Functions of the ing-forms

1. The independent use:

1) Subject. Bathing here is out of the question.

2) Predicative. To read is like dreaming at night.

3) Predicate. What about going to Moscow?

4) Object. Roger insisted on going.

5) Adverbial modifier. While going I met him. The bus passes us without stopping.

6) Attribute. Singing people filled the street..

7) Parenthesis. Generally speaking u are late.

8) Second action (simultaneous). She was upstairs getting ready.

2. The dependent use:

1) Part of a compound verbal predicate. She burst out crying.

2) Subjective predicative (after passive). The baby was found sitting on the floor.

3) Objective predicative. I felt him looking at me.

4) Part of absolute constructions (descriptive circumstances). His study was a nice room with books lining the walls.

Participle II has only one form, which may denote:

1) A state as a result of some action completed (transitive verb). The wall painted yesterday is still wet.

2) A state resulting from the action of some agent (intransitive verb). Arrived at this port we halted.

3) A process of some continuous action (intransitive verb). The watched by their parents didn’t quarrel.

4) An emotional state of a person. U must not get excited.

Subjective verbs have no PII (except in analytical forms), but there are a few exceptions: runaway, fallen, vanished, gone, faded, withered, retired, though mostly the participles ‘learned, drunken, faded, retired’ have become adjectives or are in process of adjectivization.

P II has no category of correlation but in speech it may denote simultaneousness or priority depending on the lexical meaning of the verb or context. E.g. she looked at the broken cup (terminative, priority). The old man loved and respected by all (durative, simultaneousness). P II is mostly used to modify nouns. P II may also be used with conjunctions such as when, if, as if, though in the function of adverbial modifier: when dressed I sat a long time by the window. Nobody spoke unless spoken to.

Questions

1) What are the verbals?

2) What is the point of argument between two groups of scholars concerning verbals?

3) What constructions do verbals from?

Lecture 9

Adjective

The adjective expresses the categorical meaning of property of a substance. Adjectives are distinguished by a specific combinability with nouns, which they modify, usually in pre-position, and occasionally in post-position; by a combinability with link-verbs and modifying adverbs.

In the sentence the adjective performs the functions of an attribute and a predicative. To the derivational features of adjectives belong a number of prefixes and suffixes of which the most important are:

-ful: hopeful; -ive: decorative;

-less: featureless; -ic: basic;

-ish: bluish; -un: unprecedented;

-ous: dangerous; -in: inaccurate;

-pre: premature;

As for the morphological features, the English adjective is distinguished only by the category of comparison. All the adjectives are traditionally divided into two large subclasses: qualitative and relative. Relative adjectives express such properties of a substance as are determined by the direct relation of the substance to some other substance: wood – a wooden hut; color- colored postcards. Qualitative adjectives, as different from relative ones, denote various qualities of substances: a difficult task, a hearty welcome.