Verbs With and Without Objects Tuesday, March 9 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. CT A little theory can go a long way. Take this unpresentable sentence: He finally made after considering every possibility a decision. Some verbs, like the verb made, target their action at an object, and knowing that can give us a way to …
Author Archives: rultimo
Verbs and the Verb
A little knowledge about something can cause a lot of unnecessary confusion, and when the subject is a complex one, as grammar certainly is, we are often impatient in being presented with yet another term making yet another, finer distinction. Not having that little bit more of knowledge, though, can mean the difference between somewhat …
The Parts of Speech and Thought
If I said that I was reading a book yesterday afternoon when I suddenly realized I had not yet booked the hotel reservation for my vacation, how is the word book being used grammatically in that statement? Or if an accountant speaks of the book value of a company’s assets, what is the grammar of …
Upcoming Seminar
Getting Organized: The Parts of Speech Tuesday, March 2 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. CT A cluttered sentence, like a cluttered desk, wastes a lot of time and attention, and both can be cleaned up efficiently when we begin to sort things out and toss what we don’t need. The traditional parts of speech are simply …
Fallacies
If you can put your hands on a copy of Fallacy: The Counterfeit of Argument by Ward Fearnside and William Holther (and what, really, isn’t available anymore at our fingertips?), the four-page introduction alone will be worth your time and treasure. Published in 1959, this utterly solid (and what is solid may be dense at …