Try It: Verbs Read the following introduction to an academic paper written by an undergraduate linguistics student. Look at the verb usage (both
regular verbs and non-finite verbs). Identify any errors that have been made, and suggest revisions. The sentences have been
numbered to aid you in your comments.
(1) Early Modern English, the language spoke by Shakespeare and Queen Elizabeth I, existed during a period of rich
language change and growth. (2) Vast amounts of words were borrowed into English from Latinate languages (such as French and
Spanish). (3) English words were taking Latinate suffixes and adding them to words, so they could better to fit the needs of the
people.
(4) Derivational doublets is word pairs from Early Modern English that have the
same root word but have different suffixes. (5) Take the words virtuous and
virtual, for example. (6) Both words come from the word virtue, but
they had different suffixes (-uous and -ual applied to them. (7) This paper will
examine the usage of these doublets in Early Modern English, and it briefly
looks at how these words have changing in our modern usage.
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
Virtuous 21074
Virtual 794
14705
1490s
1510s
1530s
1550s
1570s
1590s
1610s
1630
SO591
1670s
1690