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Is this true? Not sure if

Signup up is a gerund And if so does it need to modified by a possessive? is this true?

It doesn’t sound right to me with “your”

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    Both are grammatical, but I think your original version is better. It's not true / is an oversimplification to say that a gerund needs to be modified by a possessive. –  Jun 03 '19 at 11:25
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    Both nominative "you" and genitive "your" are possible. Btw, the verb is just "signing". "Up" is a separate constituent -- a preposition -- at word level. – BillJ Jun 03 '19 at 12:10

1 Answers1

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Gerunds function like a noun while looking like a present participle. And we already know possessive pronouns (your, my, etc) can be followed by a noun.

Your drawing (the noun, not a gerund) is impressive.

Since gerunds function like a noun, "your signing up" can be correct.

To add though, your first sentence isn't that wrong either.

I appreciate you signing up to watch the story . . .

You wanna know why? Here's why.

Here, the word "you" serves as the noun while "signing up" can serve as the "participial phrase" that modifies the noun. For clarity, here's another sentence:

I appreciate the lid covering the bottle from spilling its contents.

Here, the lid is the noun, while "covering the bottle" is the participial phrase modifying it. See what I did there? "Modifying it" is also a participial phrase.

Okay, in conclusion, both of them are correct, so don't worry.

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    In "your signing up ...", "signing" is ambiguous between a noun and a verb. It's a noun in "your generous signing up ..." (adj as modifier), but it's a verb in "your generously signing up ..." (adv as modifier). – BillJ Jun 03 '19 at 12:24
  • How is it ambiguous? "Signing up" is a clear gerund phrase. – Jeloh Simo Jun 03 '19 at 12:43
  • Just to clarify, it's not "signing"; rather, it's "signing up." – Jeloh Simo Jun 03 '19 at 12:44
  • I explained both those points in my comment. Please read again. – BillJ Jun 03 '19 at 13:43