Functional Grammar of English Group 7

Question:

Are “need to be V-ed” and “need V-ing” constructions synonymous and perfectly interchangeable?

Discussion:

It’s not uncommon to find in grammar books such total equations as “The house needs to be painted. = The house needs painting.” (taken from突破高中文法句型 by 劉銘), which we used to take for granted and accepted as the way it was. However, after notions like semantic roles and prototypicality were introduced in class, we began to rethink the interchangeability of these two grammatical constructions. This report is thereby set to examine “need to be V-ed” and “need V-ing” from a functional perspective.

After browsing through some 300 search entries from an NBC search result with “needs to be” as the query, we observed that in terms of semantic roles, most entries[u1] were in the construction of “PATIENT needs to be V-ed (by AGENT)”, and derived a generalization that most patients in such a construction are [-human] and the agents are very likely to be omitted, as the instance that follows:

HHV 11617 That pattern needs to be changed now, not after the general election, to reflect the needs of industry and the county.

In this case (HHV), the semantic role of the subject is a non-human patient while the agent is unspecified, as described above. If the equation “need to be V-ed = need V-ing” holds true, then “need changing” is supposedly to be spotted in the corpus as well, and we did find some. The following are two of the retrieved entries with “needs changing” as the query:

B21 1406 It is not your partner that needs changing.

F9D 1067 All these questions can help you decide whether the ad is right or whether it needs changing.

Given these two representative entries as well as those of the first construction, we have drawn some more generalizations: Unlike the “need to be V-ed” construction, “need V-ing” constructions are realized as either “AGENT needs V-ing” or “PATIENT needs V-ing”, mostly with the agent being human (B21) and the patient non-human (F9D), respectively.[u2]

Possible Explanations:

In the first construction “PATIENT needs to be V-ed (by AGENT)”, can be viewed as, in one sense, “AGENT needs to V PATIENT” in a passive voice. Who the agent is supposed to be can be readily understood from the context or simply doesn’t need to be specified (like ‘by someone’). With the patient placed in the subject position, the agent can thus be omitted so as to achieve a minimal involvement of semantic roles. Also, the infinitive (‘to be V-ed’) suggests infinity along with changeability and is closer to the prototypicality of verbs, whereas the gerund (‘V-ing’) conveys durability and acts more like a noun. This is why in many entries where the “need to be V-ed” construction is utilized, it’s also pretty easy to discover another infinitive or a subordinate clause beginning with ‘so that’[u3] – both of which indicate the possible results after the implementation of the verb within ‘to be V-ed’, as with the red-faced portions of the following entries:

1) HHV 11617 That pattern needs to be changed now, not after the general election, to reflect the needs of industry and the county.

2) H7B 394 To be a success, personal computing needs to be done without detailed computer knowledge.

3) AM7 1317 Thus the traditional formulation of an agenda needs to be changed so that a meeting starts with clarification of purpose, agreement on timing, allocation of tasks and consolidation of process issues from previous meetings.

4) CHS 261 The delivery date for new furniture and equipment needs to be arranged so that the new site is fully operational once all the equipment and goods have been transferred.

In contrast, the gerund within ‘need V-ing’ is more like a typical noun, which is characterized as being ever-lasting. Sentences in constructions as such simply express facts or conditions and don’t usually indicate possible results as do sentences in “need to be V-ed” constructions.

1) A0J 173 Some alarms warn you when the batteries need changing by giving a special signal.

2) A3G 433 Current conference procedures are unsatisfactory, unfair, archaic and need changing.

3) H0E 1425 A plan may be designed as a five-year plan and may need changing after one year.

Conclusion:

Based on observation of corpus entries from BNC, our conclusion is that “need to be V-ed” and “need V-ing” are not really perfectly interchangeable and do distinguish from each other in meaning under certain contexts.

Dear all,

這裡關切的議題十分有趣，但正如我先前在文中的注解所說，你們必須將你們所觀察的句型分布趨勢以整體的統計數據呈現。本文中基本上只以3-5個例句解釋，證據力不足，因此容易流於主觀的見解，必須特別小心。

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[u1]If this is the case, then you need to provide statistics figures to support your point.

[u2]Again, we need more specific statistics figures to support the argument..

[u3]Is this the norm?—You need to give us some statistics results for stronger support.

Functional Grammar of English Group 1

一、前言:

坊間很多國中或是高中的參考書上，將附屬連接詞(subordinating conjunctions)中的While和When視為可以引導時間副詞子句的連接詞。有的參考書甚至將這兩個連接詞以等號相連，並以中文解釋為「當…的時候」。
例如:
「我們正在唱歌的時候, 老師進來了」
When/While we were singing, the teacher came in.
雖然中文的解釋看似是一樣的，我們知道這三個附屬連接詞的用法是有差別的。


二、教材

單就對While和When的文法介紹中，我們找到了值得被質疑的教材。
以下為康軒版國中英語二上第六課　連接詞when和while的用法中，課本上的文法句型表:

When：其後所接的子句，可以是過去單純式，也可以是過去進行式。
While：其後所接的子句是過去進行式。

1. I was eating when I saw a friend.　──（when 後所接子句，為過去單純式。）
　或　I saw a friend when I was eating.　──（when 後所接子句，為過去進行式。）
　或　I saw a friend while I was eating.　──（when 改用 while，後仍接過去進行式。）
　當然也可以　When I saw a friend, I was eating.　──（兩子句間加了個逗號。）
　當然也可以　While I was eating, I saw a friend.　──（兩子句間加了個逗號。）

2. She was watching TV when we got a phone call.　──（when 後所接子句，為過去單純式。）
　或　We got a phone call when she was watching TV.　──（when 後所接子句，為過去進行式。）
　或　We got a phone call while she was watching TV.　──（when 改用 while，後仍接過去進行式。）
　當然也可以　When we got a phone call, she was watching TV.　──（兩子句間加了個逗號。）
　當然也可以　While she was watching TV, we got a phone call.　──（兩子句間加了個逗號。）

三、探討
此課本在用法上只強調when和while時態上的不同，這是非常不恰當的。 基本上應該由句子的語意來決定子句的動詞時態。所以，我們在British National Corpus中找到50筆資料中有50筆while的意思是「當…的時候」，而在這20筆中，就有12筆不符合 “while：其後所接的子句是過去進行式這個句型。”
例如：
1 I typed three letters while you were out to lunch. (While子句裡所述為狀態)
(在這個句子中, 打三封信, 吃一餐飯都需要時間, 故用while; 但並非側重在活動本身, 故用簡單過去式, 而不一定必須使用過去進行式。)
2. While you're there, ask for some styling tips from your hairdresser. (While子句裡所述為狀態)
(在這個句子中，表達同一時間且為一件事實的陳述，故用現在簡單式。)
3. The events of the last year had left her mentally drained while she was physically exhausted because of her chronic illness (While子句裡所述為狀態)
(在這個句子中，因為經過一段時間發生的事件，且為一種生理狀態的描寫，因此子句不會用過去進行式。)
4. I’m going to answer the phone while you’re out to lunch.
(在這個句子中, 他甚至可以表示未發生的事的過程, 所以用簡單式。)
5. They took over Yvon's room while he was away in Peru.
(這個句子和第二個例句一樣，都是表同一時間且一件事實的陳述 ，故用過去簡單式。)
從上面列舉的例子中，可以發現康軒版英語課本對while這個附屬連接詞解釋過於籠統和模糊，不見得while其後所接的子句一定是過去進行式。這樣的解釋不僅造成學生的混淆，更可能在使用上會有誤用的情形。

另外，我們都知道when的用處很廣, 所以當然康軒版課本中when的用法: “when：其後所接的子句，可以是過去單純式，也可以是過去進行式。” 與真實用法上也是有出入的。
因此, 我們也從corpus中找到為數不少與此規則不符的句子。
如下：
1. Stop being so rude to her father; walking out when he gives her advice.
2. Counseling ends when advice is given.
3. When she had gone, Aunt Lilian said, `Perhaps you'll tell me what this is about?'
4. James isn't curious about other people except when it affects him.
5. When media themselves are put to scrutiny they are therefore judged both on their own performance and also on their relations with the rest of society.
6. We also need to take into account other variables, particularly when concentrating upon the public sector.
四、參考資料
1. British National Corpus
2. 挑戰英文文法總複習講義 龍騰文化事業公司
3. 英語慣用法手冊 正中書局
4. 英語500句型與文法 文橋出版社


Dear all,
When和while的區別應該可從其基本語意差別找出答案：
When 用法較為廣泛，限制較少，可以表某一個時間點的事件或某一段時間的持續狀態；而while則語意較有限制，基本上僅有後者之意義，因此通常與「狀態或事件的延續」連用，形式上有可能為事件之進行貌或者是表狀態的簡單式動詞。

各位的語料觀察與收集十分完整，只要在解釋方面朝語意的面向思考即可。