MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

THANG LONG UNIVERSITY

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

ESSAY

SUBJECT: GRAMMAR OF ENGLISH

TOPIC: VERBS IN GRAMMAR OF ENGLISH

INSTRUCTOR: ASSOC.PROF.DR. NGUYEN VAN DO

STUDENT’S NAME: NGUYEN THI NHUNG
STUDENT’S CODE: A27915

HA NOI-2019

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

 PART 1: The definition of verbs.

 PART 2: Types of verb

 PART 3: Verb Phrase.

 PART 4: English and Vietnamese Verb Phrases

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  INTRODUCTION

 The reason why choose this topic:

 This is an interesting and useful topic.
 Through this topic, I can raise the knowledge and how to use of
verbs in grammar of English.

 The purpose of study:

 I research on this topic in order to know and understand verbs in
grammar of English
 In addition, I research on it in order to raise the knowledge of mine.

 The study method:

 Reading books about this topic and finding information about it.
 Searching information about this topic on the Internet.

 The structure of essay:

The essay includes three parts:
+ The first is introduction.
+ The second is contents.
+ The last is conclusion

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  CONTENTS

I. The definition of verbs:

 Verbs belong to the part of speech in English.
 Verbs are words used to describe action, state, or occurrence belong to the
parts of speech in English that include articles, nouns, pronouns,
adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, demonstrative, conjunctions,
interjections.
 Word is a single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing, used
with others (or sometimes alone) to form a sentence and typically shown
with a space on either side when written or printed.
 Each parts of speech has a different function.
 Function of verbs describe action, occurrence, indicates a state of being or
process.
 In English, the verb often has a predicate function in the sentence.
 Verbs belong to “open-class” items. Open-class items are those belonging
to the major parts of speech classes (nouns, verbs, adjectives, and
adverbs), which in any language tend to be quite large and 'open-ended.'
that is, an unlimited number of new words can be created and added to
these classes. New items are constantly being created and no one could
make an inventory of all the nouns in English and be confident that it was
complete.

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II. Types of verb:
There are various ways in which it will be necessary to classify verbs in
this chapter. This distinguishes lexical verbs from the closed system of
auxiliary verbs, and subdivides the latter into primary and modal auxiliaries.

LEXICAL: walk, write, play, beautify, etc.

AUXILIARY: Primary do, have, be
Modal can, may, shall, will, could, might, should,
would, must, ought to, used to, need, dare

 Verbal forms
Many English verbs have five forms: the BASE, the -S FORM, the PAST,
the -ING PARTICIPLE, and the -ED PARTICIPLE. Examples of these
forms and an indication of their functions are given in the table below.
Regular lexical verbs have the same -ed inflection for both the past tense and
the -ed participle (called). Irregular lexical verb forms vary from three (eg:
put, puts, putting) to eight (be, am, is, are, was, were, being, been, see). The
modal auxiliaries are defective in not having infinitive (to may), -ing
participle (maying), -ed participle (mayed), or imperative participle (may).

FORM SYMBOL EXAMPLE FUNCTIONS

(a) all the present tense except
3rd person singular:
I/you/we/they call every day
call (b) imperative: Call at once!
BASE V drink (c) subjunctive: He demanded
put that she call and see him
(d) the bare infinitive: He may
call; and the to-infinitive: He
wants her to call

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-S FORM calls
3rd person singular present
(3rd person singular V-s drinks
tense: He/she/it calls every day
present) puts
called
PAST V-ed1 drank past tense: He called yesterday
put
(a) progressive aspect (be +V-
calling ing): He's calling in a moment
-ING PARTICIPLE V-ing drinking (b) in - ing participle clauses:
putting Calling early, I found her at
home
(a) perfective aspect (have + V-
ed): He has drunk the water
called (b) passive voice (be+ V-ed2):
-ED PARTICIPLE V-ed2 drunk He is called Jack
put (c) in -ed participle clauses:
Called early, he had a quick
breakfast

 THE MORPHOLOGY OF LEXICAL VERBS

We will consider lexical verbs under two heads: regular (such as
call) and irregular (such as drink). In all of them, the -s form and -ing
participle are predictable from the base form. They differ in that the –ed1,
and -ed2, forms in irregular verbs cannot be predicted from the base.
 Regular lexical verbs
Regular lexical verbs have the following forms:
V BASE call like try
V-ing -ING PARTICIPLE calling liking trying
V-s -S FORM calls likes tries
V-ed -ED PARTICIPLE called liked tried

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 These are regular in that we can predict the other forms if we know the
base of such a verb. This is a very powerful rule, since the base is the
form listed dictionaries and the vast majority of English verbs belong to
this regular class. Furthermore, all new verbs that are coined or borrowed
from other languages adopt this pattern.
 The -ing and -s forms
 The -ing form is a straightforward addition to the base:
push ~ pushing sleep ~ sleeping
Syllabic ceases to be syllabic before the inflection (as in wriggle,
wriggling), and whether or not speakers pronounce final r (as in pour), the
r is pronounced before the inflection.
 The -s form is also predictable from the base. It has three spoken
realizations: /iz/, /z/, and /s/ and two spellings, -s and -es.
(1) Pronounced /iz/ after bases ending in voiced or voiceless sibilants and
spelled -es unless the base already ends in -e.
Eg: pass ~ passes budge ~ budges
buzz ~ buzzes push ~ pushes
catch ~ catches camouflage ~ camouflages
(2) Pronounced /z/ and spelled -s after bases ending in other voiced
sounds,
Eg: call ~ calls rob ~ robs flow ~ flows
(3) Pronounced /s/ and spelled -s after bases ending in other voiceless
sounds,
Eg: cut ~cuts lock ~ locks sap ~ saps
 Treatment of -y
(a) In bases ending in a consonant +y, the following changes occur before
inflections that do not begin with i:
carry ~ carries carry ~ carried but carry ~ carrying
The past of the following two verbs has a change y => i also after a
vowel:

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 lay ~ laid pay ~ paid
Say ~ said has the same change of spelling but, in addition, a change
of vowel;
(b) In bases ending in -ie, the ie is replaced by y before the -ing inflection:
die ~ dying lie ~ lying
 Deletion of-e
 Final -e is regularly dropped before the -ing and -ed inflections:
Shave shaving shaved
 Verbs with bases in -ee, -ye, -oe, and often -ge are exceptions to this rule
in that they do not drop the -e before -ing; but they do drop it before -ed,
as do also forms in -ie (tie tied):
-ee: agree agreeing agreed
-ye: dye dyeing dyed
-oe: hoe hoeing hoed
-ge: singe singeing singed
 Irregular lexical verbs
Irregular lexical verbs differ from regular verbs in the following ways:
(a) Irregular verbs either do not have a /d/ or /t/ inflection (drink- drank-
drunk) or break the rule for a voiced inflection (eg: burn- burnt /t/ beside
the regular burned /d/).
(b) Irregular verbs typically, but not necessarily, have variation in their
base vowel:
find ~ found ~ found write ~ wrote ~ written
(c) Irregular verbs have a varying number of distinct forms. Since the -s
and -ing forms are predictable for regular and irregular verbs alike, the
only forms that need be listed for irregular verbs are the base (V), the
past (V-ed1), and the past participle (V-ed2). Most irregular verbs have,
like regular verbs, only one common form for the past and the -ed
participle, but there is considerable variation in this respect, as the
table shows:

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 BASE V-ed1 V-ed2
all alike cut cut cut
V-ed1 = V-ed2 meet met met
V = V-ed2 come came come
all different speak spoke spoken

 These characteristics form the basis of the classification that follows. In

many cases, there are prefixed verbs having the same inflections, eg:
outdo beside do.
 The auxiliaries do, have, be
 Do
The auxiliary do has the following forms:
NON- UNCONTRACTED CONTRACTED
NEGATIVE NEGATIVE NEGATIVE
do do not don’t
present
does does not doesn’t
past did did not didn’t

Do as lexical verb (perform) and as pro-verb has the full range of forms,
including the present participle ‘doing’ and the past participle ‘done’.
 Have
Have has the following forms:
NON- UNCONTRACTED CONTRACTED
NEGATIVE NEGATIVE NEGATIVE
base have, ’ve have not, ’ve not haven’t
-s form has, ’s has not, ’s not hasn’t
past had, ’d had not, ’ not hadn’t
-ing form having not having
-ed participle had

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  Be
The lexical and auxiliary verb be is unique among English verbs in having
eight different forms:
NON- UNCONTRACTED CONTRACTED
NEGATIVE NEGATIVE NEGATIVE
base be
1st person
am, ’m am not, ’m not aren’t, ain’t
singular
3rd person
is, ’s is not, ’s not isn’t
present singular
2nd person,
are not, ’re not
1st and 3 are, ’re aren’t
person plural
1st and 3rd
person was was not wasn’t
singular
past
2nd person,
1st and 3rd were were not weren’t
person plural
-ing form being not being
-ed participle been

 The modal auxiliaries

The modal auxiliaries are the following:
UNCONTRACTED CONTRACTED
NON- NEGATIVE
NEGATIVE NEGATIVE
can cannot, can not can’t
could could not couldn’t
may may not mayn’t

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 might might not mightn’t
shall shall not shan’t
should should not shouldn’t
will, ’ll will not, ’ll not won’t
would, ’d would not, ’d not wouldn’t
must must not mustn’t
ought to ought not to oughtn’t to
used to used not to usedn’t to
need need not needn’t
dare dare not daren’t

III. Verb phrases:

 Definition
 Verb phrase is a free word phrase having main subordinate relation and
containing a verb serve as the central element and many additive
elements which modify the meanings for the central element (the
information of Giáo trình ngữ pháp Tiếng Việt tập II, 80)
 Characteristics
 Verb phrase always contains a verb as the central element.
 The central element usually governs additive elements.
IV. English and Vietnamese Verb Phrases
 Verb Phrase in English
Verb phrase in English includes three main components:
 auxiliaries
 main or lexical verbs
 complementation
The formation of English verb phrase is: auxiliary + main verb +
complementation

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1. Auxiliaries
 Auxiliaries are used to encode the following categories within the verb
phrase: Aspect is expressed by using either the verb be and the present
participle for the progressive aspect or the verb havewith a past participle
for the perfect aspect.
Formation: Progress: to be + V_ing
Is/am/are + V_ing
Eg: He is doing his homework now.
I am thinking of you now.
Was/were + V_ing
Eg: He was studying philosophy
They were having their breakfast at 8 o’clock yesterday
Will/may/must/can/could/should/would/might + be + V_ing
Eg: Tom must be staying at Thang Long Hotel at the moment.
Tom will be coming back tomorrow.
Has/have been + V_ing
Had been + V_ing
Eg: They have been living here for three years.
They had been meeting in the zoo.
Perfect: has/have/had + main verb (past participle)
Eg: I have learned English for three years.
Mai had gone to London before she moved here.
Formation: modal + verb (bare infinitive)
Eg: He can sing
You should stay at home.
You ought to finish your work before going out.
Formation: to be + verb (past participle)
Is/am/are + verb (past participle)
Eg: He is punished
They are beaten

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 I am kicked by him
Was/were + verb (past participle)
Eg: The window was broken
Only a few fish were caught by the fishermen.
Has/have/had + been + verb (past participle)
Eg: Wolves have been seen in the streets.
His name has been forgotten
May/will/would/might/can/could/must/should/have to + be + verb
(past participle)
Eg: These doors must be shut.
A song can be sungby her.
Is/am/are + being + verb (past participle)
Eg: The bridge is being repaired
Was/were + being + verb (past participle)
Eg: A house was being built by him.
Has/have/had + been + being + verb (past participle)
Eg: English has been being learned by them.
All these cakes have been being eaten by them.
Rice had been being cooked by my mother.
May/might/will/would/can/could/should/must + have + been + verb
(past participle)
Eg: He should have been punished.
All the decorating will have been finished by the weekend.
She should have been informed about the delay.
2. Main verb
According to the information of the “grammarpedia” website, the English
verb includes following types:
Intransitive verb: come, go, move...
Eg: He has just come.
Complex intransitive verb + complement/adverb: to be, become...

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 Eg: They became close friends three years ago.
Transitive verb+ object direct: buy, sell...
Eg: They have just bought a new car.
Complex transitive verb + object direct + complement/adverb: paint,
vote, appoint, elect...
Eg: He painted this door blue.
Distransitive verb + object indirect + object direct: give, offer, bring...
Eg: He gave her a red rose on her birthday.
3. Complementation
 In English verb phrases, the main verb sometimes is followed by the
complementation which can be divided into two types: complement and
adjuncts.
 There are three basic types of complements:
 objects
 predicative complements
 complements that express other types of semantic relation such as
location

 Verb phrase in Vietnamese

 Verb phrase in Vietnamese includes three elements: pre-additive element
+ central element + post-additive element.
1. Pre-additive element
 Group 1: expressing the sense of continuing or repeating of state or
action
Some words in this group: cứ, vẫn, mãi, lại, tiếp tục…
E.g: Anh ta lại hát bài hát ấy.
“Lại”: This word is used as an pre-additive element to emphasize
therepeating action.
 Group 2: Indicating the frequency

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 Some words in this group: thường, hay, chưa bao giờ, đôi khi, hiếm khi,
thỉnh thoảng…
E.g: Cô ấy thường ngồi đàn vào buổi chiều.
“Thường”: This word is used to show that the action usually happens.
 Group 3: Indicating the time of an action or a state.
Some words in this group: đã, sẽ, sắp, từng, đang, vừa …
E.g: Tôi đã xem bộ phim này.
“Đã”: This word is used to emphasize that the action already happened in
the past.
 Group 4: indication negative form
Some words in this group: không, chưa, chẳng…
E.g: Cậu ấy chưa làm bài tập.
Tôi không biết chuyện gì đang xảy ra với anh ấy.
 Group 5: Indicating the level
Some words in this group: rất, khá, hơi, vô cùng…
E.g: Anh ta rất thích nhạc giao hưởng.
2. Central element:
 Group 1: verb alone
E.g: Mặt trời mọc.
Chim hót.
 Group 2: Verbs that usually come with other verbs:
 Modal verb + Verb
Modal verb: hãy, đừng, chớ, phải, cần, nên…
E.g: Bạn nên về.
 Passive: bị, phải, được…
E.g: Hắn ta bị bắt.
Chị ấy được khen.
 Two parallel actions happening at the same time: ngồi nghỉ, nằm, ngủ,
đi học, đứng nhìn…
E.g: Anh ta đứng nhìn bầu trời đêm.

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 Group 3: Verbs which always go with additive element
 Verbs with sense of result: biết được, nhận ra, tìm thấy, nhìn thấy, tóm
lấy, thu được…
E.g: Tôi tìm thấy quyển sách này.
Anh ta thu được nhiều chiến lợi phẩm.
 Verbs with sense of moving:
Some verbs: Đi (đi xuống, đi ra, đi vào), bay (bay lên, bay xuống, bay
đến, bay vào), chạy (chạy ra, chạy vào, chạy đến, chạy lên, chạy xuống),
phóng (phóng tới, phóng đến, phóng vào), nhảy (nhảy qua, nhảy lại, nhảy
tới), bước (bước tới, bước qua)…
E.g: Thầy giáo bước vào lớp.
Anh ấy chạy lên cầu thang.
 Verb with two objects:
 Affecting two objects: Cho, đưa, tặng, biếu, xin, vay, mượn…
E.g: Lan tặng Huệ hai quyển sách.
Tâm xin mẹ tiền.
 Connecting two objects: pha, trộn, nối, kết, hòa, chấp…
E.g: Loan trộn đậu xanh với đậu đỏ.
 Considering object A as the meaning of object B: lấy, bầu, coi, chọn,
cử…
E.g: Nhật coi Tân như anh.
 Group 4: Verb with sense of mood
Some verbs in this group: lo âu, lo lắng, bồn chồn, thấp thỏm …
E.g: Anh ta lo lắng về kết quả học tập.
 Group 5: Combination of verbs
Some combinations: Chạy ngược chạy xuôi, chạy đôn chạy đáo, tính tới
tính lui, chạy ra chạy vào, nói tới nói lui…
E.g: Cô ấy cứ nói tới nói lui chuyện này.
3. Post-additive element

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 In term of word form, post-additive element could be a noun, an adjective,
a pronoun.
E.g: Anh ấy đang nghe nhạc. (a noun)
Cô ta chạy nhanh. (an adjective)
Hôm qua anh ta mua nó. (a pronoun)
 In term of structure, post-additive element could be a single word, a
phrase, or a clause (a sentence).
E.g: Anh ta đang viết thư. (a word)
Họ đang xây một lâu đài cát. (a phrase)
Tôi nhờ cô ấy hướng dẫn cách làm bánh. (a clause)
 In term of meaning, post-additive element may have many types:
 Order: tiến lên, chạy đi, ăn đi, học nào…
E.g: Cậu hãy ăn đi.
 Direction: tới (đi tới, bước tới…), vào (bay vào, chạy vào…), xuống (bay
xuống, đi xuống…)
E.g: Giá cổ phiếu vẫn tiếp tục tăng lên.
 State, process and end of an action: mãi (nói mãi, chờ mãi…), rồi (biết
rồi, đọc rồi…), ngay (đi ngay, đến ngay…), hoài (nhìn hoài, nghĩ hoài…),
xong (ăn xong, làm xong)…
E.g: Khi nhận được điện thoại, anh ấy vội đi ngay.
CONTRAST
 Through the description above, the characteristics of English and
Vietnameseverb phrases can be contrasted by form and meaning. The part
that easily attracts our attention is the form. We can see clearly that both
English and Vietnamese verb phrases have three parts: In English they are
Auxiliary, Head Verb and Complementation, while they are Pre-additive
element, Central element, post-additive element in Vietnamese. Although
they have different names and components, there are several things in
common. The first thing is verb phrase always consists a verb as central
element and the most important part, without this element, there is no verb

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 phrase. The second thing is additive elements are optional and governed
by central element. The last similarity is pre-additive element is usually
related to grammatical function when post-additive element concerns
mostly in meaning.
 However, the differences in form between English and Vietnamese verb
phrases are not less than the similarities. Tense is the crucial factor that
affects the form of English verb phrase. Verbs in English change their
forms to express different tenses.
E.g: I watched that film yesterday. (Simple past)
I watch that film every day. (Simple present)
I have watched that film several times. (Present perfect)
Now I am watching that film. (Present continuous)
I will watch that film next week. (Simple future)
 But verbs in Vietnamese always keep the same form in every situation.
One of the reason is tense in Vietnamese is not clear (In some books,
authors argue that there is no tense in Vietnamese). We just use pre-
additive element such as đã, đang, sắp, sẽ… to indicate the time of an
action.
E.g: Tôi đã xem bộ phim ấy hôm qua. (I watched that film yesterday.)
Tôi đang xem bộ phim ấy. (I am watching that film.)
Tôi xem bộ phim ấy mỗi ngày. (I watch that film every day.)
Tôi đã từng xem bộ phim ấy vài lần. (I have watched that film several
times.)
Tôi sẽ xem bộ phim ấy vào tuần sau. (I will watch that film next week.)
 Furthermore, in negative and interrogative sentences, English verbs
change form while Vietnamese verbs only have one form and add additive
element to indicate the meaning.
E.g: He watched TV last night. (Affirmative)
He did not watch TV last night. (Negative)
Did he watch TV last night? (Interrogative)

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 Anh ta đã xem TV tối hôm qua. (He watched TV last night.)
Anh ta có xem TV tối hôm qua không? (Did he watch TV last night?)
Anh ta không xem TV tối hôm qua. (He did not watch TV last night)
 The next difference is some English verbs must be followed by
prepositions such as: listen to, introduce to, believe in… while in
Vietnamese, they are optional.
E.g: He is listening to music. (Anh ta đang nghe nhạc)
 Beside the form, the other part which is not less important when
comparing English and Vietnamese verb phrase is the meaning.
 Although verb phrases are used to talk about an action or a state in both
English and Vietnamese, the way people use is not the same. People
usually use passive voice in English to make the meaning objective.
Sometimes a statement in passive is more polite than active voice. But in
Vietnamese passive voice is not preferred. Because, in English, action is
the focus, it is not important or not known who performs the action. While
in Vietnamese people usually concern in the agent that causes the action.
The other difference is Vietnamese does not have the term “phrasal verb”,
but Phrasal verbs are particularly frequent in the English language. A
phrasal verb often has a meaning which is different from the original verb.

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  CONCLUSION

1. Summary:
 The essay includes three parts: Introduction, content and conclusion.
 After studying this topic, I raised the knowledge of mine about verb in
Grammar of English, English and Vietnamese verb phrases.
 In conclusion, verb and verb phrase is a part in the structure of a sentence.
It is used in both daily life and literature. A contrastive analysis between
English and Vietnamese is useful because it can help us understandthe
differences between verb phrases of two languages.
2. References:
 To the book “A UNIVERSITY GRAMMAR OF ENGLISH”.
 To the web “vdocuments.mx”.
 To the web “Wikipedia”.

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