My favorite analogy for form vs. function is draught animals. You have a function: pulling a wagon or plow. You have various 'forms': species of animals. Several animal species are suited to pulling things thanks to their strength and their willingness to take direction: mules, horses, oxen, water buffalo ... You harness one of these animals into the traces of a wagon or plow, and it performs the function. If you usually use a mule and it dies, and you buy an ox, the ox does not turn into a mule when it is put into the traces. It stays an ox, but performs the same function that the mule did. With respect to grammar: In phrase structure, you have roles such as modifier and head. If the head is a noun, a number of forms can modify it in pre-noun position: ADJ: a clever child Present participle: a sleeping child Past participle: a disappointed child Noun: a ghost child (or ghost ship) The function of noun modification is just that, a function. The kind of word that carries out that function varies. In spite of the many teachers who will fight to the death over it, a noun that modifies a noun does not become an adjective. It remains a noun, but carries out an adjectival function: modifying a noun. (One might see this as a merely terminological dispute -- how "adjective" is defined -- but there are principled reasons for keeping form and function distinct.) The same goes for clause roles. A clause (by my definition) has a subject. Various 'species' can fill the subject slot: Noun phrase: Her lies were obvious. Gerund phrase: Janet's lying to her children was stupid. Clause: That she was lying was obvious. For-to infinitive: For her to lie was stupid. To-infinitive: To lie is stupid. Nonfinite clause: Janet lying is something I wouldn't want to see happen. Prepositional phrase: Under the bed is a good place to store this box. (This is not the same as "Under the bed there is a good place to store this box". The place for storing the box is "under the bed" in general, not a specfic part of the space under the bed, which is the "there is" reading.) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Johanna Rubba Associate Professor, Linguistics English Department, California Polytechnic State University One Grand Avenue • San Luis Obispo, CA 93407 Tel. (805)-756-2184 • Fax: (805)-756-6374 • Dept. Phone. 756-2596 • E-mail: [log in to unmask] • Home page: http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/