English Postmodifiers: Types and Usage in Sentences
Other Postmodifier Types
Postmodification by Non-Finite Clauses
There are three major types of non-finite postmodifying clauses: ing-clauses, ed-clauses, and to-clauses.
Participle clauses as postmodifiers always have subject gap positions and can often be paraphrased as a relative clause: a party organised for…/ a party which has been organised for…
To-clause postmodifiers can have either subject or non-subject gaps, e.g., non-subject: I had many things to tell him/ I told him many things. Subject: I have got enough money to buy the house/ money for buying the house. The subject in to-clauses can sometimes be expressed in a for-phrase, e.g., it’s time for you to go now.
Participle Clauses as Postmodifiers
Participle clauses are common in news and academic prose; ed-clauses are more common than ing-clauses in the latter. This kind of clause expresses the same meaning in fewer words.
Even when a relative clause could be used, it is more common that ing-participles and passive verbs occur in participle clauses. Ing-participles that express an abstract relationship, e.g., concerning, occur regularly in a non-finite clause, even if their corresponding progressive aspect would not occur in a full relative clause. E.g., a question concerning…/* a question which is concerning…
Ed-clauses can normally be rephrased as a full relative clause with a passive verb by inserting which is or something similar. E.g., the song which is sang…
When tense, modality, or aspect are important, passive verbs occur in finite relative clauses, and since these distinctions cannot be marked in a postmodifying participle clause, a relative clause is needed.
Ed– and ing-clauses can both function as postmodifying participle clauses. Ed-clauses correspond to passive verbs in finite relative clauses:
Maria sang a really nice song./ rel. clause: a song that was sang…
Ing-clauses do not always correspond to finite progressive aspect verbs: A girl singing full voice. Progressive meaning, relative clause: the girl that was singing… Various questions concerning environment. Not progressive, relative clause: the questions that concern…
To-clauses as Postmodifiers
To-clauses are more flexible than participle clauses as they can occur with both subject and non-subject gaps; they can also occur with an explicit subject noun phrase:
To-clauses with subject gap: A problem to be solved (passive).
To-clauses with object gaps: there are only two pieces to share.
To-clauses with adverbial gaps: there is a long way to go.
To-clauses with prepositional object gap (and fixed preposition): she has too many problems to deal with.
To-clauses with an explicit subject (introduced by for): these sweets are for all of you to share.
In conversation, the to-clause constructions normally have an object or adverbial gap position, e.g., that was a horrible thing to do. The most common head nouns taking a to-clause have general meanings. They are nouns that are especially common in conversation (e.g., thing, time, and way). E.g., we have not got enough time to go… / this is not the way to do… / this isn’t a place to visit.
Postmodification by Prepositional Phrase
Prepositional Phrases v. Relative Clauses
Prepositional phrases are the most common type of postmodifier in all registers; they can sometimes be rephrased as relative clauses with similar meaning. The prepositional phrases that begin with with often correspond to relative clauses with the main verb have: old people with no family to look after them/ rel. clause: old people that have no…
Another way of rephrasing a prepositional phrase as a relative clause is with the copula be and a prepositional phrase complement, e.g., the animals in his farm/ the animals which were in his farm.
Two of the factors that favor the choice of a relative clause over a prepositional phrase are:
- The need to convey non-restrictive meaning: George went to the shop which was next to the bakers.
- The need to convey past tense meaning: the young people who were at the party…
Prepositional Phrases with of
Functions of the prepositional phrases with of:
- After quantity nouns: a lot of…
- After unit nouns: a piece of…
- After container nouns: a packet of…
- After nouns denoting shape: a pile of sand.
- After species nouns: these kinds of…
They can also express many more specialized meaning relationships; some of them can be paraphrased as noun + noun sequences: prep. phrase: biscuits of chocolate / noun + noun sequence: chocolate biscuits.
Many of noun + of-phrase expressions are used in academic prose and they convey information in one of the following areas:
- Physical description: the position of
- Existence or presence: the existence of…
- Long-term processes or events: the discovery of…
Prepositional Phrases with in and Other Prepositions
These prepositional phrases express meaning that cover physical location, time meanings, and logical relationships; e.g., the shoes in the wardrobe / the wars in the 19th century. Other prepositions such as on, for, to, or, are less common than of or in, some of their uses are:
A home for old people. A spot on his face. An excursion to the mountain. A sandwich with peanut butter.
Noun Phrases with Multiple Postmodifiers
Postmodifier Complexes
Is the combination of structures following a head noun, these structures can represent embeddings or a series of forms modifying a single head. E.g., the man in the blue suit over there works for a very important computer company.
Common Types of Postmodifier Complexes
Three patterns: most common is a postmodifier complex composed of two prepositional phrases: in the main office they are working for the birthday party tonight. When there are two postmodifiers, they are often the same structure (co-ordinated with and): printed on a t-shirt with acrylic paint. The second postmodifier in a complex one is often a relative clause, regardless of the type of first postmodifier. Prep. phrase + relative clause: in the big bar that is on the right corner. Ed-clause + rel. clause: the great picture on the wall which was broken in the fight.
Relative clauses are easily identified as a postmodifier even when they are not next to the noun phrase head.
Noun Complement Clauses
Noun Complement Clauses v. Relative Clauses
Relative clauses: their function is to identify the reference of the head noun, their structure contains a “gap”, they can modify almost any noun and it is possible to omit the relativizer that with object gaps (but not with subject ones). E.g., the air plane that is leaving at…(that concrete air plane)
Noun complement clause: their function is to present the content of the head noun or add descriptive information, they do not complete any gap and it is impossible to omit the relativizer that, it can only modify a few nouns. They often express an attitude in an abstract way, without a clear agent.
Structural Types of Noun Complement Clause
.two types:finite that-clauses: the pears that had ripened were not collected in time.non-finite to-infinitive clauses: you need authorization to take a photo of him. Ing-clauses and wh-clauses sometimes occur as noun complement clauses:of + ing clause: he has no clue of writing English.Dependent wh-interrogative clause: there is no reason why he should not come.Other structures:Preposition of followed by the wh-clause (primarily used with whether): the question of who is going to go is not clear.As to + wh-clause: there are reasons to doubt as to whether we should invite him or not.Head nouns with noun complement clauses: Many of the noun complement clauses express a attitude towards the proposition in the complement clause, these head nouns can be used to indicate the belief of the proposition or the source of the information: fact, claim and report: there is a sign that he is shocked by the news / I will sign those papers that you left on my table later.Head nouns complemented by that-clauses. the that-clause, reports a proposition, while the head noun reports the author’s attitude toward those propositions. Two main kinds of position are expressed by the most common head nouns, the first is an opinion of the proposition in the that-clause, and typical nouns are: hypothesis, rumour, fact, possibility, notion, and assumption. E.g. I’ve heard the rumour that he isn’t going to marry. The second kind of stance is an indication of the source of the information expressed in the that-clause; we can distinguish there main sources and their typical nouns. Linguistic communication: claim, suggestion, report, remark, and proposal: he claimed that he had lost…Cognitive reasoning: conclusion, idea, hypothesis, assumption, and observation: we reached the conclusion that…Personal belief: belief, hope, opinion, and doubt: we have no doubt that…Many of these head nouns are nominalised correspondents of verbs or adjectives that can control that-complement clauses and most of these nouns have corresponding verbs that also control that-clauses, e.g. the report about drugs that we did…/ Pablo reported that someone…Possibility is the only common head noun derived from an adjective: there is a possibility that she comes later/ it is possible that she appears later.The attitude expressed by a controlling head noun is not normally attributed to anyone, which means that readers must infer whose attitude towards the information is reported. Head nouns complemented by to-infinitive clauses Commonly represent human goals, opportunities or actions (chance, plan, ability…) common in newspaper language. Similar to that-clauses in that many are nominalised equivalents of verbs or adj controlling to-complement clauses: nouns with corresponding verbs + to clauses: desire, failure, intention… Nouns with corresponding adjectives + to-clauses: ability/inability, determination…e.g. his ability to…/…never be able to… Head nouns complemented by of-+ing-clauses Can also take another type of complement clause, the following occur with of-+ing-clauses and with that-clauses: idea, hope, though, possibility and sign, e.g. possibility of/possibility thathead nouns complemented by wh-interrogative clauses.Occur with a wide range of head nouns: speech communication (story, explanation…) exemplification (illustration, example…) problems (issue, problem) cognitive states or processes (idea, knowledge, analysis…)Discourse functions of that-clauses. There are different that-clauses with different purposes.Post-predicate that-clauses: they present the reported speech or thought, they are the most common type of that-clauses, they are more frequent in conversation but are also found in academic prose and in news. The subject of these clauses normally refers to a person and the main verb tells us about the type of reporting that is used. E.g. I think that you are being unfair. subject-predicative that-clauses. They serve as subject predicative to copular verbs and they have three main functions: Describe a problem: the problem is… Present reasons, conclusions or results: the reason that…To present accepted truth or facts: the fact is that…Extraposed that-clauses. They often involve a main clause that reports an attitude without attributing it to anybody. They normally show the position of the speaker or the writer, but these do not assume direct responsibility. They occur above all in news and academic prose. This kind of clause normally contains a non-human subject. E.g. the evidence that stress is an important… Embedded that-clauses. They occur in conversation, news, and academic prose. E.g. Mary thinks that it is not fair, but that he deserves for his behaviour. Discourse choices with that-clauses. Subject position v. extraposed that-clauses.Both are equivalent structures and in both cases, the that-clause is the logical subject of the sentence. E.g. It surprises me that these people swear/ that these people swear…Another interrelated structure has a subject noun phrase that starts with the fact that (people throw litter on the floor annoys me)Extraposed that-clauses are commoner than subject that-clauses, but there are important factors to choose the second.Register: English speakers prefer to use short and easy subjects and the use of long and more complex structures at the end of the clause. Subject that-clauses cause difficulties because the embedded complement clause must be understood and held in the memory till we get to the main clause predicate, a problem if we consider that we have no chance of re-hearing or editing the clause.Information structure: the information given in a subject that-clause is normally presupposed and established through previously stated information. Thus the subject that-clause provides a link with previous discourse.Grammatical factor: when a subject that-clause is used, the main clause predicate has a complex construction with many phrases or clauses. The alternative extraposed construction would be difficult to understand is cases like the following example: that recycling is important is evident since it helps to prevent woods being destroyed.Topic and style: sports writers as a group have a stylistic preference for subject that-clauses. E.g. that Barcelona is one of Spain’s most important teams, is not unknown.