what is the prepositional phrase in this sentence?

Question

Who says you can go around the world in eighty days?

Answer 1

no and yes , you have "around the world" and you have "in eighty days", however, ONLY 1 is actually FUNCTIONING as a Prep Phrase( tells you about spatiality- the distribution, distance, direction, area etc) they tell you about the when's, the how's, the what's, like someone's condition or associations , the where's -spatial etc) the other is ONLY in FORM. FUNCTIONING Prep Phrases contain a noun phrase "on the table, in the house"

Noun phrases USUALLY are happy to follow articles with (the, a) etc...and sometimes they don't as with "in eighty days"

ON is the Prep and "the table" is the NP. IN is the Prep and "the house" is the NP. BUT, these are STILL Prep Phrases!!

your sentence contains only 1 PP that actually FUNCTIONS as a PREP Phrase, the other part is a Prepositional phrase that is STRUCTUALLY a PREP Phrase, but it's not FUNCTIONING as one, it's function is that of an adverb, it's telling you more about the verb "go". "in eighty days" is telling you about WHEN you can go: Notationally set as PP:ADV-time

and "around the world" is notationally set as: PP:ADV-LOC

go is an intransitive verb therefore it doesn't have a DO (direct object) or rather it doesn't take a direct object. IT can stand alone, the verb go, you can stop the sentence at go> Who says you can go? it doesn't need a a direct object, so your FUNCTIONING Prep Phrase is just part of a larger NP.

you also have a modal in there, but I won't go there OK

hope this helps


so, the actual FUNCTIONING AND STRUCTUAL Prep Phrase in your sentence is "around the world"

you have an addl PP in FORM but it doesn't FUNCTION as one.

Answer 2

Kira is right; so there are actually two prepositional phrases in the sentence:

around the world
in eighty days

Prepositions are anything you can do to the box: around the box, through the box, over the box, in the box, etc. Also, if you remove a preponisitional phrase from a sentence, the sentence will still be complete (that's a good test if you're not sure).

Answer 3

around the world in eighty days

around and in are prepositions

Answer 4

'around the world'