What are verbs?
What are verbs?
A verb is a word (part of speech) that conveys action (bring, read, walk, run, murder), or a state of being (exist, stand).
Verbs are inflected (modified in form) to encode tense, aspect, mood and voice. A verb may also agree with the person, gender, and/or number of some of its arguments, such as its subject, or object.
Every sentence has a verb. In English, verbs are the only kind of word that changes to show past or present tense.
Every sentence must have two parts: a subject and a predicate.
A subject tells who or what the sentence is about. The subject is a noun or a pronoun. A predicate tells what the subject is or does. The verb is found in the predicate.
classification of verbs
Lexical verbs and Auxiliary verbs
English has two main kinds of verbs:
・lexical (also called main and full ) verbs
・auxiliary verbs
The difference between them is mainly in where they can go in a sentence. Some verbs are in both groups, but there are very few auxiliary verbs in English.
There are also two kinds of auxiliary verbs:
・primary auxiliary verb
・modal auxiliary verb
Regular verb and Irregular verb
・Regular verb
A regular verb is one that follows the pattern of taking -ed for the past simple and past participle (or -d if the verb ends in -e; smoke smoked).
・Irregular verb
An irregular verb is one that does not take the -ed ending for the Past Simple and Past Participle forms.
Valency : Transitive verbs and Intransitive verbs
Lexical verbs are further divided into intransitive and transitive verbs.
・transitive verb (requires both a direct subject and one or more objects)
・intransitive verbs (do not have objects)
Dynamic (Action) verbs and Stative (state) verbs
・Dynamic verb
(A dynamic verb is a verb which shows continued or progressive action on the part of the subject. )
・Stative verb
(Stative verbs usually refer to a state or condition which is quite static or unchanging. )
Finite verbs and Non-finite verb
・Finite verb
A finite verb (sometimes called main verbs) is a verb that has a subject, this means that it can be the main verb in a sentence. It shows tense (past / present etc) or number (singular / plural).
・Non-Finite Verbs
A non-finite verb has no subject, tense or number. The only non-finite verb forms are the infinitive (indicated by to), the gerund or the participle.
Linking verb (Copula)
・Linking verb
A linking verb does not have much meaning in itself. It "links" the subject to what is said about the subject. Usually, a linking verb shows equality or a change to a different state or place.
Linking verbs are always intransitive (but not all intransitive verbs are linking verbs).
Phrasal verb
A phrasal verb is a combination of a verb and a preposition, a verb and an adverb, or a verb with both an adverb and a preposition, any of which are part of the syntax of the sentence, and so are a complete semantic unit.
Gerunds
A Gerund is a verb when it acts as a noun; gerunds can act as the subject or object of a main verb.
A gerund is a noun formed from a verb by adding -ing. But not all words formed with -ing are gerunds.
Infinitive
Infinitives are often used after other verbs. A modal verb is followed by a bare infinitiveand a lexical verb is followed by to infinitive:
Participle
There are two participles in English: the present participle and the past participle. They can both be used as adjectives.
・The present participle is formed by adding -ing to the base form of a verb.
・The past participle is formed by adding -ed to the base form, unless it is an irregular verb.