[Grammar] indirect speech

[Lily77]

Hello everyone. I would like to ask about tense changing in indirect speech. In this sentence The headmaster said "Don't believe everything you hear" is ' hear ' considered as a direct object and is it to be left without any changes?
Thanks in advance

 

[Tarheel]

Indirect speech would be:

The headmaster told us not to believe everything we hear.

The phrase "everything you hear" is a noun phrase and is a direct object of "believe"

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I don't know why you would change "hear" to something else. (I wouldn't.)

 

[Lily77]

I didn't change. But some "qualified " teachers tried to explain why should I change.Thanks

 

[Matthew Wai]

I think you should put 'should' after 'I' because it is not a question.

 

[Phaedrus]

The phrase "everything you hear" is a noun phrase and is a direct object of "believe"

And within that noun phrase, "[which] you hear" is a relative clause modifying "everything." "Hear" is not a direct object but a (transitive) verb which itself has a direct object. The easiest thing to say, without getting overly technical, is that the direct object of "hear" is "everything."

 

[Matthew Wai]

I consider 'hear' the main verb in the contact clause.

 

[Phaedrus]

I consider 'hear' the main verb in the contact clause.

In the what?

 

[Matthew Wai]

The contact clause: https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/contact_clause

 

[Phaedrus]

Yeah, I thought it was probably your term for "relative clause." There's no difference between our interpretations.

 

[Matthew Wai]

The difference is that a relative clause includes a relative pronoun, while a contact clause does not.

 

[Phaedrus]

No, if you read the definition very carefully, you'll see that it defines a contact clause as a type of relative clause.

 

[Matthew Wai]

I have read the definition below very carefully.
When the relative pronouns ‘who’, ‘which’ or ‘that’ (in object case) are omitted, the relative clause becomes a contact clause.

'Becomes' suggests to me that there is difference between them.

I think we are getting nitpicking.

 

[Phaedrus]

I was referring to the definition to which the link you posted leads:

A relative clause appended without a relative pronoun to the noun phrase that governs it

As you can see, it defines a contact clause as a relative clause of a certain type.

 

[Tarheel]

Hello everyone. I would like to ask about tense changing in indirect speech. In this sentence The headmaster said "Don't believe everything you hear" is ' hear ' considered as a direct object and is it to be left without any changes?

Say:

The headmaster said:

"Don't believe everything you hear."

Then start another paragraph. And google that sentence. Hopefully, if you see it enough times in context you will learn its meaning.

Post more. But start a new thread.