At home means stay in the house
At church means inside the church
At sea means on a ship
At school means stay in the building school to learn
At hand means near by
2. Preposition of place ‘in’
The preposition of place in is to indicate that X occupies some or all the space Y Close, 1962: 141. The preposition of place in has an idea of within a
geographical location such as towns, valleys and countries Corder, 1979: 107. The uses of preposition of place in observed by some expert are presented in the
following pictures. Picture 4.
In inside In a room in a building
In a
garden in
a park
In a
town in
a country
In the water In the sea
In the river In
a row
in a
line In
a queue
The uses in sentences are: - There is no one in the shop.
- The children are playing in the garden.
- When we are in Italy, we spent a few days in Venice. - Robert lives in a small village in the mountains.
- Look at the girl swimming in the river. - I prefer to sit in the front row.
- Have you read the article in the newspaper? Murphy, 1990: 224
Some prepositions which requires preposition of place in are: - sit in armchair
- In a photograph - In the sky
- In hospital - In prison
For example: - Who is the woman in the photograph?
- It was a lovely day. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. - Don’t sit in that armchair. It’s broken.
- Tom’s father is in hospital. There are also principles collocations with the preposition of place in
Corder, 1979: 115-6, such as: In place
means in a certain place. In bed
means lay on a bed.
3. Preposition of place ‘on’
The preposition of place on according to Close 1962, p.142 is used:
a. in relation with a line one dimension e.g. I am on my way home.
We are on the motorway. b. to indicate location on a surface two dimension
Picture 5.
On the ceiling On the wall
On the floor
For example: - Don’t sit on the floor.
- There is a dirty mark on the wall on the ceiling. - Have you seen the notice on the notice-board?
- There is a report of the football on page 7 of the newspaper. - The book you are looking for is on the top shelf on the table.
- Don’t sit on the chair. It’s broken. - Our flat is on the second floor of the building.
Murphy 1990, p.235 gives the uses of preposition of place on as follows: 1 Idiomatic expression with prepositions of place on.
on the left on the right or on the left right-hand side
e.g. In Britain we drove on the left. or…on the left hand side
2 To indicate location on a small area, such as a small island. e. g. Tom spent his holiday on a small island of the coast of Scotland.
3 To indicate enclosure in a geographical map, such as on the coast on a river on a road.
e, g.
London is on the river Thames. Portsmouth is on the south coast of England.
4. Comparison of the uses of preposition of place at, in and on
