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Modal or modal verb

Modal verbs are also auxiliary verbs. They are placed in front of all other auxiliary verbs or are used to express ideas or qualities. More on modal verbs .

Modal verb followed by auxiliary verb:

Examples:

  • He� will  be sentenced for murder.
  • You should have come earlier.
  • The supervisor told me what I must do on my first day.

Modal verb used to express possibility, permission, etc:

Examples:

  • We� could  bake a birthday cake for her. (Possibility)
  • You� may  join us on a day trip to the seaside. (Permission)
  • I� might  have caught your cough. (Speculation)

Nominal adjective

There are adjectives that are used as nouns; for example, the word rich is an adjective but when it is used as a noun, it refers to a group of people who share an identical physical or non-physical quality. Such an adjective used as a noun in a sentence is called a nominal adjective. Besides people, it also refers to things. Nominal adjectives follow the determiner (usually the definite article) the and take the place of the subject or the object of a sentence or clause.

Examples of nominal adjectives:

Examples:

  • I think this one is by far the better of the two.
  • The customers of the store that deals in luxurious cars are the rich .
  • The Japanese in the city usually go to that restaurant specializing in Japanese cuisine.
  • I’m not rude to you. If anything, the reverse is true.
  • Only three colors left; I’ll take the blue .
  • There were two of them behind the counter. One was on the phone, so I asked the other .

Nominal adjectives as subject

Examples:

  • The unemployed in the UK receive welfare benefits.
  • The disabled find it very hard to get jobs.

Nominal adjectives as object

Examples:

  • Soup kitchens provide food for the homeless .
  • He often donated money for the poor .

Nominal adjectives are used for the following

  • A class of people : the blind, the deprived, the downtrodden, the elderly, the innocent, the insane, the meek, the old, the poor, the sick, the wealthy, the well-to-do,
  • Comparatives and superlatives : the costlier, the older, the cutest, the funniest.
  • Nationalities : the British, the German, the Indian
  • Others : the opposite, the other, the yellow.

Nominal adjectives can be modified by using adjective (the aged disabled) or adverb (the partially blind, the criminally insane).

Non-finite clause

A non-finite clause is a subordinate clause that uses a participle or an infinitive . Non-finite clauses do not have tenses, and they do not show the time at which something happened. More on non-finite clauses .

Nor

Nor  is a conjunction and is used after neither and before the second word or clause to show something is also not true, does not take place, not possible, etc. It is also used after a negative statement to introduce another negative statement. In a construction using� nor , there is an inversion in which the auxiliary verb comes before the subject. More on neither and nor .

Nor is used here to show both sides of nor have negative expressions.

Examples:

  • Due to his weight, Bob neither plays football now,� nor  does he expect to play in the future.
  • Neither my friends nor am I going to eat in that expensive restaurant again.
    (In both sentences, the subjects� he  and� I  come after the auxiliary verb� does  and� am  respectively.) �

Examples:

Nor  is used here to introduce another negative statement.

  • “He is not attending the funeral.” “ Nor  am I.”
  • “I haven’t had my shower.” “ Nor  have I.”
  • “I don’t have a wife.” “ Nor  do I.” �

Number

In English grammar, number refers to singular or plural aspects of nouns and pronouns .

  • Singular noun names one person, place, thing, or idea, and plural nouns name more than one person, place, thing, or idea . 
  • Singular pronouns are I, you, he, she, it, me, him, her and their plurals are we, you, they, us, them .
  • A singular pronoun takes the place of a singular noun (The man is a wrestler. He is well-built.)
  • A plural pronoun takes the place of a plural noun or more than one noun (Look at those bees . They swarm round the hive.)
  • Verbs have number too, and they are used in agreement with the nouns/subjects .
  • A singular noun/subject is followed by a singular verb ;
  • A plural noun/subject is followed by a plural verb .
  • A verb that follows a pronoun , which can also be the subject, must agree with the subject in number: It has a trunk. / They have feathers.) 
  • Numbers can be cardinal or ordinal .
  • A cardinal number shows the quantity of something, such as one, two, three, twenty, eighty-nine.
  • An ordinal number shows the position of something, such as 1 st , 2 nd , 3 rd , 4 th , 5 th and so on.
  • Singular noun : A humming bird is a very small, brightly colored American bird that has wings which beat very fast. 
  • Plural noun : Humming birds   are among the smallest of birds . 
  • Singular pronoun : I, you, he, she. It (rabbit) has long ears. 
  • Plural pronoun : We, you, they. They (cats) have sharp claws.

Numbers as adjectives

Numbers are usually adjectives because they modify nouns that follow them. In doing so, they give information about the quantities of the nouns. Examples: three stooges, fifty-two cards, ninety-nine dollars. �

Examples:

  • Her new boyfriend hasn’t met all her� seven  sisters.
  • I counted� sixteen  coconuts floating down the river.

'A number of' and ' the number of'

A number of  may appear singular, but plural nouns follow it. The verb that follows the nouns must therefore be plural as well. The number of  is stating an amount and the verb that follows it must be singular. �

Examples:

  • A number of  eggs  were broken. 
  • The number of  broken eggs  is less than ten.  �

Object complement

Some transitive verbs are followed by an object and its complement. This complement follows the object and is called the object complement. It is a predicative adjective that describes the object as shown in the following example sentences. The object complements are in bold, while the direct objects are underlined.  

Examples:

  • We think you have unfairly labeled� Tom � selfish .
  • The new evidence proved the� accused � guilty.
  • The employer found� him � negligent  in not reporting the theft.

Object complement can come in the form of a phrase. The complement that follows the object and is called the object complement which can be a verb phrase or a noun phrase. The phrases in the following examples are shown in bold, while the direct objects are underlined.

Examples:

Verb phrase:

  • The teacher made the� children � draw Santa Claus .
  • The father helped� them � do their homework . �

Noun phrase:  �   �

  • We consider� Johnny � a close family friend . �
  • The mother gave� him � a hard slap . �

Glossary