Grammar Overview

Grammar Overview • Grammar errors detract • Hurt credibility • Turn off readers, editors, bosses • Grammar provides the tools and rules for writing

Basic Grammar Tools Parts of Speech • Nouns • Verbs • Pronouns • Adjectives • Adverbs • Prepositions • Conjunction • Interjections

Basic Grammar Tools • Nouns • Name something • If you can see, hear, smell, touch, taste, or feel something; IT IS A NOUN • Persons: Fred, professor, spouse, friend • Places: Home, classroom, Atlanta, office • Objects: Computer, pen, car, book • Animals: Dog, cat, Old Blue, horse, spider

Basic Grammar Tools • Nouns (Continued) • Substances: Paper, dirt, food, steel • Measures: Foot, meter, pint, month • Actions: Running, sleeping, eating, resting • Qualities: Honesty, angry, peace, love • Proper Nouns • Always capitalized • Name a particular person, place, or object • Atlanta • Connie • Nobel Prize

Basic Grammar Tools • Nouns (Continued) • Should be varied in writing • Use to create specific images • Mustang rather than car • Doberman rather than dog

Proper Nouns • Give exact information • More precise “A man lives in that area.” is less informative than “David Jones lives in Atlanta, Georgia”

Basic Grammar Tools • Verbs: • Are words that express action or otherwise help make statements. • Are the energy in your writing • Tell what is happening • Describe a condition or action

Verbs • Linking verbs • Connect words in a sentence • Fred was late. • The computer is broken. • The cheerleaders sound hoarse. • Make a statement about the subject • Explain a condition • Connect the subject and words that say something about it • Do not express action

Verbs (continued) • Action Verbs • Give life, strength, and vitality to writing • Examples: Ran, blow, scream, burst, tear, charge, force, walk, beat, hit, crash, pound, race, slam, wreck, drive, howl, attack, chase, follow, derail, roll, laugh, drink, eat, watch, steal, careen, destroy, bridle, gallop, build, fix, repair

Verbs Phrases • Have two parts • Main Verb • Helping Verb • Help the main verbs express action Examples Many Americans can speak Spanish. The dogs should have been fed by now

Verbs (continued) • Three main tenses • Present: Sam runs through the town. • Past: Sam ran through the town. • Future: Sam will run through the town. • Tenses • Express time • Used to indicate when the verb’s action takes place

Verbs (continued) • Regular verbs • Any verb that converts to past tense with “ed”, “d”, or “t” • Laugh – Laughed • Prove – Proved • Spend – Spent

Verbs (continued) • Irregular Verbs • Any verb not converted to past tense with “ed”, “d” or “t” • Speak – Spoke • Eat – Ate • Come – Came • Drive – Drove

Verbs (continued) • Verb agreement • Two or more verbs in the same sentence must agree with each other in time • They must be of the same tense • “John works hard, eats well, and enjoys his time off.” NOT • “John works hard, has eaten well, and enjoyed his time off.” • Exception: When expressing a permanent fact or truth • “I just saw that the statue is in the park”

Verbs (continued) • Active verbs vs. passive verbs • Use active verbs (active voice) 95% of the time A tornado flattened the town NOT The town was flattened by a tornado The dog bit the child NOT The child was bitten by a dog

Verbs (continued) • Use passive verbs (passive voice) the other 5% • When what is done is more important than who did it America was discovered by Columbus RATHER THAN Columbus discovered America • Or when the subject is not known, general, or not important A cure must be found for AIDS RATHER THAN They must find a cure for AIDS

Pronouns Pronoun means: • “For a noun” or • “In place of a noun” • Use pronouns to make your writing clear • They keep us from repeating nouns over & over in a sentence “Mary stood in front of Mary’s mirror and removed Mary’s makeup. Mary thought that this was the most important night in Mary’s life because Bill had asked Mary to marry Bill.”

Pronouns (continued) • Antecedent: • The word or group of words that a pronoun is used to replace. • Can be either nouns or pronouns • Single or in groups • Examples: • Bill drove his car. • Fred, Sam, and Susan were in an accident, all of them were injured.

Antecedents • Sometimes the antecedent may be either masculine or feminine; Sometimes it may be both. In such cases, some writers use the masculine form of the personal pronoun. Other writers prefer to use both the masculine and the feminine forms. Ex: A) Every one of the parents praised his child’s efforts. OR B) Every one of the parents praised his or her child’s efforts.

In conversation, you may find it more natural to use a plural personal pronoun when referring to a singular antecedent that may be either masculine for feminine. This form is becoming more common in writing, too, and it may someday be considered standard written English. • Everybody brought their lunch. (Standard English would be his or her lunch) • Each member of the club sold their tickets. (Standard English would be his or her ticket)

Common rules for Antecedents • 1. Use a singular pronoun to refer to each, either, neither, one, everyone, everybody, no one, nobody, anyone, anybody, someone, or somebody. • Examples: • Someone in the class left his (or his or her) pencil. • Each of the snakes escaped from its cage.

2. Two or more singular antecedents joined by or should be referred to by a singular pronoun. • Examples: • Either Ralph or Carlos will display his collection. • Nina or Mary will bring her cassette player. • Although rules 1 and 2 are often overlooked in conversation, they should be followed in writing.

3. Two or more antecedents joined by and should be referred to by a plural pronoun. • Examples: • Isaac and Jerome went to the playground so that they could practice shooting baskets. • Elizabeth and Don have completed their projects.

Practice • What pronoun will complete the meaning? • 1. A writer should proofread __ work. • 2. Neither recalled the name of __ first grade teacher. • 3. Each of the dogs ate the scraps that were given to __. • 4. Everyone in my class has __ own writer’s journal.

Practice • What pronoun will complete the meaning? • 1. A writer should proofread his/her work. • 2. Neither recalled the name of his/her first grade teacher. • 3. Each of the dogs ate the scraps that were given to it. • 4. Everyone in my class has his/her own writer’s journal.

Pronouns must have antecedents • Except for a few idiomatic expressions - It is getting late - all pronouns must have an antecedent. • An antecedent must be a noun, not a thought or phrase. • When inserting antecedents, substitute the proposed antecedent for the pronoun and verify that the sentence is correct.

Pronouns Must Have Antecedents • Example: Although Glen is president of the student body, he has not yet passed his English exam, and because of it, he will not graduate with the rest of his class. • What is the antecedent of it? • It is nothe has not yet passed his English exam, because that is a complete thought (clause) and not just a noun. It is not a pronoun substitute for that entire thought. • It refers to Glen’s failure to pass the exam...

Pronouns Must Have Antecedents • …Because failure does not appear in noun form in the sentence, there is no noun to function as its point of reference. • The sentence must be rewritten: because of this fact, he will not graduate...

What is wrong with the following? “Although a baseball manager seems to have a desirable job, at times they feel a lot of pressure to win.” • The pronoun “they” does not not agree with the noun it is replacing, “baseball manager”. • “Baseball manager” is singular. • “They” is plural. “Although a baseball manager seems to have a desirable job, at times he feels a lot of pressure to win.”

Pronouns • Personal pronouns refer to a particular person, place or thing. They can act in a sentence as subject, object,or possessive. • Ex: (singular) I, me, my, mine • (plural) we, us, you, our, ours

Relative pronouns refer to a person or thing already mentioned in the sentence. • Example: who, whose, whom, which, that

Demonstrative pronouns are used to pointout a particular person or thing. Ex: This is my car. • Examples: this, that, these, those

Pronouns • The following pronouns are singular: each, either, neither, one, everyone, everybody, no one, nobody, anyone, anybody, someone, somebody. • These pronouns are plural: both, few, many, several.

However – all, any ,most, none, and some may be either singular or plural. • In order to know whether to use a singular or plural verb with the pronouns above, you must observe the sense of the sentence. If the pronoun refers to one person or thing, it is singular and takes a singular verb. If it refers to more than one person or thing, it is plural and takes a plural verb. • Let’s study some examples…

All of the nation’s interest centers on politics during a political convention. (the subject all is singular because it refers to one thing – interest. The verb centers is singular to agree with it.)

All of the states send delegates to national political conventions. (The subject all is plural because it refers to more than one thing – fifty states. The verb send is plural to agree with it.)

Some of the excitement of such a convention is conveyed by television coverage. (The subject some is singular because it means “a part” of the excitement. The helping verb is is singular to agree with it.)

Some of the delegates are disappointed in the candidate who was chosen. • (The subject some is plural because it refers to more than one delegate. The verb are is plural to agree with it.)

Pronoun Usage and Verbs • Pronouns are used to take the place of nouns. • Personal pronouns: I, you, he, she, we, they, and it. • Watch for sentences in which a pronoun is incorrectly used to take the place of a verb or verb phrase.

Example The stock market went up today; I hope it happens again tomorrow. • What does the word “it” replace? • The stock market? • To check replace “it” with “stock market.” The stock market went up today: I hope the stock market happens again tomorrow. • That obviously doesn’t work!

What does “it” replace? • In this case “it” replaced the words “stock market went up”, which contains a verb and cannot be replaced by the pronoun “it”. • A correct version of the sentence might be: “The stock market went up today; I hope it rises again tomorrow.” • In this case, “it” is used to replace the noun “stock market”.

Pronouns with Appositives Sometimes a pronoun is followed directly by a noun that identifies the pronoun. Such a noun is called an appositive. To help you choose which pronoun to use before an appositive, omit the appositive and try each form of the pronoun separately.

Example: (We, Us) boys swam in the lake. [Boys is the appositive identifying the pronoun] • We swam in the lake. • Us swam in the lake. • Answer: Weboys swam in the lake.

Example: • The director gave an award to (we, us) actors. • The director gave an award to we. • The director gave an award to us. • Answer: The director gave an award to us actors.

Adjectives • Used to modify a noun or pronoun • Changes a word’s meaning by: • Describing it • Limiting its meaning • Examples, see how the word house can be modified: Big house, nice house, ugly house, our house, new house, old house, white house, dog house, fun house, rent house

Adjectives • Make your writing colorful • Give special meaning to • Nouns • Pronouns Example:It was a funny kind of window, very tall and narrow, with two sets of curtains: straight-hanging white lace framed by drawn-back red velvet. It was open. Adjectives: funny, tall, narrow, straight-hanging, whit, drawn-back, red, and open

Use of Adjectives • Many writers overuse adjectives “The deteriorating, old, creaky, scary house stood on the steep, rocky, wind swept, forbidding hill frightening the small, young, fearful child on a dark, cold, and stormy night.” • When used in moderation, adjectives add force and nuances to our writing. • When picking adjectives • Choose those that give the strongest possible mental picture

Adverbs • Modify, slightly change the meaning of: • Verbs • Adjective • Other Adverbs • Any modifying work in a sentence not modifying a noun or pronoun is an adverb • Usually answers • When? (We went yesterday.) • Where? (We went home.) • How? (We went quickly.) • How much? (We went far.) • How often? (We went twice.)

Adverbs (continued) • Inexperienced & lazy writers use adverbs to strengthen weak verbs • Bob closed the door of his car hard and ran quickly to his office. • Should look for a stronger verb instead • Bob slammed the door of his car and raced into his office. • Look for a strong verb to replace adverbs 90% of time • Results in more vigorous writing

Using Adverbs Without Adverbs: The dog was creeping toward me. He was alone. He looked hungry, and his coat was matted and dirty. The dog looked up at me. I couldn’t resist petting him. He wagged his tail. I knew we had each found a friend. With Adverbs: The dog was gradually creeping toward me. He was completely alone. He also looked hungry, and his coat was matted and extremely dirty. Eagerly the dog looked up at me. I couldn’t resist petting him gently. He wagged his tail. I knew we had each found a special friend.

Grammar Overview