Question forms: object/subject and the use of ‘do’

by | 17 Oct 2020 | General English, Grammar

Question forms

The typical word order in questions is:

Question word | auxiliary | subject | verb

examples: When does the class begin?, How does she do that?, What is that showing?

 

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subject/object

 

the subject in a sentence performs the action

 

Why does John watch football on Saturday.

When does she come home?

 

Whether the question is about the subject or the object is the decision of the person who asks. In English we can use either.

 

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the object in a sentence is the receiver of the action

 

Why does Bob sell fridges?

What does Cristina’s company sell?

 

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we don’t use do in present simple auxiliary questions with a modal verb

 

Will they return soon?

Could it break easily?

Won’t he make a quick decision?

 

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Do as an emphasis

Sometimes we want to emphasise what we are saying:

 

I do understand! (More emphatic than I understand). Maybe someone said that they understand but the listener did not believe them.

She does love me very much! (as above but with the third person conjugation)

They do wish that everyone would listen and stay at home! (people are no staying at home and ‘they’ (maybe for example,  the government) are frustrated)

That does look like a diamond! (The speaker is surprised)

 

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We use do in question tags

 

Tag questions are endings we add to questions to check information is correct or to make sure that someone answers.l

 

They don’t eat meat, do they?

They like non dairy cheese, don’t they?

He didn’t fall over, did he?

We don’t accept cheque payments anymore, do we?

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Do as a dummy auxiliary in ‘yes/no questions’

 

Do you practise English every day?

Don’t you take sugar?

Did they let you go to the park?

 

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… and to get information about the subject

 

Who did tell the student that the school is open today?

Why did you leave it on the floor?

Did they really say that?

 

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