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Anonymous Posted 20 years ago
Grammar

gerund? participle? adverb?

0 A question for master grammarians:02br
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00How would you identify the word "training" in the following sentence?02br
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00He spent years training himself to write.02br
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00Help if you can! 0-
  

Top answer

02br 02br 00[1] "He spent years training himself to write". Formerly this was not accepted as formal English. In those days most of pedagogic people though and even now some of them think that it should be: [2] "He spent years in training himself to write".

— Paco2004

  • 02br 02br 00[1] "He spent years training himself to write".
  • Formerly this was not accepted as formal English.
  • In those days most of pedagogic people though and even now some of them think that it should be: [2] "He spent years in training himself to write".
  • So, historically speaking, "training himself to write" is a gerundive phrase.
  • But now we could take it as an adverbial phrase using a present participle "training".
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15 Answers
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0 Your question is tough to answer.02br
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00[1] "He spent years training himself to write". Formerly this was not accepted as formal English. In those days most of pedagogic people though and even now some of them think that it should be: [2] "He spent years in training himself to write". So, historically speaking, "training himself to write" is a gerundive phrase. But now
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0I would say that the original structure was "to spend 05000 on/in doing something". Here, the ING form is a gerund, e.g.02br
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001. He spent years 01u00[on] training himself to write02u00.02br
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00and the underlined phrase acts as a complement.02br
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00However, without the preposition, the gerund
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0I had a similar discussion with a teacher on line regarding this type of sentence structure sometime ago.00 02br
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00If I said “He has saved for year 01b01u00hoping02u02b00 to start his own business”. Would you say this is a similar sentence structure as “He spent years 01u01b00training02b02u00
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0Hello Goodman02br
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00It looks a little different to me:02br
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001. He spent years training...02br
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002. He saved for years hoping...02br
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00In #2, we can put a comma after "saved", which suggests a participle that modifies the subject of the first clause; but in #1, we can't, which suggests an ing-for
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2br
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00Thanks for your reply.02br
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00That’s what makes this forum different than the others I had visited. 02br
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00I am a former ESL student and 00I’d like to think I have passed that level; 02br
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00but I am still trying to polish my English while sharing it 02br
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00with others
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0Very glad to meet you too, Goodman! I look forward to more of your posts.02br
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00As you say, we have many shades of opinion here, so with luck, another member will pass by and propose another view. (I'm by no means sure that my "analysis" is correct; it's a tricky question.)02br
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00See you later,02br
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00MrP0-
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0Hello02br
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00Please look at the three sentences below, which I picked up online.02br
00 1. She spent the time in working at home02br
00 2. She spent the time working at home.02br
00 3. The time working at home is gradually increasing.02br
00Sentence #1 was traditionally deemed as a grammatical form, but peopl
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0Yes, #3 does dangle. This seems to be the missing link:02br
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001. The time spent working at home...02br
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00Curious.02br
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00MrP0-
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0 01blockquote
01cite10MrPedantic12cite101. The time spent working at home...12br
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10Curious.10"That same research showed that Internet access fosters working at home. A notable number of users said their use of the Internet increases the amount of time they spend working at home – 14% said the time working at home has incre
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Could it be that the verb 'to spend' requires the infinitive of the following verb?

Example:

I spend time to study French.

If this is the case, then like many infinitives in English, it seems to be acceptable to replace the it with it's gerund form.

Example:

I spend time studying French.

Just my humble two cents
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