LIN204H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Inflection, English Verbs, Dynamic Verb
Document Summary
As with nouns, we can"t define verbs in terms of what they mean; e. g. , it"s not the case that all verbs refer to an action of some kind. Consider i am cold: am is a verb, but the sentence doesn"t refer to any action . Verbs are defined by their grammatical role as the head of a verb phrase (vp). Common grammatical properties of english verbs: they can be preceded by modal auxiliaries such as can, should, will, etc. (predicate) (predicate) (subject) (subject) They can be preceded, i will see you soon, my cat"s breath might smell: they can be modified by adverbs (before or after! They can usually be modified, i walked quickly, we reluctantly answered: they have characteristic inflectional morphology: walk, see, basic/infinitive form, third-person singular present: walks, sees walked, saw, past tense: walking, seeing, present participle, past participle: walked, seen.
