Verb Phrases: Elements and Clauses of Main Verbs Flashcards
The main verb is the head of the …. …. , just as a noun or pronoun is the head of a noun phrase. In a verb phrase with more than one verb, the main verb always comes …..
In verb phrases that are marked for tense (present or past) the tense inflection is always attached to the … verb in the verb phrase. In the example below, the first auxiliary could is a past tense form (‘can’ would be the present tense form).
Not all verb phrases are marked for tense, however. Those that contain no present or past tense verb forms are referred to as …-… verb phrases.
E.g. Could have occurred
verb phrase
last
first
non-finite
The class of verbs that function as main verbs in verb phrases can be divided into subclasses in different ways. Here we introduce two types of subclassification; the distinction between …. and …. verbs, and the classification of verbs in terms of ……
stative
dynamic
transitivity
Broadly speaking, verbs that denote a ….. state of affairs (which may sometimes have relatively short duration) are referred to as stative verbs.
Includes verbs describing … states (e.g. know, believe) and …. (e.g. like, love, hate).
stable
mental
emotions
Dynamic verbs are verbs that typically denote an activity which is controlled by an active ‘….’ or …..
Examples include, among many others, verbs like run, move, work, play, and make.
doer
agent
Dynamic verbs occur in the …., whereas stative verbs do not:
(1) Bill is working very hard on his project application. (2) *Bill is knowing that his career depends on it (not grammatically correct)
progressive
Verbs that require an object are called transitive
Some transitive verbs can, and normally do, occur with two objects. The prime example is the verb give, which in its most frequent use require both an object that denotes the recipient of a thing (the …. object) and the thing itself (the …. object), as in the following example.
Bill gave his mother a new car
indirect
direct
Bill gave his mother a new car
Bill/the storm destroyed our house
To distinguish verbs like give from verbs like destroy, the former are referred to as …. verbs, whereas the latter are referred to either as transitive or, to emphasise the fact that they require only one object, ……
ditransitive
monotransitive
A third type of transitive verbs require both an object and a further element, called an object predicative, ascribing a property to whatever the object denotes.
A prime example is the most common use of consider, as in the following example:
Everybody considers my sister a bit odd.
Verbs like consider, which take both an object and an object predicative, are referred to as …. …. verbs.
complex-transitive
Copular verbs are similar to transitive verbs in that they require an additional element besides the subject. This element, called a predicative, is like an object in occurring after the verb.
However, predicatives differ from objects in significant ways. By way of illustration, consider the following pair of sentences:
Bill hired a good lawyer
Bill is a good lawyer
In the first example, the noun phrase a good lawyer functions as a …. …., whereas in the second one the same noun phrase functions as a ….. Note the following differences:
- The direct object refers to an individual which is distinct from the subject, whereas the predicative does not really refer to an individual at all. Instead, the predicative is used to characterise the …..
- There is an alternative way of expressing the message in the first sentence, namely with a …. sentence, whereas the second sentence has no …. alternative:
A good lawyer was hired by Bill.
*A good lawyer was been by Bill - not grammatically correct
direct object
predicative
subject
passive x2
Predicatives, then are different from objects, but are still required by some verbs, namely the …. verbs. Typically low in informational content, and refer mostly to states of being or becoming.
In the following examples the verbs in boldface are copular verbs:
Bill seems angry.
Bill became a lawyer.
The liquid turned green.
copular
Verbs that do not require an object are called ….. verbs. Typical examples include verbs like arrive, die, faint, etc., as in the following examples:
(9) The train has arrived. (10) All the ants died.
(11) The old man fainted.
intransitive
Only transitive verbs can become passive. That’s because the direct object needs to become the …. in the passive sentence; if there’s no direct object, it impossible to make a passive.
subject
