Diagramming Help!

Status
Not open for further replies.

mdc283

New member
Joined
Nov 21, 2010
Member Type
Student or Learner
Can someone diagram the sentence George and Michael studied all day. Please!
 

Frank Antonson

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
Can someone diagram the sentence George and Michael studied all day. Please!

I guess I would diagram it as "George and Michael studied for all of the day" and show with "x"'s the "for,of, and the" as understood.

Not sure if that's right, but it could be made to work. Otherwise you have to consider "all day" as a phrasal adverb acting like "forever". That could work too.
 

corum

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 8, 2010
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Hungarian
Home Country
Hungary
Current Location
Hungary
.
4.gif
 

Frank Antonson

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
Corum,

Nice to hear from you again!

I think your diagram works, but I don't believe that the "would" has to be understood. "All day" works just fine as an adverb modifying "studied". "All" of course modifies "day".

It would be like "I slept last night."

What do you think?
 

corum

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 8, 2010
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Hungarian
Home Country
Hungary
Current Location
Hungary
What do you think?

I think I am happy to be here with you again. ;-) The prep is invisible but it is still there -- that is how it is idiomatic. (I have lost a lot of touch with the English language recently. I have had other things to do.)
 

Frank Antonson

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
I think I will require some convincing on that one. I know that "night" would not be considered an adverb by a dictionary. Nonetheless, I feel that it is working like one there -- as in "I slept yesterday". "J'ai dormi hier." "Ich habe gestern geschlafen." Would "gestern" even be capitalized in the German sentence?
 

Frank Antonson

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
Corum,

It is SO nice to have you back.

The website that you drew from has this reference on it.

[SIZE=+3][SIZE=-1]"The system was perfected in the nineteenth century by Kellog and Reed. It is the same system (with minor modifications) used in Kolln and Funk's Understanding English Grammar, 7th edition, which we are using in our English 328 class.[/SIZE][/SIZE]"

This makes me think that your version is not PURE Reed-Kellogg.

In any case, I would not get worked up about it.

I am glad to know about that website.

Thanks,

Frank
 

Frank Antonson

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
Yes, upon looking a little further at that site, I see that it allows for parentheses and "you" in direct address. That is needless and confusing since R-K already has a function for parentheses. An "x" is quite sufficient.
 

Frank Antonson

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
Dear Corum,

I have looked even closer at that site you quoted. Sure enough...the author does not make the distinction between "verbs" and "simple predicates", which I regard as the quickest way to see if an understanding of (at least the teaching of) syntax is flawed.

Simple predicates are always and only verbs. But the reverse is not true. Verbs in the form of infinitives, participles, or gerunds, can be many other sentence parts.

To overlap this vocabulary of morphology with that of syntax makes for needless confusion. R-K did not do that.

It is a very pretty and impressive website but it has some flaws.

Frank
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top