Craig,

Without question, the discourse context must be considered,
nonetheless, classifications remain. Klammer et.al. do not state a
"rule" for any conditionals concerning implied direct objects. So, to
this regard, your conclusion would be accurate; however, they define
sentence types "on the basis of prototype sentences, those that
clearly fit a pattern without complication or ambiguity" (209). They
also do not include other considerations, such as the derived
intransitive, an intransitive member of an ergative pair:
         The sun melted the ice sculpture.
         The ice sculpture melted.

Diane














On Tue, Jul 8, 2008 at 5:32 AM, Craig Hancock <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Diane,
>    Just to bring this back to the previous discussion, it seems clear that
> Klammer et. al.'s approach is to look at the sentence (or clause, since
> transitivity happens in all clauses, even downranked ones) rather than the
> meaning of the verb apart from that context.
>    In other words, they don't have a rule that says "If a direct object is
> implied, the sentence is transitive."
>    Would that be accurate?
>
> Craig
>
>
> diane skinner wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> Klammer, Schulz, and Volpe, in Analyzing English Grammar, 4th ed. use
> the following definitions for intransitive verbs:
> "You can test whether a verb is intransitive by dividing the predicate
> into phrases. If all the phrases except the main verb phase are
> optional adverbial modifiers, then the verb is intransitive. If you
> can substitute a prototypical adverb (like here, then, or slowly) for
> the phrase, it is an adverbial phrase.
> Ex: The bus stops here each Monday" (p.203).
>
> To explain transitive verbs, they write: (1) "Are the subject noun
> phrase (NP) the actor, the verb and action, and the object NP the
> 'receiver' of the action? if the answer is yes (as in John hit Bill,
> where hitting is an action, John performs the action, and Bill
> receives the action), then the sentence is probably Type V [i.e.,
> contains a transitive verb].
> (2) "To find the direct object, ask who? or what? after the subject
> noun phrase and verb: John saw who/what? If the answer does not rename
> the subject, it should be the direct object" (p. 221).
> (3) "Is the verb followed by a direct object, a noun phrase that has a
> referent different from that of the subject noun phrase? if so, the
> sentence [contains a transitive verb]" (227).
>
> Additionally, they include examples of transitive verbs with reflexive
> and reciprocal direct objects: "Elmer cut himself with a Swiss Army
> knife" (222),
> and transitive verbs with object complements: "Cheryl considered
> Carl's bean soup salty" (223).
>
> Grammar is so much fun!!
> Diane
>
>
>
>
> On Sun, Jul 6, 2008 at 7:17 PM, Veit, Richard <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>
> Dee, Craig, Tabetha,
>
>
>
> Whether we regard a sentence as transitive depends on how we choose to
> define the term, and we are choosing different definitions. Our diverse
> definitions cover a lot of territory. The options seen in the four postings
> (copied below) range from the narrowest to the broadest:
>
>
>
> 1.       To be transitive, the verb must be immediately followed by a direct
> object.  [Tabetha's definition?]
>
> 2.       To be transitive, the verb must have an overt direct object (in any
> position).  [Craig's definition?]
>
> 3.       To be transitive, the verb must have a deep-structure direct
> object, whether or not it is overt in the spoken sentence.  [My definition]
>
> 4.       To be transitive, one must be able to imagine a direct object for
> the verb.  [Dee's definition?]
>
>
>
> These definitions yield different results:
>
>
>
> ·          "He remembered my birthday."  Transitive for all four
> definitions.
>
> ·         "He remembered fondly the old days."  Transitive for definitions
> 2, 3, and 4; intransitive for definition 1.
>
> ·         "Did he remember your birthday?" "He remembered."  Transitive for
> definitions 3 and 4; intransitive for definitions 1 and 2.
>
> ·         "He sings in the shower."  Transitive for definition 4;
> intransitive for definitions 1, 2, and 3.
>
> ·         "He coughed loudly."   Intransitive for all four definitions.
>
>
>
> My apologies if I mischaracterized your definition, but we certainly are not
> all in accord, and the differences are interesting.
>
>
>
> Dick Veit
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
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