, and perhaps abroad, were at some point in Middle English rendered as two words: on flot, on char, and perhaps on brood. In a series of library database searches, I found 27 instances of a-float (between 1621 and 1698), 1 instance of a-jar (from 1694), and 10 instances of a-broad (between 1611 and 1698). So these words did pass through an intermediate period during which some writers fused the prefix into the root word, but marked the fusion with a hyphen.




• At least in the case of a-hunting, the earliest matches that I could find for the term were from the 1600s—and 15 of the 16 from that century were from 1650 or later. The exception is from William Slatyer, The History of Great Britanie (1621, page 213): "But deafe as dumbe, and wanton as/ Light lyther aire, more faine she was/ To seeme more faire, right woman too,/ Spreads all her Peacocks plumes to woo,/ Fresh as the morne fond Nymph, to gaine/ Light loue! her spouse a-hunting's slaine." (That is, her husband is slain while a-hunting.) But an example in Thomas Bromhall, An History of Apparitions, Oracles, Prophecies, and Predictions ... (1658, page 112) includes the phrase "he seemed to be a-hunting to those that beheld him often times"—which provides an affirmative answer to the poster's question "at the time when to go a-hunting was used, was something like to be a-hunting also used?" An example of "to go a-hunting" appears in Adam Olearis, The Voyages and Travells of the Ambassadors Sent by Frederick, Duke of Holstein, to the Great Duke of Muscovy and the King of Persia (1669).




• I noted at the end of the first paragraph of my answer that all of the non-Greek a- forms discussed in this answer are related through the Old English prepositions that both Merriam-Webster and Quinion mention as sources of the a- prefix.

grammar - Where to put a period when you quote a title at the end of the sentence?

Which one is correct?:

1. I have never heard of "Oranges".

or

2. I have never heard of "Oranges."

pronunciation - Is there any English word starting with "gh" and "gh" is not pronounced as /ɡ/?

Gh is a digraph in English (and in some other languages). In English, you can see it at the beginning, in the middle and at the end of the word.

If ⟨gh⟩ is not at the beginning of the word, it is almost always either silent or pronounced as /f/. (silent if in the middle --> light, /f/ if at the end --> tough)

Some exceptions are:

• lough (and certain other Hiberno-English words) where ⟨gh⟩ is silent. [⟨gh⟩ historically represented [x] (the voiceless velar fricative) and it still does in some words.]




• Edinburgh - ⟨gh⟩ is occasionally pronounced [ə]

Note: The locals pronounce it like "Edinburrah" and all the other "burghs" (Fraserburgh, Musselburgh etc.) rhyme. But there is an exception to this exception which is Pittsburgh (well, it is in US and not Scotland but shares the same suffix "burgh"). Another good question that comes to mind is "Why doesn't Pittsburgh rhyme with Edinburgh?" and there is a good answer in Quora if you want to check.

When gh occurs at the beginning of a word in English, it is pronounced /ɡ/ as in "ghost" and it does not derive from a former /x/. One might ask where it derives from. So, I checked the etymology of ghost and found this explanation in Etymonline:

The gh- spelling appeared early 15c. in Caxton, influenced by Flemish and Middle Dutch gheest, but was rare in English before mid-16c.

After all the information I provided, the main question is:

• Is there any English word starting with "gh" and "gh" (at the beginning) is not pronounced as /ɡ/ ?

I couldn't find any exceptions but English has a lot of surprises. There might even be a dialectal exception.

_{For example, I thought ph is always pronounced as /f/ when it is at the beginning of the word. But there are some exceptions like phthisis, phthisic, phthalate which I saw in this El&U question.}

---

_Sources:

<sub>- Wikipedia / GH digraph
- Etymonline / ghost
- Phonics from A to Z: A Practical Guide By Wiley Blevins</sub>

word order - Why does "Why doesn't it work?" become "Why does it not work?"

When you uncontract doesn't in "Why doesn't it work?" the not moves to "Why does it not work?"

This confuses me even more when I use a longer phrase instead of the pronoun it like below:

Why doesn't this simple code example work?

Why does the word order change when we use a contraction?

conjunctions - Verb agreement with a phrase set off by "but"

A coworker is writing a sentence like

Sally, but especially Joe, enjoys questions about grammar and usage.

He thinks it should be

Sally, but especially Joe, enjoy questions about grammar and usage.

Leaving aside the possibility of rewriting the sentence, I want to understand which part of the subject controls the verb's number. Consider the following:

1. 
   

   My parents, but especially my wife, [is/are] supportive of my goals.

   
   




2. 
   

   My wife, but especially my parents, [is/are] supportive of my goals.

   
   





3. 
   

   Dogs, but especially cats, [is/are] the cause of many allergies.

   
   

To my ear, are seems right in all three cases. If that's right, the rule would seem to be that if either part is plural, use the plural verb. I'm least confident about sentence two.

In any case, I'd like to learn more about what's going on here, grammatically. Is the phrase set off by commas a compound subject? An appositive? A subordinate clause?

Answer

In all of your examples, the "but..." clause is parenthetical. That means it should be able to be dropped without changing the meaning of the sentence.

So the first sentence;

"Sally, but especially Joe, enjoys questions about grammar and usage."

can be reduced to

"Sally enjoys questions about grammar and usage.".

There's only one Sally so she "enjoys".

Similarly,

"My parents, but especially my wife, [is/are] supportive of my goals."

can be reduced to

"My parents are supportive of my goals".

You use "are" because "parents" is plural.

Part of the problem with these example sentences is the (mis)use of the word "especially". This is normally used to single out a particular member of the previously referred-to group.

E.g. "The team, but especially Bob, love to drink beer"

which means that they all like beer but Bob especially likes beer.

However, in your examples the subjects of the "especially" clause are not part of the previous group. For example, "Dogs, but especially cats" doesn't work because cats are not a subset of dogs. You could change "especially" to "also", in all of these examples, to give the effect you intended.

Dogs, but also cats, are the cause of many allergies.

grammar - Where to put a period when you quote a title at the end of the sentence?

Which one is correct?:

1. I have never heard of "Oranges".

or

2. I have never heard of "Oranges."

pronouns - This is my wife and me

This sentence sounds uncomfortable but I believe it to be correct. For background I posted a simple picture with the caption "This is my wife and me" and the grammar nazi's pounced. I am having trouble figuring out if it should me "this is my wife and I" as they have proclaimed. Would we be the object or subject of this sentence to help identify if I should use "I" or "me"

Present perfect Question framed with "What is...?"

In the following question the verb is present perfect but the question is framed with "What is..." Can anyone explain the grammar to me?

"What is the most beautiful place you have ever visited?...."

grammatical number - Are the people in 'Everyone' and 'Everybody' sentences referred to using singular or plural grammar?

I looked through some past queries and I believe this particular take on the question has not yet been addressed:

Which of the following sentences is correct?:

Everyone was working as a volunteer.
Everyone was working as volunteers.

Should the 'volunteers' be referred to as singular or plural and why?

I personally imagine 'a volunteer' as being one giant volunteer made up of multiple people and 'volunteers' as being each separate volunteer in the group.

Thanks!

grammar - Change "The boys kicked the ball through the window" into passive voice

I was wondering which one would feel more natural.

1. The ball was kicked through the window by the boys.


2. The ball was kicked by the boys through the window.

Personally I feel "kicked" should be followed immediately by "the boys". But I'm not a native English speaker, so I would like your opinion.

Also, it said in the direction that it's not always necessary to include who carried out the action. Should I include it here?
Thank you.

How to ask a question to get an ordinal number answer

Possible Duplicates:
How to phrase an asking sentence that must be answered with an ordinal number?
Framing a question whose answer is an ordinal number

Given that I want to know Barack Obama is the 44th President of U.S.A, how can I frame a question like:

The how manyeth president is Barack Obama?

Answer

I'd go with the following structure:

Q: Where does Obama fall in the sequence of US presidents?

A: [He's the] 44th [president].

This reflects similar usage when discussing, for instance, rankings:

Q: Where did Harvard fall on the U.S. News & World Report list this
year?

A: 2nd.

pronunciation - Why do we say "archenemy" differently from "archangel" and "architecture"?

Like other words that start with "arch-", archenemy is partly derived from arkhi or arkhos from the Greek (Wikipedia), meaning chief. But why is it said differently, using a "ch" sound, from archipelago and archaeology, which use a "k" sound?

The "ch" in archenemy is pronounced similar to that in archbishop and archdiocese, even though they're followed by consonants in the latter, but a vowel the former.

What made it break from the rules?

Answer

I am not a native speaker, but I see a major difference between arch- in archenemy or in archaeology and even another one to archipelago, which would explain the different pronunciations.

In the first case it is used as a prefix. Enemy is still a word by itself, as bishop or diocese are. The arch- prefix is used to emphasize the relevance / importance / significance of this special enemy / diocese / bishop.
Here arch- derives from the Greek archi- or arkhi- (main, chief) as you mentioned before.

This is also correct for archipelago (archi meaning main), but here it is a word that can only be used as a whole. Pelago has no meaning in English. Archipelago derives from Italian (where it comes from Greek), so one cannot compare it with archbishop etc. It has not been combined from already English words.

In archaeology arch- is no prefix. Instead archaeo- could be counted as one. The word derives from the Greek words archaios (old, archaic) and logos (science).

The difference becomes clearly visible when translating to German:

Archbishop - Erzbischof

Archenemy - Erzfeind

Archdiocese - Erzdiözese

Archipelago - Archipel

Archaeology - Archäologie

As a prefix to the given words Erz- has the same meaning as arch- and like archipelago the German word Archipel derives from the Italian word. Archaeology and Archäologie are just the same.

prepositions - "My aunt is coming to dinner tomorrow" (grammar of 'to dinner')

My aunt is coming to dinner tomorrow.

The meaning is clear. However, if you think about it, what this seems to literally say is that the aunt is going directly to some dinner (and not even an article is used there).

How would you explain such grammar?

---

I posted this question before on ELL StackExchange. However, I did not receive an answer that would prove the grammar aspects of this.

The user Laure there told me that what is happening here is that some phrases, words, articles are simply omitted.

However, I did not receive a proof of this and I would like to have you confirm this (if this is true, of course). Just to make sure. The user seemed to be the only one claiming this. If I see more people agreeing with it, I'll be more confident this is true.

---

Edit: After some discussions, I've now decided that the explicit question I should ask here is:

Why is there no article,'the' nor possessive pronoun/noun before the singular noun 'dinner'?

Isn't there a grammar rule that tells us that singular nouns always have at least one of those?

A popular example of such usage would be the phrase 'Go to bed.'

Dependent clause/ prepositional phrase in second clause with comma

Am I right in punctuating the sentence this way?

Joe and Jim walked down the street, and, at the corner, Joe found a nickel.

This is just an example. More importantly, I need to know in general case scenarios. Also, does this apply to an 'if clause' starting the second part of the sentence?

pronouns - "that which" used together

When I read essays from Eliot, I find him using "that which" frequently, e.g.

1. the combination which is the murder of Agamemnon is probably as complex as that which is the voyage of Ulysses.


2. A very small part of acting is that which takes place on the stage!


3. They belong to a different race. Their crudity is that which was of the Roman, as compared with the Greek, in real life.

I can kind of guess its usage, but I want to know more about this grammar structure. Searching on Google mostly gave me the simple difference between "that" and "which", and some examples using "that which":

1. that which we call a rose (from "Romeo and Juliet")


2. that which we persist in doing

It is a pity that Google search does not direct me to any useful page about "that which". Can someone explicate its grammar for me?

Answer

The combination of that which in the example sentences is fine. The that is a pronoun referring back to a noun phrase and the which is the relative pronoun used for non-animate antecedents. If we expand the shortest of the OP's example sentences to replace the pronoun that with its noun referent, we get:

• A very small part of acting is acting which takes place on the stage!

We can see a similar (personal) pronoun / relative pronoun combination in:

• He who hesitates is lost.

punctuation - Terminal comma?

I've always had this question but I didn't know the name for what I wanted to ask until just recently (figured it out while reading a tutorial for the Inform Interactive Fiction system).

When using commas in a list of things (see examples below) should there be a comma between the next-to-last item and the word "and"? I think it makes more sense this way (see examples below).

Example set 1:

        I like squirrels, cheese, and typographic design.
I like squirrels, cheese and typographic design.

To me, the second method doesn't separate the two items, or indicate a pause (and the average reader would pause between "and" and "typographic design" regardless of whether the comma was there or not, right?).

The separation makes things clearer, in my opinion:

Example set 2:

        I like squirrels, cheese, and mashed potatoes and gravy.
I like squirrels, cheese and mashed potatoes and gravy.

It gets worse when the item containing "and" isn't the last item:

Example set 3:

        I like squirrels, mashed potatoes and gravy, and cheese.
        I like squirrels, mashed potatoes and gravy and cheese.

        I like squirrels, mashed potatoes, and gravy and cheese.

In the second sentence in set 2, the terminal comma (is that even the right term for it?) is removed, and in the third sentence in set 2, it is re-inserted, but in the wrong place, drastically altering the meaning of the sentence. Read aloud, the sentences probably sound about the same, but I think I like the extra clarity added by the terminal comma, but see many texts in which it is omitted.

Is the terminal comma proper punctuation?

Answer

First, I don't know whether there is a specific name for the comma in question, but when I read terminal comma in your question, I thought you were suggesting that there might be a comma (instead of a full stop) at the end of a sentence.

In answer to your fundamental question, there is no right or wrong way here. Some people prefer to put a comma before the last item and some prefer not to. I don't know whether there is a UK - US split on preferences here.

The important thing is that when there is ambiguity as in your Examples 2 & 3, you should include a comma to make it clear what you mean.

If you have a simple list with no ambiguity, then the comma is optional.

If it's a list of clauses or long phrases (instead of short single-word or 2/3-word items), then it often makes it easier for a reader if you put a comma before the final item.

So, in summary, if it makes it easier for the reader, or if it is necessary to clarify the distinctions between multiple items (especially where the items include the word 'and'), then put a comma in. If it's not necessary for intelligibility, then it's optional and up to individual style.

grammar - Inversion in "only [adverb] have they"

I have seen this construction quite often:

Online ads have been around since the dawn of the Web, but only in
recent years have they become the rapturous life dream of Silicon
Valley.

What is the rule there?. When your sentence doesn't start with pronoun + verb, invert them as verb + pronoun?. I know it sounds awkward but is it possible (grammatically correct) to use something similar to:

Online ads have been around since the dawn of the Web, but only in
recent years they have become...

And in any case, does this only work with have (or has)? Maybe it works fine with 'had' but I can't think of an example right now.

Answer

Switching around the normal word order is called inversion, and this specific type is called subject-auxiliary inversion. Wikipedia has a list of usages of subject-auxiliary inversion, including interrogative constructions (e.g. Did you eat?), but the following is the declarative section:

Declarative sentences with negative elements (i.e. never or not) are formed. See also Negative inversion.

• Example #1: Never again shall I watch that opera!


• Example #2: Not since childhood did she eat cotton candy.

Declarative sentences with restrictive elements (i.e. only or so) are formed.

• Example #1: Only on Fridays does he go to the bar.


• Example #2: So hard did she work that she overslept the next day.


• Example #3: So did I.

I found a blog called Practice English which has a laudably comprehensive post on the topic of inversion:

In statement it is usual for the verb to follow the subject, but sometimes this word order is reversed.

We can refer to this as inversion. There are two main types of inversion:

• when the verb comes before the subject (optional inversion)

In the doorway stood her father. (or …her father stood.)

• when the auxiliary comes before the subject and the rest of the verb
  phrase follows the subject (inversion is usually necessary)

Rarely had he seen such a sunset. (not Rarely he had seen…)

Inversion brings about fronting, the re-ordering of information in a sentence
to give emphasis in a particular place. Often this causes an element to be
postponed until later in the sentence, focusing attention on it.

• Inversion after negative adverbials

When we begin a sentence with a negative adverb or adverbial phrase,
we sometimes have to change the usual word order of subject and
verb (often using an auxiliary verb) because we want to emphasise
the meaning of the adverb. We use inversion when we move a negative adverb
which modifies the verb (never, nowhere, not only, hardly etc.) to the beginning
of a sentence. For example:

I had never seen so many people in one room. (= normal word order)

Never had I seen so many people in one room. (= inversion)

There are adverbs and adverbial expressions with a negative,
restrictive or emphatic meaning, which are followed by inversion
when placed first in a sentence. The most common adverbs ad adverbial
expressions with negative, restrictive or emphatic meaning that are
followed be inversion are:

Seldom, Rarely, Little, Nowhere, Nor even one, In no way
Scarcely/Hardly/Barely … when, No sooner … than, Not only … but (also)

On no occasion/account/condition, In/Under no circumstances
Only after, Only later, Only once, Only in this way, Only by,
Only then, Only when, Only if, Not till/until, Never, Never
before, Not since, Neither/Not/So, Well (formal) etc:

This is only the first 15% or so. Though not the highest quality of writing (it contains a few typos, etc), IMO it represents the contexts of proper inversion admirably well and staggeringly comprehensively.

The only real (albeit minor) disagreement I have seen that I have with it involves the following:

We can put the verb before the subject when we use adverbs expressing
direction of movement, such as along, away, back, down, in, off, out, up with verbs such as come, fly, go. This pattern is found
particularly in narrative, to mark a change in events:

The door opened and in came the doctor. (less formally …and the doctor came in)

As soon as I let go of the string, up went the balloon, high into the sky. (less formally …the balloon went up)

Just when I thought I’d have to walk home, along came Miguel and he gave me a lift. (less formally …Miguel came along and gave me …)

As far as I have seen, it's not necessarily formal to say in came the doctor - in fact, the doctor came in seems more consistent with a formal context. (It also could be that the author meant to say less informally, and if so, I'd have agreed completely).

grammar - "He" / "she" vs. "it" regarding beloved objects

Is that normal to regard a beloved object (an animal, a car, a book) as he/she? If yes, what gender should be used in this case?

One comment in this question touched the tendency to humanize things we love, but it was never upvoted properly, so I decided to ask a it as question.

I'm Russian and here gender really matters. In Russia calling my friend's dog as "it" may sound as insult. And calling a dog, which is of a male gender, "she" is a mistake.

BTW, in Russian "England" is a "she". And "United Kingdom" is an "it" :)

Answer

In English, gender pronouns are formally used only for representations of animate beings that actually exhibit a physical gender: people and animals. Any inanimate object (or asexual lifeforms like bacteria) would be an "it," by default.

Of course, a few nouns sometimes receive the feminine pronoun. This is customary with ships and boats, as well as sometimes with nations or geographic features (the sea is often referred to with a feminine gender). This isn't required, and, in fact, most people usually refer to those nouns with "it," not with the feminine pronoun.

Additionally, individuals will sometimes personalize an object, such as a car, and assign it a gender. However, that is always a personal affectation and is not representative of the generally accepted usage. Even if your friend has named his beloved car "Eddie," you are not committing an offense to refer to the car as "it" instead of "he."

It is generally acceptable to refer to an animal as "it," particularly if the animal doesn't exhibits any recognizable or outward physical indications of gender.

That's less true if it's a specific animal you are familiar with. I.e., if you're meeting a friend's dog for the first time, it would be appropriate use "it" until you had determined the dog's gender. However, if you continued to refer to your friend's dog as "it" even after you had learned the dog was male (and thus the pronoun "he" would be used), then your friend might find that odd and impersonal. And if you referred to you friend's male dog as "she," you would likely be corrected.

punctuation - Where do I put a comma when I have quotes around a short story, and the sentence structure needs a comma?

Where do I put a comma when I have quotes around a short story, and the sentence structure needs a comma? I know that, generally, commas go inside of quotes, but what if the quotes are marking a short story. Here is the part of the sentence I'm having trouble with:

Gertrude Stein’s The Gentle Lena is vastly different from Edith Wharton’s “The Other Two,” yet the two female leads ...

Should it look like that, or should it look like this:

Gertrude Stein’s The Gentle Lena is vastly different from Edith Wharton’s “The Other Two”, yet the two female leads ...

punctuation - Do exclamation and question marks always end a sentence?

It is true that exclamation and question marks end sentences in the same way a period does.

Don't do that!

Would you like to go out to eat?

However, in a more complex sentence, do exclamation and question marks replace commas? It would seem this is most common with dialog.

"Don't do that!" he said.

"Would I do that? because I don't think I would."

In a more complex sentence, do exclamation and question marks replace commas? meaning they don't end the sentence.

hyphenation - When should com­pound words be writ­ten as one word, with hy­phens, or with spaces?

Some compound words are written without hyphens (nonaggression, nonbeliever), some with hyphens (well-intentioned), and others with spaces (post office).

Is there a rule or good guide as to which option should be used?

Answer

In English, there are three types of compound words:

1. the closed form, in which the words are melded together, such as firefly, secondhand, softball, childlike, crosstown, redhead, keyboard, makeup, notebook;




2. the hyphenated form, such as daughter-in-law, master-at-arms, over-the-counter, six-pack, six-year-old, mass-produced;




3. and the open form, such as post office, real estate, middle class, full moon, half sister, attorney general.

For the most part, compound words that are created by adding a prefix are not hyphenated. For example, there are the words anteroom, extraordinary and coordinate. Some exceptions to this rule are (from the link above):

1. compounds in which the second element is capitalized or a number:
   anti-Semitic, pre-1998, post-Freudian


2. compounds which need hyphens to avoid confusion:
   un-ionized (as distinguished from unionized), co-op


3. compounds in which a vowel would be repeated (especially to avoid confusion):
   co-op, semi-independent, anti-intellectual (but reestablish, reedit)


4. compounds consisting of more than one word: (poster's note: these are phrasal adjectives)
   non-English-speaking, pre-Civil War


5. compounds that would be difficult to read without a hyphen:
   
   pro-life, pro-choice, co-edited

Your original example of "well-intentioned" is also explained here:

The other time we must use hyphenation is to join a word to a past participle to create a single adjective preceding the noun it modifies: "a well-intentioned plan," for example, or "a horseshoe-shaped bar."

So, why isn't nonaggression hyphenated? It can be broken into non + aggression, so it is formed by adding a basic prefix onto the noun. In doing so, it breaks none of the exceptions to the rule: "aggression" is not capitalized, hyphenating the term doesn't avoid confusion, a vowel isn't repeated, the compound only consists of 2 words, and it is perfectly readable without a hyphen.