English Grammar in English

موضوع: English Grammar in English السبت مارس 07, 2009 7:22 pm

تذكير بمساهمة فاتح الموضوع :

1 An Introduction to Word classes

Words are fundamental units in every sentence, so we will begin by looking at these. Consider the words in the following sentence:

my brother drives a big car
We can tell almost instinctively that brother and car are the same type of word, and also that brother and drives are different types of words. By this we mean that brother and car belong to the same word class. Similarly, when we recognise that brother and drives are different types, we mean that they belong to different word classes. We recognise seven MAJOR word classes:

Verb	be, drive, grow, sing, think
Noun	brother, car, David, house, London
Determiner	a, an, my, some, the
Adjective	big, foolish, happy, talented, tidy
Adverb	happily, recently, soon, then, there
Preposition	at, in, of, over, with
Conjunction	and, because, but, if, or

You may find that other grammars recognise different word classes from the ones listed here. They may also define the boundaries between the classes in different ways. In some grammars, for instance, pronouns are treated as a separate word class, whereas we treat them as a subclass of nouns. A difference like this should not cause confusion. Instead, it highlights an important principle in grammar, known as GRADIENCE. This refers to the fact that the boundaries between the word classes are not absolutely fixed. Many word classes share characteristics with others, and there is considerable overlap between some of the classes. In other words, the boundaries are "fuzzy", so different grammars draw them in different places.
We will discuss each of the major word classes in turn. Then we will look briefly at some MINOR word classes. But first, let us consider how we distinguish between word classes in general.

1.1 Criteria for Word Classes

We began by grouping words more or less on the basis of our instincts about English. We somehow "feel" that brother and car belong to the same class, and that brother and drives belong to different classes. However, in order to conduct an informed study of grammar, we need a much more reliable and more systematic method than this for distinguishing between word classes.
We use a combination of three criteria for determining the word class of a word:

1. The meaning of the word
2. The form or `shape' of the word
3. The position or `environment' of the word in a sentence

13.4 Complements and Adjuncts Compared

Complements differ from Adjuncts in two important respects:
1. Complements immediately follow the Head

In most phrases, the Complement must immediately follow the Head:
David [VP plays [Complement the piano] [Adjunct beautifully ]]
In contrast, the reverse order is not possible:
*David [VP plays [Adjunct beautifully] [Complement the piano]]
Similarly:
fond [Complement of biscuits] [Adjunct with coffee]
~*fond [Adjunct with coffee] [Complement of biscuits]
Complements, then, bear a much closer relationship to the Head than Adjuncts do.
2. Adjuncts are "stackable"
In theory at least, we can "stack" an indefinite number of Adjuncts, one after another, within a phrase. For example, consider the NP:

	Adjunct	Adjunct	Adjunct	Adjunct
the book	on the shelf	by Dickens	with the red cover	that you gave me...

In contrast with this, phrases are limited in the number of Complements that they can take. In fact, they usually have only one Complement. Ditransitive verb phrases are an exception to this. Recall that they take two Complements:
We [VP gave [Complement James] [Complement a present]]

13.5 Specifiers

Adjuncts can appear before the Head of a phrase, as well as after the Head. For example, in the following NP, the Adjunct sudden is part of what we have been calling the pre-Head string:

?	Adjunct	Head	Complement
the	sudden	realisation	that nothing has changed

In this section we will look at the function of the remaining part of the pre-Head string. In this example, what is the function of the in the phrase as a whole?
We refer to this part of the phrase as the SPECIFIER of the phrase. Again, Specifiers may occur in all the major phrase types, and we exemplify them in the following table:

Phrase Type	Head	Typical Specifiers	Examples
Noun Phrase (NP)	noun	Determiners	the vehicle an objection some people
Verb Phrase (VP)	verb	`negative' elements	not arrive never plays the piano
Adjective Phrase (AP)	adjective	AdvP	quite remarkable very fond of animals
Prepositional Phrase (PP)	preposition	AdvP	just across the street

An important point about Specifiers is that they relate to the Head + Complement sequence, and not to the Head alone. For example, in the AP very fond of animals , the Specifier very relates to fond of animals, not just to fond:
Amy is very fond of animals
Q. Amy is very what?
A. *Fond
A. Fond of animals
In functional terms, then, the three-part structure of a phrase can be summarised as:

(Specifier) -- [Head -- (Complement)]

You have now completed theInternet Grammar of English.
The Internet Grammar does not, of course, cover every aspect of English grammar, and many of the topics we have looked at could be discussed in much greater detail.
In the Further Reading section, we have listed some other works on grammar, and on the English language generally, which you may find useful.

مشكوووووووووووووووووووور بارك الله قيك على هذه المعلومات المفيده

English Grammar in English - صفحة 4 TJw16530

مشكووووووور بارك الله فيك

فعلا مضوغ متميز

مشكور على الجهود الرائعة.

موضوع رائع جداااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااااا

» Improving Your Motivation for Learning English