Grammer help

www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJ2SHSg5rIY

wbjones wrote:

Salanis wrote: I took two grammar classes in college (English major, and transferred schools). In one of them, we talked a lot more about Modifiers than adjectives or adverbs. A modifier is a word or phrase that provides additional information about another word or phrase. So, that includes adjectives, adverbs, and articles ("the", "a", "some", etc.). If the word or phrase being modified is a noun or pronoun, than you have an adjective or article. If the word or phrase being modified is a verb, adjective, or adverb, than the modifying word/phrase is an adverb. If you're wondering what I mean about phrases acting as adjectives take this example: "The car with a busted headlight ran the stop sign." "...with a busted headlight..." tells you about "the car", so the whole phrase is acting as an adjective. Mostly this stuff is superfluous if you don't need to know why it's wrong, or to help you know where you're supposed to put commas. But no one really notices if commas are in the wrong place. I suppose it could be important for writing legal documents where you want to be sure there is no ambiguity.

isn't with a preposition ? therefore "with a busted headlight" would be a prepositional phrase … ? would that prepositional phrase then be acting as an adjective ?

Yes, yes, and yes.

And the necessity to understand all that, is about like the need to understand conversion of energy in order to effectively stop a car.

Will wrote: The classic example is Churchill's secretary chiding him for ending a sentence with a preposition, to which he replied "This is the sort of petty pedantry up with which I shall not put" to illustrate just how bad following that rule can sound.

LOL gotta remember that one

(And use it quick before nobody cares at all anymore)

like that one …. I quite often go to great lengths to rearrange sentences so that they don't end with a preposition … but sometimes it's just not possible …

but I'm pretty sure no one has ever heard me say … "where is it AT ?" .. or" where you going TO ?" … "who you going WITH ?" … just one of my many quirks

"Where you from?"

"That sentence ended with a preposition."

"OK - where you from, bitch?"

In reply to wbjones:

Questions follow different rules for word order from statements.

"Who are you here with?" Is perfectly correct grammar.

(However, your last two sentences are bad grammar because they lack a verb.)

Beer Baron wrote: In reply to wbjones: Questions follow different rules for word order from statements. "Who are you here with?" Is perfectly correct grammar. (However, your last two sentences are bad grammar because they lack a verb.)

so tell me … what part of speech is with ? I've always understood it to be a preposition

awkward, yes, but …. with whom are you here … would be correct (and, just for the record, that wasn't a sentence I used as an example … though it's no different from the one I did use. just a bit more awkward than the one I used)

similar to the sentence, who are you going with ? which should be … with whom are you going ?

with is still a preposition .. so it needs an object

which 2 sentences ?

wbjones wrote: so tell me … what part of speech is with ? I've always understood it to be a preposition awkward, yes, but …. with whom are you here … would be correct (and, just for the record, that wasn't a sentence I used as an example … though it's no different from the one I did use. just a bit more awkward than the one I used) similar to the sentence, who are you going with ? which should be … with whom are you going ? with is still a preposition .. so it needs an object which 2 sentences ?

The issue with those sentences is not ending them in a preposition. It is actually using a subjective pronoun where you should be using an objective pronoun. "Whom are you going with?" And really, "Who are you going with?" is perfectly legitimate common usage that would be appropriate in nearly any situation.

The sentences you had which were absolutely incorrect were "Where you going to?" and "Who you going with?" Both of those lack the critical verb "are". That is a much bigger deal in correct language usage than prepositions or who/whom.

This is why, as an English major, people who get pedantic about language can tick me off. People get so hung up on the piddly guidelines that don't matter that much, such as ending sentences with a preposition, that they miss when much more significant usage errors occur.

gottcha .. in defense of those sentences, I was taught (and keep in mind that my grammar classes were in the late 50's) that there was the verb "are" understood in cases like those, so that if we were diagraming those sentences the predicate would have had ( ) around the word "are" …. and those were really just examples of sentences that I hear on a regular basis

as for the ending the sentence with a preposition … we'll just agree to disagree … as far as you're concerned, they're fine. not so for me, not the way I was taught … but then I'm only correcting others grammar in my mind … I very VERY seldom ever say anything to anyone.

in discussions like this, sure, I'll say my piece

and FWIW, I'm not an English major … my degrees were Civil Eng. Tech, and Electronic Tech

Beer Baron wrote: This is why, as an English major, people who get pedantic about language can tick me off. People get so hung up on the piddly guidelines that don't matter that much, such as ending sentences with a preposition, that they miss when much more significant usage errors occur.

Ah, the joys of prescriptivism. Teaching English to second language learners has taught me that, even though the rules are important, absolute mastery is rarely possible. But that's how languages evolve. Just ask poor 'shall' and 'shan't', or be like me, and start a sentence with 'but'. :p

wbjones wrote: gottcha .. in defense of those sentences, I was taught (and keep in mind that my grammar classes were in the late 50's) that there was the verb "are" understood in cases like those, so that if we were diagraming those sentences the predicate would have had ( ) around the word "are" …. and those were really just examples of sentences that I hear on a regular basis

That makes no sense to me. "Are" is the plural form of "to be". That helping verb is required to form the present participle. Leaving it out in those sentences would be the same as saying, "I going to the store."

as for the ending the sentence with a preposition … we'll just agree to disagree … as far as you're concerned, they're fine.

I'm not saying that participles at the end of a sentence are fine. I am saying that there are situations where it is appropriate. Also, that questions are bad examples for this rule because they employ different word order (e.g. verb before subject).

Hmm... thinking about it, I'd say that if there were a rule about ending a sentence in a preposition, it is that it is okay to do so, when there is already an implied object of the preposition. Generally, because the object of the preposition is the subject of the sentence, and it would be redundant and awkward to repeat. E.g.: "That is something we won't put up with." The subject is "That" and "[that] we won't put up with" is a subordinate clause that modifies "something" (there is an implied "that"). If this were an independent clause, you would need to include the object of the preposition: "We won't put up with that." However, we leave it out in the subordinate form because it's absurdly redundant. "That is something that we won't put up with that."

Really, the rule should be: Do not end an independent clause with a preposition. (There might be exceptions, but I can't think of any.)

Richard Nixon wrote: Ah, the joys of prescriptivism. Teaching English to second language learners has taught me that, even though the rules are important, absolute mastery is rarely possible. But that's how languages evolve. Just ask poor 'shall' and 'shan't', or be like me, and start a sentence with 'but'. :p

Yup.

There is also the fact that rules are flexible based on the formality of language you are trying to use. I wouldn't start a sentence with "But" in a formal paper, but it's probably fine on an internet forum or entertaining article.

you've hit on what I was really meaning, without my having realized it … I've been unfortunate enough in the past to be in a situation where formal writing was required … that's when some of my grade school grammar "learning" helped