2015-01-16 Structure: quantifiers and adjective order

Greg Malivuk
[email protected]
http://www.pastebin.com/u/gmalivuk
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Monday, January 19, is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. (No BAE.)
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Homework: p. 125-126, exercises 1 and 2 (you should read 123-125 notes first)
exercise 1
2 Y - "some" in questions means we expect "yes"
3 N - "some" for positive statements, "any" for negative statements
4 N - "few" is negative, it emphasizes that the number is very small
5 N - "little" means "small" with count nouns
6 N - "little" emphasizes that the amount is very small
7 Y
8 N
9 Y
10 N - "a great deal of" for noncount, also "most" means >50%, but "a great deal of" doesn't tell us anything about the percentage
11 N
12 N (same reason as number 6)
p. 126 exercise 2
2 any
3 less
4 some
5 number of
6 a lot of
7 many ("were" -> plural -> countable, they're talking about people traveling)
8 few
9 little (emphasizing that he doesn't have patience)
10 a little
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You can choose any flowers you want. (affirmative "any" = it's not important which one(s) you choose)
= We can use affirmative "any" only in statements that have some idea of choice or different options that can happen.

(Most rules about "some" and "any" are also rules for words like
something/anything, someone/anyone, somewhere/anywhere, etc.)
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both = two + all
("either" and "neither" are also specific to two things, "any" and "none" if > 2)
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p. 129 exercise 5
- we've made a little progress
- a great deal of work to do
- because few of them
- rise a little
- many loopholes
- very little money
- we've made little progress
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Little do they know, I've already finished it.

little, less, much, a lot, more, a great deal: these can also be adverbs that modify verbs
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the ball is red
the ball is fun
-> The baby has a fun red ball. (opinion before color)

the ball is fun
the ball is big
-> The baby has a fun big ball. (opinion before size)

the table is big
the table is old
-> We bought a big old table. (size before age)

the table is big
the table is old
the table is round
-> ...a big old round table (size then age then shape)

the table is wooden
the table is for breakfast
-> ...a wooden breakfast table (material before nouns)
(Remember that nouns can modify other nouns to make compounds like "bookstore".)

a box for mail
-> a mailbox

a key for a box for mail
-> a mailbox key

a box for mailbox keys
-> a mailbox key box (noun modifiers are almost never plural)

a student art award
could be an award for student art (= art made by students)
could be an art award given by a group of students
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In English, the head noun goes after all the modifiers. It is the "boss" of the noun phrase, because it tells us what noun the phrase means.

sky blue: the type of blue that looks like the sky
blue sky: the sky when it is blue

English learner: a learner of English (a student)
learner English: the type of English spoken by learners (including their mistakes)
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Remember OSASCOM:

Opinion
Size
Age (and temperature)
Shape
Color
Origin (and level, like "advanced" or "middle-class")
Material
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http://books.google.com/ngrams - search "big red" and "red big" to see which is more common, for example
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Homework: p. 133 and p. 140 exercise 2