Issues to discuss:

1. Category of person and number.

2. Category of tense and aspect.

3. Mood of the verb, its structure.

4. Grammatical category of state, its types.

Terminology:

State/ action verbs; durative/ non-durative verbs

1. Categories of person and number of the verbs serve to show the connection between the subject and the predicate of a sentence – the subject agrees with the predicate in person and number. Verb concord means the correspondence or ‘agreement’ between singular or plural subjects and their verbs (predicates). As there are few verb inflections in English, this only applies with BE, DO and HAVE and tenses using them, and the present simple tense of lexical (main) verbs. Problems arise where there is a conflict between grammatical and ‘notional’ number:

1) When the subject is a noun phrase (not a simple noun) the verb (predicate) should agree with the head. *This box of chocolates is for you. What was the cost of the tickets? Buying all those tickets was extravagant. But if the head is felt to be unimportant (a number of) the verb may agree with another noun, particularly if this noun is closer: A number of pupils have chosen this new course.

2) Noun phrases involving times and prices are usually felt notionally to represent single units. They take single verbs: Five pounds is cheap. Twelve days is too long.

3) Some expressions joined by and have singular determiners, verbs and pronouns. This happens when the two nouns are used together so often and co-ordinate subjects felt to constitute single units that we think of them as a single idea. This gin and tonic isn't very strong, is it? 'War and Peace' is the longest book I’ve ever read. Decline and Fall is a great book. War and Peace is written by L. Tolstoy. The bread and butter was too thin.

4) But a single noun phrase with a mass (non-count) noun that in fact has double reference (Australian butter and New Zealand butter) can take plural verb. Australian and New Zealand butter come in refrigerated ships.

5) Plural names of countries (as well as plural names of organisations) usually have singular verbs and pronouns. The United States is anxious to improve its image in Latin America. Consolidated Fruitgrowers has just taken over Universal Foodstores.

2. Categories of tense and aspect

a) Difference between the two present perfect tenses

Compare:

1) Susan has been cooking. Susan has been cooking dinner. Susan has been cooking this afternoon. (All these statements emphasise activity, they might be offered as reasons why she has not had time to do something else).

2) Susan has cooked the dinner (This stresses achievement – the dinner which is now ready).

Simple (Achievement)

Progressive (Activity)

I have visited Ireland / twice/ many times (prior) He has drunk the wine. (There is none left). I have run / all the way here / six miles. (But not: I have run.) Susan has learnt Arabic since 1987. (A complete achievement in the period since 1987. She didn’t know Arabic before, and now she does.) Peter has won. (i.e. in a race, match, etc. Here unusually, a verb alone stands for the complete achievement. ) What have you done about that job you wanted? (Have you applied? etc.)

I have been visiting Ireland (recent: this tense is not possible with twice, etc) Tom has been drinking / the wine. (In both cases there may or may not be some wine left.) I’ve been running. (That’s why I’m hot and tired.) Susan has been learning Arabic since 1987. (Maybe she is still learning.) Peter has been winning a lot of prizes. (Recent repeated activity. A verb to win, by itself, is a verb of achievement rather than activity.) What have you been doing since I last saw you?

b) Difference between the past simple and the past perfect

• The use of past adverbials (yesterday, last summer, in 1963, ago) normally makes past simple obligatory. Compare: We left Bristol five years ago (single action). We have lived in Bristol for the past three years (durative activity). Perfect adverbials (already, for, just, since yet) usually require perfect tenses. Karen has just passed her exam. Have you finished your translation yet?

• If there are no obviously time-linked adverbials, the present perfect goes with still present time. Compare: Queen Victoria reigned for over sixty years. (Her reign is past.) Did you have a happy childhood? (said to an adult.) I saw Henry in New York. (I’m now somewhere else.) My father lived here all his life. (He is dead now.) He has lived here all his life. (He is still alive.)

c) Difference between the past simple and the past progressive

A common contrast between the present simple and the present progressive is between habits or repeated actions (simple) and an action of limited duration at the moment of speaking (progressive): We were sitting in the kitchen when we heard the explosion. Jack arrived when the children were having their bath. I was smoking a cigarette (actual past moment) when Tom walked in (single action). I smoked 30 cigarettes a day in those days (past habit), but I was not smoking with him. I knew he didn’t like it (temporary activity.) We lived in Chicago (long-term state of affairs). They were living in a hotel (temporary activity.) The past progressive is often used to refer to a temporary situation: He was working at home at the time. Bill was using my office until I came back from America.

d) The past perfect tense is marked for past and perfective. The combination implies some measure of achievement before some past point. It refers to pre-then, not to pre-now as the present perfect does. By 2004 Paul had had enough. He had visited America twenty times in the previous thirty years. She had never, at that time, met a foreigner. In Ukrainian, the need to distinguish some pre-past and the past is not so keenly felt. ‘The past simple’ is sufficient in both cases: Вчора він працював цілий день. На той час він ще ніколи не працював у такій фірмі. In English, the past perfect is only obligatory in contexts where perfectiveness, not mere prior happening, must be stressed. This is usually in subordinate clauses (e.g., in some conditionals, some reported speech, some time clauses, and with some adverbials). A number of adverbials establish a past point to which prior achievement is related (at that time, by then, up till then).

e) The main ways of talking about the future

• Present simple. Uncle Ben leaves tonight. His train leaves at 10 pm. We have a meeting every day next week. According to the brochure, we stay in Rome for five days and then fly to Athens. This usage often feels formal and impersonal. It is not very common, except with travel arrangements and fixed timetables.

• Present progressive. What are you doing tomorrow? We’re having lunch with the Smiths. Monica and Adrian are getting married in August. It is a very common usage: an arrangement already exists now for the future. It is sometimes interchangeable with the model: going to + infinitive because arrangement and decision overlap.

• Going to + infinitive. I’m staying at the Ritz (suggests I have booked a room), whereas I am going to stay at the Ritz emphasizes my decision and intention.

• Will/shall. With future reference, this tense is concerned either with ‘pure future’ and prediction or with volition, which means a decision now at this moment. I’ll be 21 next month. (‘pure future’). You’ll be cold in Scotland in January (prediction). Oh well, I’ll wait till the summer. I’ve spilt my coffee – I’ll get a cloth (decision now).

• Will/shall be + ing. This time next week I’ll be sunbathing in Florida. The progressive tense puts emphasis on the activity rather than on volition, so this form implies a predictable future.