Grammar Q's

Norm Ryder · Post by **Norm Ryder** » Sun Oct 26, 2003 6:54 am

Hi folks,
A great discussion, although I can't claim to have previously put much effort into analysing the reasons for placing the object in one position or the other. But I find that Collins Cobuild English Grammar has a huge list of phrasal verbs, set out in about ten different tables, and it seems to make a big thing of whether the verb is transitive or intransitive in deciding where to place the object, be it a noun or a pronoun.

Can one of the grammarians tell us whether that would add anything more to the mix we've been working with so far?

Cheers
Norm

dduck · Post by **dduck** » Sun Oct 26, 2003 4:44 pm

I've now done what I should have done in the first place. I've looked it up on the internet. Doh!

http://grammar.englishclub.com/verbs-ph ... erbs_2.htm

The following words are key:

Prepositional verbs are a group of multi-word verbs made from a verb plus another word or words. Many people refer to all multi-word verbs as phrasal verbs.

The distinction make by Englich Club between a Phrasal and a Prepositional Verb is that the former is separable, and the latter is not.

Sadly, in my quick scans of the internet, I've been unable to find an authority on this subject. So, I guess we have to be aware of the varying opinions on this subject. Once again, Doh!

Iain

LarryLatham · Post by **LarryLatham** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 2:51 am

Hi again,

My computer broke a week ago, and I've just gotten my new one up and online. Nice to be back in touch.

Iain, I wholeheartedly agree that Pinker's The Language Instinct is a whopping good read. I'm especially fond of the chapter entitled Language Mavens. If you've gotten that far, you'll understand why I like it if you think about the general flavor of my posts here. May I also suggest an additional reading? Mark Baker was a student of Pinker's and also Chomsky's. He's currently at Rutgers University, where he's an expert on language types and certain African and Native American languages. He's written a book called The Atoms of Language that I'm reading now which is fascinating to me, but then I am attracted to the theoretical side of this business. If that's your bag too, I'd recommend it.

Regarding "Prepositional Verbs", I can understand the distinction between those phrasal verbs that can be split and those that cannot, but somehow don't yet quite see the need for it. It doesn't feel right. Somehow, I have the feeling that there are other ways to account for the fact that some multi-part verbs can be split, some cannot, and some seem to demand it. At any rate, even if it does turn out that this is a valuable distinction, I don't like the name. "Prepositional Verb" seems at best a very confusing label.

Larry Latham

dduck · Post by **dduck** » Thu Oct 30, 2003 11:54 am

Thanks Larry for the recommendation. I've just arrived in Madrid, I'm feeling a bit jet-lagged, but I did manage to digest a large chunk of Pinker's book at Newark Airport. I'm really enjoying but I'm not sure I want to agree with everything Pinker says, or at least I can think of questions that are left unanswered.

Pinker suggests that age plays a large role in a learner's ability to pick up a new language. But is there a difference between learning your second language as a child then going on to learn other languages as an adult AND learning your second language as an adult.

Much has been said about motherese, but how good do learners become when they're subjected to girlfriendese or boyfriendese? How does this contrast with classroom learning?

He says that children aren't corrected by their parents. Why the heck are teachers correcting our students? How do the kids self-correct?

Lots of things to ponder over

Iain

LarryLatham · Post by **LarryLatham** » Thu Oct 30, 2003 2:43 pm

Why the heck are teachers correcting our students?

Now there's a heck of a question! It deserves more than a passing thought, in my view.

Bon Voyage.

Larry Latham

Lorikeet · Post by **Lorikeet** » Thu Oct 30, 2003 5:30 pm

dduck wrote: He says that children aren't corrected by their parents. Why the heck are teachers correcting our students? How do the kids self-correct?

Lots of things to ponder over
Iain

I haven't read the book, so I don't know if the "children" referred to here are learning native speaker English, or ESL. If it's native-speaker English, I can tell you I corrected my kids.

(They turned out great, too, even if I am prejudiced about it.

LarryLatham · Post by **LarryLatham** » Thu Oct 30, 2003 5:43 pm

Lorikeet, I'm glad your kids turned out great.

(Mine did too, or have so far.

)

Pinker's point (btw, he's talking mainly about native speakers) is that your corrections may not be what produced such great kids.

More than likely, it was their playmates (at least as far as their language skills go).

Larry Latham