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Shoe
Shoe
08:48
Firstly, many thanks for taking my questions seriously and providing your interesting viewpoint. I must, though, disappoint you that reading the CGEL will change my perspective completely because my perspective on the issue of classification is that simply that different grammars/grammarians come to different conclusions and I do not feel the need to take sides - or, frankly, have the ability to do so, since I have not studied generative grammar, x-bar theory etc). But I have the CGEL on my shelf and frequently consult it (as well as their _Student's Grammar_) on various topics. However I …
Rejlan Givens
Rejlan Givens
09:45
We don't have to agree Shoe, I don't see that as a problem, on the contrary. The best way to learn is through exchanging contrasting views.
As is the case with any other language point, the ing form can be understood only if we have taken in the entirety of the grammatic as l model. The modification with a genitive noun has always been taken as the key argument favoring noun analysis of ing forms.
In the sentence "My smoking cigarettes.." we can use the accusative form as well "Me smoking cigarettes.." and nothing would have changed, except probably for the degree of formality.
So how then should we understand these alternative forms in front of the noun? How can we account for the fact that we have "me" before "smoking" in place of "my", with no change in interpretation? What is "me" supposed to be functioning as? We obviously cannot say that it "modifies"the noun "smoking"
The fact is that we can understand "me" in one way only - as the subject of the following verb "smoking". "My" has that same function in front of "smoking" - it indicates the subject of the ing clause.
In my mother tongue accusative is reserved for the object, while nominative will be used for rhe subject or predicative complement. Not so in English. We can say for example "Me and my friend went to the zoo" or "It's me"
This can be explained by the fact that the case system gradually faded out of English.
Little has remained. The use of accusative in aentences like "Me smoking.." is on the rise and can be understood as a way of regularization of the clausal naturw of ing clauses.
Non finite clauses are very important in English, so this misleading gerund stuff prevents learners from seeing an important language pattern/concept.
It is harmful actually. One can learn grammar from whoever, but I have difficulty understanding the logic of the argument " verb describes an action"
It is just utterly illogical considering the number of nouns deriving from verbs. They indicate an action too.
The classification criterion based on the capacity of the syntactic form to function as subject or object is equally untenable
If that's the criteruon the gerund class would need to encompass all sorts of things.
Anyway, as I said earlier, we have to understand the big picture to be able to understand why this gerund analysis doesnt work. Or more generally, why we can't jumble the form and function together in no serious sentence or grammar analysis
The ing form and the ing clause are so versatile that we just cannot reduce it to this simplified half verb half noun waffle
Rejlan Givens
Rejlan Givens
10:35
My point in forum discussions is not to show off my knowledge or to put anyone down. However, I've noticed that many people take it personally, and many again show zero respect for the effort I put in providing them help. I'll let gerund buffs take over from here. And I'll also let alone the fused heads on the other thread as well
I don't have anything in this so I do not feel motivated to put up with anything that's bothering me. Hope we talk again Shoe, nice meeting you.
english.stackexchange.com/questions/205390/… I stumbled upon this discussion and found the "smoking" example discussed all over the place
Some comments worth noting:
You're right that deverbal nouns exist, like in several readings of the same book, but how do you explain using him as the sentence subject if the third one is a participle? You cannot. Therefore him is merely the subject of the non finite clause, not of the finite one as that is forbidden. There is no participle the way there arguable is when you've got a smoldering campfire smoking after a wind kicks it up
Acording to grammar book Pullum and Huddlestone, in non-finite participial clauses there is choice of his (genitive) or him (accusative) for subject of this clause. So we can say "Him smoking upset me." or "His smoking upset me." So his and him are interchangeable. genitive is more formal.
Shoe
Shoe
10:55
I hope you will continue to engage on this site, if not on the topic of the gerund (a term that I now eschew by the way, preferring simply: the -ing form). Anyway I for one will be interested to read your analyses and possibly on occasion dispute your claims. But you may be better off on StackExchange's Linguistics site where you will be among more like-minded contributors. Have a good day!
Rejlan Givens
Rejlan Givens
11:35
Thank you for the kind words Shoe, I may take your advice in the future. I am tight fotr time currently so my forum participation might have to wait though.

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