Gerund

In linguistics, “gerund” is a term used to refer to various non-finite verb forms in various languages:

• As applied to English, it refers to what might be called a verb’s action noun, which is one of the uses of the -ing form. This is also the term’s use as applied to Latin; see
  Latin conjugation.
  
• As applied to Spanish, it refers to an adverbial participle (a verbal adverb), called in Spanish the gerundio. The term gerundive is also applied to this.
  
• As applied to French, it refers either the adverbial participle — also called the gerundive — or to the present adjectival participle.
  
• As applied to Hebrew, it refers either to the verb’s action noun, or to the part of the infinitive that follows the infinitival prefix (also called the infinitival construct).
  
• As applied to Frisian, it refers to one of two verb forms frequentely referred to as infinitives, this one ending in -n. It shows up in nominalizations and is selected by perception verbs.
  
• As applied to other languages, it may refer to almost any non-finite verb form; however, it most often refers to an action noun, by analogy with its use as applied to English or Latin.
  

Contents 1 Gerunds in English 1.1 Verb patterns with the gerund 1.1.1 Verbs followed by a gerund or a to-infinitive 1.1.2 Gerunds preceded by an object or a genitive 1.2 Gerunds and present participles 2 See also

Gerunds in English

In English the gerund is identical in form to the present participle (ending in -ing) and can behave as a verb within a clause (so that it may be modified by an adverb or have an object), but the clause as a whole (sometimes consisting only of one word, the gerund)