1

Definition of the " leave" :to make or allow sb/sth to remain in a particular condition, place, etc.

  1. Leave the window open. (verb + object+ adjective)
  2. I Left the headlights on. ( verb + object + preposition)
  3. Don't leave the water running. (verb + object + verb-ing)
  4. He left the children to sleep in class. ( verb + object + to-infinitive)
  5. The hurricane left hundreds of tourists stranded at the airport. (verb + object +?)

Example 1 to 4 can be found in Oxford English Dictionary, Cambridge Dictionary or Collins Dictionary, yet Example 5 doesn't appear in these dictionary. Is "stranded" a past participle or an adjective?

Improve this question
11
  • 2
    Does this answer your question? 'devastated' ... verb or adjective? @BillJ's answer cuts to the chase. Or verb or adjective in "The blue page is *stapled* to the red page"??
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented May 8, 2021 at 15:30
  • Apparently, that post isn't the same as mine. They are different in construction(structure). In that post, the usage of" Stapled" is easy to understand. My post relates to construction of object complements.
    – user421993
    Commented May 8, 2021 at 15:42
  • 1
    You appear to be complaining that a particular sentence isn't an example sentence in the OED, but then asking about the label for some non-terminal node. I'm not clear on what the question is about, or whether there really is one, since non-terminal nodes can be labelled anything one wants, or unlabelled altogether.
    – John Lawler
    Commented May 8, 2021 at 16:40
  • 1
    'It left them dead' and 'The crash left him dead from internal injuries' argue for an adjectival usage here. With 'We were stranded', both the verbal (punctive passive) and the adjectival (= becalmed, stuck) usages are possible. Cf 'The window was broken'.
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented May 8, 2021 at 18:38
  • 1
    The Green Conspiracy points out the plethora of surface constructions in English that actually are the end result of quite different processes. E.g, They shot him dead, They burned him alive, They found him alive, They left him dead, They want him dead, They got him tired, They got him going, They got him injured, ... The NP-V-NP-Adj configuration, where Adj includes participles, is a surface structure favorite and doesn't have any single analysis; much less fixed non-terminal nodes.
    – John Lawler
    Commented May 8, 2021 at 19:23

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
1

leave + object + adjective

The construction for leave (v) when describing "after effects" is leave + object + adjective according to Cambridge.

If something leaves something else, a part or effect of it stays after it has gone or been used:

Ex, "The bomb blast left 100 people dead and dying."

OALD has something similar.

leave somebody/something + adj.

[transitive] to make or allow somebody/something to remain in a particular condition, place, etc.

In this case, "stranded at the airport" would qualify as a place.

Some people might call it a participial adjective.

Improve this answer

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .