Index: Participial postmodification in NP:...2 Clauses as postmodifiers in adverbial function:...2 Scope of negation:...2 Ways of expressing

Transcription

1 Index: Participial postmodification in NP:...2 Clauses as postmodifiers in adverbial function:...2 Scope of negation:...2 Ways of expressing negation:...3 Coordination:...3 Prepositional phrase as PostM in NP:...3 Adjectival relative clauses vs. adverbial clauses:...4 Clauses introduced by however:...4 Non-finite modifiers in nominal phrase:...4 Clauses introduced by a zero marker:...5 Position of subordinate clauses:...5 Appositive clauses:...5 Subject and predicator agreement:...5 Structure of the prepositional phrase (pp)...6 Non relative adjectival clauses:...6 Non-finite clauses of purpose:...7 Syndetic vs. asyndetic coordination:...8 Nouns as premodifiers in adjectival phrase:...8 Nominal clauses functioning at the level of phrase structure:...8 Coordinating vs. subordinating conjunctions:...9 Clausal subjects (finite, infinitival, gerundial, participial)...9 Infinitival postmodifier in adjectival phrase: Cleft sentences: Appositive vs. coordinate nominal phrase: Determiners Sentence structure S+P+A and S+P+SC Clauses introduced by as Subject predicator agreement with coordinating subjects: Prepositional phrase as a non-headed structure General characteristics of a phrase Embedding vs. conjoining Adjuncts, disjuncts and conjuncts: Scope of adverbial adjuncts... 13

2 Intransitive sentence patterns Types and syntactic functions of nominal non-finite clauses: Sentence vs. predication adverbials: Prepositional phrase in a phrase structure: Nominal phrase in a phrase structure: Participial postmodification in NP: Participles are used as postmodifiers when they have retained their verbal character: Present participle expresses an action performed by the headword: This is Mr. Black speaking. Present participle nearly always occurs as predicator of a participial clause: The woman cleaning the windows is their housekeeper. In its function of a PostM it is derived from a relative clause: Here is a letter announcing his arrival (...which announces its arrival). o use of a present participial clause as postmodifier is common: with nouns after There is or Here is: There s a bus coming. with indefinite pronouns as headwords: I found nothing insulting in the letter. A single past participle expresses the result of an action: A penny saved is a penny gained. Past participial clause occurs even more it is usually a transform of a relative clause: Books published for children (which are published for the children) should be well illustrated. Clauses as postmodifiers in adverbial function: infinitival clauses occur as postmodifiers particularly when the headword is premodified by too or postmodified by enough: You work too slowly to finish in due time. She knew French well enough to read books. A for-phrase is used to indicate the subject of the infinitive. There was nowhere for me to put anything. clauses introduced by as expressing cause or concession: Incessantly as she talked she made me nervous. (cause) Quickly as he reacted he still could not prevent the collision. (concession) Scope of negation: There are three types of negation: clausal negation affects the whole clause we achieve it by negating the verb:

3 o negation by placing not after an auxiliary or modal verb I have not seen him, have I? o negation by the negative determiner, pronouns and by negative and semi-negative adverbs (negative in form, not in meaning) I have never seen him, have I? o negation by the negative conjunctions I have neither seen him nor spoken to him, have I? predication negation (limited scope) o negation by placing not before predicate: You can always not go to the party. (not negates the predication go to the party) local negation o negation by placing not before a particular element of sentence structure - I met him not long ago. (long ago is negated) Ways of expressing negation: by placing not after an auxiliary or a modal verb: I must not forget locking the doors. by placing not before a particular element of the sentence: You can always not go to the party. by the negative determiner (no), pronouns (nobody, nothing) and by negative and seminegative adverbs (never, rarely): Nobody knows you here by the negative conjunctions: He couldn t hear neither could he speak. Coordination: Clauses in a complex sentence are joined either by co-ordination or by subordination. Coordination means that the constituent clauses are on the same level. They are joined by: a coordinating conjunction and, but, or, nor, for a conjunct adverbs accordingly, also, consequently, in fact punctuation semicolon, colon, comma There are 5 types of causal coordination: copulative coordination (and, nor, as well as): He is very fond of music and plays the violin. disjunctive or alternative coordination (or, otherwise): Take it or leave it. adversative (but, however): He adores football matches, but his wife doesn t. resultative coordination (accordingly, consequently, so): You are the older brother, so you should be wiser. explanatory coordination (as, namely, for instance...): He is not a reliable man, that is to say, he rarely keeps his word. Prepositional phrase as PostM in NP: Prepositional phrases are the most common postmodifiers in NPs e.g. the birds in the tree. The object in a prepositional phrase is often a gerund or a gerundial clause (after preposition of, about, at, for, in, to) e.g. his intention of marrying. Some prepositional phrases derive transformationally from relative clauses e.g. the little boy who is on the swing the boy on the swing.

4 The of-phrase is the most common among PostM pps and denotes various relations to the headword: possession: the furniture of the old couple the doer of the action expressed by the headword (the of-phrases are the S of the headwords): the departure of Miss Hicks the object of the action expressed by the headword (the of phrases are the objects of the headwords): the export of raw materials the quality or characteristics of the headword: a feeling of hunger apposition to the headword: the city of York Two or more pp may follow the headword: the house at the end of the road. (mind the interpretation!) Adjectival relative clauses vs. adverbial clauses: Adjectival non relative clauses express the circumstances in which the headword appears (after, before, until) The day before he took the exam he studied until midnight. Adjectival relative clauses are the ones that postmodify a noun or pronoun occurring as headword in a nominal phrase the headword is called antecedent. They are divided into two groups: restrictive A student who can speak two or three languages can work as a tourist guide. non-restrictive Mrs. Thompson, from whom I bought the plants, said that the should grow fine in this climate. Adverbial clauses perform in a complex sentence the same function as an adverbial adjunct in a simple sentence: You may go out / where you want. Adverbial clauses function on the level of sentence elements, while adjectival clauses function on the level of phrase. Clauses introduced by however: In a complex sentence, however may introduce clauses in adversative coordination (clauses contradict each other): He is often in pain, however he never complains. It may be substituted with but. Non-finite modifiers in nominal phrase: Determiners: the articles (the, a an) and the pronouns in determiner (attributive) function (this, my, whose, some) function as premodifiers Numerals: can premodify countable nouns. Adjectives describe or classify the headword in a nominal phrase: an angry man. Nouns as prem can be used only attributively. Mind the use of singular and plural (a book shop, customs office). Such structures may be written separated a gold ring, hyphenated an apple-tree, or as a single word snowflake

5 Adverbs: the above paragraph. Prepositional phrases: an after-dinner nap. Gerunds: a shopping centre. Syntactic structures containing an infinitive: a well-to-do person Clauses introduced by a zero marker: In clauses introduced by a zero marker the marker of subordination is understood though not expressed. Contact clauses type of restrictive relative clauses: The boy you saw is our book-keeper s son. Zero marker may be the marker of subordination for the subordinating conjunction that: You know you can rely on him (that you can rely on him), or a relative pronoun in the objective case: John does not like the girls Mary shares the flat with. (with whom Mary shares the flat). I the case of some adverbial clauses of condition they are marked by inversion: Should Tom be at home tomorrow,..., Had i known,... Position of subordinate clauses: When in final position, subordinate clauses are not separated from the main clause by commas: He didn t miss the train because it was 20 minutes late. When in initial position they often sound emphatic with the exception of subject clauses: Since the train was 20 minutes late, he didn t miss it. Medial position is not very common subordinate clause is usually separated from the res by commas: On Tuesday, as he came home from school, his brother broke the news to him. Relative clauses introduced by the independent relatives whoever, whatever, whichever,... normally occur in initial position: Whoever you are, be honest. Appositive clauses: Apposition is a special kind of noun postmodifier which gives noun another name. Nominal clauses are usually in apposition to nouns derived from verbs and adjectives which take a that clause, e.g. announcement, belief, indignation, proposal, request: His request that he be freed from paying taxes was flatly refused. After factive (after the fact) nouns: The fact that he always cheats at playing cards makes me furious. They may occur as dependent statements: The fact that he is now old and weak must be taken into consideration, dependent verbal questions: The problem whether they should send the child to the kindergarten will soon have to be resolved or dependent wh-questions: The question who shall take his place is still open. Subject and predicator agreement: In principle the predicator agrees with the subject in number and person agreement is restricted to the present tense forms (verb be is an exception). Rules: subject predicator: He runs fast predicator agrees with S not SC: The best part of his book is prepositional phrases. predicator in plural:

6 o coordinate subjects connected asyndetically: Mr. Brown and Mary s father are great friends. o none: None are so blind as those who won t see. Predicator in singular: o subjects joined by or or by the correlative conjunctions: either... or, neither...nor, not only... but: John or Mary is going to settle the affair. o with conjunction as well as, no less then: I as well as they am ready to help you. o subject is a plural nominal phrase denoting time, measure or instance weight, height... and represents a singular idea: Ten days is too short a time for the trip. o either, each, someone, anyone,...either of the examples was wrong. Depending on the meaning: o books: Gulliver s travels is a fine satire vs. Lyrical ballads were written in 18 th century. o fractions: One third of the debt was... vs. One third of the workers were... o phrases like a lot of: A lot of money has been wasted. vs. A lot of cars were parked. o collective nouns: if attention is paid to the individual members of the unit, the predicator is in the plural: His audience is middle class people. vs. The audience are requested no to leave the theatre before the national anthem is finished. o fruit and hair: She has a few grey hairs. vs. What colour is her hair. Structure of the prepositional phrase (pp) after midnight: prepositional phrase contains two elements: the head (preposition) and the object to a preposition. Prepositional phrases have as the head of the structure a preposition. Prepositions show the relationship between its object and some other word: simple: at, by, from compound: inside, into, throughout phrasal preposition: by means of, according to participial preposition: concerning converted from adverbs: aboard, about... The second element of the prepositional phrase is the object to a preposition which may be: a noun: after midnight a pronoun: with you an adjective: by then, from here another prepositional phrase: from under the floor a gerundial clause: for being late again an infinitival clause introduced by how: his plan of how to fight a finite clause: it all depends on when we shall start an adjective: in short, in brief Non relative adjectival clauses: Express the circumstances in which the headword appears. They are introduced by temporal conjunctions such as after, before, until, when, while and postmodify headwords denoting time. They

7 are strongly related to adverbial clauses of time: The day before he took the exam he studied until midnight. Sentence elements: syntactic functions vs. semantic roles: Sentence elements may take different semantic roles e.g. Syntactic functions: Predicator (P): the state/action. Always a verb (phrase): Mary fed the cat. Subject (S): the doer of the action: You must feed the cat. Direct Object (DO): the sufferer/result of the action. Typically a noun phrase: You must feed the cat. Indirect Object (IO): the beneficiary of the action. Typically a noun phrase: I fed the cat some fish Subject complement (SC): a description/qualification of the subject. Adjectival or nominal. Occurs with such verbs as be, become, etc. The cat is hungry. / The cat is my favourite animal. Object complement (OC): a description/qualification of the direct object. Adjectival or nominal. I find cats annoying. / The Egyptians considered the cat a sacred animal. Adverbial (A): time, place, manner etc. Typically adverb (phrase) or prepositional phrase.the cat wasn t fed yesterday. The cat is in my favourite chair. I am sitting uncomfortably on the floor. Non-finite clauses of purpose: They may be infinitival or gerundial clauses. With the infinitival clauses of purpose the number of verbs which can be followed by an infinitival clause of purpose is not restricted and their lexical character may be quite different: She rang up her mother to ask her to dinner. An infinitival clause of purpose may follow the verb be when it is used with adjuncts of place (e.g. down, here, off, there, up) and also such set phrases as be down, be off, be over: I ll be there to help you. Purpose can be expressed by a to-infinitive alone, or occasionally by in order + to-infinitive and so as + to-infinitive which emphasize the idea of purpose: I had to keep shaking my head so as / in order to stay awake. Negative purpose is not expressed by a negative to-infinitive alone; therefore the sentence *I ll go there at once not to be late is not grammatical. A negative infinitive of purpose is always preceded by so as or in order: I ll go there in order not to be late. The subject of the infinitival clause is, as a rule, the subject of the finite verb in the sentence: My parents saved money to go abroad. However the subject of the infinitival clause may also occasionally be the person denoted by the object of the subordinate clause: Tom says that he is taking you to meet some interesting people tomorrow. In other cases if the subject of the subordinate clause is different from the subject of the finite verb in the sentence, it must be expressed by the preposition for: My parents saved money for Mary to go abroad.

8 Gerundial clauses of purpose (formal English) are preceded by prepositions such as for, for the purpose of, with the object of, with a view to: This aeroplane is used for transporting goods. Syndetic vs. asyndetic coordination: Clauses in a sentence coordination are usually coordinated using one of the coordinators (e.g. and, but, or). The type of coordination where a coordinator is present is called syndetic coordination: She came early, but he arrived only in the small hours. When no coordinator (or the so called zero marker) is present, but the clauses are still coordinated, the coordination is called asyndetic: He came, he saw, he conquered. If we have more than two coordinate clauses, we speak of polysyndetic coordination: He came and he saw and he conquered. Nouns as premodifiers in adjectival phrase: Noun premodifiers in adjectival phrases are used adverbially. The number of nouns used in this way is very limited and the adjectival phrases with noun premodifiers also belong to set phrases. This structure is typical of English language. Adjectival phrases with noun premodifiers express: adverbial relations of time: age long, life long adverbial relations of comparison: brick red, navy blue, sky blue different degrees of quality: ankle deep, mountain high When such adjectival phrases are used as premodifiers in nominal phrases they are usually hyphenated: an age-long wait. Adjectives denoting distance, age, and size are premodified by nominal phrases: The canal is twenty metres wide. When such adjectival phrases occur as premodifiers in nominal phrases they are hyphenated: a twenty-metre wide canal Nominal clauses functioning at the level of phrase structure: Nominal clauses may have the pattern of dependent statements (that-clauses) that may function on the level of phrase structure as: appositive clauses (as apposition in nominal phrases): The fact that he is now old and weak must be taken into consideration. postmodifier in adjectival phrases: He is afraid (that) things might get worse. Dependent verbal questions may function as: appositive clauses (as apposition in nominal phrases): The problem whether or not they should send the child to the kindergarten will soon have to be resolved. postmodifier in adjectival phrases (after certain, doubtful, sure): I am not certain whether or not there is an elephant in our zoo. object to a preposition: Everything depends on whether the telegram will reach him in time. Dependent wh-questions may function as: apposition in nominal phrases: The question who shall take his place is still open. postmodifier in adjectival phrases: I am not sure who will substitute for the manager. object to a preposition (preposition is often dropped): Don t worry (over) what people will say.

9 Nominal relative clauses may function as: object to a preposition: This differs greatly from what I expected. Coordinating vs. subordinating conjunctions: Coordinating conjunctions link two or more syntactical units which are equal in rank. They may join clauses asyndetically (with a zero marker) or by means of conjunctions, which are placed between syntactical units. They are either simple (and, but, nor, or), compound (rather than, as well as) or correlative (not only... but also, either... or): e.g. John and Mary smiled an nodded each other. Subordinating counjunctions join the subordinate clause with the main clause or with a clause of a higher degree of subordination: after, before, providing... According to morphemic structure they are divided into: simple: as, if, that compound: although, unless, notwithstanding phrasal: as if, as long as, in order to participial: providing, seeing Subordinating conjunctions are always placed in initial position in the clause they introduce, they can even come at the beginning of the complex sentence (not the case with coordinating conjunctions). As markers of subordination may function also wh-pronouns and adverbs they have two functions: that of subordinationg conjunction (joining the subordinate to the main clause) and that of subject (who), direct object (whom) and adjunct (where) in the subordinate clauses they introduce: Tell me who did it. Zero Marker may also be the marker of subordination. It normally stands for the subordinating conjunction that: You know (that) you can rely on him. or a relative pronoun in the objective case: John does not like the girls Mary shares the flat with (with whom). Clausal subjects (finite, infinitival, gerundial, participial) With the exception of elliptical sentences, every sentence needs a subject. In a finite clauses subject precedes the predicator expressed by a finite form: Mary speaks English brilliantly. In non-finite clauses predicator consists of a non-finite verbal phrase. Subject in non-finite sentences may be expressed in the clause itself or (if subordinated) in the clause of a higher degree. Infinitival clauses : o bare infinitive without subject: All I did was take French leave. with subject: I saw her take the change from the counter. o with the to-infinitive: without subject: He wants to leave at once. with subject: He wants me to leave at once. Gerundial clauses: without subject: I like driving a fast car. with subject: I don t mind your brother coming to our party. Participial clauses:

10 o ing participial clauses: without subject: Nearing the entrance I shook hands with my friends. with subject: The bus being crowded, I had to stand. o past participial clauses: without subject: Once published, the book proved a bestseller. with subject: The choice made, she rang her father up. Infinitival postmodifier in adjectival phrase: Adjectives that take an infinitive or an infinitival clause as postmodifier normally denote some attitude such as pleasure, surprise or annoyance (afraid, amazed, pleased). They often imply cause or reason: I was delighted to hear of your success. There are two types of adjectives, postmodified by infinitives eager and easy type: John is eager to please. John is eager. John pleases. the subjects of the main clause and of the infinitive or infinitival clause are identical. John is easy to please. To please John is easy. the subject of the main clause and that of the infinitival clause are different The infinitive may also be accompanied by a preposition: John s girlfriend is pleasant to look at. A to infinitive or infinitival clause often postmodifies adjectives which are premodified by too they may imply result: The man was too old to start a new job. The post modifying structure enough + to-infinitive marks the amount of the quality required for the action of the infinitive to be realized: The drink was cold enough to drink. A for phrase is used to indicate the subject of the infinitive: The great truths are too important for us not to know. Cleft sentences: The subject and the object of the sentence are made strongly emphatic if placed after the introductory phrase it+be (it was, it will be); the remaining part of the sentence then follows as a relative clause introduced by who, which, that. In this way a simple sentence is split or cleft into two parts see the conversions: Subject: I am not to blame. vs. It s not I who am to blame. The flies bothered me most. vs. It was the flies that bothered me most. Object: I met Mrs. Brown at Selfridges. vs. It was Mrs. Brown that I met at Selfridges. He really misses Mary. vs. It s Mary that he really misses. The emphatic it is used when a whole subordinate clause is made emphatic. It s what you do that counts.

11 A similar structure is to be found in the sentence pattern: it+be+adjunct+that in which the adjunct is made strongly emphatic: It was then that he did it. vs. He did it then. Appositive vs. coordinate nominal phrase: An apposition is a special kind of noun postmodifier which gives the headword another name. It is either loose (separated by commas, e.g. Elizabeth, daughter of Henry VII, was...) or close (not separated by commas and closely connected to the headword, e.g. We children adored our grandfather). Coordinate nominal phrase has two or more elements of the same rank which are joined by means of coordinators (e.g. Mike and Mary are a nice couple). Determiners Determiners precede nouns and prove that the H they premodify is a noun (for example: this car, wherein this is a determiner and car is a noun ). Furthermore, determiners indicate selection, as in the example my book. The article is the most frequent determiner in English and is considered a clear-cut marker of the noun (for example: "a car" or "the car"). Pronouns in determiner (attributive) function present the second group of determiners, comprising demonstrative pronouns ( this car ), short possessive pronouns ( my car ), interrogative and relative pronouns ( whose car, which car ) and indefinite pronouns ( any car ). It is interesting to note that only demonstrative pronouns show number agreement with the noun they premodify, as seen in the example this car. Sentence structure S+P+A and S+P+SC The sentence structure S+P+A (e.g. The dog is outside) is an intransitive pattern, which means that it has no complement. S+P+SC structure belongs to the linking or equational patterns. Subject complement in this case may be an adjectival phrase (e.g. Dogs are beautiful) or a nominal phrase (e.g. Dogs are a nuisance). Clauses introduced by as Adverbial clauses of time: adverbial clauses of time as normally introduces a clause in which the action is in progress and refers to past only denoting: o simultaneity: His eyes glittered as he looked at his new car. o gradual development: As night came on, the wind calmed down. o action of the main clause immediately follows that of the subordinate clause: Just as he neared the corner, a little girl jumped directly in front of the car. adverbial clauses of time as soon as denotes that actions in the subordinate and in the main clause closely follow each other: As soon as we received your telegram, we prepared the goods for shipment. adverbial clauses of time as long as: I ll never eat oysters as long as I live.

12 Adverbial clauses of reason: the emphasis is not so much on the reason as on the result expressed in the main clause: As it was raining, we stayed indoors all day. Concession may be expressed by a predicate adjective or noun, or ba an adverb in initial position postmodified ba a clause introduced by as: Dazed as she was, he couldn t catch up with the others. Adverbial clauses of manner express the manner in which an action is done: They keep the house as it was in the poet s lifetime. As if expresses a supposed present or past fact: He spends his money as if he were rich (subjunctive were or the modal past tense or the modal past perfect is used). Adverbial clauses of comparison: She was as friendly as she had ever been (postm in adj.p), His brothers work as hard as he does. (postm in adv. P) Copulative coordination: She cleaned the car as well as washed the dishes. Subject predicator agreement with coordinating subjects: The base rule is that two or more co-ordinate subjects connected by and or asyndetically take a plural predicator: Mr. Brown and Mary s father are great friends. When two or more co-ordinate subjects connected by and denote one single idea, or one person or thing (a unit), a singular predicator is used: Truth and honesty is the best policy. With two or more subjects joined by the conjunction or, or by the correlative conjunctions either or, neither nor, the predicator is in the singular: John or Mary is going to settle the affair. However: Neither the assistants nor the professor was/were able to solve the problem. When two or more subjects are connected by means of as well as, no less than the predicator is in the singular: The main actress as well as the director was late again. Prepositional phrase as a non-headed structure Prepositional phrase e.g. George is at the meeting consists of a preposition and object to a preposition. Both elements are obligatory, therefore we can not say, e.g. George is at or George is the meeting. It could be argued that the whole prepositional phrase is the headword of the structure, or we can simply call it a non-headed structure. General characteristics of a phrase A phrase is structured around its headword, which is usually the part of speech the phrase takes its name from (e.g. adjective adjectival phrase). The words in front (to the left) of the headwords are premodifiers, the words after the headword (to the right of it) are postmodifiers. Premodifiers and postmodifiers are dependent on the headword. While the headword is always obligatory, the premodifiers and postmodifiers are optional. Phrase is either simple, consisting of the headword only, or complex, consisting of one or more modifiers (those three books on the shelf). Embedding vs. conjoining If we embed, we place a sentence inside another sentence. In the sentence I m aware that she knows, she knows is an embedded sentence. If we conjoin two sentences, we simply put them together with the means of coordinators: John read a book and Mary watched TV.

13 Adjuncts, disjuncts and conjuncts: Adjunct is a syntactic term used to describe a word, phrase, or clause joined to another word or phrase, yet not syntactically required by that word or phrase. Adverbial adjuncts, for instance, modify a verb or verb phrase. An adverbial adjunct is a sentence element that usually establishes the circumstances in which the action or state expressed by the verb take place. The following sentence uses adjuncts of time and place: Yesterday Lorna saw the dog in the garden. Quirk says that there are three types of adjuncts: ADJUNCTS: those integrated in clause structure: She sang beautifully. He went home yesterday. They comprise: o qualitative adjuncts fast, hard, well (Learning rules by heart is useless) o quantitative adjuncts almost (adjuncts of degree), thirty pence (adjuncts of measure) o circumstantial adjuncts now, always, here, on account of illness... DISJUNCTS: those peripheral in clause structure (primarily non-connective): He is, in fact, quite a drinker! They are not incorporated in the sentence structure they are independent elements used to express the independent opinion of the speaker towards the situation described in the clause CONJUNCTS: primarily connective: It was late autumn; yet the days were very warm. Scope of adverbial adjuncts The adverbial adjunct is usually an optional element in sentence structure and characterizes an action as to its quality or quantity, or indicates the time, place, cause, purpose, etc. with which the action is connected e.g. The children play happily. It may be realized by: 1. qualitative adjuncts or adjuncts of manner denote the quality of an action e.g. fast, hard, well, beautifully, by heart, arm in arm, in a rush, by leaps and bounds. Learning rules by heart is useless. 2. quantitative adjuncts denote intensity or the extent of an action: a. adjuncts of degree e.g. almost, even, hardly, merely, partly, scarcely I do not quite understand what he is up to. b. adjuncts of measure, including cost, distance, weight (usually represented by NP) e.g. a lot, three miles, two pounds He spends about 50 p. on bus fares a day. 3. circumstantial adjuncts express various circumstance in which an action takes place a. adjuncts of time, e.g. now, then, tomorrow, yesterday Peter took his Master s degree four years ago b. adjuncts of frequency, e.g. always, ever, never, seldom, usually, each year, hardly ever, annually Buses to Brighton run at short intervals. c. adjuncts of place and direction e.g. here, there, everywhere, in the corner, in London Miss Tapley hasn t been on the stage this season. d. adjuncts of cause, e.g. on account of illness, due to the weather The boy was absent from school on account of his illness not laziness.

14 e. adjuncts of concession, e.g. in spite of, for all his riches Despite his endeavours he was not promoted. f. adjuncts of condition, e.g. in case of fire, but for his expert knowledge In case of danger ring the alarm bell. g. adjuncts of instrument, e.g. with a carving knife He succeeded by dint of hard labour. h. adjuncts of result, e.g. He worked himself to death. The house was burned to ashes. Intransitive sentence patterns Intransitive sentence patterns are the ones which take no complement or only a subject complement (with linking verbs). There are four such patterns: S P Dogs bark S P A The dog is outside S P SC (adjectival phrase) Dogs are faithful. S P SC (NP) Dogs are a nuisance Types and syntactic functions of nominal non-finite clauses: To-Infinitival Nominal Clauses can occur in the function of: Subject: To know the truth is important. Subject complement: Mary s aim is to win the first prize. Direct object: The doctor wanted to cure her. Gerundial Clauses can occur as sentence elements in the function of: Subject: Writing letters is a waste of time. Subject complement: During the war our only task was fighting for freedom. Direct object: Have you finished reading the newspaper? Sentence vs. predication adverbials: Sentence adverbials (disjuncts) characteristically modify an entire sentence or comment on its probability, desirability or style. They are often set off with commas at the beginning and end of a clause: Surprisingly, George passed. Fortunately, I wore my raincoat. Frankly, I'd rather be in Philadelphia. We can say that disjuncts are a special group of adverbials in order to separate them from those adverbs which modify verbs and verb phrases. Predication adverbial is a syntactic term used to describe a word, phrase, or clause joined to another word or phrase, yet not syntactically required by that word or phrase. It modifies a verb or verb

15 phrase. An adverbial adjunct is a sentence element that usually establishes the circumstances in which the action or state expressed by the verb take place. The following sentence uses adjuncts of time and place: Yesterday Lorna saw the dog in the garden. Prepositional phrase in a phrase structure: A prepositional phrase represents a unit which may perform different syntactical functions in phrase. It may function as: headword (as such it can take its own modifiers): right in the centre postmodifier in nominal phrases: the department of English premodifier in nominal phrases: his on-the-job training postmodifier in adjectival phrases: afraid of dogs, red with anger postmodifier in adverbial phrases: there in the corner, first of all Nominal phrase in a phrase structure: A nominal phrase represents a unit which may perform different syntactical functions in phrase. It may function as: postmodifier: o derived from prepositional phrases: a girl your age o as apposition (give the word another name) loose: Elizabeth, the daughter of Henry VII, was... close: You two keep quiet