Linking verbs | The parts of speech | Grammar | Khan Academy Video Lecture | Complete Course on English Grammar: Upgrade your Speaking & Listening - Personal Skills

hello grammarians today we're talking
about verbs and bears so we had
previously established at least one
thing about the verb and that was that
it can show actions but today I'd like
to introduce the idea that the verb can
link ideas to one another in fact we
have this whole class of verbs that we
call linking verbs or if you want to
call it something fancier we call that
state of being verbs these linking verbs
include all forms of the verb to be
which I have handily written out for you
so I am he is we are be nice they were
being they have been he was we were now
we use a linking verb when we want to
connect one idea to another so what I'm
going to do is I'm going to divide the
screen in half between the action side
and the state of being side just to show
you what I mean
so we use action verbs to show what
something does whereas we use state of
being verbs to show what something is so
let's bring it back to this bear let's
think of an action for this bear to do
what is a bear like thing to do the bear
eats a fish that's an action that's
something the bear is doing the bear is
hungry however is not something that the
bear is doing it's something that the
bear is so what is is doing here is
connecting the word hungry to the word
bear it's linking it some verbs can be
used both ways they can be used both as
actions and as linking verbs and I'll
show you an example of that you could
say the bear looked at me which is to
say the bear is doing a thing looking at
something namely me but we could also
say using the same verb the bear looks
lonely now in this case this is
describing how the bear looks what the
bear looks like this looking is not
something the bear is doing it is how
the bear appears to a viewer so looked
is connecting lonely to bear it is
linking lonely to bear it as a linking
verb
by the same token we could say for an
action the bear smells a person what is
it smelling a person but we could also
say the bear smells like cinnamon which
I grant you is pretty unlikely
don't go smelling bears but what what
smells is doing here is connecting the
idea of cinnamon to the bear the bear
isn't smelling cinnamon the bear smells
like cinnamon and that's the difference
between a linking verb and an action
verb as a linking verb shows what
something is an action verb shows what
something does so the bear is hungry the
bear looked and lonely the bear smells
like cinnamon these all reflect
something about what the bear is how
it's being you can learn anything Dave
it out