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Struggling with a simple sentence:

He had spent the morning investigating a burglary at the City Deli, a small shop …

Is investigating a burglary a participial phrase here? Seems so. That would imply placing a comma in front of it, which sounds a bit strange. Any help will be appreciated.

Kris
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Rusty
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    Does this help? "When they begin a sentence, they are often set off by a comma (as an introductory modifier); otherwise, participial phrases will be set off by commas if they are parenthetical elements." The Garden of Phrases http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/phrases.htm – Kris Apr 09 '15 at 06:05
  • Yes, that helps. Several Web sites stated to place a comma in front of the phrase if the noun it modified came earlier in the sentence, but I knew that could not be a hard and fast rule. The complete sentence is "He had spent the morning investigating a burglary at the City Deli, a small shop in a strip center near the University." Obviously, no comma needed before investigating. Thanks for the reference. – Rusty Apr 10 '15 at 02:39
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    This is a garden variety A-Equi Gerund Complement, like He enjoyed/likes/tried/indicated an interest in/continued/spent an hour baking a cake. The reason is seems different is that there is a metaphor involved; the Time Is Money metaphor theme, to be precise. Spend an hour V-ing means 'continue V-ing for one hour'; it measures the perceived duration of an event. – John Lawler Apr 11 '15 at 22:07
  • @JohnLawler I am sorry for bringing up an old thread, but if this follows under A-Equi, what would be the reversed sentence? Also, I understand that a metaphor theme is being used. Furthermore, what about the similar forms that don't use metaphor themes-- "I spent all my gas going to the store." – AJK432 Apr 04 '19 at 17:50
  • @AllexKramer: Spent sounds very odd with gas as its object. I would say used instead. And it is a metaphor theme if it's using a commercial transaction term like spent outside that context. It's just not the Time is Money theme. As for A-Equi, I don't know what you mean by "reversed sentence". – John Lawler Apr 04 '19 at 20:03
  • @JohnLawler Well, I’m not very good with transformational grammar, but if I’m correct, the Equi refers to the two identical subjects, one in the parent clause and one below, which gets deleted, or something like that, right? – AJK432 Apr 05 '19 at 02:01
  • @JohnLawler Also, I notice that you call it a gerund complement— I justify my asking about this by saying that it furthers the answer that is desired by the OP—, so can you explain why you count it as a gerund, and not a participle? Additionally, would you mind explaining why it’s an exception to the comma “rule” that is stated by the OP? I am actually trying to compose an explanation on this topic for a non-native English speaker, and I, too, am confused at times. – AJK432 Apr 05 '19 at 11:50
  • @AllexKramer: There is no "comma rule"; English commas are not distributed according to grammar but rather intonation. "Equi" is short for "Equivalent Noun Phrase Deletion", which means there are two co-referential noun phrases, one of which (the downstairs subject) is deleted, and the other of which (the upstairs subject or object, depending on the verb) remains. Mostly Equi is obligatory. – John Lawler Apr 05 '19 at 14:46
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    @AllexKramer: As for "gerund", that's the traditional name for the variety of complement clause headed by a verb form with -ing. Gerund complements tend to be subjects, while infinitive complements tend to be objects; it all depends on the verb. "Participle" is a name given to a number of different -ing constructions, mostly adverbial, that are not gerunds. – John Lawler Apr 05 '19 at 14:57
  • @JohnLawler I have a hard time wrapping my head around this use of the -ing words being called "gerunds". How does that -ing word, in either of the examples, fulfill the role of a noun? Additionally, you say "mostly adverbial", but I was under the impression that participles were almost always adjectival.

    Additionally, my reasoning for not moving this to chat is that I think the conversation at hand will perfectly clarify an answer to the question. If need be, we can delete these replies and add a summary answer afterwards.

     – AJK432 Apr 05 '19 at 15:10
  • @JohnLawler By the way, I am not criticizing nor disagreeing with any of your comments. I was introduced to some of your writings on complements and raising/equi a while ago, briefly, so I know of your authoritative stature. – AJK432 Apr 05 '19 at 15:14
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    It isn't the word that's a noun; it's the clause the -ing word is in. I like eating tacos has a subject I, a verb like, and an object eating tacos. The object is a noun phrase, by definition; but it's a clause being used as a noun phrase. That's the gerund; it's a construction, not a single word. Participles are not always adjectival; they are often adverbial as well. The whole point of subordinate clauses is that they act like some kind of part of the sentence, like subject, object, or modifier. – John Lawler Apr 05 '19 at 16:01
  • @JohnLawler I hate being difficult, but I still can't understand how "going to the store" or "investigating a burglary" is a gerund in these cases. I could understand if the sentence was "I hate going to the store" or "I hate investigating burglaries", as they are the direct object. But with our sentences, I see "morning" or "gas" as the direct object, while the -ing phrases sound to be just modifiers.

    And can you give a few differently used examples of adverbial participles?

     – AJK432 Apr 05 '19 at 17:17
  • @JohnLawler The only way I can see it operating at an object, a noun, is if we imagine there to be a omitted preposition or something in between. "I spent all my money by going to the store." – AJK432 Apr 05 '19 at 17:37
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    Spend the morning is indeed verb plus object. But it's metaphoric, using the [Time Is Money`](http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jlawler/TIM.pdf) metaphor theme. In that theme, a clause using "spend" and some amount of time, with a gerund complement means to experience the activity or state described by that clause over that period of time. So spent time doing X simply means did X. – John Lawler Apr 05 '19 at 20:57
  • @JohnLawler Okay, so in these metaphor situations, the “spent all day” is treated like the verb and the gerund is the object of such. So what about other situations, without metaphors? “I went to work wearing a t-shirt.” Gerund or participle? – AJK432 Apr 05 '19 at 22:27
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    That's pretty clearly an adverbial; it can be moved around -- Wearing a t-shirt I went to work. – John Lawler Apr 05 '19 at 23:26
  • @John Lawler Okay. So this would be one your adverbial participle cases. Now I’m catching on, but how could it not be designated as an adjective? It describes the subject, “I”, correct? – AJK432 Apr 06 '19 at 00:07
  • Just about everything in a sentence can be said to "describe the subject". That's not the proper criterion. Adjectives can't move around, and adverbs can. What they mean is irrelevant -- grammar isn't about meaning. It's about structures and what can appear with what, never mind what they mean. – John Lawler Apr 06 '19 at 02:10
  • @JohnLawler Last comment of mine and then we will call it quits and clean up the comments: If that’s the case, then how come participles can even be described as adjectival? Yes, their phrases can move around, but I always thought part of the meaning of participles was found in their adjectival sense; “The boy, sporting a baseball cap, walked into the stadium.” Actually, most definitions I’ve read have talked about their adjectival properties as a defining feature. – AJK432 Apr 06 '19 at 02:28
  • I'm afraid I have no idea what kind of grammatical analysis you've been exposed to, nor why people might have said one thing or another about this. There are a lot of various opinions about what's what and what it ought to be instead; I'm not responsible for them. I just try to tell the truth as simply as I can. – John Lawler Apr 06 '19 at 02:59
  • @JohnLawler I’ve always had trouble differentiating participial adjective phrases from participial adverb phrases, but the analysis, from I understand, was based on what that phrase was telling us about, subject or something in the predicate. Adjective phrase: The dog, wagging its tail rapidly, was running up and down the street. Adverb phrase: The boy shot into the distance, hitting the target. – AJK432 Apr 06 '19 at 14:17
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    Defining words and constructions as being (or "acting as", which adds no meaning) nouns or verbs or adjectives or adverbs is not done by determining "what that phrase was telling us about". That's totally meaningless; anyone can say anything at all about what any word in the sentence is "telling us", and somebody will agree with them. Ignore that stuff; it's just BS. Instead, there are tests that can be applied. For nouns, in English they can take an article -- any constituent beginning with an article is a noun phrase. For adverbs, they can appear in several positions. Etc. – John Lawler Apr 07 '19 at 16:21
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    @JohnLawler Do you have a guide/manual that you recommend with details on this, something simple? – AJK432 Apr 07 '19 at 16:44
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    I tend to use the terminology that Jim McCawley develops in his 1999 The Syntactic Phenomena of English (2nd edition). He doesn't complicate the terminology without showing why the complication is necessary, and where it can be ignored. – John Lawler Apr 07 '19 at 18:23

1 Answers1

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Yes, that is an participial clause. However, commas do not have always to precede or follow such clauses, esp in final position.

I see

He had spent the morning investigating a burglary at the City Deli.

as equivalent to:

All his time went into investigating a burglary at the City Deli.

You wouldn't use a comma before "investigating" here, would you?

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However, in the following one can readily identify two distinct actions:

John hangs out with his buddies, leaving me alone at home.

the 2nd one parenthetical (as Kris says), and the comma emphasizes that.

Marius Hancu
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