by James Day ... An Advanced English Practice Course - The aims and scope of this course
This course has three aims. The students using it will probably have done anything up to six years' fairly intensive study of English at school and possibly at university. There are, however, certain mistakes which even advanced students make again and again. These mistakes vary from nationality to nationality, and largely depend on the mother tongue of the students.
The first aim of the course is remedial. It tries to demonstrate how native English writers use certain tricky structures that overseas students sometimes mismanage, and then gives them practice in the correct use of those structures.
The second aim is to improve the students' powers of self-expression by expanding their vocabulary and repertoire of structures.
The third is to stimulate them, through reading and discussion of sometimes provocative material, to think about and criticise both the form and the content of the passages that have been chosen to illustrate the structures practised.
Part 1 - The basis of any language communication depends largely on the verb, and the majority of sentences result from the interplay of static elements -nouns and adjectives - with dynamic ones - verbs and adverbs. Most students find that the English tense system needs careful study. So, although the course has been designed so that any one section of it may be used in isolation to illustrate and practise a particular structure, it develops out of a detailed examination first of tense, then of mood, then of the satellites of the verb (adverbials), via verb forms that operate as nouns (gerunds and infinitives), through noun clauses and nouns to adjectivals and adjectives. It thus leads from the simple to the compound; from the immediate to the contingent; from the definite to the indefinite; and from the concrete to the abstract. Each pattern of structures has a group of exercises attached to it. These develop from the almost absurdly simple, which aim at simply drilling the student in the correct use of the structure considered, via exercises with a closed system, where the most suitable answer is probably the most correct one, through exercises involving the student's imaginative use of the structure in a 'controlled' situation, to those where the student is allowed much more freedom of self-expression, still practising the structure required, in a precise but not too restricted context-situation. In each section, the purely structural exercises are preceded by a number of comprehension questions about the vocabulary and argument of the passage, and followed by suggestions for discussion and/or essays about the material touched on in the passage and related topics. This constitutes Part I of the book.
Part 2 concerns more extended forms of self-expression. Examples are given of different types of style, of ways of constructing a paragraph, of methods used by authors to suit vocabulary to subject, not simply as a technical device, but in order to make the writer's intention absolutely clear. Some of these examples also show how the choice of vocabulary may influence the shape of the paragraph itself.
Part 3 makes suggestions concerning the organisation of students' self-expression on a larger scale still, notably in class-discussion and in essays. So while
Part 1 consists largely of expository and practice material, Part 2 attempts to develop the students' imagination, and Part 3 merely gives him what it is hoped is useful advice. It is not necessary to use the book as a consecutive course, though it has been planned as such. It is perfectly possible to arrange work on it using related themes from certain passages on similar topics, or simply to use sections at random for purely remedial purposes. Nor is it necessary to use all the exercises from one section. The teacher may omit such exercises as he considers too easy for his students. All the same, it is often both useful and encouraging to students to give them something that they are almost certain to get 100 per cent correct first go off, particularly in remedial work. Moreover, what has been designed as a step-by-step process should be more effective when used that way, and it is hoped that the individual steps involved are not so great as to confuse or irritate either teachers or their pupils.
Contents
General Introduction: The aims and scope of this course XIII
Parti STRUCTURES IN THE SENTENCE
Subdivision I: The verb and its appendages
A: THE TENSES
Introductory notes 4
1 The use of the simple present tense to express universal statements 6
JOHN MAYNARD SMITH: The Theory of Evolution
2 The use of the simple future to express predictions or intentions 9
ALBERT E. SLOMAN: ^ University in the Making
3 The simple present and the present perfect 13
H.J. EYSENCK: Uses and Abuses of Psychology
RAYMOND WILLIAMS: Culture and Society 1780-1950
4 The present progressive, the simple present and the present perfect 17
SIR BERNARD LOVELL: The Individual and the Universe
ELLIS WATERHOUSE in The Listener
SOMERSET MAUGHAM: Virtue
5 The present perfect in relation to the simple past 2.2.
T. S. ELIOT: Poetry and Drama
6 The use of the past and present progressive forms in relation to other tenses 25
GEORGE ORWELL: The Road to Wigan Pier
7 The past perfect in relation to the simple past 28
C. P. SNOW: The Masters
8 The past perfect in relation to time and other contingencies 31
KAREN BLIXEN: Out of Africa
9 Perfect progressive forms 34
SOMERSET MAUGHAM: His Excellency
A. G. STREET: Fit for What?
B: MOODS AND CONTINGENCIES
Introductory notes 37
10 Open conditions with a present tense in the subordinate clause 39
G. B. SHAW: Preface to The Apple Cart
DOROTHY L. SAYERS: How Free is the Press?
11 Conditions with the simple past tense in the subordinate clause 43
SIR DONALD TOVEY: The Main Stream of Music
G. K. CHESTERTON: A Defence of Penny Dreadfuls
12 Rejected conditions 48
GWYN THOMAS: And a Spoonful of Grief to Taste
G. B. SHAW: Preface to Saint Joan
ANDREW SHONFIELD: British Economic Policy since the War
13 The interrelationship of time, mood and contingency 52
BERTRAND RUSSELL: The Limits of Human Power
HESKETH PEARSON: The Life of Oscar Wilde (2 passages)
Introductory notes on the modal [anomalous jinite] verbs 57
14 Modality - 1: Permission, open possibility and ability 61
W. MACNEILE DIXON: The Human Situation
J. MAYNARD SMITH: The Theory of Evolution
15 Modality - 2: Prediction and possibility 65
H. G. WELLS: 'The World of Sport'
16 Modality - 3: Opportunity; possibility; impossibility 68
J. MIDDLETON MURRY: Shakespeare and Love
CECIL WOODHAM-SMITH: The Reason Why
DAVID THOMSON: England in the Twentieth Century
17 Modality - 4: Necessity, advice or warning 73
BERTRAND RUSSELL: Has Man a Future!1
RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS: Composing for the Films
18 Modality - 5: Necessity, advice and suggestions 77
'The Killer Cars' in New Statesman
19 Consecutive and final clauses 80
E. ARNOT ROBERTSON: Four Frightened People
HENRY WILLIAMSON: Salar the Salmon
C: ADVERBIALS
Introductory notes on adverbials 85
20 The position of adverbials in the sentence 87
GRAHAM GREENE: Brighton Rock
F. L. GREEN: Odd Man Out (2 passages)
21 Verbs not necessarily followed by an adverb 92
E. ARNOT ROBERTSON: Four Frightened People
22 Adjectival and Adverbial Similes 96
JOYCE CARY: TO be a Pilgrim
WILLIAM SANSOM: A Wedding
DERYCK COOKE: The Language of Music
23 Word-order problems with contingent and adverbial clauses 101
SIR HAROLD NICOLSON: The Congress of Vienna
ALDOUS HUXLEY: English Snobbery
Subdivison II: Verb-nouns and verb-adjectives
24 The use of the gerund 106
J.Z. YOUNG: Doubt and Certainty in Science
CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS: Farewell to Westminster
HENRY WILLIAMSON: Salar the Salmon
25 The uses of the infinitive 112
L. P. HARTLEY: A Perfect Woman (5 passages)
26 The uses of the past participle 119
THEODORA BOSANQUET: As I Remember Henry James
PENELOPE HOUSTON: The Contemporary Cinema
Subdivision III: The noun and its appendages
27 Noun clauses 126
ANGUS WILSON: Anglo-Saxon Attitudes
G. D. H. & MARGARET COLE: The Murder at Crome House
28 Relative clauses 130
J. M. COHEN: Poetry of This Age
ALDOUS HUXLEY: Antic Hay
SIR HERBERT READ: Contemporary British Art
29 The impersonal pronoun IT with a noun or adjective predicate 135
SIR WALTER RALEIGH: Don Quixote
T. D. WELDON: The Vocabulary of Politics
30 The position and order of adjectives 140
KATHERINE MANSFIELD: At the Bay
VIOLA MEYNELL: The Pain in the Neck
31 Countables and uncountables 144
ALDOUS HUXLEY: Beyond the Mexique Bay
ERIC NEWTON: European Painting and Sculpture
32 The indefinite pronouns and adjectives 148
JOHN WILSON: Language and the Pursuit of Truth
Subdivision IV: Link-words [prepositions and conjunctions]
Introductory Notes 153
33 Common prepositions of place and direction 1J4
H.E. BATES: The Jacaranda Tree
H.E. BATES: The Little Farm
H.E. BATES: Fair Stood the Wind for France
34 Prepositions and conjunctions of time 159
PHILIP HOPE-WALLACE: Half-Way House
MARY LAVIN: The Will
RONALD BLYTHE: The Age of Illusion
35 Prepositions expressing reactions or relationships 164
GRAHAM GREENE: Preparation for Violence
ST JOHN ERVINE: Acting in My Time
36 Figurative uses of prepositions of time, place and direction 168
H. E. BATES: The Purple Plain
CONSTANCE HOLME: The Last Inch
37 Extensions of meaning with common prepositions - 1 172
E. M. FORSTER: A Passage to India
38 Extensions of meaning with common prepositions - 2 176
H. E. BATES: The Purple Plain
ROBERT GRAVES: HOW Poets See
Part 2 SENTENCES IN PARAGRAPHS
39 Factual description 184
JOHN STEINBECK: The Grapes of Wrath
CECIL WOODHAM-SMITH: The Reason Why
HONOR TRACY: The Straight and Narrow Path
40 Inferential factual description 188
ANGUS WILSON: A Sad Fall
WILLIAM GOLDING: Lord of the Flies
41 Pictorial description 191
EVELYN WAUGH: Brideshead Revisited
KINGSLEY AMIS: That Uncertain Feeling
EVELYN WAUGH: Decline and Fall
ERIC LINKLATER: Magnus Merriman
42 Symbolic description 196
ALDOUS HUXLEY: Eyeless in Gaza
43 The development of the argument within the paragraph 198
ALDOUS HUXLEY: Selected Snobberies
J. Z. YOUNG: Doubt and Certainty in Science
A. D. RITCHIE: The Biological Approach to Philosophy
44 Beginning and ending an essay 202
SIR HAROLD NICOLSON: A Defence of Shyness
J. MIDDLETON MURRY: Dickens
C. A. LEJEUNE: The Shaping of a Critic
Part 3 SELF-EXPRESSION IN A WIDER CONTEXT
45 The organisation of the essay 207
46 Organised class discussions 216
