Verbs the engines of the sentence Revision & overview
Some basic revision Remember that any construction intended to be a sentence (a complete idea) should consist of a subject (who) and a predicate (a verb and, usually, an object). So, even the simplest kind of sentence consists of an idea that could be summed up as who does what. The does part the verb is vital to this idea! A sentence is the best kind of construction for expressing an idea linked to a series of other ideas in the framework of a discussion or argument the kind of writing required at university level. A sentence must have a verb.
Participles & auxiliaries Participle forms (e.g. studying, selling) can be very useful in communicating exactly when something took place and for how long it continued. They can also add variety to your style when used to begin sentences. However, you must remember to keep the subject of the participle close by, so that there is no confusion about which noun is the subject of the participle. Otherwise, you will end up with a sentence like, Cooked to a crisp, Jane devoured the delicious bacon. Verb auxiliaries (helpers) such as has, had, will, be and been provide important ways of altering tense.
The range of verb tenses More complicated conditional verb forms (e.g. She would like to go to the beach tomorrow if the weather is fine ) will be covered in a later series. The easiest way to think of the most commonly used English tenses is as a set of twelve tenses composed of four sets of three. The four sets are: simple, continuous, perfect and perfect continuous. Each set or type includes a past, present and future version of that type of verb tense.
Simple tenses: action limited to a particular time The three most straightforward tenses are: Present I study hard every night. (regular activity) She sells jeans at the market on Saturdays. (regular activity) Past I studied hard last night. She sold jeans at the market last Saturday. Future I will study hard tomorrow night. She will sell jeans at the market next Saturday. Note that the simple present may also be used to refer to the future, as in, I fly to Singapore next Saturday, so long as some word or phrase suggestive of the future ( tomorrow, in 2022 )is added.
Continuous tenses Sometimes, we need to express continuing action action going on for a restricted period of time in one of the three basic tenses listed in the previous slide. The resulting tenses are called the continuous or, sometimes, progressive tenses. Present continuous I am studying whenever possible this trimester. She is selling jeans at the market until she s saved her fare to Paris. Past continuous Before the exams, I was studying hard every night. She was selling jeans at the market on Saturdays until she found a better job. Future continuous I will be studying hard every night next year. She will be selling jeans at the market on Saturdays until Christmas.
Perfect tenses - role Another set of three tenses helps us to position a series of actions more precisely in relation to each other. For instance, sometimes we need a tense to help us to show that an action that began in the past extends up to the events of the present moment; then it is best to use the present perfect tense. Here is an example of the present perfect tense: I have taken the bus to the University of Newcastle and will be there in ten minutes. This sentence suggests that someone only took the bus very recently and is actually still on it at the time of speaking, perhaps on a mobile phone. So, the verb in the sentence suggests both that action was begun in the recent past and that the action involved is somehow still current or relevant.
Perfect tenses Present perfect: I have taken the bus to Callaghan for a lecture and will be back later tonight. (The subject s action of taking a bus began in the past but is still current.) Past perfect: I took the bus to Callaghan for a lecture but then returned home because I had left my textbooks on the table in the hallway. (One past event the careless leaving behind of the textbooks took place before another past event, the speaker s boarding of the bus to Callaghan.) Future Perfect: I am afraid that I will have left for Callaghan by the time you arrive at my apartment. (Here, the speaker is looking ahead to a time when his or her friend is just arriving at the apartment in question but the speaker will already have left. That is, the speaker is projecting himself or herself forward to a time when his or her departure for Callaghan will be in the past although it s still in the future at the time of speaking.)
Perfect continuous tenses What if you want to show that some action for which one of the perfect tenses is appropriate continues, continued or will continue for some time, perhaps in relation to some other action? Then, you should use one of the three perfect continuous tenses.
Perfect continuous tenses the range Present perfect continuous: I have been living in Australia for three months. (Here, the action of the sentence, living in Australia, has been going on for a period of three months and is still occurring.) Past perfect continuous: I had been living in Australia for three months before I found my current flat. (In this sentence, both actions are now in the past and were restricted in duration, although the past continuous action, living in Australia, occurred before the finding of the flat, an action restricted to a very short time. The had been before living emphasises that it occurred before the discovery of the flat where the speaker now lives.) Future perfect continuous: If I stay in Australia until I graduate from a second postgraduate program, I will have been living here for three years. (The speaker of this sentence is looking well ahead and viewing a prolonged segment of action living in Australia from that vantage point. In the more distant future, the immediate future will be in the past.)
References: King, G. (2000). Good Grammar. Glasgow, UK: HarperCollins. Thomson, A.J., & Martinet, A.V. (1977). A Practical English Grammar (2 nd ed.). Oxford, UK: OUP. Associate Professor Jim Jose, Senior Lecturer, School of Economics, Politics & Tourism, for his guidance through my frequent reference to his Study Skills Online (2000). For practice: Murphy, R. (2004). English Grammar in Use (3 rd ed.). Cambridge, UK: CUP. Units 1-37