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In English, we all know that words are divided into various types. These types are adjectives, nouns, Pronouns, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and Verb.
Verbs are one of the most important parts of a sentence. It is a part of a sentence that describes what a subject is actually doing. A verb indicates the physical action or any occurrence which is happening in a sentence by the subject or the doer.
Verbs are also of various types depending on the type of action which is happening in the sentence. For example, Auxiliary Verbs, modal verbs, phrasal verbs, linking verbs, and many more.
One such type of verb is called a Non-Finite verb. In this article, we will delve deeper into this type of verb and understand its behavior and usage in a sentence.
What is a Non-Finite Verb?
In very simple words, non-finite verbs are verbs that do not have any type of tense associated with it or do not show any tense. One cannot tell the tense of the sentence using these verbs. Thus, these verbs are not the main or primary verb of the sentence. The primary verb is always the finite verb.
The finite verb is the verb through which one can easily tell what tense the sentence has. These verbs show the tense, the person, and the number of persons involved in doing an action.
For example, “ He is playing tennis”. This sentence involves a primary finite verb “play” in the present continuous tense “playing”.
Non-finite verbs are of various types. Now we will see the types of non-finite verbs.
Types of Non-Finite Verbs
Mainly non-finite verbs are of three types:
- Gerunds
- Infinitives
- Participles
1. Gerunds
These are the functions that usually have “ing” ending with them. These are also forms of verbs but are used as nouns. Hence, we can say that these are combinations of verbs and nouns.
For example, “laughing” can be used both as a verb and a noun. We can consider “laughing” as a verb or an action and also “laughing” as a state of being happy.
We can also say that to convert a verb into a gerund we just have to add “ing” to it. A gerund phrase includes a gerund, the object, and the modifiers.
Some examples of gerunds are: laughing, swimming, agreeing, being, singing, dancing, meditating, and many more.
2. Infinitives
These are the types of non-finite verbs which are used by adding “to” in front of it. They are also called full infinitive or infinitive verbs. For example, to be, to help, to sleep and many more.
Infinitives can function as a verb, a noun, an adjective or an adverb depending on the condition and requirement of the sentence.
For example, “the manager asked me to do this”, in this sentence the verb is “ask” and the infinitive used is “to do”. Similarly in this sentence, “ I want to be a chef”, “want” is a verb, and “to be” is the infinitive used here.
We can also use infinitives as subjects in the sentence. For example, “ to play is what I promised to them”, here “to play” is the infinitive which is used as the subject here.
3. Participles
These are the types of infinitives that are used as verbs or as adjectives. They form the tenses of verbs and adjectives.
Mainly, participles are of two types :
1. Present Participle :
Here, we use “ing” at the end of the verb to convert it into a present participle form. This form shows us the present action with respect to time done by the finite verb. The suffix used here is “ing”. These too can act as nouns, adjectives, or an adverb.
For example, “ the players were playing football”, here the word “playing” acts as a present participle form of the verb.
2. Past Participle:
This is a derivation of a verb that shows us the past tense of an action and can be used as an adjective. These words form the passive voice. Almost all tenses use these past participle forms to show their respective past tense.
For example, the past participle of the verb “be” is “been”, the past participle of the word “look” is “looked”, and the past participle of the word “talk” is “talked”. Thus, we can see that the rule to form a past participle is by using the suffix “ed” to the actual original base verb.
A common use of the past participle in a sentence is shown, “ he looked at the tower”, “she has taken a day off”, “we have been here for an hour” and many more.
In this article, we read about the non-finite verbs and understood their meaning and usage in day-to-day English. We also learned about the types of non-finite verbs and the rules to form them and use them as per the requirements.
FAQs Non-Finite Verbs
What are verbs?
Verbs are one of the most important parts of a sentence. It is part of a sentence that describes what a subject is actually doing. A verb indicates the physical action or any occurrence that is happening in a sentence by the subject or the doer.
What are Non-Finite Verbs?
In very simple words, non-finite verbs are verbs that do not have any type of tense associated with it or it does not show any tense. One cannot tell the tense of the sentence using these verbs. Thus, these verbs are not the primary verb of the sentence. The primary or the main verb is always the finite verb.
State the infinitive of the word look
The infinitive of the word look is to look.
