Monday, October 11, 2010

Parts Of Speech

Traditional grammar classifies words based on eight parts of speech: the verb, the noun, the pronoun, the adjective, the adverb, the preposition, the conjunction, and the interjection. Each part of speech explains not what the word is, but how the word is used. In fact, the same word can be a noun in one sentence and a verb or adjective in the next.


What is verb?

The verb is perhaps the most important part of the sentence. A verb or compound verb asserts something about the subject of the sentence and express actions, events, or states of being. The verb or compound verb is the critical element of the predicate of a sentence.
In each of the following sentences, the verb or compound verb is highlighted:
Dracula bites his victims on the neck.
The verb "bites" describes the action Dracula takes.
In early October, Giselle will plant twenty tulip bulbs.
Here the compound verb "will plant" describes an action that will take place in the future.
My first teacher was Miss Crawford, but I remember the janitor Mr. Weatherbee more vividly.
In this sentence, the verb "was" (the simple past tense of "is") identifies a particular person and the verb "remembered" describes a mental action.
Karl Creelman bicycled around the world in 1899, but his diaries and his bicycle were destroyed.
In this sentence, the compound verb "were destroyed" describes an action which took place in the past.




What is noun?

A noun is a word used to name a person, animal, place, thing, and abstract idea. Nouns are usually the first words which small children learn. The highlighted words in the following sentences are all nouns:
Late last year our neighbours bought a goat.
Portia White was an opera singer.
The bus inspector looked at all the passengers' passes.
According to Plutarch, the library at Alexandria was destroyed in 48 B.C.
Philosophy is of little comfort to the starving.
A noun can function in a sentence as a subject, a direct object, an indirect object, a subject complement, an object complement, an appositive, an adjective or an adverb.




What is pronoun?
A pronoun can replace a noun or another pronoun. You use pronouns like "he," "which," "none," and "you" to make your sentences less cumbersome and less repetitive.
Grammarians classify pronouns into several types, including the personal pronoun, the demonstrative pronoun, the interrogative pronoun, the indefinite pronoun, the relative pronoun, the reflexive pronoun, and the intensive pronoun.




What is an adjective?

An adjective modifies a noun or a pronoun by describing, identifying, or quantifying words. An adjective usually precedes the noun or the pronoun which it modifies.
In the following examples, the highlighted words are adjectives:
The truck-shaped balloon floated over the treetops.
Mrs. Morrison papered her kitchen walls with hideous wall paper.
The small boat foundered on the wine dark sea.
The coal mines are dark and dank.
Many stores have already begun to play irritating Christmas music.
A battered music box sat on the mahogany sideboard.
The back room was filled with large, yellow rain boots.
An adjective can be modified by an adverb, or by a phrase or clause functioning as an adverb. In the sentence
My husband knits intricately patterned mittens.
for example, the adverb "intricately" modifies the adjective "patterned."
Some nouns, many pronouns, and many participle phrases can also act as adjectives. In the sentence
Eleanor listened to the muffled sounds of the radio hidden under her pillow.
for example, both highlighted adjectives are past participles.
Grammarians also consider articles ("the," "a," "an") to be adjectives.





What is an adverb?

An adverb can modify a verb, an adjective, another adverb, a phrase, or a clause. An adverb indicates manner, time, place, cause, or degree and answers questions such as "how," "when," "where," "how much".
While some adverbs can be identified by their characteristic "ly" suffix, most of them must be identified by untangling the grammatical relationships within the sentence or clause as a whole. Unlike an adjective, an adverb can be found in various places within the sentence.
In the following examples, each of the highlighted words is an adverb:
The seamstress quickly made the mourning clothes.
In this sentence, the adverb "quickly" modifies the verb "made" and indicates in what manner (or how fast) the clothing was constructed.
The midwives waited patiently through a long labour.
Similarly in this sentence, the adverb "patiently" modifies the verb "waited" and describes the manner in which the midwives waited.
The boldly spoken words would return to haunt the rebel.
In this sentence the adverb "boldly" modifies the adjective "spoken."
We urged him to dial the number more expeditiously.
Here the adverb "more" modifies the adverb "expeditiously."
Unfortunately, the bank closed at three today.
In this example, the adverb "unfortunately" modifies the entire sentence.




What is a preposition?

A preposition links nouns, pronouns and phrases to other words in a sentence. The word or phrase that the preposition introduces is called the object of the preposition.
A preposition usually indicates the temporal, spatial or logical relationship of its object to the rest of the sentence as in the following examples:
The book is on the table.
The book is beneath the table.
The book is leaning against the table.
The book is beside the table.
She held the book over the table.
She read the book during class.
In each of the preceding sentences, a preposition locates the noun "book" in space or in time.



What is a conjunction?

You can use a conjunction to link words, phrases, and clauses, as in the following example:


ate the pizza and the pasta.

Call the movers when you are ready.



What is an interjection?

An interjections a word added to a sentence to convey emotion. It is not grammatically related to any other part of the sentence. You usually follow an interjection with an exclamation mark. Interjections are uncommon in formal academic prose, except in direct quotations. The highlighted words in the following sentences are interjections:

Ouch, that hurt!

Oh no, I forgot that the exam was today.

Hey! Put that down!

I heard one guy say to another guy, "He has a new car, eh?"I don't know about you but, good lord, I think taxes are too high!

Monday, September 27, 2010

About Architecture

My name is FUNG VUI KEIT,im studying in KLMU. My course is architecture and this is my first blog in my life.I want to tell u all about architerture.

The architect

Architects plan, design and review the construction of buildings and structures for the use of people. Architects also coordinate and integrate engineering design, which has as its primary objective the creative manipulation of materials and forms using mathematical and scientific principles.

Theory of architecture

[edit] Historic treatises

Architectural drawings of details of the Palace of Persepolis, Persia (Iran)
The earliest surviving written work on the subject of architecture is De architectura, by the Roman architect Vitruvius in the early 1st century CE.[2] According to Vitruvius, a good building should satisfy the three principles of firmitatis utilitatis venustatis,[3][4] which translates roughly as -
  • Durability - it should stand up robustly and remain in good condition.
  • Utility - it should be useful and function well for the people using it.
  • Beauty - it should delight people and raise their spirits.
According to Vitruvius, the architect should strive to fulfill each of these three attributes as well as possible. Leone Battista Alberti, who elaborates on the ideas of Vitruvius in his treatise, De Re Aedificatoria, saw beauty primarily as a matter of proportion, although ornament also played a part. For Alberti, the rules of proportion were those that governed the idealised human figure, the Golden mean. The most important aspect of beauty was therefore an inherent part of an object, rather than something applied superficially; and was based on universal, recognisable truths. The notion of style in the arts was not developed until the 16th century, with the writing of Vasari.[5] The treatises, by the 18th century, had been translated into Italian, French, Spanish and English.
The Parthenon, Athens, Greece, "the supreme example among architectural sites." (Fletcher).[6]
In the early nineteenth century, Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin wrote Contrasts (1836) that, as the titled suggested, contrasted the modern, industrial world, which he disparaged, with an idealized image of neo-medieval world. Gothic architecture, Pugin believed, was the only “true Christian form of architecture.”
The 19th century English art critic, John Ruskin, in his Seven Lamps of Architecture, published 1849,[7] was much narrower in his view of what constituted architecture. Architecture was the "art which so disposes and adorns the edifices raised by men ... that the sight of them" contributes "to his mental health, power, and pleasure".
For Ruskin, the aesthetic was of overriding significance. His work goes on to state that a building is not truly a work of architecture unless it is in some way "adorned". For Ruskin, a well-constructed, well-proportioned, functional building needed string courses or rustication, at the very least.

Contemporary concepts of architecture

The great 19th century architect of skyscrapers, Louis Sullivan, promoted an overriding precept to architectural design: "Form follows function".
While the notion that structural and aesthetic considerations should be entirely subject to functionality was met with both popularity and skepticism, it had the effect of introducing the concept of "function" in place of Vitruvius' "utility". "Function" came to be seen as encompassing all criteria of the use, perception and enjoyment of a building, not only practical but also aesthetic, psychological and cultural.
Nunzia Rondanini stated, "Through its aesthetic dimension architecture goes beyond the functional aspects that it has in common with other human sciences. Through its own particular way of expressing values, architecture can stimulate and influence social life without presuming that, in and of itself, it will promote social development.'
To restrict the meaning of (architectural) formalism to art for art's sake is not only reactionary; it can also be a purposeless quest for perfection or originality which degrades form into a mere instrumentality".[9]
Among the philosophies that have influenced modern architects and their approach to building design are rationalism, empiricism, structuralism, poststructuralism, and phenomenology.
In the late 20th century a new concept was added to those included in the compass of both structure and function, the consideration of sustainability. To satisfy the contemporary ethos a building should be constructed in a manner which is environmentally friendly in terms of the production of its materials, its impact upon the natural and built environment of its surrounding area and the demands that it makes upon non-sustainable power sources for heating, cooling, water and waste management and lighting.