Grammar -- The Subject

The Subject

Introduction 

What is subject?

The word or group of words that we speak about in a sentence is called the subject

When we write a sentence first, we name someone or something and write something about that someone or something

What we name is called the subject and the something we write about is called the predicate

 

If I want to write a sentence about Samanali, first I must name Samanali and then write something about Samanali


Smanali   is a clever girl.

Name + Something

Subject       Predicate

 

                                                     More examples

Smanali   sings beautifully.

                                            Name + Something

                                          Subject       Predicate




Smanali in my class   comes to school early morning.

                                        Name  +          Something

                                        Subject             Predicate

 

Very often the subject is the doer of the action

 and subject is a

a noun or a noun phrase

 

                 Examples

 Man sleeps soundly.

                                                   Noun

                                                  Subject




 

The young man on the sofa sleeps soundly.

                                           Noun phrase

                                               Subject

 

 

What is a noun phrase?

 

Noun phrase is a group of words in which the head word is a noun

The group of words highlighted is a noun phrase

 

The old man under the tree sleeps soundly.

                                    Head word

                                           noun

 

The pretty woman in the car waved her hand.

                                               Head word

                                                        

                                                    noun

 

 Practice Activity

Underline the head noun of the following noun phrases.

  1.  The man
  2.   The beautiful bird
  3.  An interesting book
  4. The boy in the bus
  5. The prime minister of India
  6. The longest river
  7.  The small house in the valley
  8.   The girl who writes poems
  9. The little boy under the tree
  10.  Mr. Silva ,the principal of our school

 

Everything that comes before the verb is called the subject

 

The man sleeps soundly.

                                                    Subject    verb

 

The pretty woman in the car waved her hand.

                                           Subject                           verb

 

Mr. Perera, our class teacher is a kind person

                                                Subject                      verb

 

 

Look at the following sentences and identify the highlighted subjects

 

                                  My friend   is very good.

                                   My father    wanted to buy a new car.

                                                   I    can speak English well.

The president of Sri Lanka   visited India recently.

                                That house    belongs to my uncle.

                                      The girl   cried.

        The old man in the bus   sat at the back.

                           The sick man    was unhappy.

 

 

There is an easy way to find out the subject of a sentence.

First pick out the verb and ask “Who?” or “What?”

Who? / What?       -      Verb = Subject

 

Look at the following examples

The boy eats a bun.

                         Who     -    eats? (a bun) =   The boy (subject)

 

That house belongs to my friend.

                   What      -    belongs? (to my friend)  = That house (subject)

 

Practice Activity

Find the subject of the following sentences.

  1.    Fish swim.
  2.    The students play in the garden.
  3.    The farmer ploughs the field.
  4.     Samanali borrowed some books from the library.
  5.     My sister goes to school every day.
  6.  The woman sells vegetables.
  7.  The medicine given by the doctor cured my headache.
  8. The teacher was teaching the grammar lesson.
  9. I can give you some money.
  10. An old lady was walking along the road.
  11. The  head prefect of our school is my brother
  12. Kurulu who was sitting under the tree was crying.

  

Let’s discuss subject further.

Subject can be a noun or a noun phrase

Example

 Mala is my sister.

In the above sentence only a single noun is used as the subject

Look at the following sentence.

That girl at the gate is my sister.

 In the above sentence there is noun phrase as the subject

If the subject is a noun phrase, the head word of that noun phrase can be followed and proceeded by other words

 We are going to learn what those words are.

They are:

  Pre modifiers

 Post modifiers.

 

Pre modifier + noun  + post modifier

What are the pre modifiers and post modifiers used?

 

Pre modifiers + noun  + post modifiers

                  Adjectives              Prepositional phrase

                                     Determiners                    Participle phrases                                                                                Relative clauses

                                                                                    Noun phrase in apposition

When there is a pre modifier there can be either an adjective or determiners.

Look at the following example

 

The head noun can be followed by an adjective

 

Clever students are always praised.

    Adjective+noun

 

 

What are the determiners we can use?

Determiners are:

 Articles

a ,  an ,  the

 

Example phrases

a girl

an apple

the sun

 

Example sentences

A girl is crying at the gate.

An apple is a very tasty fruit.

The sun revolves around the earth.

 

Quantifiers

some, many, number of, a lot of, few

 

Demonstrative pronouns

this, that,  these, those

 

Possessive pronouns

my, our, his, her, its, their

 

Numerals

Cardinal numbers

one, two, three, four, five

 

Ordinal numbers

first ,second, third, fourth, fifth

 

Look at the following examples

 

 


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