Participle Phrase...Prepositional Phrase...What?
So I know the difference between phrases and clauses, but not well enough it seems. Here's the sentence:
"She came over to the house last night celebrating and boasting about how she made honors."
It seems simple enough. The fact that "celebrating and boasting" are -ing and seem to be modifying the sentence tells me that it's a participle phrase of some kind, but then I move on to "...about how she made honors," which feels like a clause to me but a little like a prepositional element to some degree as well.
In short, I'm not sure what to make of the sentence. Could someone break it down for me if it isn't too much trouble? I would really appreciate it! Thanks!
Top answer
She came over to the house last night [celebrating and boasting [about how she made honors]] . Celebrating and boasting are verbs in the clause (in outer brackets) functioning as a depictive adjunct in clause structure referring to the referent of the subject ”she”. How she made honors is tricky.
- She came over to the house last night [celebrating and boasting [about how she made honors]] .
- Celebrating and boasting are verbs in the clause (in outer brackets) functioning as a depictive adjunct in clause structure referring to the referent of the subject ”she”.
- How she made honors is tricky.
- It is tempting to analyse it as a ‘fused’ relative construction interpreted as the way that she made honors, which would be a noun phrase.
- But I think it would be better to take it as a subordinate clause, where "how" is analysed as a subordinator (a variant of "that").
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She came over to the house last night [celebrating and boasting [about how she made honors]].
Celebrating and boasting are verbs in the clause (in outer brackets) functioning as a depictive adjunct in clause structure referring to the referent of the subject ”she”.
How she made honors is tricky. It is tempting to analyse it as a ‘fused’ relat
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