Form Classes

Ed McCorduckEnglish 402—GrammarSUNY Cortland http://mccorduck.cortland.edu

• nouns o definition: any word that takes the characteristic

endings of nouns

slide 2: nouns

English 402: Grammar

the plural ending

-(e)s for regular nouns

exx

dog – dogs cake – cakes box – boxes

(this ending may be pronounced [s] or [z] or as an additional syllable depending on the final sound of the noun it is added to)

slide 3: the plural ending for regular nouns

English 402: Grammar

no one form (though a few similar ones) for irregular nouns

exx

mouse – mice louse – lice

foot – feet goose – geese

child – children man – men

fish – fish deer – deer

slide 4: the plural ending for irregular nouns

English 402: Grammar

regular inflections – follow a predictable patternirregular inflections – don’t follow a pattern; unpredictable

the possessive ending

-’s added to singular nouns

-s’ added to plural nouns

slide 5: the possessive ending

English 402: Grammar

-’s and -s’ are identical in pronunciation to regular plural ending, leading to “errors” (in the traditional grammar sense) in written language such as “the cars wheels” (= ‘the wheels of the car’ or ‘the wheels of the cars’) and to the contraction –’s of is, leading to errors such as “the mans at the apartment now”

• verbs o definition: any word that takes the characteristic

endings of verbs

slide 6: verbs

English 402: Grammar

• five forms for all verbs o base form (a.k.a. present tense):

no ending for all verbso third person singular

-(e)s ending for all verbs except be

slide 7: first two forms of verbs

English 402: Grammar

o past tense (a.k.a. –ed form) -(e)d ending for regular verbs

o past participle (a.k.a. –en form) -(e)d ending for regular verbs

slide 8: remaining three forms of verbs

English 402: Grammar

Why “-en form”? To distinguish it from the past tense form using the fact that the past participles of many irregular verbs end in –n, e.g. know-known, speak-spoken, go-gone.

o present participle (a.k.a. –ing form)

-ing ending for all verbs