The Eight Parts of Speech

Look to the right and you will see a new link: Online Adult Grammar Book. Its title is
Traditional English Grammar: Description and Use, by Donald E. Hardy

This interactive book seems reasonably arranged and appropriately advanced for adults, although the first quiz seems far too advanced.

The book, like most grammars, starts by explaining the eight "parts of speech," which are the functional categories of English words. But the chapter has not eight, but nine sections.

As soon as the author has explained nouns, he digresses to discuss "frames." These are not parts of speech, but the word's neighbors in the sentence. Without knowing a word's frame, you cannot tell its function. Personally, I think it's great that the eight functions are introduced along with the idea of "frame."

This online grammar goes from NOUNS and FRAMES to
PRONOUNS
VERBS
ADJECTIVES
ADVERBS
PREPOSITIONS
CONJUNCTIONS
and
INTERJECTIONS

My problem? The very first quiz question in this book asks readers to identify a pronoun's person, number, and case. Yet at this point, the book has not, as far as I can see, mentioned terms such as second person or accusative.

I am puzzled, but will continue to work through Hardy's book so that I can review it for you more thoroughly. Watch this space, as they say.
Flesch Reading Ease 73.6
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level 6.5

Pronunciations I Never Knew

At the back of the Gregg Reference Manual, 9th edition, is an appendix of pronunciation problems. Some of its entries surprised me:

angina - "Medical professionals pronounce this ANN-jinn-uh. Others typically say an-JYE-nuh."
applicable - Gregg says to put the accent on the first syllable: A-plih-kuh-bul.
Celtic - The language is KELL-tick. The Boston team is SELL-tick.
conch - This is a seashell and is pronounced KONK.
corps - We all know that the singular is KAWR. The plural is pronounced KAWRZ but spelled "corps."
data - Gregg's pronounces this word DAY-tuh. Lots of people are going to disagree.
Metairie, city in Louisiana - Accent the first syllable: MET-uh-ree.
Natchitoches, city in Louisiana - Again, accent the first syllable: NACK-kuh-tish.

Well, I could go on. But here's one that isn't in Gregg's and used to trip me up:
Oaxaca, place in Mexico, is pronounced wuh-HAH-kuh.