Orsdxy

Which of these two is preferred?

A: Tea drinking is a British custom

B: Tea drunk is a British custom

P.S. What is it called when we say tea drinking instead of drinking tea?

Also, can we say the "tea drunk" sentence without beginning with "the"?

Tea drinking and drinking tea are both phrases that refer to the custom of consuming a beverage made by immersing the leaves of certain plants in hot water. The gerund drinking fits equally well before or after tea.

Tea drunk uses the past participle of drink to refer to tea that has been consumed.

For example:

Tea drinking (or drinking tea) is widely recognised as bringing health benefits.

and

The amount of tea drunk has increased since its health benefits were recognised.

Thus the first of your examples is correct. The second is not.

It's not grammatical to say that tea drunk is a British custom.

Yes, you can begin a sentence with tea drunk:

Tea drunk without sugar is better for you.

meaning that tea consumed without sugar is better for you.

Equally, you might write:

Drinking tea without sugar is better for you.

whereas to write

Tea drinking without sugar is better for you

is NOT idiomatic.

"Tea drunk" is not an idiom, and only makes sense with the meaning "[some] tea [which has been] drunk".

"Tea drinking" is a noun phrase, and its head is the verbal noun (gerund) "drinking". I would be inclined to hyphenate it ("tea-drinking").

"Drinking tea" is a full non-finite clause, which still has verbal qualities. For example, you can modify it with an adverb ("slowly drinking tea"), or elaborate the object ("drinking several cups of very hot tea").

"Tea-drinking" is a noun phrase where most of the verbal qualities have been leached out, so you can't do those things.

There is another use of the phrase "tea drunk", which has its origins in Chinese, as 茶醉 (cha zui, which literally translates to "tea drunk"). It's a state of being, named because it's similar to being drunk on alcohol, with symptoms including dizziness, weakness, and nausea. In this case, "drunk" is a noun and "tea" is an adjective specifying the type of drunkenness, similar to phrases such as "wine drunk" or "liquor drunk."

Example B would still not be correct with this interpretation, as it's not an activity that can be a custom. However, one could say something like "If you drink tea too quickly, you could get tea drunk."

Usable patterns:

• Drinking tea is nice.


• Tea drinking is a custom in some countries.


• Answering questions is difficult.


• Playing tennis is boring.

Tea drinking is subject matter. Drinking tea is the actual activity.

All those are activities. In English, we use gerunds as nouns all the time. Here they are all the subject of the sentences I have provided. Knowing that might be helpful to you. In this last case, "knowing that" is the subject made up of a non-action verb that can take a direct object.

Drinking too much is not good for you. [drinking, as in drinking alcohol]
Drinking wine with friends can be amusing.

Another usable pattern, past participle + prepositional phrase, used adjectivally:
The tea ||drunk at the gathering|| was from Japan.
The movie ||viewed at the conference|| was terrible.
The man ||seen on the bus|| was the spy.