Recently Added Articles Page #55

imperative mood

The mood of verbs shows how the speaker regards the utterance. The speaker might regard the utterance as a statement: that's the indicative mood. The speaker might ask a question: that's the interrogative mood. The speaker might issue a command: that...

imperfect tense, progressive tense

The progressive tense (also called the progressive aspect) is sometimes referred to as the imperfect tense.There are six progressive tenses: present, past, future, present perfect, past perfect, and future perfect. Some grammarians refer to the progr...

indefinite article

We have three articles in the English language: a, an, and the. The words a and an are the indefinite articles. The word the is the definite article.Indefinite articles—a and an—are used only with singular nouns. These words denote a single unspe...

indefinite pronoun

Indefinite pronouns enable us to refer to any one, any two, several, or all in a group or class of persons or things or ideas. Examples include: all, another, anyone, each, someone, everybody, none, others. Some of the pronouns have possessive forms ...

independent clause

A clause is a group of words with a conjugated verb in it. We have two kinds of clauses: independent and dependent. An independent clause is a complete sentence. It begins with a capital letter and ends with a period or other terminal punctuation mar...

indicative mood

First, understand this: The word mood has nothing to do with frame of mind, as in happy or sad. It actually refers to mode, which is the attribute of a verb suggesting the speaker's attitude toward the action expressed.The mood of verbs shows how the...

indirect object

The indirect object is a person or thing secondarily affected by the action of the verb, the direct object being primarily affected. The indirect object appears in the sentence as a noun (or pronoun) unconnected by a preposition. It is positioned bet...

infinitive phrase

Every verb has a base infinitive form. We think of the infinitive as the verb with the preposition to in front of it, as in to have, to hold, to love, to honor, to cherish. Infinitive phrases can act as (1) nouns, (2) adjectives, or (3) adverbs. T...

initialism, acronym

An acronym is a pronounceable name made up of a series of initial letters or parts of words; for example, UNESCO for the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization.An initialism, on the other hand, is simply a set of initials ...

intensive pronoun

The reflexive and intensive pronouns are the “-self” words, as in myself, yourself, himself, herself, themselves, and so on. These words are used in two ways: (1) to reflect action back onto the actor in the sentence (reflexive pronoun) and (2)...

interjection

An interjection is one of the eight parts of speech. It is a word of surprise, as in wow, whoopie do, yikes. It rarely shows up in formal expository writing....

interrogative mood

First, understand this: The word mood has nothing to do with frame of mind, as in happy or sad. It actually refers to mode, which is the attribute of a verb suggesting the speaker's attitude toward the action expressed.The mood of verbs shows how the...

interrogative pronoun

We have various ways of asking questions in the English language. We can take a multiword verb form and put the subject between the auxiliary verb and the base infinitive, as in Do you mind? or Will he go? We can also use certain adverbs and ask ques...

intransitive verb

Action verbs are either transitive or intransitive. A transitive verb has the intrinsic ability to attach directly to a noun, called the direct object. But an intransitive verb cannot attach directly to a noun. To form a relationship with a noun, an ...

irregular verb

Verbs have four principal parts: (1) the infinitive, (2) the past, (3) the past participle, and (4) the present participle. A regular verb forms its past tense and past participle the same way, usually by adding “-ed.” Take the regular verb w...

infinitive verb

Every verb has a base infinitive form. We think of the infinitive as the verb with the preposition to in front of it: as in to have, to hold, to love, to honor, to cherish. Infinitives appear in the language in three ways: (1) they appear alone to s...

linking verb

A linking verb is also called a copula or copulative verb. It shows no action. Instead, it links the grammatical subject usually to an adjective, sometimes to a noun. All the verbs denoting the five senses are linking verbs: sound, look, taste, smell...

main clause

The main clause of a sentence is the independent clause—complete with subject, conjugated verb, and a third part. The third part is dictated by the verb. If the verb is transitive, the third part will be a noun acting as the direct object, as in Jo...

main verb

The main verb in a sentence is the verb in the main clause, also called the independent clause. This verb will appear in conjugated form, showing tense, person, number, and mood. Other conjugated verbs might appear in a sentence, but these will be ve...

modal auxiliary verb

We have ten modal auxiliary verbs: can, could, may, might, must, ought to, shall, should, will, and would. We use them to express the mood of the verb, which, most often, is the indicative mood (expressing something as a fact). The modals enable us t...

modifier

Modifiers are words or groups of words that limit, enumerate, or describe and clarify the meaning of other words—called headwords. The headwords are nouns (or words acting as nouns) or verbs. Modifiers act either adjectivally or adverbially.Here ar...

mood

First, understand this: The word mood has nothing to do with frame of mind, as in happy or sad. It actually refers to mode, which is the attribute of a verb suggesting the speaker's attitude toward the action expressed.The mood of verbs shows how the...

no-action verb

All main verbs divide into two broad categories: action verbs (transitive and intransitive) and no-action verbs (the verb to be and linking verbs).The verb to be, as a main verb, joins the grammatical subject with another noun (subject complement or ...

nominal clause

A nominal clause is a group of words with a conjugated verb in it that acts as a noun. Also called a noun clause, this structure can fulfill virtually all functions of a noun. A nominal clause starts with words like that, the fact that, whether, when...

nondefining clause

The great grammarian Henry Fowler coined this term to refer to a nonrestrictive clause. A nondefining clause looks to the noun modified and adds information about it. It does not single it out among others that could exist in the context. Instead, th...