Complements vs. Adjuncts in English Grammar
Complements vs. Adjuncts (Modifiers)
A complement is a necessary constituent to understand a sentence. The number of complements is established by the meaning of the word they complement (this word may be a noun, verb, adjective, etc.), so it is limited. They also must be immediately attached, either before or after, to the word they complement. If we drop a complement, the sentence becomes ungrammatical. In English, we can find from 0 to 4 complements. An adjunct or modifier is a non-necessary constituent to understand a sentence. The number of modifiers is unlimited. They add additional information, but they’re not required for the understanding of the sentence, so if we drop a modifier, the sentence remains grammatical. You can combine as many adjuncts as you want.
Complement Clauses vs. Adjunct Clauses
A complement clause is a clause acting as a complement, so it is necessary for the understanding of the sentence. Complement clauses can complement a noun, a verb, etc. Like complements, complement clauses may be immediately attached to the word they complement. An adjunct clause is a clause acting as a modifier or adjunct, so it is not essential to understand the meaning of a sentence.
*Notice that you can translate most complements as ”de que” and most adjuncts as ”que”*
Semantic Roles: Experiencer, Agent, Instrument, etc.
- Agent: An entity (anything that exists) performing an action deliberately. (If we have an agent, we can say “on purpose”. There’s a type of compatibility)
- Affected: An entity which can undergo a state, a process, or an action passively.
- Force: An entity that participates in an action unconsciously.
- Instrument: Entity used by the agent.
- Experiencer: Entity involved in a process of emotion (love, like, happy, sad), cognition (know, understand), or perception (see, hear, take, smell, feel).
- Stimulus: Entity causing the process.
- Locative and Located: Locative is the space where a state, process, or action happens, or where a located entity is.
- Eventive (or Event) and Time: An event is something that happens in time, and time is when something happens.
- Cognate: It is when two words come from the same origin.
Affected vs. Effected
- “I painted [my flat] myself” (affected because it is an entity that already exists)
- “Picasso painted [this picture]” (effected because it is an entity that doesn’t exist and you create it)
Recipient vs. Beneficiary
The beneficiary is an entity which is the final destination of a transfer, while the recipient is not the final destination; it’s only temporary.
Current and Resulting Attributes
An attribute is a state of affairs, and it can be current or resulting. Current attributes are those attributes (or complements) in which the action comes from the past and extends up to the present. In resulting attributes, we find what’s called a proleptic structure; that is, an action causes a resulting state on something.
Types of PRO: Subject-Controlled, Object-Controlled, Speaker-Controlled, Generic
“Pro” happens when an element of the dependent clause is missing.
Subject-Controlled PRO
“Mary expected [Pro (subject)] to win” (subject-controlled pro). The subject of win is invisible; there is a PRO. In this case, Mary is the one who controls win, so, as she is the subject of the main clause and also the subject of the dependent clause, we say that it is subject-controlled pro.
Object-Controlled PRO
“Mary asked him [PRO object] to come”. In this case, Him is the one who controls come, so, as him is the object of the main clause, the Pro would be object-controlled.
Speaker-Controlled PRO
“My brother, [speaking frankly (speaker-controlled pro)], is very lazy”. The one who is speaking frankly is the speaker. S/he’s giving his/her personal opinion about what is said in the main clause.
Generic PRO
“Smoking is dangerous”. Here we have a universal subject. The subject is everybody.
Attachment Rule
The attachment rule is a syntactic rule which establishes that, in adverbial clauses (except from disjuncts), if they are subjectless, subject-controlled PRO always applies. Disjuncts are excluded because they are only speaker-controlled PRO.
Types of Raising
(This section was started but not developed in the original text. It is included here for completeness, but further content would be needed to fully explain this topic.)