Next graduate writing workshop
Grammar II: Common Writing Problems
Wednesday, Nov. 7, 2012: 3:00 – 4:30 PM
Location: Physics 165 (here)
Basic English Grammar

University Learning Centre
Writing Help
Ron Cooley
Department of English
ron.cooley@usask.ca
Outline
Overview/review of English grammar
and grammatical terminology:
 Parts of speech
 Parts of a sentence
 Sentence types
This session will review some
of the most common
problems in English
grammar, usage, and
punctuation. We’ll focus on
how to recognize trouble
spots and correct your own
work.
Parts of Speech: Nouns


Noun: names a person place or thing
Types


Proper: names of people, places, institutions
Common:




Concrete: material things (table, house, dog)
Abstract: conditions, qualities, ideas (hunger, wisdom)
Collective: singular nouns naming groups (family)
Countable (students, apples, books)
vs. non-countable (grain, water, information)
Parts of Speech: Nouns
Parts of Speech: Nouns
(and their attributes)
(and their attributes)

Number



Singular: book, computer, thief
Plural: books, computers, thieves
Usage problem

Plural nouns do not
take apostrophes.
Plural possessives


Sometimes a usage problem:
the students’ timetables
 Apostrophe after the “s”.
 Omit the second “s” (not students’s).
 Hence, plural possessives are actually
contractions.
 The apostrophe signals both the
possessive form and the contraction.
Case (grammatical function of a noun)
 Subject (nominative): book, computer, thief
 The book was long.
 Object (accusative): book, computer, thief
 She enjoyed the book.
 Possessive (genitive): the book’s cover, the
computer’s keyboard, the thief’s mask
 “The book’s cover made it seem interesting.”
Parts of Speech:
Pronouns: substitute for nouns



Personal pronouns: substitute for particular people
 (I, you, he, she, they)
Demonstrative Pronouns: substitute for things
 or things (it, they, this, these, those)
Like nouns, pronouns have number and case
 Number:
 Singular: I, you, he, she, it
 Plural: we, you, they
 Case:
 Subject (Nominative): I, we, you, he, she, it, they
 Object (Accusative): me, us, you, him, her, it, them
 Possessive (Genitive): my, our, your, his, her, their
I [subject] gave him [object] your book [possessive].
Parts of Speech: Pronouns
Types of Pronouns


Relative:
introduce adjective clauses
 who, whom, that, which:
 “He is the man whom I love.”
Parts of Speech: Verbs
“Action Words”
(and their attributes)

Tense (present, past, future)



Interrogative: introduce questions
 who, whom, which: “Which sandwich is that?”






Indefinite: refer to unspecific people or things
 each, some, either, anyone, all: “All are welcome.”



Reflexive: indicate that the subject and object are the same
 himself, herself, myself: “I hurt myself.”

Simple present (fact or repeated or usual action):
I go to class
Simple past (action started/finished at specific time
in past): I went to class
Simple future (promise or plan for future):
I will go to class
Present perfect (action at unspecified time before now): I have gone to class
Past perfect (action before another action in past): I had gone to class
Future perfect (action before another action in future): I will have gone to class
Present progressive (action happening now): I am going to class
Past progressive (longer action in the past was interrupted): I was going to class
Present perfect progressive (action started in past has continued until now):
I
have been going to class
Past perfect progressive (action started in past has continued until another time in
past): I had been going to class
Future perfect progressive (action will continue until a particular event or time in
future): I will have been going to class

Parts of Speech: Verbs
“Action Words” (and their attributes)

Mood

Infinitive: to go
 The verb in the abstract, disconnected from a subject.
 Can be used as a noun: “To err is human”
Indicative: He goes to class.
 Used to express facts or opinions.
Imperative: Go to class!
 Used to make demands or give orders.
Subjunctive (often used with conditional): If I were to go to class, I
would understand the subject. It is important that he go to class.
 Used to express unreal conditions or urgency.
 The subjunctive is falling out of use, especially orally.



Resource: http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/types.html
Parts of Speech: Verbs
“Action Words” (and their attributes)

Voice



Active: We studied samples to determine . . .
Passive: Samples were studied to determine . . .
When you use the passive voice, you reverse the
normal positions of subject and object. The
performer of the action becomes the object of the
sentence.
Parts of Speech: Verbals
forms of verbs that can function as other parts of speech
Problems with verbals


Verbal nouns (Gerunds):
Cycling is my favourite sport.

Verbal adjectives (Participles):
My cycling friends like to ride on weekends.


Parts of Speech: Modifiers
modify (describe) other words in the sentence

“The reason being that I don’t like driving” is not a
sentence.
Verbals (participles)
can “dangle”
Parts of Speech: Prepositions

Express location or relationship: in, on, to, into, with,
through, under, between, before, etc.

Introduce prepositional phrases:
 In our study, we found . . .
Usage is highly idiomatic (i.e.
governed by convention, not by
rule)
 We say “Reaction x takes place
under certain conditions” not
 “Reaction x takes place with
certain conditions”
Adjectives: modify (describe) nouns or pronouns


Verbals can’t function as verbs
I made a careful study of the book.
Adverbs: modify (describe) verbs, adjectives, or other
adverbs



I studied carefully.
Some adverb forms are falling out of use in informal speech.
Many say “close the door tight” rather than “close the door
tightly.”

Parts of Speech: Conjunctions

Coordinating: and, yet, but
 Join equal sentence elements (independent clauses)
 Road construction can be inconvenient, but it is necessary.

Correlative: either/or, neither/nor, not only/but also
 Always work in pairs to link parallel sentence elements
 This project not only gave me experience working with others,
but also pushed me to think about the complicated nature of
today’s workplace.

Subordinating: although, because, unless, whenever, if, when
 Introduce subordinate clauses
 Because he enjoys walking, he often takes backpacking
vacations.

Conjunctive adverbs: however, therefore, furthermore
 Indicate the relationship between independent clauses
 I didn’t know which job to take; therefore, I declined both offers.
Rules for Article use
Parts of Speech: Articles (the, a, an)
introduce a noun (but not always)
Definite
Indefinite
Singular
countable
the book
a book
Plural countable
the books
books
Non-countable
the information
information
Parts of a Sentence

Most English speakers don’t
even realize there are rules.

Complicated, but one easyto-remember rule: singular
countable nouns ALWAYS
take articles.

Rensselaer Polytechnic
Centre for Communication
Practices
Article Usage guide
http://www.ccp.rpi.edu/resourc
es/article-usage/




The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog’s back.
Subject: the noun performing the action (and
words and phrases associated with it)
 “The quick brown fox”
Predicate: the verb (and words associated with
it)


“jumped over the lazy dog’s back.”
The object (the noun receiving the action) is part
of the predicate: “the lazy dog’s back”
Parts of a Sentence: Phrases and Clauses
Parts of a Sentence: Phrases and
Clauses

Phrase: a group of words lacking either a
subject or a predicate.

Clause: a group of words containing both a
subject and a predicate.

A phrase can function as any of the main
parts of speech: verb phrase, noun phrase,
adjective phrase, adverb phrase

Independent clause: could stand alone as a
sentence.

Subordinate clause: could not stand alone as
a sentence; needs to be attached to a main
clause.
A subordinate clause—also called a dependent clause—will begin with
a subordinate conjunction
after
as
before
even though
in order that
provided that
since
than
though
until
whenever
whereas
whether
why
although
because
even if
if
once
rather than
so that
that
unless
when
where
wherever
while
or a
relative pronoun
that
which
whichever who
whoever
whosever
whom
whose
whomever
Subordinate clauses introduced by relative
pronouns (relative clauses) can be either
restrictive on non-restrictive



A restrictive clause provides essential information
about the subject of a sentence: it restricts the
meaning of a sentence by identifying the specific
qualities of the noun or pronoun.
Restrictive:
 “The officer helped the civilians who had been
shot.”
Non-restrictive:
 “The officer helped the civilians, who had been
shot.”
Subordinate clauses introduced by relative
pronouns (relative clauses) can be either
restrictive on non-restrictive

Sentence Types (three basic types, plus
combinations)
Simple: subject, predicate, and sometimes object:
I go to class
Restrictive clauses usually begin with “that”

The meat that was contaminated with e-coli was
removed from stores.



Non restrictive clauses usually begin with
“which” and are set off by commas.

The meat, which was contaminated with e-coli,
was removed from stores.
Sentence Types (three basic types, plus
combinations)

Compound: two (or more) independent clauses
joined by a coordinating conjunction:


A string of simple sentences will
often make your writing seem
simplistic.
A paragraph with NO simple
sentences will fatigue your reader.
Useful for variety and emphasis:
 Many issues concerning this
new model remain unclear.
Sentence Types (three basic types, plus
combinations)

I go to class, and you go to the lab.
Complex: at least one independent (main)
clause and at least one subordinate clause.


Use compound sentences to enumerate related
facts (especially in pairs)


There are approximately 5.2 million deaths from injuries
every year, and non-fatal injuries account for about onetenth of the global burden of disease.
Or to present simple contrasts

Physical activity brings the risk of injury, but inactivity leads
to other health problems.

Whenever I go to class, you go to the lab.
Use complex sentences to convey the
relationship between related ideas

By the time they get support, most of the students
will have failed at the most important task,
learning to read.
Sentence Types: Examples

We use labor income as a proxy for domestic wealth and find
empirical support for these predictions. (compound sentence)

We test the implications of an international asset pricing model, in
which agents have preferences that are exogenously defined over
both their own consumption and the contemporaneous average
consumption of a reference group, defined in this paper as the
agent's countrymen. (complex sentence)

These preferences are termed “keeping up with the Joneses.”
(simple sentence)
Resources:

General Parts of Speech/Sentences:

Adapted from: Gómez, Juan-Pedro, Richard Priestley, and Fernando Zapatero. 2009. “Implications of
Keeping-up-with-the-Joneses Behavior for the Equilibrium Cross Section of Stock Returns:
International Evidence.” International Journal of Finance 64: 2703-37.
Online Writing Lab at University of Ottawa

http://www.writingcentre.uottawa.ca/hypergrammar/partsp.html