They made us translate an English paragraph. 2 clauses here?

[Burwood]

Hi everyone.

Although I'm an English speaker I know very little about grammar. I think there are two clauses in this sentence. Could someone tell me if I'm right? And if not, please explain how the two verbs relate to each other.

Thanks for any help.

They made us translate an English paragraph.
(They made us)(translate an English paragraph.)

[mykwyner]

A clause is a group of related words that has a subject and a predicate.
Your sentence has only one clause.

[Burwood]

A clause is a group of related words that has a subject and a predicate.
Your sentence has only one clause.

Thanks mykwyner for your help in my effort to understand.

B.

[Mariner]

Actually, it DOES have two clauses.

"They made us translate an English paragraph."

They made=main clause, finite

us translate an English paragraph=subordinate clause, non-finite

It's a bare infinitive clause

See http://www.ucl.ac.uk/internet-grammar/clauses/bare.htm

[mykwyner]

Sorry, us cannot be a subject, therefore us translate... cannot be a clause of any type.

[rewboss]

As a matter of fact, the clause is "translate an English sentence", not "us translate an English sentence" (the page Mariner linked to contains a small error).

It is an example of a non-finite clause, and in a non-finite clause, the subject is only implied. Here, the implied subject is "we". (Non-finite clauses cannot have explicit subjects because the verb is non-finite, and non-finite verbs do not have subjects.)

[Mariner]

Thanks for the clarification rewboss. As a matter of fact, at first I intended to give as a clause the "translate an English sentence", as you suggest. But then I saw the example in University College London's site, and I reconsidered. Well, even UCL can make mistakes, huh?

[mykwyner]

If translate is a non-finite verb because no tense comparison is possible in this context (and I agree that it is), then it can be called a non-finite clause. This is, however, a relatively new idea (at least to me) in sentence analysis. Many of us old-timers were taught that a clause without a finite verb is a phrase.

Even old-timers have to admit when they are out of step. I humbly agree that rewboss's answer is the correct one.

[MikeNewYork]

Hi everyone.

Although I'm an English speaker I know very little about grammar. I think there are two clauses in this sentence. Could someone tell me if I'm right? And if not, please explain how the two verbs relate to each other.

Thanks for any help.

They made us translate an English paragraph.
(They made us)(translate an English paragraph.)

As you read the replies in this thread, you will likely be confused. There are two different points of view regarding verbals (gerunds, participles, and infinitives). The traditional view holds these verbals to be parts of speech other than verbs. In that view, your sentence has only one clause.

In a different viewpoint, these verbals function as non-finite verbs in non-finite clauses. In that view, there are two clauses in your sentence, one finite and one non-finite.

I prefer the first approach. In that system:

they = subject
made = verb
us = indirect object
translate = a bare infinitive acting as the complement/direct object of the verb
an English manuscript = the direct object of the verbal "translate".

[Verbals maintain the ability to take objects and adverbial modifiers.]



IMO opinion, the co-existence of these two viewpoints just causes confusion for learners, but I suspect that the two will be around together for a long time.

[rewboss]

Many of us old-timers were taught that a clause without a finite verb is a phrase.

Taking this, and adding to what MikeNewYork said:

Sometimes you can interpret the same thing in more than one way. A phrase is a group of words that acts as a unit in a sentence; thus a sentence like "The cheerful girl was running way too fast" contains three phrases -- the noun phrase "the cheerful girl", the verb phrase "was running" and the adverbial phrase "way too fast". Each can be replaced by a single word: "Mary ran fast".

In the sentence "They made us translate a text", the group of words "translate a text" does function as a phrase in itself; it can be replaced by a noun phrase, as in "They made us drinks", although that does completely change the meaning of the sentence. That said, the clause itself consists of two phrases: a verb phrase ("translate") and a noun phrase ("a text").

In short, it is not wrong to call it a phrase, as it does perform the function of a noun phrase. But because such phrases themselves can contain more than one phrase, it is probably more useful to class it as a clause, but a special type of clause.

All of which is probably very baffling to Burwood, let alone the non-native speakers here, but it all goes to prove one thing: That sentence analysis can be a very complex and difficult science, and there aren't always very clear-cut answers. Indeed, one can imagine grammarians grabbing each other by the lapel and screaming at each other, "It's a clause, I say!" -- "No, I tell you, it has no subject!"