Stephanie,
   Professor Veit sent your questions to a discussion group (Assembly for
the teaching of English Grammar) with an invitation to respond to you
directly and include the group in our reply. So you're getting this
from a stranger, but as part of a public conversation. (You should
always be careful about who you are talking to on-line.)
    First of all, you are asking a very delightful question.  I am a
teacher myself, and these kinds of questions always make me feel good
about being a teacher.  I know at least one student is awake and alert
and curious.  These are the kinds of questions that linguists ask
themselves and each other all the time.  You are trying to be a
practicing linguist. The question is a very important one because it
involves the kinds of meanings that can show up in a sentence and
whether they can show up together.
   One way to label a sentence (clause would be better) with an indirect
object is "di-transitive." The kind of meaning it presents is very
close to the pattern we see with "giving".  If I give something (direct
object), the idea automatically comes along that there must be a
receiver of the gift. We can't send something (direct object) without
the idea that there is a receiver.  We teach something (direct object)
to someone who receives the teaching. We can't show something (direct
object) without the idea that it is being shown to someone (even if all
elements aren't directly expressed, they are part of our understanding
of the underlying process.)  At other times, the verb process is more
like doing something FOR someone, and the indirect object is more like
a beneficiary than just a receiver.  (So sometimes this is best tested
by "for").  "She baked the kids cookies." She didn't bake the kids, but
baked the cookies for them.     >
   One way to label a sentence with an "object complement" is as "complex
transitive."  The idea here is that the verb process acts upon the
direct object in such a way as to change or transform it.  (A new
identity. "They elected me captain".  New characteristics. "The song
made me sad." New place in space or time. "We put the cookies on the
table". This last one is not always included in traditional grammars.)
The underlying idea would be that the clause expresses the kind of
change that takes place as a result of the "happening" or "impacting"
of the verb.  (In a strict sense, it is the verb rather than the direct
object that "licenses" these structures.)
   The fine sentence you asked about, "I gave him the present unwrapped"
is highly grammatical, perfectly "correct", and certainly meaningful
and clear.  I see it primarily as a di-transitive sentence and not a
complex transitive one. "Unwrapped" is a modifier of "the present", but
it is not an object complement in the strict sense of that term. 
(Sending him the present didn't cause it to be unwrapped.) The other
possibility would be that "unwrapped" modifies "gave," saying in effect
how it was given.  In either case, it is an optional element in the
sentence and not a complement in the way we usually use that term. It's
not the same as saying "I sent him the unwrapped present," but it comes
close enough for me to see these as almost parallel. "Unwrapped" seems
to tell us what the present was like when "I" sent it.
   When we analyze a clause type (and its complements) we are labelling
the bare bones of the clause.  We can then add many optional elements,
like various kinds of adverbial modifiers (I sent him the present on
Tuesday) or modifications of the various words in the noun groups.  (I
sent him a fancy present with a pretty ribbon.)
   That doesn't answer your other fine question, which is whether there
ARE instances in which these two kinds of elements can show up in the
same sentence.  A quick answer would be that sentences are not always
single clause sentences and don't always have single predicates.  When
this happens, as it does often, there is no rule that says each
predicate has to be of the same type.  We can say or write, for
example, "I gave him the present unwrapped, and that made him angry."
This is a compound sentence, with the first clause being di-transitive
and the second complex transitive.  We could do the same thing with a
single subject and compound predicate: "He sent me a cheap present and
made me angry." We can also put one of these processes into a
subordinate clause:"The cheap present that he sent me made me angry." 
This is a good way of understanding that it's the verb that is most
centrally involved in determining the kinds of complements that show
up. Each verb has its own "transitivity", which is a word we can use
when we are doing this kind of analysis.
   I hesitate to say that the same verb can't be both in the same
instance, but that just means you got me scratching my head and I
couldn't think of an example that would fit. When we look at language
this way, we are not imposing our "rules" on it, but trying to
understand how it works. We have to be careful about jumping to quick
conclusions. It's like a biologist saying that mammals can't lay eggs,
then finding one.  Mammals don't have to follow our "rules."
   Congratulations to your teacher, by the way, for teaching you about
complements and encouraging you to search out answers outside the
classroom. I'm a college teacher, and I would be very happy with a
question this thoughtful from my own students.  Don't be afraid to
think of this as a conversation.  Let me know if you disagree or if
it's not clear. I would be happy to stand corrected by you or by any of
my colleagues. We are not always as polite as we should be, but we
learn a great deal from each other.

Craig Hancock, University at Albany


 I received the inquiry below from an eighth grader. Would any of you
> care to send an answer to Stephanie ([log in to unmask]), with a CC to
> this list ([log in to unmask])?
> ________________________
>
> Richard Veit
> Department of English, UNCW
> Wilmington, NC 28403-5947
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Stephanie !!! [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Friday, March 24, 2006 7:48 PM
> To: Veit, Richard
> Subject: Question about Complements
>
> Dear Mr. Veit,
>
> Hi, I'm Stephanie Lim, an 8th grader attending Pinewood School, CA,and I
> would like to know whether or not an indirect object and an objective
> complement can exist to be grammatically correct in a sentence.
> Currently in our Writing class we have been learning about complements,
> indirect object, direct object, and objective complements, and our
> teacher is unsure of whether an indirect object and an objective
> complement can be in the same snetence because many grammar textbooks do
> not state if in that case it is correct or incorrect.
>
> I am very interested whether sentences can obtain an indirect object and
> obective complement like in the sentence "I gave him the present
> unwrapped" because i would like to acknowledge people whether that in
> this case the sentence can be grammatically correct or incorrect and
> why. Thank you for taking your time to read my request.Please reply to
> me soon if possible. Thank you for reading my email again.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Stephanie Lim
>
> _____________________________________________________________
> --------o goodie, yum, yum! :9 o--------
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>
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>
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