Past participle constructions in place of relative clauses

Past participle constructions can be used in place of defining clauses

[> 1.26] deleting which + be

The system which is used in this school is very successful The system usedin this school is very successful

Avoiding ambiguity with past participle constructions

Same subject, therefore acceptable [compare > 1.61]

Seated in the presidential car, the President waved to the crowd Unrelated, therefore unacceptable

'Seated in the presidential car the crowd waved to the President ' Past participle related to the object

We preferred the house painted white

(Not 'Painted white, we preferred )

One-word nouns

What a noun is and what it does

A noun tells us what someone or something is called For example, a noun can be the name of a person (John), a job title (doctor) the name of a thing (radio), the name of a place (London), the name of a quality (courage), or the name of an action (laughter/laughing) Nouns are the names we give to people, things, places, etc in order to identify them Many nouns are used after a determiner, e g a the this [> 3.1] and often combine with other words to form a noun phrasee g the man the man next door that tall building the old broom in the cupboard Nouns and noun phrases answer the questions Who? or What? and may be

- the subject of a verb [> 1.4] Our agent in Cairo sent a telex this morning

- the direct object of a verb [> 1.9] Frank sent an urgent telexfrom Cairo this morning

- the indirect object of a verb [> 1.9] Frank sent his bossa telex

- the object of a preposition [> 8.1] / read about it in the paper

- the complement of be or a related verb like seem [> 1.9] Jane Forbes is our guest

- used 'in apposition' [> 1.39, 3.30] Laura Myers, a BBC reporter asked for an interview

- used when we speak directly to somebody Caroline shut that window will you please?

Noun endings

Some words function only as nouns (desk), others function as nouns or verbs (work), while others function as nouns or adjectives (cold) we cannot identify such words as nouns from their endingsor suffixesHowever, many nouns which are related to verbs or adjectives have characteristic endings For example, er, added to a verb like play, gives us the noun player, ity, added to the adjective active, gives us the noun activity There are no easy rules to tell us which endings to use to make nouns A dictionary can provide this kind of information, but [> App 2]

Noun/verb contrasts

Some words can be either nouns or verbs We can often tell the difference from the way they are stressed and pronounced

Compound nouns