Causative
Causative
Causative
Remember:
1. The causative has the meaning of 'someone causes someone to do something'.
2. The three verbs usually used for the causative are get,have, and make.
Examples:
a. John got Susan to rake the leaves.
b. John had Susan rake the leaves.
c.John made Susan rake the leaves.
Notice in a that there is a to in to rake.
Notice in b and c that there is no to.
3. Get gives the idea of persuasion, have is asking, and make is forcing or strong
convincing. There is not much difference between have and get.
causative have
Form
have + object + verb 3 past participle - have something done
have + object + infinitive - have someone do something
Meaning
1. We use causative when arranging for someone to do something for us.
causative have
We use the 'have something done' construction when we want to indicate that we have
arranged for other people to do something for us.
Compare the following sentences:
'He had the fence repaired.' (He arranged for somebody else to do it.)
'Are you going to redecorate the house yourself?' 'No, Im going to have it
redecorated.'
Take care with the formation of the causative. The past participle always comes after
the object, thus:
have + object + past participle
Look at these examples:
'Weve just had double-glazing fitted and the house is so much warmer now.'
'Its not surprising that you break down all the time, you never have your car
serviced.'
'When are you going to have your bad tooth taken out?'
'Joanna loves having her photograph taken, but David hates it.'
the causative can be used with a wide variety of different tenses and
constructions, e.g. past simple, present perfect, present simple, future
reference, 'like/dislike/love/hate' + -ing and so on.
In informal, spoken English, we also sometimes use the alternative 'get
something done' instead of 'have something done':
'When are you going to get your hair cut?'
'If you dont get the roof repaired before winter, youll be in serious trouble.
Note that this order of words, i.e. have + object + past participle, must
be observed as otherwise the meaning will be changed: he had his hair
cut means he employed someone to do it, but He had cut his hair
means that he cut it himself some time before the time of speaking (past
perfect tense).
When have is used in this way the negative and interrogative of this present and past
tenses are formed with do:
-
Do you have your windows cleaned every month? I dont have them cleaned;
I clean them myself.
He was talking about having central heating put in. Did he have it put in in the
end?
houses
The houses had their roofs ripped off by the gale.
Get can also replace have here:
The cat got her tail singed through sitting too near the fire. (The cats tail was singed
etc.)