Grammar II (1/2)

I've written a post on grammar before.  But was it good enough?
This year for Valentine's Day, I got George the book "Diagramming Step by Step, One Hundred and Fifty-Five Steps to Excellence in Sentence Diagramming" by Eugene Moutoux.  I know, I know, I was excited too.  So excited, in fact, that I gave it to him for Lunar New Year instead of Valentine's Day because I couldn't wait.  There are 24 chapters to take notes on, and my notes may be more or less in the form of plagiarism because I can't necessarily word this stuff more efficiently than Moutoux.  If poring over the book and my notes isn't the definition of great couples time, I don't know what is.  Not to brag, but I got this romance thing down.

1)  Subjects and Verbs

Subject - noun, pronoun, phrase, or clause about which the sentence says or asks something
Predicate - verb together with its modifiers and complements
Phrase - group of words that form a unit but do not have a subject or a predicate
Clause - group of words with a subject and a predicate
Sentence - independent clause that begins with a capital letter and ends with a period, question mark, or exclamation point

Verb voices - active, passive
Verb forms - simple, progressive, emphatic
Verb tenses - present, past, future, present perfect, past perfect, future perfect
(progressive - to be/ing; emphatic - to do; perfect - to have)

Active voice of the verb to love
simple present - love, loves
simple past - loved
simple future - will love
simple present perfect - has loved, have loved
simple past perfect - had loved
simple future perfect - will have loved
present progressive - am loving, are loving, is loving
past progressive - was loving, were loving
future progressive - will be loving
present perfect progressive - has been loving, have been loving
past perfect progressive - had been loving
future perfect progressive - will have been loving
present emphatic - do love, does love
past emphatic - did love

Passive voice of the verb to love
simple present - am loved, is loved, are loved
simple past - was loved, were loved
simple future - will be loved
simple present perfect - has been loved, have been loved
simple past perfect - had been loved
simple future perfect - will have been loved
present progressive - am being loved, is being loved, are being loved
past progressive - was being loved, were being loved

Be consistent with verb tenses when writing.
When compound subjects use or or nor, the verb should match the noun closest to the verb.
Sometimes, singular collective nouns like team, choir, and orchestra take plural verbs.
Don't overuse the word be; use action verbs instead.
Indefinite pronouns - each, every, enough, much, any, either, some, none
When none is used in reference to a singular noun, use a singular verb.
When none is used in reference to a plural noun, grammarians disagree.
Indefinite pronouns each and one are considered singular and should take singular verbs.

2)  Modal Auxiliary Verbs

Verb moods - indicative, imperative, subjunctive
Imperative - gives commands, does not use modal auxiliary verbs
Indicative - makes statements or questions
Subjunctive - used in unreal conditions and noun clauses expressing wishes, suggestions, and commands
The subjunctive mood often uses clauses beginning with the word if.

Present Subjunctive I
I/you/he/she/it/we/you (pl.)/they - be
I/you/he/she/it/we/you (pl.)/they - love
Present Subjunctive II

I/you/he/she/it/we/you (pl.)/they - were

I/you/he/she/it/we/you (pl.)/they - loved

Past Subjunctive

I/you/he/she/it/we/you (pl.)/they -  had been

I/you/he/she/it/we/you (pl.)/they -  had loved
Subjunctive Progressive Forms - be loving, were loving, had been loving
Subjunctive Present Conditional Form - would love
Subjunctive Past Conditional Form - would have loved

Modal auxiliary verbs - can, may, must, might, could, would, should

Can, may, and must are always indicative.

Might is the present subjunctive form of may.

Could, would, and should can be indicative or subjunctive.

Could can be used as past indicative or present subjunctive.

Would can be used to express habitual action in the past or in unreal conditional sentences.

Should can be used to express obligation or as a future tense indicator.

All 7 modals can be used with present-perfect forms (have loved).

A modal auxiliary verb and the verb it modulates are considered a single verb phrase.

3)  Imperatives, Vocatives, Contractions, and Coordinating Conjunctions

Imperative mood - expresses commands, requests, or suggestions
Imperatives can be expressed either by using the infinitive form (love), or with the word do before the infinitive (do love).
The subject of an imperative sentence is often an unexpressed you.

Vocative - noun or pronoun used in direct address

Vocatives are not connected grammatically to the rest of the sentence.

Contraction - word formed by joining two words and replacing omitted letters by an apostrophe

Coordinating conjunction - connects words, phrases, and clauses of equal importance
Coordinating conjunctions almost always connect nouns with nouns and verbs with verbs, etc.
Principal coordinating conjunctions - and, but, or, nor
Correlative coordinating conjunctions - both/and, either/or, neither/nor
Once two items are connected by coordinating conjunctions, they are said to be compound.
For example, "compound" can describe nouns, adverbs, clauses, prepositional phrases, and sentences.

Traditionally, vocatives are set apart with commas before and after if possible.
Commas are used to set off individual parts of addresses, but not between address number and street or state and zip code.
The format Feb 14, 2016, requires commas, but 14 Feb 2016 does not.
Compound sentences normally take a comma before the coordinating conjunction joining the clauses, but this comma can be omitted in clear, short compound sentences.
The Oxford comma is the comma before the and/or joining the last two elements of a series; use it.
Serial semicolons should be used to separate comma-laden elements of a series.

4) Articles, Attributive Adjectives, and Direct Objects

Indefinite articles - a, an

Definite article - the

Attributive adjective - adjective that precedes or comes immediately after the noun/pronoun it modifies

Predicate adjective - adjective or equivalent expression that follows a linking verb and refers to the subject

Predicate nominative - substantative that follows a linking verb and refers to the subject

Substantative - noun or noun substitute, such as a pronoun, adjective, phrase, or clause

Direct object - direct recipient of the action of a transitive verb

Transitive verb - verb that needs a direct object for completion

Intransitive verb - verb that does not need a direct object

Linking verb - intransitive verb that requires a predicate nominative or a predicate adjective for completion
Many verbs are both transitive and intransitive according to their meanings.

Subjective pronouns - I, he, she, we, and they

Objective pronouns - me, him, her, us, and them

When two or more attributive adjectives precede the same noun, use a comma between them if they can be joined by the word and.

Use an before words that sound like they begin with vowels (everlasting, L&G).

Use a before words that sound like they begin with consonants (last, unicorn).

5) Adverbs

Adverb - modifies verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, prepositional phrases, conjunctions, clauses, and sentences

Interrogative adverb - modifies verbs (when, where, why, how)

Conjunctive adverb - connects and modifies; there are two types: transitional adverb (however, moreover, therefore) and relative adverb (when, while, where)

Correlative adverb - adverb pairs (as/as, so/as, so/that, then/when, there/where)

Some words are both adjectives and adverbs (daily, likely, sickly, friendly).

Some adverbs have two forms (wide/widely, direct/directly, near/nearly, most/mostly, wrong/wrongly).

Hither, thither, whither, hence, thence, whence, hitherto, and henceforth are useful adverbs.

Avoid overusing very, actually, and really.

Farther is used for measurable distances, and further is used for figurative distances.

It's okay to begin a sentence with and or but, and it's okay to use the phrase cannot but.

6) Subjective Complements: Predicate Nominatives and Predicate Adjectives

Subjective complement - noun (predicate nominative) or adjective (predicate adjective) or the equivalent of either that completes a linking verb

Subjective complements can follow certain intransitive verbs and passive-voice forms of factitive verbs.

Factitive verb - makes someone something (elect, make, choose, appoint, designate)

Choose attributive adjectives carefully and avoid redundancy.

I feel good, I feel well, I am well, and I am good are all okay.

Although adverbs ending in ly and the adverb very are never hyphenated to their attributive adjectives, it can be helpful to connect other adverbs to their attributive adjectives, particularly when the adverb can be read mistakenly as an adjective.

If an attributive adjective is a noun modified by an adjective or another noun, use a hyphen to connect that word with the attributive adjective (elementary-school, long-term).

Compound modifiers are hyphenated (win-or-lose situation).

Less is singular; fewer is plural except in regards to time and money.

7) Possessives, Appositives, and Expletives

Possessive - noun or pronoun used to show various kinds of possession or belonging

Most singular possessive nouns end in 's, and most plural possessive nouns end in s'.

Possessive pronouns - my, mine, your, yours, his, her, hers, its, our, ours, their, theirs

The pronouns my, your, her, its, our, and their always precede the nouns they modify.

Absolute possessive pronouns - mine, yours, hers, ours, and theirs

Appositive - word, phrase, or clause that identifies or explains another word or other words in the same sentence

Restrictive appositive - necessary for identification; should be written without commas

Nonrestrictive appositive - unnecessary for identification; should be set off with commas

The pronouns myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, and themselves are both reflexive pronouns and intensifying pronouns.
As intensifying pronouns, they are appositives.
"I myself don't care much for the example I'm writing."

Expletive - word with a function but little or no meaning

The expletives as, or, such as, namely, and for example are used to introduce appositives.

Colons can be used to introduce lists, but should not be used after the words for example, namely, that is, or any form of the verb to be.

The apostrophe can be used to show the person or thing to which someone or something belongs.

The 's is used to form the plural forms of lower-case letters and abbreviations requiring periods.

The apostrophe is used to replace missing letters or numerals.

To form the possessive of most singular nouns, add 's, even to proper nouns ending in s.
Ancient names such as Ramses and Moses tend to form the possessive by adding only an apostrophe.

In general, if a possessive is pronounced without a voiced s, use the apostrophe only.

If two or more people possess something jointly, put 's on the last name of the group only.

To form the possessive of plural nouns ending in s, add only an apostrophe.  If the plural ends in a letter other than s, add an 's.

8) Prepositional Phrases

Preposition - a particle (a small, uninflected word) that shows a relationship between its object and other word or other words

When used in a sentence, a preposition must have an object; if it doesn't, then it is not a preposition.

Preposition objects can be nouns, pronouns, gerunds, gerund phrases, infinitives, infinitive phrases, noun clauses, and even prepositional phrases.

Most prepositional phrases are adjectival or adverbial.

Rule of parallelism - each element of a series should be of the same grammatical type (series of words, phrases, or clauses)

The object of a preposition is never the subject of a sentence.

In one of, one is a singular subject.

In any of, and a number of, any, and number are plural when they have plural references.

In the phrase the number of, number is usually singular.

It's fine to end a sentence with a preposition.

Phrasal verb - a verb-particle combination with an idiomatic meaning such that the meaning cannot be known from the separate meanings of the verb and the particle (put up with, try on)

Phrasal verbs do not have prepositions even though they use the same words.

Avoid piling up prepositions at the end of a sentence.

9) Indirect Objects and Objective Complements

Indirect object - tells to whom or for whom a direct object is given, said, or shown

An indirect object is not preceded by a preposition.

Object complement - noun or adjective or the equivalent that completes a verb with respect to a direct object

Often, sentences with object complements have factitive verbs.

Indirect objects come before direct objects.

Objective complements follow direct objects.

In addition to joining clauses with and or but, try sometimes to use a semicolon with words while, moreover, nevertheless, however, and although.

Avoid redundancy and ambiguity.

Logical Errors

Circular reasoning - the conclusion is presupposed in one of the premises

Begging the question - a premise is no more certain than the conclusion

Non sequitur - the conclusion does not follow from the premises

Post hoc ergo propter hoc - a conclusion based on the reasoning that if A follows B, B must be the cause of A

Undistributed middle - conclusion based on the unwarranted universalizing of a non-universal term in a premise

10) Adverbial Objectives, Retained Objects, and the Expletive "There"

Adverbial objectives - nouns and pronouns that function as adverbs

Adverbial objectives express time when, extent of time, location, destination, direction, quantity, etc.

Indirect objects are adverbial objectives.

When an active sentence has a direct object, the direct object becomes the subject of an equivalent sentence in the passive voice.  When a sentence has an indirect object, the indirect subject, too, can be used as the subject of an equivalent sentence in the passive voice.  When this happens, the direct object becomes a retained object.

Retained object - a direct object that continues to function as a direct object when the indirect object of a sentence in the active voice becomes the subject of a corresponding sentence in the passive voice

There can be an adverb or an expletive.

In the sentence, "There is little point in learning grammar this late in the game," there is an expletive and point is the subject of the sentence.

There are several transitive verbs that cannot be made passive.

Minimize your use of the passive voice by using it only when it is more effective than the active voice.

In other words, use the passive voice when the object of an action is more important than the doer of the action.

The passive voice is often desirable in scientific writing.

An author may want to conceal the identity of the doer of an action in order to create suspense.

Use a singular subject with there is and here is.

The adverb awhile cannot be the object of a preposition.

"We studied diagramming sentences for a while" and "We studied diagramming sentences awhile" are both correct.

11) Infinitives

Infinitive - the basic form of any verb, usually preceded by the word to

Infinitives do not have person and number, but they do have tense.

Transitive infinitives have voice.

present active - to love

present passive - to be loved

present-perfect active - to have loved

present perfect passive - to have been loved

present progressive - to be loving

past progressive - to have been loving

Infinitive phrase - infinitive with its modifiers and objects

Infinitives and infinitive phrases can function as adverbs, adjectives, and nouns.

They can be subjects, direct objects, predicate nominatives, appositives, prepositional objects, and objective complements.

Split infinitive - infinitive with a word or words between the particle to and the remainder of the infinitive; the extraneous word or words must come immediately after to

It is best to avoid split infinitives, but occasionally, after to is the best place for the adverb.

Split infinitives that contain more than one word between to and the verb should not be used.

12) Infinitives (2)

Complementary infinitive - infinitive used to complete certain modal-like verbs

Infinitives and infinitive phrases can function as predicate adjectives.

The infinitives may be preceded by forms of the verb to be, but they can also follow other linking verbs such as seem, and appear.

The particle for can be used as an expletive to introduce an infinitive phrase as a subject, a direct object, a predicate nominative, or an appositive.  These infinitive phrases have their own subjects.

Infinitive phrases can also be used as the object of the preposition for.

Infinitives and infinitive phrases can be used as independent expressions.

"To be honest, George isn't keeping up with my grammar notes, and I'm halfway through the book."

Dangling infinitive - infinitive or infinitive phrase that when functioning as a modifier of the verb has no subject

Dangling infinitives are errors.

Sometimes it is necessary to use in order to in place of to.

Use infinitives and infinitive phrases as nouns (subjects, direct objects, objective complements, predicate nominatives, appositives), adjectives (attributive adjectives, predicate adjectives), adverbs (modifiers of verbs, adjectives, and adverbs), and complementary infinitives.

Use try to instead of try and.

Part II: Chapters 13-24