Exploring grammar - verb types A recent discussion at GrammarGirl (link below) about the active voice talked a lot about unaccusative verbs and semantic patients in its explanation I'm not convinced of the wisdom of using these specialist linguistic terms on a website read by a general audience of native speakers and learners I have a slight suspicion that more than a few will have been more confused at the end than they were at the beginning But in the interests of understanding, I've tried to put these terms into some sort of scheme, while at the same time looking at different terms used for types of verbs, both by linguists and by more general grammar books I hope this will be interesting, but I'm not suggesting that there is any need for the general reader or learner to learn these specialist terms Disclaimer - Please don't take this as any kind of gospel As usual, I make no claims to be either a grammarian or a linguist This is simply my way of trying to work it all out Any linguists who might happen to stumble on this are welcome to let me know if I've gone wrong We'll be looking briefly at the following:         Main (lexical) verbs and auxiliary (helping) verbs Transitive, intransitive verbs and linking verbs Subjects and objects, agents and targets (patients) Ambitransitive and ergative verbs Unaccusative verbs and unergative verbs Empty verbs and inchoative verbs Dynamic and stative verbs Finite and non finite verbs forms  Basic verb patterns You already know about transitive and intransitive verbs, linking verbs and auxiliaries, but here's just a quick reminder: 1a - Main verbs, aka lexical verbs  Transitive verbs - these take at least one object, the direct object Sometimes they take a second object, either an indirect object or an object complement See o o o o o  o o o o  Peter loves Jane David got a new bike for his birthday Amanda has read three books this week The sun has melted all the snow Would you like to taste this soup? Intransitive verbs - don't take an object He has resigned from his job He fell and broke his leg Don't interrupt Amanda She is reading The snow has completely melted in the hot sun Linking verbs - take a subject complement o o o o o She is a doctor She became a doctor when she finished her studies He seems older than I remember This soup tastes delicious It's getting a bit cold 1b - Auxiliary verbs, aka helping verbs  o o o Primary auxiliaries - do, be, have - used with main verbs to construct tenses He doesn't smoke She is coming now Have you eaten?  Modal auxiliaries - can, could, will, would, shall, should, may, might, must, ought to used with main verbs to show modality o o He can't drive She might be late o You ought to book later  Semi-modals - need, dare - can be used like ordinary verbs with a primary auxiliary, or like a modal o o o o He doesn't need to come He needn't come She doesn't dare ask him She daren't ask him (British English) In this post I'll be mainly talking about transitive and intransitive verbs, and verbs which can be both I'll say just a little bit about linking verbs, as I've already dealt with them in some detail here I won't be saying anything more about auxiliaries here, as this post is concerned only with main verbs Neither will I be discussing phrasal verbs, which I've discussed elsewhere Verbs can follow more than one pattern The eagle-eyed among you will have noticed that I have used some verbs more than once: Some verbs can be both transitive and intransitive     Amanda has read three books this week Don't interrupt Amanda She is reading The sun has melted all the snow The snow has completely melted in the hot sun Some verbs can be both transitive and linking     Would you like to taste this soup? This soup tastes delicious David got a new bike for his birthday It's getting a bit cold I've already written about linking verbs in another post, so I won't say any more about them here Verbs which can be both transitive and intransitive are known as ambitransitive verbs, and I'll be saying a little more about them in a minute Subjects and objects, agents and targets (patients) You are of course familiar with subjects and objects, and you will have heard a bit about agents when talking about the passive; but you probably haven't come across the idea of targets or patients before 3a Agents and targets with transitive verbs Look at this sentence:  Mark read the book from cover to cover Mark, the subject, is the doer, he does the reading The doer is known as the the agent (in red), So here the subject and the doer are the same The object of his reading, the book, is sometimes called the target (in green), or (especially by linguists) the patient, or undergoer I'll stick with target, as I think it's easier to understand Here the object and the target are the same thing But look what happens when we turn it into a passive:  The book has been read by millions of people  The book has been read all over the world The subject is now the target, and the agent may follow the passive verb, linked to it with by, or more commonly, not be mentioned at all In linguistics things get a little more complicated Linguists call agent and patient (target) semanticroles, but they don't think that these two cover all possibilities, so they have a couple of other semantic roles as well But I think these two are enough for our purposes 3b Agents and targets with intransitive verbs Look at these four sentences from the opening section   Mike has resigned from his job Don't interrupt Amanda She is reading  Pete fell and broke his leg  The snow has completely melted in the hot sun While Mike and Amanda have obviously chosen to what they do, Pete and the snow had no choice in the matter So Mike and She (Amanda) are seen by linguists as agents, but Pete and the snow are seen as targets When this happens the verbs are known by linguists as unaccusative verbs From now on I'll colour-code subjects and objects according to whether they are agents or targets Unaccusative verbs As we have just seen, unaccusative verbs are intransitive verbs where the subject has no choice in the matter, has no volition The most commonly quoted examples are die, fall and suffer ; and the intransitive forms of ergative verbs such as melt and break We'll be looking at ergative verbs in a minute  He died at a young age      She fell from the horse He is suffering from a severe hangover My ice-cream has melted all over my clothes The window broke in the storm The vase fell and broke Unaccusative verbs cannot be passive Unaccusative verbs, being intransitive, cannot of course be passive However, because of their apparent passivity, their lack of action, they are sometimes mistakenly identified as grammatically passive They are not But as we'll see in the next section, ergative verbs like break also have a transitive form which can be used in the passive form - The window was / got broken in the storm Ambitransitive verbs Ambitransitive verbs are verbs which can be used both transitively and intransitively They fall into two types Let's look at those sentences again:     Amanda has read three books this week Don't interrupt Amanda She is reading The sun has melted all the snow The snow has completely melted in the hot sun 5a Ergative verbs If you look at the second pair, with the verb melt, you will notice that the object of the transitive verb in the first sentence, snow, has become the subject of the intransitive verb in the second sentence There are quite a few verbs that can be used this way, and they are known as ergative verbs I've already written a post on ergative verbs, so I'll just give a few examples here    Little Jimmy broke the window - transitive The window broke when little Jimmy threw a stone at it - unaccusative  The publishers have sold 10,000 copies of her new book - transitive Her new book is selling really well - unaccusative  The pilot landed the damaged plane and taxied it over to the terminal - transitive  The damaged plane landed safely and taxied over to the terminal - unaccusative 5b Unergative verbs We can't this with other ambitransitive verbs like read, understand, eat, follow, win When used intransitively, these are known by linguists as unergative verbs  He understood her very well - transitive  That's fine then; I completely understand - unergative  What are you eating? - transitive  Leave Sally alone; she's eating - unergative   We'll follow you later - transitive You go now and we'll follow later - unergative  We're winning this match easily - transitive  Hooray! We've won again - unergative 5c Passive with ambitransitive verbs Remember that we can only make passive constructions with transitive verbs We can make passives from the transitive forms of both types of ambitransitive verbs:     Amanda has read three books this week His book has been read by people all over the world The sun has melted all the snow The snow has been completely melted by the hot sun Intransitive verbs To recap a little, intransitive verbs are divided by linguists into two types: unergative and unaccustive These terms are really only used in linguistics, and there is absolutely no need for EFL students to learn them I put them in for reference (and interest's sake) only:  o o  o o Unergative She ran to the window We talked all night Unaccusative He fell down the stairs A bee dies when it uses its sting Intransitive verbs cannot be passive Remember that intransitive verbs cannot be used in the passive But some intransitive verbs have transitive forms or similar looking transitive forms, which can be used in the passive:   The race was run in record time Several trees were felled in the storm Transitive verbs Transitive verbs can work in several ways:  Standard transitive - takes a direct object o I 've made a bit of a mess o  He kissed her tenderly on the cheek Ditransitive - the verb takes a direct object and an indirect object (in orange) o He made her a cup of coffee o She gave him the book  Factitive - the verb takes two objects, the first being the direct object and the second being the complement (in blue) of the first, and known as the object complement o o  o They made him head boy of the school She called her son Mike Causative - the verb takes an object plus another verb phrase in the infinitive (in navy) He made me it o She told me to it o We can also have passive-like causative constructions: o He is having his hair cut tomorrow They are getting their new TV delivered tomorrow o Notice that some verbs can be used in more than one way: make, for example, can be used in several different ways I've written a post on causative verbs, which you can find here Transitive verbs and the passive Where it makes sense, transitive verbs can of course be used in the passive:      A lot of smartphones are made in China She had never been kissed like that before The prize was given by a local store The doing word is called a verb He has been told not to that I don't know how many times Empty verbs We often use common verbs like do, give, have, make or take with nouns instead of using an action verb to talk about everyday actions  o I'll go and the shopping I'll the cleaning while you're out o  give o Give me a call / ring today Come and give me a hug o  have o We'll have breakfast at eight o She's having a bath  make o I'm afraid I've made a mistake I'm glad we had that little chat o  o o take We'll take a break now Let's take a look at that shop over there We could often use a verb instead:     We shopped till we dropped He's cleaning the bathroom She hugged the child We chatted all night In American English take is often used where in British English we use have  Have a bath (UK) - Take a bath (US) I'll probably a post on these sometime, but meanwhile there's a link to an exercise below Inchoative verbs Inchoative verbs describe a change of state  The snow melted  The apples have ripened  This wine ages well  My socks have shrunk  This milk has turned sour  The sky darkened They can often also be ergative verbs, and some are linking verbs See the links for a comprehensive list (PDF) 10 Stative and dynamic verbs Dynamic verbs - also called action verbs, they indicate an action, process or sensation     She walked up the path She's having a bath I've been thinking about that plan of yours She hasn't been feeling well lately Stative verbs - describe a state, situation or condition     She lives in an enormous house She has a large bathroom in her house I think that plan of yours is rather good It appears to be rather a good plan Note that some verbs can be used as both dynamic and stative verbs Remember that stative verbs are not normally used in continuous (progressive) tenses 11 Finite and non-finite verb forms Finite verb forms Look at this definition of finite verb from Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary: a finite verb form or clause shows a particular tense, person and number    He walked into the room - past simple, 3rd person singular I've bought a new car - present perfect, 1st person singular Are you two getting married next year? - present contimnuous, 2nd person plural Non-finite verb forms (aka verbals) Non-finite verb forms are are those forms of the verb that not have a tense, person, or number There are three types:    Infinitives Gerunds Participles