Adverbs

Question

In the sentence," mother has gone out somewhere. " What part of speech is "out" and what part of speech is "somewhere"

GPY · Accepted Answer

"go out" is a phrasal verb. "out" is essentially an adverb, but in this context it may also be termed a particle.

"somewhere" is an adverb.

CalifJim · Answer

GPY"go out" is a phrasal verb.

Very minor quibble here.

I'd say it's not a phrasal verb in the given example, because the adverb "out" is literal, but it would be in the expression The candle went out.
______

— What does 'extinguish' mean?
— Put out.
— In that case please extinguish the cat.

CJ

GPY · Answer

CalifJimI'd say it's not a phrasal verb in the given example,

A number of sources do term it thus. For example:

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/go-out

http://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/american/go-out

http://www.usingenglish.com/reference/phrasal-verbs/go+out.html

My feeling is that "go out" in this sense is enough of an idiomatic unit to be termed a phrasal verb, but perhaps it is a borderline case.

CalifJim · Answer

GPYA number of sources do term it thus.

True. I guess I prefer Radford's approach (Transformational Grammar), in which he appeals to the concept of "parallelism of selection restrictions" (rather a mouthful), whereby it's not a phrasal verb if there are a number of parallel forms such as for go in, go out, go through, go away, go back, but it's a phrasal verb if no such parallelism exists: The opposite of to put on (a coat) is not to put off (a coat); the opposite of to wake up (from sleep) is not to wake down (to sleep).

CJ

GPY · Answer

My feeling is that "go out", when referring to a person leaving a house to go and do an activity elsewhere, has enough additional idiomatic connotations to make it not exactly parallel with, say, "go in". However, there probably would be other more exactly literal uses of "go out" where the parallels would be more exact.

CalifJim · Answer

GPY"go out", when referring to a person leaving a house to go and do an activity elsewhere

True. When applying Radford's criteria, these borderline cases are maddening. He says that the same words, e.g., "go out", to take your example, can be phrasal verbs or not, depending on context, i.e., depending on the intended meaning. Of course I can't speak for him, but my best guess is that he'd say "go out" with the meaning in the quote box above is certainly a phrasal verb, but with the meaning it has in "Because of the new law, smokers have to go out to smoke", it's not a phrasal verb.

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

Definitions of phrasal verbs:

"In this book phrasal verb is a general term for all combinations of verb + adverbial particle and/or preposition. (...) A phrasal verb can have more than one meaning. Its meaning may be non-idiomatic or idiomatic. If the phrasal verb is idiomatic, it has a special meaning which we cannot easily guess from the meaning of the separate words." (English Idioms Exercises on Phrasal Verbs by Jennifer Seidel/Oxford University Press.)

"Phrasal verbs are idiomatic combinations of verb and adverb, or a verb and preposition (or verb with both adverb and preposition)." (Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs by Rosemary Courtney/Longman.)

"phrasal verbs

1 A multi-word verb consisting of a verb plus one or more particles and operating syntactically as a single unit. (Also called compound verb, verb-particle construction, and sometimes verb phrase.)

Thus defined, phrasal verbs is an umbrella term for different kinds of multi-word verbs. Some analysts make metaphorical (or idiomatic) meaning a criterion for phrasal verbs, excluding combinations which have a transparent literal meaning: but it is not always easy to draw the line. For example, get in seems literal when the implied object is a vehicle (e.g. I got in and drove off); but is it literal or metaphorical when the meaning is 'into one's own home' (e.g. I usually get in by 7 pm) or 'into Parliament' (e.g. He got in by a tiny majority)?

2 (More narrowly.) A multi-word verb consisting of a verb plus an adverb particle, in contrast to a PREPOSITIONAL VERB or a PHRASAL-PREPOSITIONAL VERB.

In this narrower definition, phrasal verbs are of two main types
(a) intransitive:

The plane took off
I don't know - I give up!

and (b) transitive, where the particle can follow the object:

Take off your coat. Take your coat/it off
I've given up chocolate. I've given chocolate/it up" (The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar by Sylvia Chalker and Edmund Weiner.)

"phrasal verb 1. is a verb + particle collocation in which a verb governs a particle that looks like a preposition but functions as an adverb; e.g., put it down, roll along, stand up, call her up, call up your friend. The particle can occur before or after the direct object. (...) 2. is a generic term covering prepositional verb, phrasal-prepositional verb, the construction described under the sense 1, and other verb + particle collocations where the particle is an adverb or other function word."
(NTC's Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs and Other Idiomatic Verbal Phrases by Richard Spears/National Textbook Company USA.)

Which of the above definitions represents current mainstream grammar?

GPY · Answer

CalifJimHe says that the same words, e.g., "go out", to take your example, can be phrasal verbs or not, depending on context, i.e., depending on the intended meaning.

I would agree with that.

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