Smarty pants student set to evaporate my weekend.

[skelerobo]

Hi. A student provided me with the following example to test my boundless knowledge of grammar,

A rich man will probably choose a window seat to enjoy the view when eating.

His question regarding the 'when eating' is if the 'when' is a conjunction, where is the complete clause following it? Should the clause be, 'When he is eating something', where the extra words are unnecessary and therefore redundant?

Thanks for any help, Skele.

[billmcd]

Hi. A student provided me with the following example to test my boundless knowledge of grammar,

A rich man will probably choose a window seat to enjoy the view when eating.

His question regarding the 'when eating' is if the 'when' is a conjunction, where is the complete clause following it? Should the clause be, 'When he is eating something', where the extra words are unnecessary and therefore redundant?

Thanks for any help, Skele.

Yes, and although I can not speak as an authority on other languages or even speak other languages (except a little Espanol) we AmE speakers tend to compress our statements and omit a few words here and there and hope that the listener/reader will understand. But I wouldn't consider the complete and correct words in your revised version, redundant. I should also point out that that if it were not for the phrase "to enjoy the view", your original statement could be understood to mean that the rich man was eating a "window seat" .

[skelerobo]

Yes, and although I can not speak as an authority on other languages or even speak other languages (except a little Espanol) we AmE speakers tend to compress our statements and omit a few words here and there and hope that the listener/reader will understand. But I wouldn't consider the complete and correct words in your revised version, redundant. I should also point out that that if it were not for the phrase "to enjoy the view", your original statement could be understood to mean that the rich man was eating a "window seat" .

Thanks for the response. Yes, I didn't really think the corrected statement included redundant words. And In that case is the uncorrected statement ungrammatical? If not, is there a specific rule for this type of omission?

I always wondered why the rich could enjoy more leg room

[5jj]

A rich man will probably choose a window seat to enjoy the view when eating.

This is a complete and natural sentence with a participle construction, as is:

He may take a small aperitif before eating.

Please give your threads more helpful titles, skelerobo

[skelerobo]

A rich man will probably choose a window seat to enjoy the view when eating.

This is a complete and natural sentence with a participle construction, as is:

He may take a small aperitif before eating.

Please give your threads more helpful titles, skelerobo

I see. Is a participle construction the same as an -ing clause?

Be careful when/before crossing (the road).

(Apologies for the vague title)

[skelerobo]

A rich man will probably choose a window seat to enjoy the view when eating.

This is a complete and natural sentence with a participle construction, as is:

He may take a small aperitif before eating.

Please give your threads more helpful titles, skelerobo

So may I ask how does the participle construction in these examples work? Are 'when' and 'about' acting as adverbs?


When eating, a rich man will probably choose a window seat to enjoy the view.

Adverb> verb
Participle phrase
(adjective) > subject