29: The verb is the coat rack that the rest of the sentence hangs on
b'Some sentences have a lot of words all relating to each other, while other sentences only have a few. The verb is the thing that makes the biggest difference: it\\u2019s what makes \\u201cI gave you the book\\u201d sound fine but \\u201cI rained you the book\\u201d sound weird. Or on the flip side, \\u201cit\\u2019s raining\\u201d is a perfectly reasonable description of a general raining event, but \\u201cit\\u2019s giving\\u201d doesn\\u2019t work so well as some sort of general giving event. How can we look for patterns in the ways that verbs influence the rest of the sentence? \\n\\nIn this episode, your hosts Lauren Gawne and Gretchen McCulloch get enthusiastic about a new metaphor for how verbs relate to the other words in a sentence -- a verb is like a coat rack and the nouns that it supports are like the coats that hang on it. Admittedly, it creates some slightly odd-looking coat racks that you might not actually want in your home, but as a metaphor it works quite well. (We\\u2019ll stick to linguistics rather than becoming furniture designers.) \\n\\nWe also take you through a brief tour of other metaphors for verbs and sentences, including going across (aka transitivity) and molecular bonds (aka valency). \\n\\nThis month\\u2019s bonus episode is a recording from our liveshow in Melbourne, Australia, where we talk about how the internet is making English better with real audience laughter occasionally in the background! Feel like you\\u2019re in a cosy room of friendly linguistics enthusiasts by supporting Lingthusiasm on Patreon to gain access to this and 23 previous bonus episodes. lingthusiasm.com/patreon \\n\\nInternet language is also the topic of Gretchen\\u2019s book, Because Internet, which is now officially available for preorder! You can show the publisher that people are interested in fun linguistics books and have a delightful treat waiting for you on July 23, 2019 by preordering it here! gretchenmcculloch.com/book\\n\\nFor links to more topics mentioned in this episode, check out the shownotes page at https://lingthusiasm.com/post/182969748701/lingthusiasm-episode-29-the-verb-is-the-coat-rack'