English Copula | Linking Verbs | Adjectives and Adverbs

hey everybody Chris americo's here and in this video I'm going to tell you all about English copula now what does copula mean well let's think of it like this in most English sentences we have subject verb and object and where there's an object this is a transitive verb which means that the action moves from the subject to the object some verbs are not transitive and they do not show that the action moves away from the subject for example if we say he runs it's just the subject doing the action and the action is not transferred to an object but in English sometimes we just want to say more about the subject we just want to give more information about the subject and when we want to do that it's like in math when we use the equal sign and when you use the equal sign it means that a and B are the same right that it's the same thing a and B are different but they are still equal they are the same so when we use copular verbs in English it's like in math when we use this equal sign so let me show you a few examples of this probably the best example of a copular verb is the verb to be and I'm talking about when we use the verb to be in its usual meaning not as a helping verb right or not as a modal verb or any other type of verb just as the main verb in the sentence for example if we say I am a teacher then I is the subject am is the verb and then teacher just tells us more information about Who I am right so it's just giving us more information there's no action that's being transferred so sometimes we call these kinds of verbs linking verbs so copular verbs are like linking verbs and actually there are a lot of them so it's important that know them because something else that's important to remember is that adjectives give us more information about nouns and adverbs give us more information about verbs but adverbs also give us more information about adjectives and other adverbs so sometimes it's difficult to understand where we need to use an adjective and where we need to use an adverb but when we use popular verbs or linking verbs we use an adjective because we're not describing an action that's happening we're just describing the subject so let me give you a few examples of this first of all the word act we could say John acted strange we don't have to say John acted strangely because the verb act is a popular verb which means that it's just like an equal sign in math right like we said John acted strange this tells us that at some point in time John was strange it's the same as the verb to be or the word up here we can say jaalin appeared happy but he wasn't really happy so it's how he looked it's about him again it just adds more information about him and it doesn't add any information about any actions or verb about this right it's about John himself the verb to be is the most usual example we can say John is a hero right so John and hero are the same they are equal and remember that we need to have a verb in every sentence another verb that's very similar to the verb to be is the verb to become for example John became rich it's about something that changed about John right but it's still adding more information about John not about some action that he did next call in John called in sick so imagine that John doesn't want to go to work because he doesn't feel good and we can say that he called in sick we don't have to say he called in sick Lee or unhealthily no that's about how he did the action right but here we want to talk about him in the state that he was in when he called so we say he called in sick sick is about him sickly would be about how he called right this would be something different okay the next one is the verb to come and this one has a lot of different meanings but here what we really mean is when we use the verb to come like the verb to become so we might say something like the predictions came true and it means that the things that people said what happened in the future the predictions they became true right but usually we just used to come true this is a special verb and it has a special meaning that we use in this situation when someone talks about something in the future we can say it came true and this is a great example of how we use true which is an adjective with this verb and this is popular because there's no action that's being transferred here right all that's happening is we're getting more information about the prediction or for example if you go to a concert and everybody is very quiet and maybe some people are sleeping and then at one moment in the concert everybody becomes very active we can say the audience came alive right came alive so again we use an adjective here because this is a popular or linking verb okay our next example is the verb to come out and to come out really is like the verb to turn out so it's like the result of something so here we can really see that it's like an equals sign right so for example you're baking some bread and you can say the bread came out delicious and you don't need to say deliciously right this would be about some action that happened like coming out or moving out of the oven right this would be strange it didn't walk out of the oven deliciously it has the result the final result that it is delicious so it came out delicious all right next is the verb to constitute and we don't use it a lot so I'll just give you a quick example for example nouns constitute one of the largest categories of words in English there you go okay a little more important of a word is the verb to die I know it's sad but we still have to talk about it sometimes and we could say for example she died young and here we need to say young as an adjective again because die is a popular verb we don't say young Li right we need to use an adjective and the next one might surprise you it's the verb to eat and we could say he eats healthy or he eats unhealthy and yeah we can use an adjective here because you know we have this funny phrase in English you are what you eat and so here you can really see again it's like an equal sign in math you are what you eat and you and what you eat are the same so think of that next time when you're speaking English and you want to talk about the way that somebody eats what you're really saying is something about that person okay our next example to emerge we could say John emerged shocked from the accident and emerged to come out of a situation right to come out of something but it's about being again how that person is when they come out of some situation or something right so he emerged from the accident and he was in the condition of being shocked he was shocked when he came out of the accident so he emerged shocked from the accident okay another one is end up this is kind of like come out because it talks about the final result of things so you could say I went to the beach and I put on sunscreen or Sun lotion but I ended up sunburned so here again I'm using an adjective it's about a condition that I'm in right so I ended up sunburned this is about me more information about how I was after this experience right now this one should not be surprising the word equal in the verb to equal so I keep telling you in math you know equals so if you didn't really understand what that word meant I think this example will help you 4 plus 4 equals 8 so 8 + 4 plus 4 actually written differently they look differently right and when we speak we speak about them differently but in the end they are the same that's what equal means that they are really just the same okay our next example is with the verb to get and I know you're probably thinking Chris there's a million meanings of the verb to get and I agree it's really difficult to learn them all but what we're talking about here is when we say get good like become so for example you're speaking to someone and you say something that they don't like you could say John got upset John got upset and this means that he was not happy about something right he became like this it's about him this is a popular verb and very similarly we can use the verb to go like to become for example she went insane she went crazy right so every day that I listen to this noise I go crazy you can say something like this and it's about how you become so it's again about you it's not about the action itself as you can see a lot of these verbs really just mean to become and just give you a little bit more of a meaning you know type of meaning in each situation but in general we could say that a lot of these words are the same as the verb to become and here's another example to grow for example the more I spoke with the man the more suspicious I grew now to grow suspicious we can also say to become suspicious they're the same but we have the verb to grow that we can use in this way so when we use it like this then it is a copular verb all right another example is the verb to fall and we use this a lot when someone is sick or ill we can say he fell ill so again it's like to become he became hill but he fell ill highlights that you know this was a negative thing and it's a low point for him all right our next example is the verb to feel after a long day of work you might feel exhausted and if you live somewhere where it gets cold in the winter then you might have a pond or river or lake near your house that freezes solid yeah we can say that the lake is frozen solid or the lake froze solid so it's like it became solid our next example is with the verb to keep and we could tell someone keep still it means don't move or keep quiet means don't make a noise right so basically it means stay how you are or be the same so of course this is not about an action it's just more about you now our next example I honestly don't use a lot but I have heard it in newspapers and on the news on television and things like that so if we talk about politics we could say that this district leans liberal and so lean which means to not stand straight right if we stand straight we're like this and if we stand like this we are leaning maybe you know a famous tower in Pisa Italy called the leaning tower of well we could say that this group of people leaned in one direction and this means that they have this opinion alright the next one should be really easy to understand it's the verb to look and so we can say that this person has this appearance right we could say John looks angry and that's how he appears to us another one that is about appearing is the verb to play yeah to play can be popular and so we could say this about an animal maybe the animal is playing dead yeah so we use this adjective dead to talk about how it appears and that's really what we're talking about when we use the verb to play like this our next example is with the verb to prove and this is really just another way to say to be because it's talking about how it really is so it's like really to be for example I thought the exam would be easy but it proved very difficult so it's similar to end up or come out right the end result was that this exam was difficult it proved to be difficult or it proved difficult another one that we can use in this way as a copular verb is to remain and this means to stay or not to change right to continue to do something so we can say remain calm we don't say remain calmly right we say remain calm because this is a linking verb a copular verb now here's one that a lot of people get confused with this is the verb to run and maybe there's some kind of idea that's very popular in your family or your group of friends and you can say well let's say that it's patriotism you guys really love your country and you say patriotism runs deep in my family so we can say runs deep not deeply runs deep this is probably one of the only situations when we use it like this but it's an interesting one okay another one that is about appearances is the verb to seem so this is like the verb to be but how it appears to us right so he seemed to be in a hurry and we could say he seemed rushed right if we want to use an adjective to provide more information about he about the subject so you know if we have this example he seemed rushed then we can say that because it's a popular verb another one that is used very often like this is the verb to shine and we can say for example the stars are shining bright so it talks about something that they're doing right it seems like it's an action like shining would be an action but there's no transfer of this action at all so when we say the stars shine bright it's really talking about just a quality that they have it's just giving us more information about the subject because this is a copular verb again now one thing that you can remember is that the verbs of the senses are usually popular when we use them in these ways like when we said look we said he looks angry and so this is how it appears to me right another one is smell we could say this smells terrible or to sound that sounds great so after these verbs we use adjectives not adverbs and another one that we can use that means not change or to stay the same is well the verb to stay we can use the verb to stay like stay calm right like we said remain calm we can also say stay calm or we could say everyone left and John stayed alone so he existed he was alone okay our next example is with the verb to take and you probably remember when we had the verb to fall it was about being ill right where is it here it is I'm trying to stay away from it fall hill well another way that we can say to fall ill is to take ill yeah it means the same thing and so we could say he took ill and stayed home he fell ill and stayed home if you fall ill you need to go to the hospital if you take ill you need to go to the hospital they're the same all right our next example is the verb to taste and to taste is another verb of the senses we can say this tastes wonderful or it tastes salty or something like this right we use an adjective so don't forget that about verbs of the senses all right our next example is the verb to turn and this is very close to the verb to become we could say he turned angry when I told him the bad news like he became angry or he got angry right they're all very similar and this is another example of that now the next one is not just the verb to turn but to turn up and this is again very close to end up or come out or prove right it's about that last result that final result so turn up can be about that final situation or the final result of the actions that we were taking and maybe everybody is trying to find a person nobody can find them and they think that he is missing they looked and they looked and he turned up missing so in the end this was his condition this was his state so this is another popular verb and our last example for today is the verb to wax and you're probably thinking what does that mean or you're thinking well how can that be used as a verb right to wax well maybe you know what that means to wax it's like you put something special in your car and now your car is very smooth and shiny well this is wax you make wax from candles this is wax or you mean candles from wax I guess would be more correct to say but the verb to wax means something very different it's like to have a feeling and to have emotions about something so there's a phrase that we use a lot to wax nostalgic and I don't think we use it a lot and not in spoken English but in written English you might see this so we could say John waxed nostalgic and this means that he had strong emotions or feelings about something from the past so I hope that this video helped you understand copula in English and how we can understand these words and why we use adjectives with them instead of adverbs I know that it's really confusing for a lot of people out there who are learning English because you learned that adverbs talk about verbs and here we have verbs right all of these words behind me are verbs but we don't use adverbs with them and so this explains why we don't use adverbs with these kinds of verbs and it's really just about the meaning that is being used with that verb right so that's what we really need to understand is this whole idea of copula or this equal sign in math so I hope you like this video by the way if you liked this and you want more videos like this then press subscribe press like leave a comment down below I also have a speaking club called everyday English where you can speak with me and with other native speaking teachers every day we have lots of lessons I think we have seven or eight lessons every day right now and we're always trying to add more so when more students join there's more lessons it's a great program and I'd highly suggest coming over in practicing speaking with us you can try it one month and if you don't like it you can stop that you know that's your choice also if you send me your feedback you can get my course called all about articles 100% for free yeah all you have to do is send me your feedback and I'll give you the course for free I'm very serious about this so if you want to understand how you can send me your feedback there's a link under this video just click that link and you can go to the page and read more about what you need to do to do this if you're interested in that but if you really want to learn English and you want to learn how to speak it I highly highly suggest our everyday English speaking program thanks for watching and I hope to see you in the next video bye bye

Channel: English With Kris Amerikos

Views: 46,290

Keywords: copula, English copula, English grammar lessons, best English grammar lessons, adjectives and adverbs in english, english adverbs, english adjectives, copular verbs, linking verbs

Id: vEXJEpB4B-o

Length: 22min 18sec (1338 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 04 2020