English Grammar

lgerm1123  2022-2023  Louvain-la-Neuve

English Grammar
5.00 credits
30.0 h + 15.0 h
Q1 and Q2
Teacher(s)
Meunier Fanny;
Language
English
Prerequisites
Level B1 of the Common Europea Framework of Reference for Languages
 
Main themes
Introduction to grammatical analysis : the sentence and its constituents
Detailed review of the English grammatical system.
Learning outcomes

At the end of this learning unit, the student is able to :

1 By the end of the course, the students will be able to illustrate, explain (with the help of the appropriate grammatical metalanguage) and justify English grammar in use.
Students will be able to:
- master the basic notions of English grammar and their analysis
- understand and explain the coherence of the English grammatical system (i.e. via tense usage, modality, etc)
- illustrate relationships between grammar, lexis and discourse
- apply the grammatical rules in interactive competence
 
Content
The course provides a detailed study of English grammar for undergraduates and masters-level students specializing in English.
The reference book used will be A STUDENT'S INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH GRAMMAR (second edition) - R. Huddleston, G. Pullum and B. Reynolds, Cambridge University Press, 2022.
Chapter 1 is a brief introduction to some general issues relating to the linguistic study of English. Chapter 2 introduces some crucial concepts and provides a brief survey of the content of the entire book. Chapters 3, 5, 6 and 7 deal with the major lexical categories - verbs, nouns, determinatives, adjectives, adverbs, and prepositions - and the structure of the phrases that they head. Chapter 4 describes the structure of simple, positive, active, declarative, non-coordinate clauses with no special stylistic reordering (in other words 'canonical clauses'). Chapter 8  focusses on adjuncts (modifiers and supplements). Chapters 9 to 16 present a step-by-step introduction to the ways in which clauses may diverge in structure from canonical ones : negation (Chapter 9), non-declarative clause types (Chapter 10), subordination (Chapter 11), relativization (Chapter 12), comparison (Chapter 13), non-finiteness (Chapter 14), coordination (Chapter 15), and discourse-sensitive 'information-packaging' constructions (Chapter 16).
Word-internal structure (inflectional morphology, the basics of lexical word formation, and the associated spelling rules) will be made available in an appendix.
Exercises are available for each chapter.
Teaching methods
Lectures on the various chapters of the book (30h) accompanied by exercises (15h). The exercise sessions can be a mix of in-class sessions and/or exercises to be done online. For the in-class exercise sessions, the format will be that of the 'question-answer' methodology and of the integration of the student's previous grammatical knowledge in the building of new knowledge.
Evaluation methods
Continuous assessment (25% - 5 points out of 20 - of the final grade):
Averaged results of the continuous assessment tests taken during the year (theory and exercises)January session (37,5% - 7.5 points out of 20 - of the final grade):
Written exam on the subjects covered during the first semester (60% theory - 40% exercises).
Students who do not get a pass mark for the January partial exam must retake that part in June.
June session (37,5% - 7.5 points out of 20 - of the final grade):
Written exam on the subjects covered during the second semester (60% theory - 40% exercises).
The final mark for the June session is the weighted means of the three parts. As we are aiming to train language specialists, the focus on  language accuracy is of particular importance. Details on the specific weight of language accuracy is available in a document on the LGERM1123 Moodle course platform.  
September session:
Written exam on the subjects covered during the first (50%) and second (50%) semester (60%: theory - 40%: exercises, for each section).
The final mark for the September session is the weighted means of the two parts (first and second semesters). As we are aiming to train language specialists, the focus on  language accuracy is of particular importance. Details on the specific weight of language accuracy is available in a document on the LGERM1123 Moodle course platform.  
Bibliography
A STUDENT'S INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH GRAMMAR (second edition)
R. Huddleston, G. Pullum and B. Reynolds
Cambridge University Press , 2022
https://www.cambridge.org/highereducation/books/a-students-introduction-to-english-grammar/EB0ABC6005935012E5270C8470B2B740#overview
Faculty or entity
ELAL


Programmes / formations proposant cette unité d'enseignement (UE)

Title of the programme
Sigle
Credits
Prerequisites
Learning outcomes
Minor in English Studies

Bachelor in Modern Languages and Literatures: German, Dutch and English

Minor in Linguistics

Bachelor in Modern Languages and Literatures : General