The Verb Forms

We can distinguish the following verb forms:

I. Nonfinite Verb Forms - they carry no time of their own.

1. infinitive

a. to infinitive e.g. I want to go home now.

b. bare infinitive e.g. Doris can swim very well.

2. present participle (or -ing form) e.g. She was sleeping. Crossing the street, Mary fell.

3. past participle (or -en form)

e.g. I must have forgotten about it. Sean had waited all day.

II. Finite Verb Forms - they carry the tense and are identified with a particular time.

1. present tense form e.g. This woman works very hard. These women work very hard.

2. past tense form e.g. The children looked hungry. She drank all wine.

• compare the forms of eat (irregular verb) and walk (regular verb)

1. infinitive:		to eat/eat		to walk/walk
2. present participle:		eating		walking
3. past participle:		eaten		walked
4. past tense:		ate		walked
5. present tense:		eats/eat		walks/walk

Subcategories of Verbs:

I. Main Verbs - express action or state of being; have all five forms; can occur alone, independent of any other verb.

e.g. Mike studies statistics. My aunt collapsed in the hallway.

II. Helping Verbs - are used to support the main verb and do not occur by themselves in the sentence; have only grammatical meaning (express tense, aspect, modality, and sometimes person and number). There are two types of helping verbs:

1. auxiliary verbs

2. modal auxiliaries

III. Auxiliary Verbs

• there are three auxiliary verbs in English: be, do and have.
• when the auxiliary is present, the main verb occurs in one of its nonfinite forms: the present participle, the past participle, or bare infinitive. The auxiliaries appear in different forms depending on the tense, person and number (have - have, has, has; do - do, does, did; be - am, is, are, was, were)

I am waiting for an answer.

Did you like Italian food when you were a child?

Have you seen the report yet?

The car was washed by the students.

• auxiliaries carry no lexical meaning of its own.
• auxiliary verbs have, be and do function both as main verbs of sentences and as auxiliary verbs in "verb strings" (multiple-verb constructions).

The rabbit had four babies following her.

The dog had had a huge bone for dinner.

The dog is determined to dig under the fence.

The dog is digging as fast as he can.

Tom did a good job.

Did Tom write the memo?

Did Tom do a good job?

• the auxiliary have occurs before past participle to express the perfect (completed) aspect of the verb (e.i. an action that was completed at a certain point in time in the past or started in the past and continues to the present).

She has been to France before.

She has lived in France for 17 years.

A bright green bird had nested there.

• the auxiliary be occurs before present participle to express the progressive (continuous) aspect of verb (e.i. an action that is or was in progress at a certain point in time).

Harvey is cooking squash again.

The football players were lifting weights when I came.

• The auxiliary do (do, does, did) is often called stand-in auxiliary: it is used to form negative or interrogative sentences (when modals or be or have do not occur in affirmative).

Amy is here.

Amy is not here.

Is Amy here?

Amy will be here tomorrow.

Amy will not be here tomorrow.

Will Amy be here tomorrow?

Amy lives here.

**Amy lives not here.

Amy does not live here.

Boris worked yesterday.

**Boris worked not yesterday.

Boris did not work yesterday.

IV. Modal Auxiliaries

• Modal Verbs are helping verbs that affect the "mood" of the main verb but can never function as the main verb or appear by themselves. The modals convey conditions of probability, possibility, obligation, or necessity.

I may eat.

I could eat.

I should eat.

I must eat.

• List of modal verbs:

Present	Past
will	would
shall	should
can	could
may	might
must
ought to

• Many linguists do not consider modals to be true verbs because modals usually:

1. do not occur with present (-s) or past tense (-ed) ending

2. do not have present or past participle form

3. do not have infinitive form

4. cannot be made into command

Practice: Analyze the following sentences:

• underline the entire verb phrase (multiple-verb construction plus all its modifiers).
• indicate MV for the main verb.
• indicate AUX for auxialiry verb
• indicate M for the modal verb if one is present.
• indicate Pres-Part if one is present.
• indicate Past-Part if one is present.
• indicate any adverbs present.

I received your message.

I have received your message.

You might have called me!

The class actually started on time.

I had been quietly wondering about that.

I must have been dreaming.

You will not be sorry about that.

He was just kidding.

You can't teach an old dog new tricks.

I try hard every day.

I could try harder though.

I was steadily working in the back yard.

I will be patiently waiting outside.

The waiter had already taken our orders.

They should definitely have finished the test by now.

I was reading about the railroad.

You could have told me.

I can not see your point, and I do not agree with your line of reasoning.

The dinner might have been prepared by a catering service.