A Word, Please:

For years I’ve been telling people: Don’t fear the word “participle.”

Today I’d like to change camps. My new motto is: Be afraid. Be very afraid.

My bleak new outlook on participles began recently when I stumbled across the term “participle clause.” It wasn’t the “participle” part that scared me. It was the “clause” part. You see, I’d always heard that units like “eating peaches” in “I saw a man eating peaches” were called participle phrases or participial phrases. Not clauses. But an Internet search revealed that lots of people — including university professors and those smart-sounding types who write Wikipedia entries — don’t agree on whether to call these phrases or clauses.

A clause is defined as a unit that contains both a subject and verb — except when it doesn’t. In “Tracy wanted to ride her bike,” “Tracy wanted” is a clause. Subject and verb. Badda bing, badda boom.

But “to ride” is also considered a clause. It’s an infinitive clause. An infinitive clause qualifies as something called a “non-finite” clause because the verb form doesn’t show when the action took place. In “Tracy wanted” we know that her wanting was in the past because “wanted” is a past tense form. But “to ride” doesn’t have a tense or a subject. Yet it’s a non-finite clause.

So you can see how a clause contains a subject and a verb — except when it doesn’t.

In “I saw a man eating peaches,” “I saw” is a whole clause. But, like “saw,” “eating” also conveys action. In that way, it’s like the clause “to ride” above. Plus, we know who’s doing the eating: the man. So this “eating” is a clause, right?

Not so fast.

Participles like “eating” can also be modifiers. Adjectives, if you will.

A refresher on participles: They’re most commonly “ed” or “ing” forms that are used with forms of “to have” or “to be” to show when something happened or that it was ongoing. “Lou has painted the house.”

“Painted” is a past participle. “Mr. Ed is talking.” “Talking” is a present participle, also called a progressive participle.

But these can also be adjectives: “Lou saw the painted house.” “Mr. Ed was a talking horse.”