There are

[GoldfishLord]

There is a restaurant around the corner.
There are two people waiting outside.
-------------------
I'd like to know if the red and blue words have different meanings.

 

[Skrej]

No. They're just the singular and plural forms of the highly irregular 'be' verb in the simple present tense.

 

[Phaedrus]

If "There is a restaurant around the corner" and "There is a person waiting outside" are understood to derive from "A restaurant is around the corner" and "A person is waiting outside," respectively, then "is" in "There is a restaurant around the corner" is a form of "be" as a copula, and "is" in "There is a person waiting outside" (or "are" in "There are two people waiting outside") is a form of "be" as a progressive auxiliary.

 

[PaulMatthews]

There is a restaurant around the corner.
There are two people waiting outside.
-------------------
I'd like to know if the red and blue words have different meanings.

No: other than number, there is no difference. “Is” and “are” are both forms of copula “be”, here functioning as predicator.

In [1] “is” has the noun phrase “a restaurant” as PC (predicative complement) in its specifying sense, while the preposition phrase “around the corner” is a separate constituent functioning as locative adjunct.

In [2] “are” has the noun phrase “two people waiting outside” as PC, again in its specifying sense. The noun phrase has “people” as head with the gerund-participial clause “waiting outside” as modifier of the head.

 

[SoothingDave]

How is it that you know English enough to construct a well-written question, but you have seemingly never studied the most basic verb in the most basic tense?

 

[jutfrank]

How is it that you know English enough to construct a well-written question, but you have seemingly never studied the most basic verb in the most basic tense?

Right. I find this quite a bizarre question. I'm not sure what GoldfishLord is really asking.

 

[Phaedrus]

No: other than number, there is no difference. “Is” and “are” are both forms of copula “be”, here functioning as predicator.

In my opinion, he might be overlooking the obvious difference between progressive and copulative "be," pointed out in Post #3.

 

[5jj]

Not everybody agrees with your analysis, Phaedrus.

 

[GoldfishLord]

Right. I find this quite a bizarre question. I'm not sure what GoldfishLord is really asking.

I thought about it in the same way as Phaedrus described in post #3, so I asked it

 

[TheParser]

NOT A TEACHER


1. If you accept a diagramming system called Reed-Kellogg, then I feel that you could say there is a difference.

a. In both sentences, for the sake of analysis, ignore the word "there": "A restaurant around the corner is ( = exists. A full verb)."

b. In the second sentence ("Two people are waiting outside") "are" is an auxiliary verb (as Phaedrus reminded us).

 

[5jj]

a. In both sentences, for the sake of analysis, ignore the word "there":

Why not ignore another word - or add one (for the sake of analysis)?

 

[Phaedrus]

Why not ignore another word - or add one (for the sake of analysis)?

Do you see another grammatical expletive, or dummy element, in the sentence? If so, your "suggestion" might make sense.

 

[5jj]

I was simply somewhat frivolously expressing my doubts about grammatical analyses that require a word to be omitted or one (or a mysterious gap) to be added.

 

[Phaedrus]

I was simply somewhat frivolously expressing my doubts about grammatical analyses that require a word to be omitted or one (or a mysterious gap) to be added.

When do-support is used to form questions or negation, do you consider do grammatically basic to the sentence and deeply meaningful?

If so, I can understand why the There-Insertion analysis of sentences with existential/dummy/expletive there does not sit well with you.

Also, I suppose you wouldn't want a sentence with it-extraposition like It is good that you came to be deemed related to That you came is good.

 

[5jj]

When do-support is used to form questions or negation, do you consider do grammatically basic to the sentence ...?

The possible alternative forms seem to be consider you ...? and you consider ...? The first of those is ungrammatical in modern English and the second unnatural in that sentence. I would therefore say that in do you consider, do is grammatically important.

 

[Phaedrus]

I would therefore say that in do you consider, do is grammatically important.

Is it grammatically important in the sense of being a grammatically important addition (in the context of question formation and negation formation) which is otherwise meaningless, or do you accord dummy do added significance, such that it ought not to be deemed a meaningless but grammatically required addition in those syntactic contexts?

 

[5jj]

I think we are getting rather a long way from:

There is a restaurant around the corner.
There are two people waiting outside.
-------------------
I'd like to know if the red and blue words have different meanings.

 

[Rover_KE]

Agreed.

Will those who wish to continue this discussion please start a new thread in the Linguistics forum.

Thread closed.