Your English Class

Regular Verbs

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Traditionally VERBS have been defined as action words. This definition, however, is rather vague. A more precise way of defining words belonging to this category is by inflection. Verbs are form class words with distinctions for base/stem, third person singular, and present participle. Their past tense and past participle forms may not be distinctive.

NOTE: Form class words are distinct form structure class words in that they admit new members by adding prefixes or suffixes to already existing base/stems in order to change word category. Form class words are nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.

REGULAR VERBS have four inflections in addition to the base form, for which we use the null ∅ symbol, as shown below.

The following examples illustrate verb inflections:

a. [verb base/present tense]
“I hook my readers with good plots.”

b. [3rd person singular/present tense]
“The drug hooks its users slowly.”

c. [present participle]
“The fisherman was hooking one fish after another.”

d. [past tense]
“Her smile hooked me every time.”

e. [past participle]
“I’ve been hooked on that TV show for three years.”

Some spelling conventions of regular verbs require special attention.

DOUBLING OF FINAL CONSONANT
Double the final consonant when it is preceded by a single stressed vowel.

Exceptions to the above requirement are as follows:

British English doubles the final consonant with respect to certain consonants:

DELETION OF FINAL -e
Final -e is regularly dropped before the -ing and -ed inflections.

Verbs with bases in -ee, -ye, -oe, and often -ge do not drop the -e before -ing, but they do drop it before -ed.

Copyright © 2012 Thomas Fasano. Your English Class™ trademark is the property of Thomas Fasano.

Verbs: Voice

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The active voice is used when the subject of the sentence does something. The passive voice is used when the subject is acted upon. For example, in the active voice, a sentence might read “the boss yells.” For the passive voice, add the past participle form of the verb to the appropriate form of the verb to be, for example: The cake is baked (was baked, has been baked, may be baked, will be baked).”

In formal writing, avoid reliance on the passive voice. It is a weak voice, used mainly in narrative writing when the subject of the sentence or performer of the action is not the focus of attention. For example: “The account was audited.”

The use of the passive is seen in the following:

The campaign has a new strategy, which will be rolled out next week.

Where directness is needed, try the active voice first although the passive voice may be appropriate sometimes to maintain parallelism.

Weak: His laziness showed that motivation was lacking in him.
Better: His laziness showed that he lacked motivation.

Weak: All the money that was contributed by us to the charity was squandered.
Better: All the money we contributed to the charity was squandered.

It’s always best to avoid a sudden shift from active to passive voice:

Poor: We went to the theater, where a great play was seen.
Better: We went to the theater, where we saw a great play.

Poor: Nutritious food is expensive, but great health benefits are rewarded to us.
Better: Nutritious food is expensive, but it rewards us with great health benefits.

Major Verb Classes

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VERBS are often defined as action words or words that make a statement about the subject of the sentence.

For the purposes of modern grammar, the term Verb is used in two senses:

1) A verb is one of the elements of a clause structure, like a subject or an object.

2) A verb is also a member of a word class or part of speech, like a noun or an adjective. The two senses have a similar relationship.

A Verb Phrase consists of one or more verbs, e.g., held, is building, can see, might be talking in the following sentences:

Verbs are divided into three major categories according to their function within the verb phrase: Full Verbs, the vast majority of verbs in English, and the very small classes of Primary Verbs and Modal Auxiliary Verbs. We can list the primary verbs and the modal auxiliary verbs in their entirety; full verbs are too numerous to list.

If there is only one verb in the verb phrase, it is the Main Verb. If there’s more than one verb, the final verb is the main verb, and the verbs that precede it are auxiliaries. For example, graduating is the main verb in the following sentence, and will and be are auxiliaries:

He will be graduating soon.

Full verbs can act only as main verbs, the modal auxiliaries can act only as auxiliary verbs, and the primary verbs can act as either main verbs or auxiliary verbs.

NOTE: Verbs can be discontinuous. That is, the verb phrase can be broken up by other words. For example, in Do you want this? the verb phrase Do . . . want is discontinuous. The verb phrase is similarly discontinuous in sentences such as They do not want me and I can probably make that.

Sometimes the main verb is understood from context so that only auxilaries are present in the verb phrase.

I can’t talk to them, but maybe you can. [i.e., "can talk to them"]

Your employer may not have suspected anything, but your colleagues may have. [i.e., "may have susptected something"]

Copyright © 2012 Thomas Fasano.
Your English Class™ trademark is the property of Thomas Fasano.