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I'm a bit astonished about the long discussions in the post How can I prove a word is a noun? I admit that there a certain problems, especially with gerunds.

  • Smoking cigarettes is unhealty.

In this example, containing a gerund with an object, it is indeed a bit difficult to say to which word class "smoking" belongs. Is it a noun or a verb?

Traditionally the gerund is seen as a verb form with a double nature. It can behave as a noun and as a verb.

I think it would be practical to see the gerund also as a special word class, a noun-verb thing. In this way we could avoid a lot of problems that arise about the word class noun when we come across gerunds with objects.

My question: Would it be practical to see gerunds as a word class of its own?

rogermue
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    It's a verb, or at least an untensed (non-finite) verb form. If it takes a direct object, it's a verb. On the other hand, if it can take an article, it's a noun. That's close enough for the kind of accuracy you can expect here. Gerund, like infinitive and past participle, is an untensed verb form; past and 3spres are tensed verb forms. Most of the time that's all you need, and quite a few of them are identical. You don't need a new part of speech for each one; you just need a better definition of verb. – John Lawler Feb 24 '15 at 15:41
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    No, it wouldn't solve any problems to create a special category for the things you don't understand. Dig in and solve them. – Greg Lee Feb 24 '15 at 15:44
  • @FumbleFingers - You can close the question if you think it is a duplicate. I only asked this question because Araucaria suggested in What is a gerund? to post my suggestion as a separate question. – rogermue Feb 24 '15 at 15:45
  • The troublesome part seems to be that (a) you can't always tell because there's neither an object nor an article, and this bothers people who want to label everything, and (b) gerund clauses are Noun Clauses -- i.e, they function as nouns in another clause, normally either subject or object, but also object of preposition on occasion. So if you have a word that could be a noun, and acts like a noun, you think of it as a noun. But one-word -ing subjects are Schrödinger's Gerunds -- you can't ever tell whether they're a one-word noun clause or a true noun. – John Lawler Feb 24 '15 at 15:48
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    This is not really a duplicate of the question referred to. The point is that there are a lot of usages and a lot of zombie rules for them, most of which are silly if you think about them. – John Lawler Feb 24 '15 at 15:49
  • @GregLee - What is difficult to understand about the double nature of gerunds? Gerunds were used in Latin 2000 years ago: Consilium ceperunt ex urbe exeundi. – rogermue Feb 24 '15 at 15:56
  • Wouldn't this be like creating a new part of speech for adjectives used as nouns (e.g. the rich) or nouns that are verbed? In this case, doesn't gerund describe the category perfectly? – Barmar Feb 24 '15 at 16:01
  • @rogermue, where is this double nature? Where is the nominal nature of a gerund? I understand that you think being the head of a NP makes a gerund somehow nominal, but I think that's just in your head. There is no dual nature. If you have evidence that it ever acts as a noun, tell us the evidence. – Greg Lee Feb 24 '15 at 16:07
  • @Barmar - I see "the rich" as a simple ellipsis of "the rich people" and I don't think that the use of an adjective without the noun "people" raises any problems. And the use of the noun chalk as a verb as in "to chalk a cercle on the floor" doesn't raise any problems either. – rogermue Feb 24 '15 at 16:08
  • @rogermue And gerunds elide the act of, so they're very similar ways that the language has evolved. – Barmar Feb 24 '15 at 16:13
  • @GregLee Compare Walking is healthy and Milk is healthy. The gerund walking serves the same role as the noun milk. – Barmar Feb 24 '15 at 16:35
  • @Barmar, but what is that "same role", exactly? You probably mean the role of subject. But subjects are noun phrases, not nouns or verbs. So what "walking" and "milk" have in common in your examples is that they can both be heads of noun phrase subjects. We already knew that the verb "walking" can head a noun phrase, so there is no new information here. – Greg Lee Feb 24 '15 at 17:01
  • @GregLee But it's acting as a "thing" that can be described. You can use a gerund in most places where a conceptual noun can be used. – Barmar Feb 24 '15 at 17:04
  • @Barmar, "thing"?? Walking is an activity. Milk is not an activity. – Greg Lee Feb 24 '15 at 17:15
  • @GregLee That's why I said "conceptual". Nouns are not always tangible things, they can also be abstract entities. And activities are abstract. – Barmar Feb 24 '15 at 17:18
  • @Barmar, activities are abstract, and so we can use a verb to characterize them. We don't need a noun, or noun-like thing. We do need a NP, so as to make an activity an argument of another verb. It all hangs together, doesn't it? – Greg Lee Feb 24 '15 at 18:18
  • @GregLee Doesn't a NP need a noun within it? Note also that you can modify a gerund with an adjective, e.g. brisk walking. But you can also modify it with an adverb, e.g. walking briskly. – Barmar Feb 24 '15 at 20:05
  • @Barmar, no, a NP does not need a noun. I don't know why people keep saying this. And contrary to what you say, you cannot modify a gerund with an adjective. *"Brisk walking the dog is good exercise." There is a derived noun "walking", but that's not a gerund. – Greg Lee Feb 24 '15 at 21:14

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