Suggested Answers for Check Questions

As a preliminary assumption it may be assumed that finite clauses contain finite inflection. What this amounts to is that in a finite clause there is agreement with the subject in number and person, and there is some independent tense marking available as well. In a non-finite clause agreement with the subject is not so straightforward, and its tense will depend on the tense of some other finite clause. Less traditionally speaking, another diagnostic to distinguish between the two clause-types is the form of the complementiser introducing them: finite clauses can occur with that while non-finite clauses with for. This is somewhat unreliable, though, as not all non-finite clauses can occur with for, this is only to say that if a clause can, then it is non-finite. Thirdly, finite clauses can occur in isolation or as embedded clauses, while non-finite clauses can only occur in embedded context. In addition, a further property finite clauses they do not share with non-finite clauses is their ability to contain modals – modals are excluded from non-finite clauses. Lastly, the subject of a finite clause is in nominative Case while the subject of a non-finite clause is in accusative, or phonologically empty.