Sunday, July 19, 2020

Grammar: Water keeps you hydrated.

I'm going to do grammar analysis of the sentence: "Water keeps you hydrated". I got this sentence and suggestion to do grammar analysis from here.

I'll find verbs and choose the main one to organize the sentence around.

Keeps is a verb. Hydrated is too I think. 

I looked up "hydrated" in Merriam Webster dictionary. The "ed" version of the "hydrate" can only be a verb. 

I looked at apple dictionary and found that "hydrated" could be an adjective. 

verb [with object
cause to absorb water• Chemistry combine chemically with water molecules(as adjective hydrated:  hydrated silicate crystals.
But that definition is related to chemicals not people. And in this sentence I'm analyzing, "hydrated" is about a person not chemicals. Also for this definition, "hydrated" needs an object, which is not the case in the sentence I'm analyzing. So I think that "hydrated" being an adjective doesn't work.

"Hydrated" seems to be acting like an adjective in this sentence though. I tried out some sentences that are similar. 
  • "Alcohol keeps you drunk." Drunk is a state of being. I looked up "drunk" and it's a noun. I see an adjective version but that only works for modifying a noun like in "drunk driving". [1]
  • "I am drunk." Here "drunk" is a noun. 
  • "I am hydrated". Following the logic of the last sentence, I think "hydrated" is a noun.
  • "You remain drunk as long as you drink enough alcohol." Here "drunk" is a noun.
  • "You remain hydrated as long as you drink and retain enough water." Here "hydrated" is a noun.
I'll do outlining using brackets. 

<Water> <keeps> <you hydrated>.

So now I'll try to analyze the whole sentence.

Verb(action): keeps
    Subject: Water
    Object phrase: you hydrated
        Object: you
        Adjective: hydrated

I chose "adjective" for hydrated because of the structure of the sentence that I setup. It disagrees with my above work.

In "Water keeps you alive", "alive" is an adjective. This seems to have the same meaning-structure as "Water keeps you hydrated".

I looked in other dictionaries and found one that says hydrated is an adjective. This is from Cambridge Dictionary.

adjective
having absorbed enough water or other liquid
Be sure to stay hydrated during the race by drinking plenty of fluids
Hydrated skin looks younger and smoother.
So my analysis which says "hydrated" is an adjective is compatible with the above definition.

[1] How about "driving drunk"? Is drunk an adjective? I think so. So I should have recognized that "drunk driving" is the same as "driving drunk". And I should have decided that "drunk" is acting as an adjective in "Alcohol keeps you drunk".

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