gerund

Definition:

A verbal that ends in -ing and functions as a noun. A gerund with its objects, complements, and modifiers is called a gerund phrase. Adjective: gerundial.

Etymology:

From the Latin, "to carry on"

Examples and Observations:

• "Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it."
  (William A. Ward)



• "The dead might as well try to speak to the living as the old to the young."
  (Willa Cather)



• "Because they are nounlike, we can think of gerunds as names. But rather than naming persons, places, things, events, and the like, as nouns generally do, gerunds,because they are verbs in form, name activities or behaviors or states of mind or states of being."
  (Martha Kolln and Robert Funk, Understanding English Grammar, 1998)



• "All talk of winning the people by appealing to their intelligence, of conquering them by impeccable syllogism, is so much moonshine."
  (H. L. Mencken)



• "Eighty percent of success is showing up."
  (Woody Allen)



• "Gerunds, like normal nouns but unlike their relatives, the participles, may also be modified by adjectives. These modifiers may be standard adjectives, as well as possessive case nouns or possessive pronouns used as adjectives.
  • Her quick thinking saved us all a lot of trouble.
  • Slow dancing is one of life's greatest pleasures.
  • My mom's cooking is reason enough for me to travel back to Illinois.
  The first sentence contains a gerund, thinking, modified by the adjective quick and the possessive pronoun her. Here, the possessive pronoun serves as a modifier. The second sentence contains a gerund, dancing, modified by the adjective slow. In the final sentence, the gerund cooking is modified by the possessive case noun mom's."
  (Michael Strumpf and Auriel Douglas, The Grammar Bible, Owl Books, 2004)



• "Humor is laughing at what you haven't got when you ought to have it."
  (Langston Hughes)

Pronunciation: JER-end