reported speech (present simple) – English Grammar Profiler
Point 12 in the category of REPORTED SPEECH for CITATION is defined as:
PRESENT SIMPLE of the reporting verb to report information from a written source and a present tense verb in the reported clause.
We can start our search with:
_nn1 says|tells
and then choose nouns related to citation:
1 REPORT SAYS 19880
2 BIBLE SAYS 18326
3 COMPANY SAYS 14282
4 WEBSITE SAYS 7829
5 USER SAYS 7386 6 LAW SAYS 7018 7 GOVERNMENT SAYS 6766 8 TITLE SAYS 5601 9 DOCTOR SAYS 5542 10 MAN SAYS 5254 11 TRUMP SAYS 5034
12 OFFICE SAYS 4807
13 MANUAL SAYS 4800 14 BIBLE TELLS 4687
15 ARTICLE SAYS 4571
16 NAME SAYS 4477
17 STUDY SAYS 4385
18 GROUP SAYS 4313
19 SITE SAYS 4008
20 SCRIPTURE SAYS 3831
21 DEPARTMENT SAYS 3700
22 BOOK SAYS 3605
23 LORD SAYS 3365 24 AGENCY SAYS 3337
25 MOTHER SAYS 3254
26 BOOK TELLS 3247
27 PERSON SAYS 3240
28 RESEARCH SAYS 3027
29 GUY SAYS 2994 30 FAMILY SAYS 2913 31 DOCTOR TELLS 2850
32 WOMAN SAYS 2845
33 STATEMENT SAYS 2809
34 HISTORY TELLS 2799 35 MOM SAYS 2766 36 PAGE SAYS 2754 37 WIFE SAYS 2743 38 LEGEND SAYS 2737 39 COUNCIL SAYS 2700
40 HUSBAND SAYS 2510
41 SOURCE SAYS 2447
42 FILM TELLS 2385
43 SERVICE SAYS 2383
44 DESCRIPTION SAYS 2347
45 EXPERIENCE TELLS 2343
46 PAPER SAYS 2336
47 ASSOCIATION SAYS 2318
48 AUTHOR SAYS 2312
49 TEXT SAYS 2253
50 CITY SAYS 2249 51 TEAM SAYS 2238 52 MINISTER SAYS 2147 53 APOSTLE SAYS 2145
54 OFFICIAL SAYS 2114
55 POST SAYS 2109
56 RESEARCH TELLS 2089
57 SOURCE TELLS 2069
58 FRIEND SAYS 2057
59 LETTER SAYS 1998
60 FATHER SAYS 1961
61 LABEL SAYS 1936
62 SCIENCE SAYS 1932
63 STORY TELLS 1876
64 COMPLAINT SAYS 1866 65 TEACHER SAYS 1859 66 DAD SAYS 1820 67 WORD SAYS 1751 68 KING SAYS 1737 69 LAWSUIT SAYS 1717 70 EXPERT SAYS 1666
71 GUT TELLS 1666
72 DOCUMENT SAYS 1629
73 MANAGER SAYS 1588 74 OWNER SAYS 1585 75 MAN TELLS 1580 76 APPLE SAYS 1562 77 LAWYER SAYS 1552 78 PRESIDENT SAYS 1547 79 RELEASE SAYS 1530 80 GOOGLE SAYS 1528 81 HOUSE SAYS 1515 82 COMMISSION SAYS 1510 83 SUIT SAYS 1510 84 SENSE TELLS 1488
85 SOCIETY SAYS 1460
86 STORY SAYS 1452 87 SURVEY SAYS 1452
88 SIGN SAYS 1437
89 DOC SAYS 1434
90 MESSAGE SAYS 1434
91 FIRM SAYS 1418 92 THEORY SAYS 1418 93 COURT SAYS 1404 94 BOSS SAYS 1388 95 BOARD SAYS 1366 96 UNIVERSITY SAYS 1365 97 BANK SAYS 1327 98 SPOKESMAN SAYS 1315 99 NARRATOR SAYS 1302
100 ADMINISTRATION SAYS 1299
This allows us to narrow down the search ngrams with”
statement|scripture|film|study|report|manual|website|bible|description
|paper|author|text|post|research|source|label|letter|document|survey
|message|sign|advert|book|report|article|story|journal says|tells * * * *
And we can now delete rows that have no chance of offering further present simple to the right:
1 FILM TELLS THE STORY OF A 363
2 FILM TELLS THE STORY OF THE 199 3 BOOK TELLS THE STORY OF A 193
4 BOOK TELLS THE STORY OF THE 186
8 BOOK TELLS THE STORY OF HOW 96 9 FILM TELLS THE TRUE STORY OF 66 10 BIBLE TELLS US THAT WE ARE 65
11 FILM TELLS THE STORY OF AN 62
13 BOOK TELLS YOU EVERYTHING YOU NEED 53 14 FILM TELLS THE STORY OF TWO 51 15 FILM TELLS THE STORY OF HOW 48
16 BIBLE TELLS US THAT GOD IS 47
19 BIBLE SAYS , ” THERE IS 38
21 SOURCE TELLS E ! NEWS THAT 36 22 BOOK TELLS THE TRUE STORY OF 35
23 BIBLE SAYS , ” DO NOT 34
28 FILM TELLS THE TALE OF A 30
30 BIBLE SAYS , ” GOD IS 29
32 STORY TELLS THE TALE OF A 29
35 BIBLE TELLS US TO LOVE OUR 26
37 BIBLE SAYS , ” THE LORD 25
38 BOOK TELLS THE STORY OF AN 25
40 BIBLE SAYS , ” IF YOU 23 41 BIBLE SAYS , ” IT IS 22 42 BIBLE TELLS US THAT IN THE 22 43 SOURCE TELLS E ! NEWS . 22
44 BOOK TELLS THE STORY OF TWO 21
47 BIBLE SAYS , ” THE WAGES 20 48 BIBLE TELLS US THAT GOD HAS 20 49 ARTICLE TELLS THE STORY OF THE 19
50 BIBLE TELLS US THAT IT IS 19
PELIC STUDENTS:
3129,fx9,Japanese,Female,175,5,w,374,1,30,
This is a thesis statement. It says there are three characteristics and does not say what they are. The writer is going to explain about each characteristic in each paragraph.