BTAN11006BA/BTAN1104OMA The structure of English: The noun phrase and the verb phrase NUMBER, GENDER AND CASE IN GRAMMAR, AND AGREEMENT PHENOMENA 13/11/2018 Lecture 8
The noun phrase the student the tall student the tall English student the tall English student of physics the tall English student of physics from Bath
The noun phrase (1) The student has arrived. (2) I saw the student. (3) I gave it to the student. (4) He is the student.
The noun phrase (5) The student has arrived. He is tired. (6) I saw the student. The student, I didn t see.
Case nominative, accusative & genitive (7) I saw John. (8) John saw me. He sat next to me. (9) John saw my book. It is mine. (10) Who(m) did you talk to? (11) To whom/*who did you talk? (12) What did you see? What was it?
Case nominative, accusative & genitive (13) I saw John. (14) John saw me. I sat next to John. (15) This is John s book. (16) This is the student of biology s book. (17) Dickens novels (18) the teachers book
Gender feminine: masculine: neuter: she/her/herself he/his/himself it/its/itself animate/inanimate who which/what whose (18) He flipped open the book whose pages were filled with her beautiful, careful script.* *This, and most of the subsequent examples are from the British National Corpus.
Gender (19) The emotional and mental link tying the child to its mother is usually very powerful. (20) On a mid-summer morning, a small child made her way towards school. (21) There can be emergency situations, for instance if your dog cuts its paw or is bitten by a poisonous snake. (22) I watched the dog lifting his leg again and wondered if my idea was sensible.
Gender (23) Everyone has his own story of being ignored when requesting information. (24) Each cast member created his or her offstage character, complete with name and detailed personality and background. (25) Everyone has their own idea but history. (26) If you love somebody, set them free.
Gender (25) boy - girl (26) husband - wife (27) waiter - waitress (28) god - goddess (29) widower - widow (30) fireman firefighter (31) chairman chair(person) (32) stewardess flight attendant
Number (1) No decent food, no place to park and almost zero women. (2) One woman had spoken only French, another only Spanish. (3) The Nikolaikirche, with 2,000 seats, was full one and a half hours before the church meeting began. (4) It is possible that the two women are one and the same. (5) all women vs every woman
Number: countability Uncountable nouns (5) This is my water, this is your water. Now we have water together. (6) I give you some of my water. Now we both have water. Countable nouns (7) I have a car and you have a car. Now we have two cars together. (8) I have a car and I give you half of it. Now we both have a half car.
Number: countability (9) In these smaller waters, the miller could work by day and his mill-pond would be replenished at night. (10) By day the general atmosphere is tranquil, dreamy and unspoilt with long, sandy beaches and clear waters. (11) It is also important because wrecks in Scottish waters are usually just that -- complete wrecks. (12) But at least the mineral waters are analysed and labelled.
Number: countability (17) *I am writing book. (18) He went on to master the art of book illustration. (19) Payment terms, for example, are generally much shorter than those of book publishers. (20) Moths consumed two kilos of book.
Number (21) No news is good news. (22) Her politics were really cool. (23) Politics is an autonomous realm, to be studied by the methods of science. (24) She said the drawer was unlocked and the scissors were at the back. (25) The BBC's archives are bulging with entertainment, drama, music, science and educational material.
Number (26) People were walking around. (27) The police have just arrived. (28) First check your water quality -- it could be that one fish is indicating a problem that will soon be common to all. (29) Their sole aim is to kill as many fish as possible. (30) They were able to survive on fully aquatic prey, such as fishes.
Number (31) shelves (32) feet (33) syllabi (34) phenomena (35) kibbutzim
Number (36) The drilling team was headed by BPX senior drilling engineer Tony Emmerson. (37) The British team were smart. (38) The Committee is formed by 26 directors. (39) So that the committee are aware of the movement of cash from one period to the next.
Agreement (1) I <1SG> am <1SG> here. (2) He <3SG> is <3SG> here. (3) *He <3SG> am <1SG> here.
Agreement (verbal) -s: PERSON: 3 NUMBER: SG TENSE: PRESENT (4) a. Kate lives there. b. *I lives there. c. *Kate liveds there.
Agreement (5) 1SG am live 2SG are live 3SG is lives 1PL are live 2PL are live 3PL are live
Agreement (6) There's two sides to every story. (7) Here's some other movies you might want to check out. (8) It s the policies that really matter.