Definition and Examples of You Understood in English

Definition and Examples of You Understood in English In English grammar, you understood is the implied subject in most imperative sentences in the language. In other words, in sentences that convey requests and commands, the subject is almost always the personal pronoun you, even though its often not expressed. Examples and Observations In the examples below,  you understood  is indicated by square brackets:  []. As soon as she was on the sidewalk Mick caught her by the arm. You go right home, Baby Wilson. [] Go on, now!(Carson McCullers, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. Houghton Mifflin, 1940)I dont care if shes a murderer! [] Leave her alone! [] Get out of here and [] leave her alone! All of you! [] Get out of here!(Bethany Wiggins, Shifting. Bloomsbury, 2011)Youre not from around here, I say.[] Leave me alone.Youre from somewhere else. From EuropeYoure disturbing me. Id appreciate it if you would stop pestering me.(Elie Wiesel, Legends of Our Time. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968)Mrs. Bloxby sighed. Would you please leave, Mrs. Benson, and in future, would you telephone first? I am very busy. Please [] shut the door on your way out.Well, I never!Then its time you did. Goodbye!(M.C. Beaton [Marion Chesney], As the Pig Turns. St. Martins Press, 2011) You-Understood in Transformational Grammar Imperative sentences differ from others in that they lack subject noun phrases: Be quiet!Stand up!Go to your room!Do not smoke! Traditional grammar accounts for such sentences by claiming that the subject is you understood. Transformational analysis supports this position: The evidence for you as the subject of imperative sentences involves the derivation of reflexives. In reflexive sentences, the reflexive NP must be identical with the subject NP: Bob shaved Bob.Mary dressed Mary.Bob and Mary hurt Bob and Mary. The reflexive transformation substitutes the appropriate reflexive pronoun for the repeated noun phrase: Bob shaved himself.Mary dressed herself.Bob and Mary hurt themselves. Let us look at the reflexive pronoun that appears in imperative sentences: Shave yourself!Dress yourself! Any reflexive pronoun other than yourself results in an ungrammatical sentence: *Shave himself!*Dress herself! This fact provides evidence for the existence of you as the deep structure subject of imperative sentences. You is deleted by means of the imperative transformation, which is triggered by the Imp marker. (Diane Bornstein, An Introduction to Transformational Grammar. University Press of America, 1984) Implied Subjects and Tag Questions Some imperatives appear to have a third person subject as in the following: Somebody, strike a light! (AUS#47:24) Even in a sentence like this one, though, there is an understood second person subject; in other words, the implied subject is somebody among you all out there. Again, this becomes clearer when we tack on a question tagsuddenly the second person subject pronoun surfaces: Somebody, strike a light, will you? (AUS#47:24) In an example like this, it is quite clear that we are not dealing with a declarative, since the verb form would then be different: somebody strikes a light. (Kersti Bà ¶rjars and Kate Burridge, Introducing English Grammar, 2nd ed. Hodder, 2010) Pragmatics: Alternatives to the Plain Imperative If we have the feeling that a direct speech act might be perceived as a face threat by the hearer, there is quite a range of implicit directives, which are indirect speech acts . . . from which we might select something appropriate and less threatening to the others face. (28a) Shut the door.(28b) Can you shut the door, please?(28c) Will you shut the door, please?(28d) Would/could you please shut the door?(28e) Lets shut the door, shall we?(28f) Theres a draught in here. . . . [I]n Anglo culture there are scripts blocking the imperative (28a) and prescribing the interrogative (28 b, c, d). Though it may be perfectly acceptable among friends, the use of the imperative in (28a) is not appropriate when the speaker and hearer do not know each other well or when the hearer is of a higher social status or has power over the speaker. The use of the imperative as in Shut the door has the strongest impact on the hearer, but it is normally not used. (Renà © Dirven and Marjolijn Verspoor, Cognitive Exploration of Language and Linguistics, 2nd ed. John Benjamins, 2004)

3 Types of Sexual Life Cycles - Evolution

3 Types of Sexual Life Cycles - Evolution One of the properties of life is the ability to reproduce to create offspring that can carry on the genetics of the parent or parents  to the following generations. Living organisms can accomplish this by reproducing in one of two ways. Some species use asexual reproduction to make offspring, while others reproduce using sexual reproduction. While each mechanism has its pros and its cons, whether or not a parent needs a partner to reproduce or it can make offspring on its own are both valid ways to carry on the species. Different kinds of eukaryotic organisms that undergo sexual reproduction  have different types of sexual life cycles. These life cycles determine how the organism will not only make its offspring but also how the cells within the multicellular organism will reproduce themselves. The sexual life cycle determines  how many sets of chromosomes each cell in the organism  will have. Diplontic Life Cycle A diploid cell is a type of eukaryotic cell that has 2 sets of chromosomes. Usually, these sets are a genetic mixture of both the male and female parent. One set of the chromosomes comes from the mother and one set comes from the father. This allows a nice mixture of the genetics of both parents and increases diversity of traits in the gene pool for natural selection to work on. In a diplontic life cycle, the majority of the organisms life is spent with most of the cells in the body being diploid. The only cells that have half the number of chromosomes, or are haploid, are the gametes (sex cells). Most organisms that have a diplontic life cycle start from the fusion of two haploid gametes. One of the gametes comes from a female and the other from the male. This coming together of the sex cells creates a diploid cell called a zygote. Since the diplontic life cycle keeps most of the body cells as diploid, mitosis can happen to split the zygote and continue splitting future generations of cells. Before mitosis can happen, the cells DNA is duplicated to make sure the daughter cells have two full sets of chromosomes that are identical to each other. The only haploid cells that happen during a diplontic life cycle are gametes. Therefore, mitosis cannot be used to make the gametes. Instead, the process of meiosis is what creates the haploid gametes from the diploid cells in the body. This ensures that the gametes will have only one set of chromosomes, so when they fuse again during sexual reproduction, the resulting zygote will have the two sets of chromosomes of a normal diploid cell. Most animals, including humans, have a diplontic sexual life cycle. Haplontic Life Cycle Cells that spend the majority of their lives in a haploid phase are considered to have a haplontic sexual life cycle. In fact, organisms that have a haplontic life cycle are only composed of a diploid cell when they are zygotes. Just like in the diplontic life cycle, a haploid  gamete from a female and a haploid gamete from a male will fuse to make a diploid zygote. However, that is the only diploid cell in the entire haplontic life cycle.   The zygote undergoes meiosis at its first division to create daughter cells that have half the number of chromosomes compared to the zygote. After that division, all of the now haploid cells in the organism undergo mitosis in future cell divisions to create more haploid cells. This continues on for the organisms entire life cycle. When it is time to sexually reproduce, the gametes are already haploid and can just fuse with another organisms haploid gamete to form the zygote of the offspring. Examples of organisms that live a haplontic sexual life cycle include fungi, some protists, and some plants. Alternation of Generations The final type of sexual life cycle is a kind of mix of the two previous types. Called alternation of generations, the organism spends about half of its life in a haplontic life cycle and the other half of its life in a diplontic life cycle. Like the haplontic and diplontic life cycles, organisms that have an alternation of generations sexual life cycle begin life as a diploid zygote formed from the fusion of haploid gametes from a male and a female. The zygote can then either undergo mitosis and enter its diploid phase, or perform meiosis and become haploid cells. The resulting diploid cells are called sporophytes and the haploid cells are called gametophytes. The cells will continue to do mitosis and split in whichever phase they enter and create more cells for growth and repair. Gametophytes can then once again fuse to become a diploid zygote of the offspring. Most plants live the alternation of generations sexual life cycle.