be committed to doing / to do sth

[Andrew Patterson]

Duncan,
Far from missing something, you appear to be seeing things that aren't there.

Let's go through this.

Nico wrote among other things:

a) "be committed to doing sth" refers to energy, effort and time binding one to an ongoing activity, one that is already in progress;
b) "be committed to do sth" or "have a commitment to do sth" refers to a binding promise (can a promise be anythng but binding, I wonder?!) to do sth, to achieve sth not yet begun, only just outlined or proposed, to seek an outcome.

Let me know what you think! (There's more to come!!)

...but it was specifically this portion of his post that I commented on.

I replied,
I also think that there is a significant difference between the two forms, however, I would like to slightly alter your definitions.

a) When followed by the gerund, it means that the subject promises and binds themselves to carrying out the activity. I think that the activity does indeed need to be already on-going.

b) When followed by to and the infinitive, it implies that the committment is imposed externally, either because it has been mutually agreed and the subject feels beholden to the promise, or because it has been imposed by judicial authority. For instance, a judge might sentence someone saying, "I commit you to ten years hard labour." Thus the promise or the judicial authority are the external imposition.

I shall add this to my Venn diagram. There's more to come you say, ready when you are.

Now Nico's comment marked a) corresponds exactly with my comment a); and Nico's comment b) corresponds exactly with my comment b).

In a) Nico writes, "be committed to doing sth" but "I write when followed by the gerund" now maybe I'm missing something here, but isn't "doing" a gerund?

In b) Nico writes, "be committed to do sth" or "have a commitment to do sth", I refer to "to" and the infinitive ("to do" is "to" and the infinitive.) I go on to explain what I feel is the difference in meaning more clearly between to and the infinitive and the gerund. I did not distinguish between the two forms of the infinitive here, there are differences, but I think my analysis still holds. I agree that "committed" can be construed as an adjective (or as a past participle), but it was Nico who introduced this, not me.

Both you, Duncan and Larry seem to think that I have tried to change or have accidently changed the form under examination

the form under examination gets subtly (or not so subtly!) altered in the course of discussions

At no point in this post do I imply that something that I have written is the same as what Nico wrote unless it actually is the same. At no point in this discussion do I subtly or not so subtly change the form under examination. I really am not following you here, Duncan.

[Duncan Powrie]

And I am not quite following you either, Andrew. Perhaps we should just forget it, then (or at least wait until others comment).

[Andrew Patterson]

"I commit you to ten years hard labour."

Is that the bit that you object to?

[Duncan Powrie]

Yes, that is the bit. Well identified! Mind telling me what it's doing there?

[LarryLatham]

Following on from the above, I would tell your student to seriously examine at least a few learner dictionaries (and if possible search their CD-ROMs), if not a corpus, to see what is usual and PROBABLE (not just "possible" - e.g. we say "kill" rather than "cause to cease to live"!).

This is excellent advice, not only here in this particular example, but as a general suggestion to teachers and students who worry over whether they "can say (something)." Far too often, I have seen language touted as "correct" in textbooks, coursebooks, workbooks, and even on these forums which stretches the limits of what might be likely in natural use. Open any coursebook you like and read the dialogs therein with your mind attuned to the likelihood that you would actually hear them in in normal conversation between native speakers. Chances are, you'll find them "correct", but quite strange, to say the least. Need we teach these to our students? Are we doing them a (good) service?

By contrast, open a novel by a good contemporary author (Tom Clancy comes to mind for American speech, Roald Dahl for those Brits of us) and read the dialogs there. Quite a substantial difference!

Good job, Duncan.

Larry Latham

[Duncan Powrie]

I rarely have an original thought, Larry (those ideas come from Lewis, and Taylor - and Taylor's example of a notorious deep structure was actually "cause to become not alive"): using a corpora is old hat now, and corpora won't always be able to replace good old-fashioned intuition.

But of course the two should work in tandem, and I for one just like theories to align with and be supported by examples (and also for examples to give rise to theory, although this is perhaps not quite as necessary).

[LarryLatham]

Nonetheless, good show!

Larry Latham

[woodcutter]

Surely, in a Chomsky worshipping world, the sentences do not need to be natural as long as the structures are natural.

I often ask beginners if they like to eat shoes, or if Chong-min has a striped face, etc, for entertainment value. Such sentences will never be heard again, but as long as the vocab and structure is learnt, so what?

Roald Dahl is a similarly surreal choice for typical contemporary Brit-ness, by the way! Larry, do you keep cheese in your beard, in case you suddenly fancy a tasty snack?

[Andrew Patterson]

"I commit you to ten years hard labour."

Is that the bit that you object to?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Yes, that is the bit. Well identified! Mind telling me what it's doing there?

Would you object to, "He was committed to ten years hard labour," Duncan?

[Duncan Powrie]

"He was committed to ten years' hard labour" is fine, Andy - provided we all agree that it would be highly unlikely to be interpeted as having an adjectival sense (because who of us would be peverse enough to think we'd enjoy knuckling down to a stretch like that!). "Committed" here is obviously a passive (p.p), with a meaning clearly very distinct from the ones we were considering before (regardless of whether those past examples were viewed as adjectives or past participles).

Tell me, is your purpose now to survey every form of the lemma COMMIT (rather than try to decide what should follow "be committed to..." with the other meaning)? If so, then you should explicitly say so, unless you want stupid guys like me jumping on you every five minutes!

By the way, I noticed that (the verb) "commit" in its "consign/send (and perhaps "sentence"?)" meanings is slipping down the frequency rankings in most dictionaries, perhaps it will be nothing more than a relic in a hundred years or so (then again, maybe not, if crime increases a lot more!).

There's nothing wrong with silliness, Woodcutter, indeed I am all for it! If learners can work out your jokes and actually smile or laugh, it is a sure sign they have mastered the basic meanings/contexts of those words, and are ready to move onto irony etc (I guess if they don't break into a smile you can forget the irony).

[Duncan Powrie]

Hey maybe you could try for a job at COBUILD, Andy! Their policy is, after all, "one (lemma base?) form one entry"!

It's interesting to compare their approach (in COBUILD 3) with that in other dictionaries - it is certainly harder to find the typical form-meaning pairings in the COBUILD (they would probably defend this by saying there is only one entry to search, and that it helps reflect the complexity of language...but we do often approach dictionaries with some inkling/intuition regarding word class etc already)

Obviously, a form can change word class and meaning too, but I think it is possible and more helpful to try to identify what is typical, especially form>meaning/use=function-wise (as dictionaries with separate entries for differing word classes, and signposts etc, seem to do, and do quite well).

[Duncan Powrie]

Surely, in a Chomsky worshipping world, the sentences do not need to be natural as long as the structures are natural.

Very nicely worded (="effective"), so I a bit loathe to comment further, but if the structures that make up a sentence are natural, the sentence itself will also obviously be natural. I'd also like to say that the sentences you "used" with your students are perfectly natural in every sense (form, structure, meaning, function)! It is precisely this type of "holistic humanism" that Chomsky womsky is lacking. Maybe some (more?) time in an EFL classroom would help him realize what he's "missing"!

[Andrew Patterson]

"He was committed to ten years' hard labour" is fine, Andy - provided we all agree that it would be highly unlikely to be interpeted as having an adjectival sense (because who of us would be peverse enough to think we'd enjoy knuckling down to a stretch like that!).

Their policy is, after all, "one (lemma base?) form one entry"!

Before I start, Duncan, could you give me a precise definition of "form under examination" as you used it when you accused me of subtly, or not so subtly changing it.

I came to the conclusion that, "I commit you to ten years hard labour," was the sentence that you objected to because it was the only new definition in my post, the rest being what I intended as a more precise definition of Nico's posts. However, it was something that I had to work out, it was not at all clear from your post, and I was not sure that it was that sentence until you confirmed it. It would have been far more clear to have simply quoted the exact sentence that you objected to stating that you objected to it and why.

You put me off locating the sentence, too, by talking about "adjectives". I think we are aproaching this in different ways.

Now my original sentence was in the active voice (nothing remotely like an adjective there), and you didn't like it. The second, "He was committed to 10 years hard labour," was in the passive voice, that's the only difference. Now it is possible, of course to have concepts that can only exist in the passive, "be born" being one such example. We do have an active equivelent "give birth", but it is not simply the active equivelent of the passive form.

Now, my original sentence was the active equivelent of the passive form.
Now let's look at two analagous form:
a) I sentence you to 10 years hard labour.
b) He was sentenced to 10 years hard labour.

Here I'm sure you would agree, both forms are possible and indeed likely.

There has been a tendency to use more active forms particularly due to the influence of the Plain English campagn, even where in the past, the passive form was used more often. Can you give me a good reason why the active voice should not be used with commit?

Talking of Plain English principles, I did eventually suggest that Nico use the nominalised form "have a committment to do something," even though it obscures the verb because this form implies a commitment both to carrying out the action and to the person with whom you have entered into an agreement to carry out the action, furthermore because it is followed by "to" and the infinitive, implies a strong sense of purpose. Yes, I am looking for all the possible uses of the word "commit" and its different parts of speach, although I'm not sure that "lemma base" is the right word for this. A lemma is a mathematical theorem used to solve another mathematical theorem, if you can't decide which of two to use to solve a problem you have a dilemma I don't know what a lemma base is. A lemming is a small furry animal fabled to commit suicide en mass, but which doesn't really, I'm told that a film company drove some off a cliff in one of its wildlife "documentaries", though.

You used the expressions in its "past participle sense" and in its "adjective sense". These mean nothing to me. Exactly what is the difference? That may sound like a naive question, but I have deliberately avoided using these terms because what we are talking about are participle adjectives ie, they are verbs acting like adjectives. I can see no cases where the participle should be eclusively regarded as an adjective or exclusively regarded as a verb. Instead of this I used the terms, "promises and binds themselves to carying out the activity", and "imposed externallly." I suppose this could be simplified to internal and external imposition. I note that it was in definition b) that you made the destinction between past participle and adjective, can you explain why.

[Duncan Powrie]

BTW some of you might think I am beginning to contradict what I said in my "Macmillan Dictionary hamstrung?" thread (What?! You mean you haven't read that yet?! You should!!! ), but I'm not really...I am sympathetic to Willis's arguments for "fuzziness" in dealing with form, if it helps students concentrate on and appreciate meaning better...but sympathetic only up to a point.

Andrew's recent example is an instance where only native intuition and knowledge (e.g. of the meaning of "labour" - admittedly taken from a wider "crime/legal" context) can really discern it is a passive and not simply an adjective, and it is precisely this kind of example that has to be identified and sorted before we are in any kind of position to know whether Willis's ideas are worth implementing (if there are too many in the "fuzzy" category, then his radical ideas will be problematic to implement, and the current "passive participle" label still a useful reminder). See also my comments in my "I wish I had (had) a good textbook!" thread.

Hope this is not too tangential...

[Duncan Powrie]

Ah, I see you posted as I was writing my previous post, Andy.

Yes, I was a bit sloppy when I said "form under examination", I suppose I should instead distinguish "structure" from "form", and then probably just say "word" or "examples" (rather than also use "form" for those further meanings). Anyway, I believe examples must reflect the structure under consideration (I hope this is an understandable sentiment), and the example you introduced seemed to bear no relation (to me at least, if not Larry and possibly other readers) to the whole of the structures (and/or meanings!) Nico had been concentrating on.

I didn't quote the exact sentence because I initially didn't think there was a need to...and I mentioned adjectives simply because I thought they were the focus, or rather the springboard into the following structures that you were attempting to more precisely define or differentiate meaning-wise (so, I appreciate that you were mainly attempting to reformulate Nico's defintions more "precisely" ).

It wasn't the active voice that I didn't like so much as the fact that it was a verb...and this has nothing to do with me circumscribing the use of the active voice with verbs or even with "commit", by the way (I am not an active supporter of the Plain English campaign, at least). Honestly, where did you get THAT idea?!

I did actually like your use of nominalization in helping Nico, I thought it was elegant. <<<Kissy wissy wissy hug hug hug>>>

I am not aware of "lemma" as used in mathematics, but I can tell you (at no extra charge) that "lemma" is a now common term in lexicography (and probably was in common use long before I got interested in the area)...this would imply that we do indeed have different approaches! (BTW I should maybe have put a slash in between "lemma" and "base" thus (rough and ready though such a parallel might be to a super-grammarian): "one (lemma/base(?)) form one entry".

I don't know much about lemmings but it's a shame the film company resorted to such cruelty. ( =me trying to keep a straight face). "No smoke without fire=No 'lemons' before lemmings".

Actually, I too don't like using those grammatical labels (hence my interest in Willis), but I see no harm in them when one is dealing with a relatively clear example (or trying to assign one of two labels to part of an example), and am probably just trying to make sense to those who always presume there is a clear difference (which I don't, by the way). Yes, I like the "fudge factor" of "participle adjectives", hmm hmm swee-eet! Do you think Willis should use this term, then? Maybe he isn't as well-read as he should be, and is simply in need of a label to hang on his dunce cap.

I'd prefer not to get into "obligation" until I have at least re-read the "What's the foikin' difference, Homes?" thread (and I must say I myself am wary of getting involved, if the horrific handbag-inflicted injuries reported at the hospital shortly after that "discussion" are anything to go by).

Lastly, there is no huge or juicy underlying reason for me making the "destinction (sic) between past participle and adjective" in relation to "definition b)" generally.

"Picking up on spelling mistakes - last refuge of crazed lone linguists-turned-snipers, and Stephen Jones".