GERUNDS

​A gerund is a form of a verb that ends in -ing that is used as a noun. As you may know, a verb is a word that refers to actions or states of being, and a noun is a word that we use to refer to people, places, things, and ideas. A gerund is like a blend of verbs and nouns. It looks like a verb, but it acts like a noun.

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For example, the word swimming is an example of a gerund. We can use the word swimming in a sentence as a noun to refer to the act of moving around in water as in Swimming is fun. When used in sentences, gerunds are treated as third person singular nouns (like he, she, and it).

​As stated already, gerunds look like verbs but behave like nouns. Likewise, gerund phrases behave like noun phrases. In practice, this means that gerunds and gerund phrases can be the subject of sentences/clauses or be the subject complement connected to the subject by an auxiliary verb (helping verb). Let’s look at examples of each of these ideas:

• Gerund as a subject: Sleeping is hard if you suffer from anxiety.

• Gerund phrase as a subject: Being rude to customers won’t earn you many tips.

• Gerund as a subject complement: His favorite activity is reading.

• Gerund phrase as a subject complement: The thing she hated most about school was getting up early.

​Just like nouns and noun phrases, gerunds and gerund phrases can be used as objects in sentences/clauses. They can be used as both direct objects as well as objects of prepositions:

• Gerund as a direct object: Helena has mastered fencing.

• Gerund phrase as a direct object: They hate mowing the lawn. 

• Gerund as an object of a preposition: He quickly resorted to begging.

• Gerund phrase as an object of a preposition: Holidays are perfect for visiting family.