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changes we have felt it necessary to make [parse of "necessary to make"]

English Language & Usage Asked on December 21, 2020

From a textbook:

The analysis of content clauses presented in this chapter differs in significant ways from that found in traditional grammar: in this section, therefore, we explain some of the changes we have felt it necessary to make.​

Is “necessary to make” an adjectival phrase?

Is “necessary to make” the object complement of “it“?

Thanks!

One Answer

It starts out as an extremely awkward sentence:

  • We have felt [for us to make changes] to be necessary

transformed by extraposition on the higher infinitive, moving the lower infinitive and inserting a dummy it:

  • We have felt it to be necessary [for us to make changes]

and then by deletion of optional material, the following sentence is produced:

  • We have felt it necessary [to make changes].

At this point we want to refer to those changes outside the clause, so we make changes into an antecedent NP with a relative clause

  • changes [(that) we have felt it necessary to make].

As you can see, the noun phrase has been extensively revised from its original syntactic shape. Two subordinate clauses have been stretched, sliced, and diced along the length of a main clause, with several rules applying. That's what transformations do to constituents -- they make them unrecognizable as one thing but still understandable as another. And there are a lot of them.

As for whether any particular stretch of this is an adjective phrase or an object complement, that isn't really important. Looking for labels to put on some possible string of words in some possible transformation of one sentence is not a particularly helpful strategy in understanding syntax.

Answered by John Lawler on December 21, 2020

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