└── README.md /README.md: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | # Notes on grammar 2 | 3 | References: 4 | 5 | - [For who the bell tolls](http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/23/bell-tolls-grammatical-perfection-marsh-review) - David Marsh 6 | - [Gwynne's grammar](http://www.nmgwynne.net/gwynnesgrammar.htm) - N.M. Gwynne 7 | - [The Elements of style](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elements_of_Style) - William Strunk 8 | 9 | -------------- 10 | 11 | **Grammar has two divisions:** 12 | 13 | - morphology (accidence) - how words are formed, how they change their form when used for different purposes 14 | - syntax - the use of words, how they are used in combination to form sentences 15 | 16 | ## Speech 17 | 18 | Eight parts of speech: 19 | 20 | - noun 21 | - pronoun 22 | - adjective 23 | - verb 24 | - adverb 25 | - conjunction 26 | - preposition 27 | - interjection 28 | 29 | ### Nouns 30 | 31 | - the name of a person, place or thing 32 | - types: 33 | - common nouns - indicates a class of persons, places or things 34 | - proper nouns - refers to an individual person or place 35 | - concrete thing - something that exists in physical form 36 | - abstract thing - something we can’t perceive with our senses 37 | - collective nouns 38 | 39 | ### Pronouns 40 | 41 | - used in place of a noun 42 | - used to avoid repetition of nouns 43 | - types: 44 | - personal: you, I, me, he, she, him, her 45 | - possessive: your, yours, mine, his, hers 46 | - demonstrative: these, this, that 47 | - relative: whose, who, which 48 | - interrogative: what, who, which 49 | - indefinite: something, someone, anything, anyone 50 | - reflexive: myself 51 | - reciprocal: each other 52 | - alternative types: 53 | - subject: I, you, he, she, it, we, they 54 | - object: me, you, him, her, it, us, them 55 | - possessive: my, your, his, her, its, our, their, mine, yours, hers, ours, theirs 56 | - relative: that, which, who, whom 57 | 58 | ### Adjectives 59 | 60 | - modify nouns by giving information about them 61 | - descriptive, classifying 62 | - [descriptive adjective] [classifying adjective] [noun] 63 | - don't need a comma between them if they are of different types, do if they are of the same type 64 | - order: [opinion]-[size]-[age]-[shape]-[colour]-[origin]-[material]-[purpose] 65 | - types: 66 | - adjectives of quality - good, bad 67 | - adjectives of quantity - any, few, many 68 | - adjectives of number - one, infinite 69 | - demonstrative adjectives - this, that 70 | - possessive adjectives - my, your, his, her, its 71 | - degrees: 72 | - positive adjectives - (nice, good) 73 | - comparatives - more of (nicer, better) 74 | - superlatives - most of (nicest, best) 75 | 76 | ### Verbs 77 | 78 | - doing word, expressing an action or state 79 | - tenses: 80 | - past 81 | - present 82 | - future 83 | - present participle, often ends with -ing 84 | - past participle, often ends with -ed, -t, -n 85 | - auxiliary verbs: 86 | - help form verbs 87 | - do, am, have 88 | - voices: 89 | - active voice - when the subject of the sentence is doing whatever is being done 90 | - passive voice - when the subject is not doing the action, but experiencing it 91 | - “I learn” vs “We are being taught” 92 | - moods: 93 | - what the verb is being used for 94 | - indicative mood - making a statement or asking a question 95 | - imperative mood - commands 96 | - subjunctive mood - used to express a doubt, uncertainty, order, recommendation, condition, purpose 97 | - infinitive mood - express an action or state without indicating the subject 98 | - non-finite parts 99 | - verb parts that cannot be connected with a subject, they cannot have a noun placed in front as a subject 100 | - the infinitive - names an action or state without reference to a subject 101 | - the participle - a verb that also does the job of an adjective 102 | - the gerund - a verb ending in '-ing' that acts as a noun (“swimming”, "smoking”) 103 | 104 | ### Adverbs 105 | 106 | - modify verbs, adjectives or adverbs 107 | - describe how, when, where, etc 108 | - often end in -ly 109 | - place it as near to the word it modifies as possible 110 | - some adverbs qualify entire sentences/clauses - “probably”, “actually”, “surprisingly” 111 | - Adverb categories: 112 | - degree (I entirely agree) 113 | - emphasising (really) 114 | - intensifying (immensely) 115 | - moderating (rather) 116 | - focusing (only) 117 | - place (“here”, “there”) 118 | - time (“now”, “today”) 119 | - manner (“quickly”, “easily”) 120 | 121 | ### Conjunctions 122 | 123 | - linking words between clauses 124 | - coordinating conjunctions: 125 | - and/but/for/nor/or/yet/so 126 | - link two clauses of equal status 127 | - subordinating conjunctions: 128 | - because/whether/unless 129 | - link a main clause with a subordinate clause 130 | - after, although, if, before, as, since, than, though 131 | - correlative conjunctions - "both ... and ..."; "either ... or ..."; 132 | - OK to start a sentence with one 133 | 134 | ### Prepositions 135 | 136 | - at, for, in, after, between, to, among, because of 137 | - show a relationship between words 138 | - generally placed in front of a noun/pronoun 139 | - take an object - "to the office", "in the net" 140 | 141 | ### Interjections 142 | 143 | - An exclamation 144 | - Expresses a feeling of the author or speaker 145 | 146 | ### Sentences 147 | 148 | - A group of words expressing a complete statement, wish, command or question 149 | - End in a full stop, exclamation mark or question mark 150 | 151 | ### Clause 152 | 153 | - a group of words that contain a verb and its subject 154 | - a subordinate/subsidiary/dependent clause forms part of a sentence but can't make up a sentence on its own 155 | 156 | ### Phrase 157 | 158 | - a group of words that do not contain a verb 159 | 160 | ### Word order in a sentence 161 | 162 | - subject-verb-object 163 | - (who did what to whom) 164 | - "she loves you" 165 | - subject - who or what the sentence is about 166 | - predicate - the rest of the sentence, apart from the subject 167 | 168 | ###Determiners 169 | 170 | - determine the noun 171 | - a (indefinite article - "a dog") 172 | - the (definite article - "the dog") 173 | - any, each, every, some, this, that 174 | 175 | ### Subjunctive 176 | 177 | - verb form 178 | - indicate something is demanded or proposed 179 | - "I insist that you sit down"; "if I were you" 180 | - were/was, who/whom 181 | 182 | ### Relative clauses 183 | 184 | - restrictive/defining relative clauses - not enclosed by commas 185 | - non-restrictive/defining relative clauses (non-essential information) - are enclosed by commas 186 | - use which (and a comma) before defining non-restrictive clauses 187 | - use that (and no comma) before defining restrictive clauses 188 | - "should advertising, which targets children, be banned?" 189 | - "should advertising that targets children be banned?" 190 | 191 | ### Dangling modifiers 192 | 193 | - don't leave participles (/subordinate clauses) too far from their pronoun - reword instead 194 | - "having ...., they ...." 195 | 196 | ## Punctuation 197 | 198 | ### Apostrophes 199 | 200 | - to indicate missing letters - I'd, won't, it's 201 | - to indicate possessive (association or relationship) - dad's, people's 202 | - not for for every possessive - its, ours, yours, theirs 203 | - if the word ends with an s, to make it possessive add 's if that's how it's pronounced: "James's book", "waiters' tips" 204 | - to indicate time/quantity - "two days' time", "12 years' jail" - where the time period modifies a noun. Don't use when it modifies an adjective: "3 weeks old" 205 | 206 | ### Apostrophe examples: 207 | 208 | - He is staying with Jones 209 | - He is staying at Jones's 210 | - He is staying with the Joneses 211 | - He is staying at the Joneses' 212 | 213 | ### Commas 214 | 215 | - use where there's a natural pause in a sentence 216 | - use a comma if you could use 'and' to separate adjectives in a statement: "bright red car"; "tall, dark, handsome stranger" 217 | - use for a non-restrictive clause - when the words make a separate clause within the clause, and could be left out without changing the overall meaning (i.e. where they perform the same function as brackets) 218 | - don’t use in a restrictive clause - when the information is vital to the clause 219 | - don't join two independent clauses with a comma 220 | 221 | ### Oxford commas 222 | 223 | - "bacon, egg and chips" 224 | - "cereal, toast and marmalade, and a muffin" 225 | 226 | ### Colons and semicolons 227 | 228 | - use a colon where the first part introduces a proposition that is resolved by the second 229 | - use a colon to indicate the start of a list, and a semicolons in between 230 | - use a semicolon between two related statements when a colon is too much and a comma is too little 231 | - use a semicolon to where two related and grammatically complete sentences are joined without a conjunction 232 | 233 | ### Brackets 234 | 235 | - use to clarify or give further information 236 | - punctuation stays outside brackets if the sentence content is complete without the extra content 237 | - dashes can be used in place of brackets or commas 238 | 239 | ### Hyphens 240 | 241 | - useful to avoid ambiguity: "black-cab driver"; "man-eating squid"; "don't panic-buy petrol" 242 | 243 | ### Paragraphs 244 | 245 | - make paragraphs the unit of composition - one to each topic 246 | - begin a paragraph with a topic sentence; end it in conformity with the start 247 | 248 | ### Active/passive 249 | 250 | - Use the active voice, where possible 251 | - more direct, bold, lively, emphatic 252 | 253 | ### Split infinitives 254 | 255 | - are OK. 256 | - use of adverbs between ... words. 257 | - "to boldly go", "to personally guarantee", "to aggressively avoid" 258 | 259 | ### Double-negatives 260 | 261 | - don't make a positive, except in maths 262 | 263 | ### Between/among 264 | 265 | - between when the relationship is reciprocal 266 | - among when it's collective relationships 267 | 268 | ### You and me/I 269 | 270 | - "between you and me" - when part of the object 271 | - "between you and I" - when part of the subject 272 | - "My friend and I would like a sandwich" 273 | - "Do you have any sandwiches for my friend and me" 274 | 275 | ### Compare to/with 276 | 277 | - to - liken 278 | - with - make a comparison 279 | 280 | ### Self 281 | 282 | - myself, yourself, himself, herself, ourselves, itself, themselves 283 | - emphatic - put the focus on a participant in a statement: "I myself..." 284 | - reflexive - reflects a relationship between one element and another: "she gave herself..." 285 | - I not myself when it's the subject: "myself had a drink" 286 | - me not myself when it's the object: "a drink for you and myself" 287 | 288 | ### Like 289 | 290 | - OK as a preposition: "ride like the wind" 291 | - Not OK as a conjunction with a clause containing a verb: "ride like you're riding a motorbike" - use "as if" instead 292 | - Also use "such as" where possible 293 | 294 | ### i before e 295 | 296 | - deign, feign, heir, species, weird, seize 297 | 298 | ### Abbreviations 299 | 300 | - acronyms - Nato, laser 301 | - initialisms - pm 302 | - contractions - dr 303 | - shortenings - phone, tv 304 | 305 | ### Tips 306 | 307 | - never use a long word where a short word will do 308 | - If you can cut words out, do 309 | - keep statements in the positive form 310 | - place the emphatic words in a sentence at the end 311 | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------