z
A Grammar for Reading and
Writing
A Grammar for Reading and Writing
(adapted from />We do not read words, one by one. Meaning is contained not so much in
individual words as in collections of words conveying broader or more specific
ideas.
Readers thus make sense of a sentence by breaking it into meaningful chunks
and examining their interrelationships. Skillful writers focus not so much on
individual words, as on creating and rephrasing larger phrases and clauses.
The topics covered here describe the "meaningful chunks" of English sentence
structure. In so doing they examine key grammatical principles underlying
effective reading and writing.
Speaking Constructions, Not Words
When discussing speech, we say we know something when we can repeat it "word
for word." Yet, when we speak, we do not really speak "one word at a time." We
break the flow of words into chunks. And we do not do this randomly, simply to
take a breath now and then. We insert pauses to break the flow into meaningful
chunks. We do not say
I left my raincoat on the chair.
We say:
I left my raincoat on the chair.
When we break a sentence into portions, whether by pauses or intonation, we are
actually doing grammatical analysis. We break the sentence into chunks to
facilitate understanding.

The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday
Who was hit? How? Do we know the gender of the driver? Do we know the nature
of the accident?
In an effort to make sense of the sentence, we analyze it various ways.
The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday
The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday
The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday
We find meaning by finding ways to break the sentence into meaningful chunks.
In the first, the driver's own head is injured on a specific day. The driver is
female.
The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday
In the second instance, the driver hit a female in a head on collision.
The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday
In the third, and more improbable, alternative a drunk driver somehow hit a
female's head.
The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday
Maybe she was leaning over into traffic! Should we come upon such a sentence
within a text, we would look to the context to decide which reading is appropriate.
Structure and Meaning
Finally, consider the following three sentences:
1. The boy ate the apple in the pie.
2. The boy ate the apple in the summer.
3. The boy ate the apple in a hurry.
At first glance, the three sentences seem to have the same structure.
1. The boy ate the apple in the pie.
2. The boy ate the apple in the summer.
3. The boy ate the apple in a hurry.
As we try to find meaning in the sentences, however, we discover that their
structure is different:
1. The boy ate the apple in the pie.

signaled by a variety of words, each word possessing slightly different
connotations. We can indicate that people are less than content by saying they
are angry , irate , incensed , perturbed , upset , furious , or mad. The broader our
vocabulary, the greater our options and the more precisely we can convey our
meaning.
And yet no matter how wide our vocabulary may be, a single word is often
insufficient. A single word, by itself, can appear somewhat vague, no matter how
specific that word might seem. The term `dog’ may be specific compared to
`mammal,’ but it is general compared to `collie.’ And `collie’ is general compared
to `Lassie.’ Then again, many different dogs played Lassie!
Suppose you want to indicate a female person across the room. If you don’t know
her name, what do you say?
That girl.
If there were more than one, this alone would be too general. It lacks specificity.
The girl in the blue Hawaiian shirt
x The taller of the two cheerleaders by the water cooler
When a single term will not supply the reference we need, we add terms to focus
or limit a more general term. Instead of referring to drugs in a discussion, we
might refer to hallucinogenic drugs. We might distinguish between hard drugs and
prescription drugs . In so doing we modify the notion of a drug to describe the
specific one, or ones, we have in mind. (Then again, at times we are forced to
use many words when we cannot recall the one that will really do, as when we
refer to that funny device doctors pump up on your arm to measure blood
pressure instead of a sphygmomanometer ).
This section examines how we construct full and specific references using noun
phrases. An ability to recognize complete noun phrases is essential to reading
ideas rather than words. A knowledge of the various possibilities for constructing
extended noun pharses is essential for crafting precide and specific references.
Nouns
To begin our discussion, we must first establish the notion of a noun.

The most common pre-modifiers are adjectives, such as red , long , hot . Other
types of words often play this same role. Not only articles
the water
*
but also verbs
running water
*
and possessive pronouns
her thoughts
*
Premodifiers limit the reference in a wide variety of ways.
Order: second, last
Location: kitchen, westerly
Source or Origin: Canadian
Color: red, dark
Smell: acrid, scented
Material: metal, oak
Size: large, 5-inch
Weight: heavy
Luster: shiny, dull
A number of pre-modifiers must appear first if they appear at all.
Specification: a, the, every
Designation: this, that, those, these
Ownership/Possessive: my, our, your, its, their, Mary’s
Number: one, many
These words typically signal the beginning of a noun phrase.
Some noun phrases are short:
the table
→ *
Some are long:

school. Teachers rarely speak as much about adding words after the initial
reference. Just as we find pre -modifiers, we also find post -modifiers—
modifiers coming after a noun.
The most common post-modifier is prepositional phrases:
the book on the table
*
civil conflict in Africa
*
the Senate of the United States
*
Post-modifiers can be short
a dream
*
or long, as in Martin Luther King Jr.’s reference to
a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former
slaves
*
and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together
at a table of brotherhood.
What does King have? A dream? No. He has a specific dream. Once we are
sensitive to the existence of noun phrases, we recognize a relatively simple
structure to the sentence. Here we recognize a noun phrase with a very long
post-modifier—thirty-two words to be exact.
We do not get lost in the flow of words, but recognize structure. At the point that
we recognize structure within the sentence, we recognize meaning. (Notice also
that post-modifiers often include clauses which themselves include complete
sentences, as in the last example above.)
Post-modifiers commonly answer the traditional news reporting questions of who
, what , where , when , how , or why . Noun post-modifiers commonly take
the following forms:

No native speaker would say that! They’d say
The boy ate it.
The pronoun replaces the complete noun phrase, the apple in the pie .
Boxes Within Boxes: Testing for a Complete Noun Phrase
The goal of reading, we noted above, is not to recognize grammatical features,
but to find meaning. The goal is not to break a sentence or part of a sentence
into as small pieces as possible, but to break it into chunks in such a way that
fosters the discovery of meaning.
Consider one of the examples above of a prepositional phrase as a post-modifier:
the book on the table
Book is a noun at the center of the noun phrase. But table is also a noun. If
we analyze the noun phrase completely, on all levels, we find:
the book on the table
*
on the table
→ *
We can have prepositional phrase within prepositional phrase within prepositional
phrases:
…the book on the table in the kitchen…
*
on the table in the kitchen…
*
in the kitchen …
*
We don't want to recognize every little noun phrase. We want to recognize the
larger ones that shape the meaning. The book is not "on the table." The
book is "on the table in the kitchen."
The Senate of the United States is composed of two legislators from each State.
Question: Who is in the Senate?
a) two legislators

was getting popcorn.) We assume that he has another book by Twain about the
Mississippi that he did not lose. Want proof? What would be replaced by `it’?
The full reference of a noun phrase is often `conveniently’ ignored in movie
advertisements. Janet Maslin, movie critic for The New York Times , complained
when an advertisement for the video tape of John Grisham’s "The Rainmaker"
quoted her as describing the movie as director Francis Ford Coppola’s `best and
sharpest film,’ when, in fact, her review stated:
John Grisham’s "The Rainmaker" is Mr. Coppola’s best and sharpest film in
years. (1)
The original quotation does not refer to the `best and sharpest film’ of Coppola’s
career, but to his `best and sharpest film in years.’
Noun Phrases: The Dominant Construction
Finally, the degree to which noun phrases are the dominant construction within
texts can be seen in the opening paragraph of the Text for Discussion: Annotation
- Needle Exchange Programs and the Law - Time for a Change. The complete
noun phrases appear within square brackets and appear in red.
(1) In [ his social history of venereal disease ], [ No Magic Bullet ], [ Allan M.
Brandt ]describes[ the controversy in the US military about preventing venereal
disease among soldiers during World War I ]. Should there be [ a disease
prevention effort that recognized that many young American men would succumb
to the charms of French prostitutes ], or should there be [ a more punitive
approach to discourage sexual contact ]? Unlike[ the New Zealand
Expeditionary forces ], which gave[ condoms ]to[ their soldiers ],[ the United
States ]decided to give [ American soldiers ][after-the-fact, and largely
ineffective, chemical prophylaxis ]. [ American soldiers ]also were subject to
[ court martial ] if they contracted[ a venereal disease ]. [ These measures ]
failed. [ More than 383,000 soldiers ]were diagnosed with[ venereal diseases ]
between April 1917 and December 1919 and lost [ seven million days of active
duty ]. [ Only influenza ], which struck in [ an epidemic ], was [ a more
common illness among servicemen ].

picking. They are simply being precise. They are saying exactly what they want to
say or feel secure in saying based on the available evidence. Weak writers can
achieve an immediate gain in the level of thought of their writing by taking
advantages of the opportunities for adding pre- and post-modifiers.
For writers, this model is a reminder of the opportunity to extend, limit, or
otherwise shape a specific idea. You can greatly increase the sophistication and
depth of thought of your work by taking advantage of these pre- and post-
modifier "slots". Having written a statement, you might go back in editing to see
how you can further shape your thoughts by making use of these slots.
The Constitution is the nation’s charter, and lawmakers should resist the
temptation to push for amendments every time an election year rolls
around.
Notice how much richer the next sentence is (additional modifiers in bold face) .
The Constitution of the United States is the nation’s bedrock charter,
and devoted lawmakers sworn to uphold it should resist the dangerous
temptation to push for pandering amendments every time an election
year rolls around.
(1) Janet Maslin, `When Phrases That Flatter Are Misused,’ The New YorkTimes ,
Arts & Leisure section, August 23, 1998, p. 9.
Sentence and Predicate Modifiers
At times when reading, we come away with little, if any, understanding. We see
the trees, but not the forest.
We may miss the meaning for a number of reasons. We may not know the
meaning of certain words or the concepts to which they refer. Even when we
understand the words, we may come away with little understanding because the
writing itself is particularly complex. In this latter instance, it is often helpful to
apply grammatical analysis, to consciously attempt to break the sentence into
meaningful units.
A Model Of English Sentence Structure
All English sentences follow the same basic formula. All speakers of the language