General Forum
Start a New Topic 
Author
Comment
Identifying subject complements

Is the word "pressure" a subject complement in the sentence, She and the other contestants feel tremendous pressure to win.

Re: Identifying subject complements

Yes. Why? Because there is a "linking" verb (feel) followed by a noun (pressure). A subject complement, by definition, is the adjective, noun, or pronoun that follows a linking verb, the most common of which is any form of the verb "to be."

Re: Identifying subject complements

Yes! Pressure is a subject, because you can use it in a sentence for example ( mom i am under alot of pressure) whats the subject there pressure so yes it is.

hope that helped.

Re: Identifying subject complements

Jane
Is the word "pressure" a subject complement in the sentence, She and the other contestants feel tremendous pressure to win.


No, it's not, but I understand where you're coming from.

"Feel" in this sense means that she and the other contestants are the experiencers of pressure. Predicative complements (PCs) either denote a property that is ascribed to the subject, as in "Ed was very tired", or they specify something as in "Ed was a fine soldier".

But "tremendous pressure to win" neither describes the subject nor specifies it; instead it simply denotes something that is being experienced.

A useful test for a predicative complement is to replace the verb in question with "be":

She feels a complete idiot. ~ She is a complete idiot. OK
She feels tremendous pressure. ~ *She is tremendous pressure. WRONG!

As you can see, the NP "tremendous pressure" cannot be PC with "be", so it cannot be PC with "feel" either.

See what I mean?

PaulM