Abstract
The prior contribution of present study is its focus on verb rather than subject in commencing teaching sentence structure. Firstly, this paper deals with a detailed analysis of stative and dynamic verbs and stipulates how the difference between subject and agent comes down to is, by projection on the part of either stative verb or dynamic verb. Secondly, in Pakistan where more often than not, ELT practices in class rooms from grass root level to master’s level look to grammar translation method, two theta roles i.e. subject and agent are conspicuous by their absence. Therefore, this paper reasons out their absence and the difficulty, in explaining the subject and agent, faced by the teaching staff members working in schools and colleges in the south southern part of Punjab, Pakistan. Finally, the study culminated that the teaching of verb prior to subject is sine qua non for teaching the sentence structure.
Highlights
Neither the syntax nor is the semantics of the subject NP a reliable source of determining the subject and agent
For the purpose of this study, the analysis focused on the percentage of the options marked with tick to get at: (i) the element of grammar the teaching staff members give priority to in commencing the teaching of sentence structure; (ii) the source they rely on to determine the subject and agent; (iii) a more general label they give to the subject in a simple active sentence; (iv) and the number of respondents entangled in perplexity in dealing with the subject and agent
In view of the data, that the tendency to teach subject prior to verb prevails in the schools and colleges situated in the south southern part of Punjab, Pakistan
Summary
Neither the syntax nor is the semantics of the subject NP a reliable source of determining the subject and agent. Stative and dynamic are the semantic based types of verb and have appeared as role assigners. Both types of verb correlate with the subject and agent respectively, that is to say the subject agrees in theta role with the verb. This type of agreement is called notional. This stipulation outflanks Coppola & Newport (2005) who stressed on the need of a single semantic correlate associated with the roles taken on by the subject
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