An Introduction to the Grammar of English: Syntactic arguments and socio-historical background

by Elly van Gelderen

This Introduction provides a lively and clearly written textbook. It introduces basic concepts of grammar in a format which inspires the reader to use linguistic arguments. The style of the book is engaging and examples from poetry, jokes, and puns illustrate grammatical concepts.The focus is on syntactic analysis and evidence. However, special topic sections contribute sociolinguistic and historical reasons behind prescriptive rules such as the bans on split infinitives, dangling participles, and preposition stranding.The book is structured for a semester-long course. It provides exercises, keys to those exercises, and sample exams. It also includes a comprehensive glossary and suggestions for further reading.

Genres: Linguistics

224 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 2002

Reviews

[Elisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a book about English grammar. Need I say more?

Well this is goodreads to I suppose that I maybe should. The title is a slightly misleading, this book is not exactly a grammar book in that it teaches about punctuation, sentence structure, and so forth, this is a text concerns with the fundamentals of the English language which involves clause types, phrase types, and sentence components. It's my linguistics textbook so take from that what you will. Had I not had a magnificent professor to teach me what was "explained" in this book I would still be curled in the fetal position rocking back and forth in a corner. I would follow along during the lectures and think: "Yeah, I've got this!" I would sit at home and read this and each time think afterwards: "Why is this SO hard! Blast you English!" I love my language but holy moly I have to respect people who learn it and nevertheless master it when it's not their first language--seriously good for them.

My professor and I determined I was so confused because the explanations are too brief. As a student with a long reading list each week I appreciated the shortness of the chapters, but as a confused human being I wanted more.

[Eve Nicholson · Rating 3 out of 5]

For a book claiming to be an introduction to grammar, the author speaks like the reader should already know everything she is talking about. Most of the time, I’d read the assigned chapters then go into class clueless until my professor put things into real world terms. My professor said this book is better than the one he used to use. I’m glad we didn’t use that one, but I can’t help but wonder if there isn’t something better.

[Kieran Darnell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nope nope nope. And no, I don’t remember example 27(b) highlighting the intransitive verb from ten pages ago, so please refresh me if you’re going to draw a tree of it!

Edit: I’m just frustrated with syntax, not this book. It’s actually pretty helpful

[MissBirdee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Used this for a class. It's a good introduction to syntax, and the extra inserts like comics make it more enjoyable

[Hyojoong Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Easy-to-understand and clearly- organized.