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Faldage, that was *very interesting. Bartleby hs this to say on the history of weak /strong verbs:

http://www.bartleby.com/68/73/5773.html

Q: What is the verb hang; (weak/strong/irregular/regular) -hang-hanged-hung. Is it all of them?



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And, maahey, another fascinating link. We are apparently a bit lazy with our verbs, aren't we, or, to put a positive spin on it, we prefer the simple, direct route, weak though it may be.


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Oooh. This hang, hanged/hung thang is a whole nother question involving transitive and intransitive verbs. It is more clearly illustrated in light and shine, but, still, a whole nother question, and one that I have done a small amount of inconclusive research on.


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a little peek into the past.

My head is so full of gerunds/ duratives/ intransitives/ causatives..., that I am merely posting the link with no further comment. It was a good thread to read though and rather heartening to know that the board has not changed much, in its idiosyncratic character, since.

http://wordsmith.org/board/showflat.pl?Cat=&Board=words&Number=19694


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They rather complicated gerunds on that thread. Gerunds are simply 'ing' forms of verbs that function as nouns, plain and simple. A gerund is about as easy to spot as a post oak. One person on that thread mentioned 'candle lighting ceremony'--and in that instance 'lighting' would no longer qualify as a gerund because the function in that nouns phrase was adjectivial. Take any verb, turn it into the present participle form, let it function adjectivially, and you simply end up with a present participle functioning as an adjective; that same 'ing' present participle form of the verb functioning purely as a noun in a sentence is what we call gerunds.

"We went to the candle lighting." Lighting there is a gerund.

"We went to the candle lighting ceremony." Lighting there is a present participle functioning as an adjective.


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"We went to the candle lighting." Lighting there is a gerund.

"We went to the candle lighting ceremony." Lighting there is a present participle functioning as an adjective.


Sounds a little picky to me. Does it stop being a noun when it's acting as an adjective? Is an adjectival noun not a noun?


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I'd agree with WW, on this Faldage. Lighting in the second sentence is a verb that is used as an adjective for ceremony and is therefore a participle. An example of this word as a gerund might be when referring to it as decor. The lighting in a house or auditorium, for e.g.


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Faldage,

Technically speaking according to modern grammar books, a gerund qualifies as a gerund only when it functions as a noun in a sentence and not as a modifier. When the present participle functions as an adjective, the grammar books show it to be just that: present participle functioning as an adjective.

Now things were very much different even a hundred years ago. I should let you borrow my great great grandfather's grammar book that is antebellum. Terms were very much different and by far more numerous.


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Let me try this:

Running

I saw a running deer in the meadow behind my house.

The deer is running so the running is a participle.

I entered the third running of the Dinwiddie marathon, finishing in 17 hours 35 minutes 23.86 seconds, a personal best.

Running is used as a noun, so it is a gerund.

They gave me a third-running T-shirt anyway.

The T-shirt is not running. Running is part of an adjectival noun phrase. It is still a gerund.


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Good point, Faldage. And the noun phrase functions as an adjective. You still should, I think, give a nod to how the words in the phrase are functioning. Titles, for instance: Much Ado About Nothing. There we have a pronoun functioning as an adjective, a noun, a preposition and a pronoun again functioning together as a noun--a very proper noun, in fact--but that doesn't change the fact that the words that make up the title still are what they are in terms of parts of speech.

Participles can be harder to nail down, but unless you have a case as you showed above, generally 'ing' forms of verbs that modify nouns are going to be participles and not gerunds. Grammarians today would classifying such 'ing' modifiers as present participles and not as gerunds. The case you have shown us is one of those glorious exceptions to the rule, such as it is. But to present the exception as the rule would be misleading. Generally, 'ing' forms of verbs modifying nouns will be participles functioning as adjectives--and then to have lots greater understanding of the flexibility of the language, pull out all those possible exceptions. This is the kind of exercise that I expect gives experts in linguistics papers to write. However, were I to teach my ninth graders that present participles modifying nouns were gerunds, I think I would be leading them astray.

If you want to fervently hold on to the belief that gerunds are adjectives, then I suggest that you begin a letter-writing campaign to the board members on AHD and suggest that they redefine 'gerund.' ('Letter-writing' here has been used as an adjective modifying campaign and not as a gerund.)


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