Download Words and word classes

Morphology
Word Structure: Words and word
classes
Nancyy Kula
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Class 8: Words & word classes ( Radford et al. p125 139)
p125‐139)
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Class 9: Building words (Radford et al. p140‐
Class 9: Building words (Radford et al. p140
155)
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Class 10: Morphology across languages ( ad o d et a p 56 69)
(Radford et al. p156‐169)
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Office hours (Rm 4 209): Tuesdays 15 17
Office hours (Rm 4.209): Tuesdays 15‐17
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What are words?
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Classes of words
ƒ Lexical categories
ƒ Functional categories
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Labelled bracketing
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A: where are you going?
B shopping
B: shopping
A: what for?
B: some socks
k
A: whareying?
B: shing
A. Whor?
B: smsks
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A word is the smallest free form found in a language.
language
ƒ A free form is an element that ƒ
ƒ can occur in isolation
ƒ does not have an entirely fixed position
y
p
e.g. the birds left
birds avoid cats
cats chase birds
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(1) A giergy has arrived.
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Even if we do not know what giergy means we can infer that we can have;
the giergy
h i
two giergies
every giergy
a yellow giergy
We do this because we assign giergy to a word class.
word class
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Lexical words vs. function words
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Lexical words denote concrete objects, activities, ideas, events, states, properties, etc. (Dictionary words with specific meanings)
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Function words: words that fulfil a particular function in a sentence (cannot easily be u ct o
a se te ce (ca ot eas y be
assigned a dictionary meaning)
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(2) John thinks that Bill has been visiting Mary to ask for her help with the assignment which must be finished by Friday. Lexical words
Function words
thinks
hi k
visiting
askk
Bill
assignment
i
t
that
h
have been
to the
which
hi h
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cat house exercise
cat, house, exercise
Noun
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hit, sing, think
, g,
Verb
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red, tall, difficult
Adjective
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often, there, quickly
Adverb
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on through for
on, through, for
P
Preposition
iti
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How do we assign words to classes?
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By their meaning
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By their morphological properties
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By their distributional patterns
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Noun
Things
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Verb Actions
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Adjective
Properties
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Adverb Manners,Times, Places,
Manners
Times Places
Reasons, ... ƒ
P
Preposition ii R l i ( on mat))
Relations (cat
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Non‐things as nouns:
idea, singing
, g g ((is fun), redness
),
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Non‐actions as verbs:
remain, suffice, equal (2 + 2 = 4)
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Non‐properties as adjectives
N
ti dj ti
alleged (the alleged attacker), former (president), the singing detective
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A given word may have several different forms called inflected forms
forms, called inflected forms
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For nouns, verbs and adjectives the set of ,
j
inflected forms often help us identify the word class
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E.g. noun ‘cat’: singular cat, plural cats
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Plural form (only for count nouns, i.e. nouns denoting things that can be counted like cats, not mass terms such as water)
e cats, ot ass te s suc as ate )
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cats, criteria, knives, teeth, sheep
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How do we know that sheep is a plural form?
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Four (regular verbs) or five forms (some irregular verbs))
Regular verbs
Irregular verbs
walk
sing
walks
g
sings
walking
singing
sang
walked
sung
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Comparative/Superlative forms
Meanings
more green
Comparative
th the most green
t S
Superlative
l ti
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The comparative and the superlative can be formed by adding the endings ‐er
y
g
g
or ‐est to adjectives as in j
the following:
adjective
comparative
superlative
green
g
greener
g
greenest
g
happy
happier
happiest
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Adjectives: morphological properties
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However, some adjectives do not take these endings:
curious
*curiouser
curiouser *curiousest
curiousest
foolish *foolisher
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But *foolishest
more curious, most curious
more foolish, most foolish
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Adverbs can often be recognized as being derived from adjectives by adding ly
derived from adjectives by adding –ly
curiously, foolishly
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But they don’t have any other regular forms and are not inflected themselves
d i fl
d h
l
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Prepositions don’t take any special form and d
k
lf
d
don’t inflect
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We have seen how Lexical words can be categorised into classes in terms of meaning and in terms of their morphological structure.
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We now see how they can also be categorised with respect to their distribution.
with respect to their distribution
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(3)
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The children are applauding a crazy clown. Nouns
ƒ A noun is often preceded by a definite (the) or an p
y
( )
indefinite article (a/an).
ƒ Nouns can be modified by adjectives: crazy
y j
y clown.
ƒ Nouns cannot be modified by adverbs: * foolishly clown *clown foolishly
clown, *clown foolishly
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Verbs
ƒ Verbs can take nouns as complements or arguments:
( ) Th it t l k
(4) The waiter stole a cake
ƒ Verbs are modified by adverbs;
y
;
(5) The waiter laughed foolishly
ƒ Verbs do not take articles; are not modified by V b d t t k ti l t difi d b adjectives (6) * the steal ; *crazy stole
* the steal *cra stole
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Adjectives
ƒ Can be used with another adjective to modify a C b d ith th dj ti t dif noun; the crazy green clown
ƒ Unlike verbs: *steal applauding, or nouns.
ƒ An adjective can be used after a form of the verb j
be to denote a property of a noun; John is happy
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Adverbs
ƒ An adverb typically modifies a verb indicating A d b t i ll difi b i di ti how, when or why something happened or the d
degree of a property; carelessly
f t l l dropped.
d
d
ƒ Like adjectives two can be used to modify a verb;
the audience applauded the clown very enthusiastically.
y
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Thus when we hear a sentence we can identify the word classes in it and label them as follows:
the word classes in it and label them as follows
(7) John called Bill on Friday evening.
(7)
y
g
[NJohn] [Vcalled] [NBill] [Pon] [NFriday] [ADJevening]
(8) Bill laughed heartily
[NBill] [Vlaughed] [ADVheartily]
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We have identified the following major lexical word classes:
word classes
j
Adverbs and
Nouns Verbs Adjectives
Prepositions
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We can identify them by their meaning, their f
morphological properties
p
g
p p
or their distributional patterns.
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Function words can be differentiated from lexical words because they are not content words.
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They have grammatical rather than lexical meaning.
meaning
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They usually don’t have referents.
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They form a closed class.
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that, this
demonstratives
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and, but, or, as
conjunctions
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th / the, a/an, every
determiners
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him, her, who
pronouns
p
o ou s
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if, that, whether
complementizers
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can, will, must, have
auxiliaries
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Can be identified by their distribution:
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allow inversion in questions
ƒ May I go? Did John go? *Go John yesterday?
y g
g
y
y
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attract negation
ƒ John didn’t go. Mary will not eat. *John go not. ƒ
they can be emphasised (easily)
ƒ John did sing that song. ??John eats bread.
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Can be used as question tags
ƒ John came, didn’t he? John plays the violin, J h did ’t h ? J h l th i li doesn’t he? * John eats apples, eatsn’t he?
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Can be used in gapping
ƒ A: John ate the apple
A: John ate the apple.
ƒ B: Yes he did
ƒ C: No he didn’t
C N h did ’
ƒ B: yes he did!
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Co‐occurrence of lexical & function words
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Words of a given major lexical class (N, V, Adj ) will often be accompanied by Adj,) will often be accompanied by ƒ
particular kinds of function words
l k d ff
d
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or lexical words
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or phrases
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determiners (the, a, some, all, every, ...)
d
demonstratives
t ti
(thi (this man,...)
)
conjunctions
j
((Jack and Jill))
complementizers (If John comes...)
adjectives
dj i
(the fluffy toy)
h fl ff
relative clauses (the girl that/who is wearing a red coat)
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auxiliary verbs (may be being checked, will have been checked)
pronouns (she gave him a hat)
adverbs (arrived now, came quickly, ...)
adverbial clauses (left when Jill arrived/because she was bored...)
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modifiers
too, very, more/most, (tall) enough
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comparative phrases
p
more intelligent than ll
h
her brother
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We can now label more complicated sentences:
((9) John thinks that Bill has been visiting Mary to ask for ) J h hi k h Bill h b
i i i M k f her help with the assignment which must be finished by F id
Friday.
[NJohn] [
] [Vthinks] [
] [COMPthat] [
] [NBill] [
] [AUXhas] ]
[AUXbeen] [Vvisiting] [NMary] [Pto] [Vask] [Pfor] [PRNher] [Nhelp] [Pwith] [DETthe] [Nassignment] [PRNwhich] [AUXmust] [AUXbe] [Vfinished] [Pby] [NFriday].
Friday]
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Words can be divided into word classes.
ƒ We can broadly distinguish lexical from W b dl di ti
i h l i l f
function words.
ƒ The major word classes in lexical words are ,
,p p
, j
nouns, verbs, prepositions, adjectives and adverbs.
ƒ Word classes under function words include; auxiliaries, determiners, demonstratives, pronouns and conjunctions pronouns and conjunctions. ƒ
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Read Radford et al. Chapter 9: Building words (p162‐179)
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