253. Descriptive Wording after Nouns 2

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A noun can be described by various types of wording after it

THE STUDY OF POST-NOUN WORDING

This discussion is a continuation of one begun in the post before this, where post-noun wording in noun phrases (technically called “noun postmodification”) is said be of various types, and a start is made on describing and analysing them. Three types are considered there: infinitive verbs, preposition phrases and relative clauses. Here, the focus is on participles, adjectives and other nouns.

The aim of the study is to assist recognition of noun phrases, which is useful for both reading comprehension (see 15. Reading Obstacles 8) and grammatically accurate writing. Many of the points are also made elsewhere in this blog, but having them all together here may help their greater appreciation. For a similar discussion of adjective phrases, see 203. Expanding an Adjective with Words after it.

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FURTHER TYPES OF NOUN POSTMODIFICATION

1. Participles

The verb forms that grammarians call participles are by definition noun-describing, and hence particularly likely to be in noun phrases. However, not all go after their noun – some must go before. Some are verbs with -ing, others are regular verbs with -ed (e.g. involved) or irregular ones in the “third” form (e.g. put, begun, known – see 97. Verb Form Confusions).

Participles after a noun can be alone or closely combined with their own object, complement or adverbial (their subject usually being the noun they are postmodifying). In the following proverb, the participle living is combined with an adverbial in phrase:

(a) People living in glass houses should not throw stones.

This means “Do not criticise if you yourself deserve criticism”. It will be seen that living follows directly after its noun people. This is common but not inevitable, since sometimes the same noun will have another postmodifier in between. It is even possible for a participle and its noun to be at opposite ends of a sentence, but this is not the focus here – it can be read about in 101. Add-On Participles.

With the exception of this last kind, postmodifying participles can generally be thought of as just abbreviated relative clauses: living in (a) means the same as who live. Replacement by a relative clause is practically always possible, though the reverse is less so (see 52. Participles Placed Just after their Noun, #5).

The participle in (a) has -ing because it corresponds to an active, not passive, verb after who. The tense of live (present simple) is irrelevant here: living (despite being what some would call a “present” participle) could replace other tenses too, such as the past simple. For an -ed participle to be necessary, the corresponding verb after who would need to be passive. For example, who are accommodated used in (a) would be paraphrased with the participle accommodated.

The similarity between participles of this type and relative clauses even extends to the fact that two commas (or a comma and a full stop) sometimes have to be placed around the participle and any partner words of it (see 52. Participles Placed Just after their Noun, #3).

Some participles are as usable before their noun as after. For example, remaining may go equally well before or after problems. Other participles, however, go always before or always after their noun. An easily-recognisable kind that must always go after has its own following words, in the manner of living in (a) (see 109. Placing an Adjective after its Noun, #3). Participles without such words are harder to judge. Their meaning can sometimes indicate where they go: those expressing a one-off event rather than a constant characteristic or condition tend to follow their noun. For example, emerging, a characteristic in emerging nations, is a one-off event in the colour emerging.

There is one situation where an -ing word after a noun may not be a postmodifying participle: when the noun is the object of a particular kind of verb:

(b) The magazine photographs people working in London.

There are two ways of understanding this. In one, working is a participle like those discussed above: equating to who work and classifying the photographed people. Crucially, it does not refer to anything photographed: the object of photographs is only people, not their work. In the other interpretation, however, working in London is the main part of what is photographed. Working means not “who work”, but “when they are working”.

In this second case, working is a noun-like gerund rather than adjective-like participle. As the main part of the object of photographs, it is not postmodifying people (see the end of 71. Gerund and Participle Uses of “-ing”). As one might expect, this ability of the same combination to have different meanings sometimes causes misunderstanding (see 257. Structures with a Double Meaning 4, #2).

The gerund meaning is not possible after any verb – it is a special property of just some, not usually predictable. Other examples besides PHOTOGRAPH include DEPEND ON, ENTAIL, FIND, INVOLVE, LEAD TO, LIKE, NECESSITATE and SEE (see 232. Verbs with an Object + “-ing”).

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2. Adjectives

English adjectives are, of course, not normally placed directly after a noun they are describing, the two standard positions being either directly before it (difficult problems) or after it with a link verb like BE in between (…problems are difficult). One could say, in other words, that adjectives are rare postmodifiers. Most English courses highlight the few exceptional adjectives that do usually need to follow their noun, such as immemorial, present (= “in attendance”) and responsible (= “in charge”).

In this blog, the post 109. Placing an Adjective after its Noun considers both adjectives that always occupy this position, like immemorial, and those that only do so in particular grammatical circumstances, such as when describing pronouns ending in -thing or -body (e.g. something beautiful), or when possessing their own postmodifiers (e.g. islands beautiful in the extreme). The possibility of circumstantial influences entails that practically any adjective can be placed directly after its noun in the right circumstances.

However, adjectives in this position are not always postmodifying. Here is an example of the main exceptional kind:

(c) Some language learners find grammar enjoyable.

The reason why the adjective enjoyable is not considered to be postmodifying the noun grammar here is a close link to the verb find. This is a verb whose meaning (= “consider”) necessitates mention of two types of information, one represented by grammar and one by enjoyable. If enjoyable was left out, the sentence would either feel incomplete or convey a different meaning of find.

More technically, find (= “consider”) is a verb that requires an “object complement” to describe its object (grammar), and enjoyable has that role. Object complements are classified as a major sentence element along with subjects, verbs and objects, and as such they cannot be part of a subject etc. – they cannot postmodify. For more about them, see 220. Features of Complements.

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3. Other Nouns

It is quite common in English to see two nouns acting together in a single noun position in a sentence. However, the second noun is not always postmodifying. It is never so if the nouns refer to two different things. They may be linked by and (e.g. nouns and adjectives are…) or just placed together, as in library books or the night sky. With and, both nouns are equal; without it, the second noun is the main one, modified by the first. In this blog there is plentiful information about this latter combination type in posts like 38. Nouns Used like Adjectives.

When two adjacent nouns refer to or describe the same thing, however, the second noun is often more like a postmodifier. Examples are the footballer Maradona and mammoths, an extinct species. As these show, sometimes there is a comma between the nouns, sometimes not. Technically, such combinations are called “apposition”. They are analysed in detail in this blog in 77. Apposition.

To say that the second of two nouns (or noun phrases) in apposition is a postmodifier is probably not strictly true. Certainly in some cases (for example where two alternative names are being given) the second noun is as central as the first. However, the second noun seems in many cases to be more describing than described, so that apposition does perhaps have some relevance to this discussion.

In some apposition constructions, the second half is a noun phrase based on a verb:

(d) There is little proof that Homer was a real person.

Here, the underlined words form an apposition construction with the preceding noun proof. They are easily mistaken for a relative clause (one of the postmodifying possibilities considered in the post before this). One indicator of the difference is the inability of that to be replaced by which – it is a conjunction here, not a pronoun. Another is that, unlike relative clauses, the phrase as a whole can be the object of a verb like proved (see 153. Conjunction Uses of “that”, #1).

Noun phrases beginning with that cannot be placed after every noun to make an apposition construction. Most possible preceding nouns represent speech or thought, e.g. argument, belief, claim, denial, expectation and suggestion. Their combination with that is thus a form of indirect statement (see 127. When to Use Indirect Speech). Other nouns that can precede that include advantage, evidence, likelihood, possibility and problem.

That is not the only word that can introduce a verb-based noun phrase after another noun. Most others are question words, creating indirect questions. Typical combinations are uncertainty when…, the question whether… and explanations why…. In many such cases, though, a preposition, typically of, is added before the question word, ruling out apposition (see 160. Uses of “of”, #4).

Question words used after a noun in this way are classified not as conjunctions like that, but mostly as adverbs (linking in an adverb-like way with the verb after them). They are further called “interrogative” in order to distinguish them from the same spellings used as so-called “relative adverbs”, as in the reason why…. Relative adverbs introduce not noun phrases but adjective ones, similar to those made by relative pronouns like who.

One way to tell the difference is to examine the meaning of the preceding noun: any expressing asking, explaining or knowing will probably indicate an interrogative adverb and hence an apposition construction. Interrogative adverbs should also not be paraphrasable with which: after reason, why can become for which but after explanation no which paraphrase is possible (see the end of 185. Noun Synonyms of Question Words).

252. Descriptive Wording after Nouns 1

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A noun can be described by various types of wording placed after it

DEFINITION AND BASIC STRUCTURE OF NOUN PHRASES

Words next to a noun are sometimes closely combined with it into what most grammarians call a “noun phrase”. One way of distinguishing such phrase-making words from other words near a noun is by seeing whether they and the noun are replaceable by a lone noun without changing the overall structure of their sentence. Consider this:

(a) Strong demand for scarce commodities keeps their price high.

The underlined words here are recognisable as a noun phrase because they could all be replaced as the subject of the sentence by just the noun demand.

Other clues are used too. For example, an adjective (like strong) positioned immediately before a noun that it is describing (demand) is almost certain to be making a noun phrase with it, and so is a preposition phrase (like for scarce commodities) if it is positioned immediately after a subject noun with no comma in between. On the other hand, a verb agreeing with a noun immediately before it is not combining with it into a noun phrase: it is instead all or part of a separate “verb phrase”.

Different kinds of expression combine with the central noun in a noun phrase in different ways. Apart from being typically before or after the noun, each kind has a normal position there relative to other kinds. For example, if there is an article – the or a(n) – it goes before both the noun and any other describing words. This variety means the grammar of English noun phrases is actually quite extensive – more than could be covered in a single post. As the above title suggests, the aim here (and in the next post too) is to survey only what is possible after a central noun – technically called “noun postmodification”.

My reason for choosing this topic is a belief that it can help noun phrases to be recognised, thus assisting both reading comprehension (see 15. Reading Obstacles 8) and grammatically accurate writing. Many of the points are also made elsewhere in this blog, but having them all together here seems useful. For a similar discussion of adjective phrases, see 203. Expanding an Adjective with Words after it.

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TYPES OF NOUN POSTMODIFIER

1. Infinitive Verbs

Placing an infinitive (to verb) after a noun only sometimes creates a noun phrase (see 239. Nouns Combined with a “to” Verb.). There are three common phrase types. One that can involve practically any noun indicates something that can or should or must be done to what the noun represents. Examples are time to spare, water to drink, nothing to see and work to do.

It will be seen that the noun is like the object of the verb – it receives rather than performs the action – yet the verb is active rather than passive. In some cases, however, a passive infinitive is actually possible as well, usually to overcome a double meaning or to express a special non-passive meaning (see, for example, the discussion of nothing to be seen in 246. Tricky Grammar Contrasts 2, #1).

Secondly, some nouns can be the subject rather than object of the infinitive in order to indicate something they can do, as in machines to dig or stories to enthral. Unsurprisingly, this use always requires infinitives in the active form.

Thirdly, some nouns can have an active or passive infinitive without relating to it in either of the above two ways: the infinitive just specifies more precisely what the noun is referring to, as in a need to be seen. Most nouns can combine with some kind of specifying verb after them, but often this will need a form other than the infinitive, often -ing after a preposition as in opposition to smoking and love of learning. Other infinitive-taking nouns include ability, determination, advice and request.

It is common for there to be no comma before a noun-describing infinitive, but not compulsory. For a description of the comma use, see 289. Exotic Grammar Structures 8, #3. 

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2. Prepositions

A preposition and its following noun-like partner is only sometimes part of a noun phrase. In its other common role, it is like an independent adverb. This is the case, for example, if it directly follows a full stop or verb (see 53. “As”, “Like” and “Such As”), or even sometimes a noun that is the object of a verb (see 124. Structures with a Double Meaning 1, #2). Within noun phrases, a preposition and its partner go after the central noun, never before, describing it in an adjective-like way.

The choice of preposition within adjective-like preposition phrases is dictated sometimes by the noun before it, sometimes by the one after, and sometimes because its own typical meaning needs to be expressed.

PREPOSITIONS DETERMINED BY THE NOUN BEFORE

In the phrase opposition to smoking, to is necessitated by opposition: it is a typical preposition after this word, not expressing the standard movement meaning of to but marking its following noun as the target of opposition.

Here are some other prepositions that are sometimes closely linked to a preceding noun just as to is:

…FOR
demand, desire, enthusiasm, fondness, hope, instructions, liking, payment, reason, responsibility, search, substitute, taste, yearning, wish

…OF
advantage, benefit, certainty, danger, difficulty, importance, kind, likelihood, necessity, news, possibility, problem, risk, value (For more, see 78. Infinitive versus Preposition after Nouns and 160. Uses of “of”)

.…IN
interest, inclusion, involvement, participation

…ON

dependence, effect, emphasis, feedback, focus, impact, limit, reliance

…TO
alternative, answer, applicability, clue, contribution, correspondence, equivalence, exception, follow-up, harm, immunity, introduction, the key, kindness, marriage, objection, opposition, obstacle, preliminary, reaction, response, similarity, solution, superiority (care is needed with these not to have a following infinitive verb instead of an -ing one: see 35. Words Followed by “to -ing”)

…WITH
agreement, association, collaboration, compliance, connection, familiarity, fascination, happiness, partnership, success

PREPOSITIONS DETERMINED BY THE NOUN AFTER

Consider the following:

(b) Introductions of different kinds are possible.

This means introductions vary in their form. The of is a preposition closely linked to kinds, the second noun. The typical preposition after introductions, showing what is introduced, is to.

This example does not mean, however, that later nouns with a typical preposition always have priority over preceding ones: the preposition of either noun can be preferred over that of the other, depending on the desired meaning. It would be perfectly possible in (b) to change of into to if we wanted to mention different kinds as the content of introductions rather than a characteristic of them. We could even have both an of phrase and a to one together, the former usually first.

Other nouns that, like kind, have a typical preceding preposition include way (after in), screen (after on) and this moment (after at). For many more, see the end of 111. Words with a Typical Preposition. A rare example of a noun that expresses different meanings with different typical prepositions before it is scene (see 317. Tricky Word Contrasts 13, #6).

PREPOSITIONS CHOSEN FOR THEIR OWN MEANING 

This type of postmodifying preposition is much less specific to either of its associated nouns:

(c) Employment in the North is higher than in the South.

Here, in has a major kind of inherent preposition meaning: geographical. Numerous other prepositions have it too and are grammatical alternatives, such as across, beyond or near (see 151. Ways of Using Compass Words). Other common inherent meaning types include time (at, in, for etc.), function (for), means (by) and instrument (with, in).

I also include in this category what I call “object” and “subject” prepositions. These are sometimes used after an “action” noun to show that their following noun would have been either an object or a subject if the action noun had been a verb. The typical object preposition is of (see 31. Prepositions after Action Nouns 1); typical subject prepositions are by or of (see 49. Prepositions after Action Nouns 2), or occasionally from (see 246. Tricky Grammar Contrasts 2, #4).

A standard action noun is introduction. As noted earlier, it is “typically” followed by to. However, it could also be followed by of (+ object) or by (+ subject). This is not contradictory: introduction has two different meanings, each with a different preposition need. The one with of or by refers to the action of introducing, and requires introduction to be uncountable; the one with to refers to a more concrete result of the action, where introduction is countable (see 14. Action Outcomes).

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3. Relative Clauses

Relative clauses are nearly always noun postmodifiers (for a rare exception, see 200. Special Uses of Relative Clauses, #2). They start with a special kind of word and contain a verb in an ordinary tense form, along with its subject. In the best-known type, the special word is either a pronoun (who, which etc.) or an adjective before a noun (whose). Some relative clauses, however, start with an adverb (when, where, why):

(d) Note the exact moment when the colour change occurs.

This use of when is a relative adverb rather than a conjunction because it is introducing information about the noun moment rather than the verb note. When after a noun is not always a relative – sometimes it is the question word (an “interrogative” adverb), introducing an indirect question – but it is not interrogative here because moment does not express any kind of asking, explaining or knowing (see 285. Complexities of Question Words, #3). Its status as a relative adverb is further indicated by its ability to be replaced by a preposition + relative pronoun (at which above: see the final section of 185. Noun Synonyms of Question Words).

The noun that relative clauses postmodify is usually just before them, but if a prepositional postmodifier is also present, e.g. on the screen added to (d) above, that would precede the relative clause. This can cause two types of reading error: misinterpreting the relative pronoun (see 28. Pronoun Errors, #3) and failing to recognise the extent of the noun phrase (see 2. Interrupted Structures).

An important further feature of relative clauses is that they sometimes need to be separated from the noun they postmodify by a comma (partnered by a later comma or full stop), depending on the noun’s meaning (see 34. Relative Pronouns and Commas). However, such punctuation makes no difference to the fact that the relative clause is part of a noun phrase centred on a noun before it.

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4. Other Possibilities

Other common noun postmodifiers are participles, adjectives and other nouns. They can be read about in the post after this (253. Descriptive Wording after Nouns 2).