© 2019 Steve Campsall

So you're now a grammar expert. Well, okay - you know enough for your course!

A word of warning. The grammar of some real-life sentences can cause problems even for those who have studied grammar for years! Real speech and writing, rather than artificially created examples used to teach grammar can be complex and difficult to analyse in detail and with accuracy. Remember the following:

• It is usually straightforward to carry out a basic grammatical analysis such as counting up the average number of grammatical units (phrases and clauses) within a text.

• This is particularly useful when deciding on the complexity or formality of the grammar of a sentence.

Here is the sentence you have been analysing over the past few web pages. It has been broken down into each of its grammatical elements. Breaking down a sentence grammatically is sometimes called parsing a sentence...

The drunken young man slipped awkwardly into a ditch although he seemed unhurt.

A final and important reminder...

Comment on the grammar within the sentences of a text only if, by doing so, you feel you are commenting on an important aspect of the writer or speaker's stylistic choices relating to genre, context, audience or purpose.

A discussion of grammar for its own sake will gain no marks at all - and it is can be so very boring! Here are just three examples where, for your course, a grammatical analysis could prove very useful.

In language change (A2) you will generally find that syntax has simplified over the years.

In language change also, you will find that morphology has changed over the years.

In language acquisition, you will find children unable to use complicated syntax at an early age.