Download Syntax (LANE-334)

King Abdulaziz University
Department of European Languages & Literature
Syntax (LANE-334)
Chapter 2
Constituents
Dr. Abdulrahman Alqurashi
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Words
 How do we identify word boundaries?
e.g. Johnhastwobrothersandonesister.
• It is our linguistic competence which
allows us to do that.
• linguistic competence is the linguistic
knowledge possessed by native speakers of a
language.
• e.g. John-has-two-brothers-and-one-sister.
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Word Classes
 Word classes in English are:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Nouns
Verbs
Adjectives
Adverbs
Prepositions
Pronouns
Determiners
Conjunctions
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Nouns
Subtypes
• Count noun = (it can be counted. e.g. one chair, two
chairs )
• Mass noun = ( it is uncountable. e.g. *one furniture,
* two furnitures)
*********
• Common noun = ( it can be modified by a determiner.
e.g. the chair, the boy, these books)
• Proper noun = ( it can not be modified by a
determiner. e.g. *The Ahmad is writing, *The Jeddah is
a beautiful city)
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Nouns
Forms:
• Singular (e.g. The teacher is teaching his child)
• Plural (e.g. The teachers are teaching their children)
Grammatical functions:
• Subject (e.g. Ahmad wrote a book)
• Object (e.g. Ahmad met Ali yesterday)
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Noun Phrases
The noun is the head of the noun phrase.
• The head is the central element (non-omissible) of the
phrase.
• For example:
• [NP The teacher ]
= [NP
teacher ]
• [NP The math teacher ]
= [NP
teacher ]
• [NP The good math teacher ]
= [NP
teacher ]
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Noun Phrases
 Elements before the head:
• The head noun can be preceded by a determiner or
an adjective.
 a Determiner can be:
• a definite article such as the
• an indefinite article such as a and an.
• a possessor pronoun such as his , her, their, our, my, your and
its.
• a demonstrative pronoun such as this , that, these and those.
• a numeral such as one, two, three ….
• an item like some, any, each, every, all, both, half, many, much ,
which and whose
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Noun Phrases
Determiners are specifiers because they
specify what person or thing is indicated by (or referred
to by) the NP.
 Determiner = grammatical category
 Specifier = grammatical function
• Examples:
• [a student], [ the student]
• [his book] , [their books]
• [this car], [these cars]
• [two boys], [all girls], [some girls]
 Items like some, any, each, every, all, both, half, many, much are
known as quantifiers
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Noun Phrases
Determiners may be:
• Predeterminers (e.g. half, all , both)
• Central determiners (e.g. the, a, my, that , this …)
• Postdeterminers (numerals such as two, three, …)
Determiners
predeterminers
central determiners
postdeterminers
• e.g. [ NP Both the two students] passed the exam.
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Noun Phrases
 Elements before the head:
• The head noun can also be preceded by an adjective.
 Adjectives are modifiers because they modify the
head noun.
• Examples:
• [smart boy] , [easy job] , [expensive book]
 Adjectives which precede the nouns are called premodifiers and they follow determiners
NP
determiners
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pre-modifiers
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NOUN
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Noun Phrases
 Elements after the head:
• The head noun can also be followed by other
elements such as relative clauses.
 Elements that follow the nouns are called postmodifiers.
• Examples:
• [NP The car [ which you bought]] is stolen
• [NP The tall man [ with the red hair]] entered the room.
NP
determiners pre-modifiers NOUN
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post-modifiers
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Personal pronouns
Plural
Possessive Possessive
determiner
pronoun
reflexive
First person
I
me
my
mine
myself
Second person
you
you
your
yours
yourself
Masculine
he
him
his
his
himself
Feminine
she
her
her
hers
herself
Neutral
it
it
its
its
itself
First person
we
us
our
ours
ourselves
Second person
you
you
your
yours
yourselves
Third person
they
them
their
theirs
themselves
Third person
Singular
Subject Object
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Personal pronouns
A pronoun can be linked with another NP in the
sentence or outside the sentence.
 Pronouns are referential.
• e.g. Ahmad met Khaled at the university. He gave him a book.
 The noun Ahmad and the pronoun he are co-referential.
 The noun Khaled and the pronoun him are co-referential
• e.g. Ahmad met him at the university.
 The noun Ahmad and the pronoun him are not co-referential.
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Personal pronouns
Possessive determiners precede the noun
(they must be followed by a noun).
• e.g. I like my car very much.
• e.g. * I like my very much.
Possessive pronouns can be used to replace a
complete noun phrase (NP).
• e.g. This is your car. [NP My car] is there.
• e.g. This is your car. Mine is there.
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Verbs
 Main verbs or lexical verbs
e.g. (go, read, buy, travel , … etc.)
 Auxiliaries (AUX) or helping verbs
e.g. (is, are, was, has, have, had, will , … etc.)
Grammatical functions:
 Predicate
• A predicate might be a single word or a group of words.
• e.g. Ahmad left.
• e.g. Ahmad will leave.
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Verbs
Forms:
 Main verbs and auxiliaries can have different forms
depending on the following:
Tense
• Past e.g. Omar wrote a book last year.
• Present e.g. Omar writes a book every year.
• Future e.g. Omar will write a book next year.
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Verbs
 Agreement
 In many languages, verbs agree with their subjects.
 Examples:
• (The man / he / the lady / she ) is sleeping.
• (The men / they / you ) are sleeping.
• (The man / he / the lady / she ) teaches English.
• (The men / they / you ) teach English.
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 Modal auxiliaries or Modals:
(e.g. will - would, can - could, may-might , shall, must)
 Examples:
• Omar will meet the king.
• He said that he would meet the king.
• you can speak English
• you could speak English
• It may rain today.
• It might rain
• The students should come early to the class.
• The students must study hard to pass the exam.
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 Other types of auxiliaries
• There are auxiliary verbs which are not models such as:
•
•
•

have- has - had
be (am, is, are, was, were)
do - does – did
Primary auxiliaries are used to indicate the aspect and the voice of
the sentence. They can also be used as main verbs.
 Aspect: A term typically used to denote the duration of the activity
described by a verb (i.e.whether the activity is ongoing or completed)
 Perfect Aspect
 Indicated by the auxiliary verb have + past participle form:
• e.g. Mary has taken the medicine.
• e.g. I have taken my medicine.
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 Primary Auxiliary
 Progressive Aspect (in progress activity)
 Indicated by the presence of the auxiliary be + main verb-ing
such as:
• Mary is taking the medicine.
• Mary was taking the medicine when John entered the room.
 Voice: A term refers to whether a sentence or a clause is
ACTIVE or PASSIVE.
 Active Voice:
• e.g. The thieves stole the jewels.
 Passive Voice
• e.g. The jewels were stolen by the thieves.
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Verb phrases (VP)
The verb is the head of the verb phrase.
• e.g. The student passed the exam.
• e.g. [S [NP The student] passed [NP the exam]].
 Is the verb passed constitute a verb phrase?
• No.
• Clefting and fronting suggest that the verb passed is not
a constituent as shown below:
• * It is passed that the student the exam.
• * Passed the student the exam.
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Verb phrases (VP)
 Pseudo-cleting shows that the passed the exam is a
constituent as shown below:
• what the student did was pass the exam.
• [S [NP The student] [VP passed [NP the exam]]].
 The NP [the exam] is a part of the VP. It completes the
meaning of the verb passed.
 The NP [the exam] is called a complement of the verb
passed.
 Complements are those elements
presence is syntactically required.
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Verb phrases (VP)
 Verb Complements


•
•

•
•

•
•
Consider the following:
Intransitive verb
The boy laughed.
The verb laughed takes no complement.
VP
V
The story was interesting.
Copula verb
The verb was requires the AdjP [interesting ] as its complement.
VP
V AdjP
Ahmad finished the course.
Monotransitive verb
The verb finished takes the NP [the course] as its complement.
VP
V NP
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Verb phrases (VP)
 Verb Complements
Ditransitive verb
 He told the girl an interesting story.
• The verb told requires two complements: the NP [the girl ] and
the NP [an interesting story].
• VP
V NP NP
Complex transitive verb
 He called him stupid.
• The verb called requires two complements: the NP [him] and the
AdjP [stupid ]
• VP
V NP AdjP
Intransitive verb
 He drove towards the mountains.
• drove requires the PP [towards the mountains] as its complement.
• VP
V PP
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Verb phrases (VP)
 Verb Complements
Transitive verb
 The boy put the cup on the table.
• The verb put requires two complements: the NP [the cup] and the
PP [on the table].
• VP
V NP PP
 A verb subcategorizes for a certain type of complements
(i.e. a verb occurs inside a certain frame and must be
followed by certain classes of categories).
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Verb phrases (VP)
 Subcategorization frames for verbs:
Head
Complements
Verb types
Verbs like laugh, sleep,
-------
Intransitive
Verbs like is , are
AdjP , NP or PP
Copula
Verbs like say ,…
NP or S
Monotransitive
Verbs like told , send, …
NP+ NP or NP + PP
Ditransitive
Verbs like call
NP + AdjP or NP
Complex transitive
Verbs like move, lean
PP
Intransitive
Verbs like put
NP - PP
Transitive
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Verb phrases (VP)
 Verb Complements are obligatory.
 Adjuncts are optional.
Adjuncts
 e.g. The boy put the cup on the table last night.
• The verb put requires two complements: the NP the cup and the
PP on the table .
 What about [last night ] ?
• It is optional. The verb does not require [last night ] as its
complement. It is called an adjunct.
Adjuncts are those elements whose presence is
syntactically optional.
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Verb phrases (VP)
Auxiliaries precede main verbs in certain order:
tense
models
perfect
progressive
passive
main verb
suffix
Ø
may
have
been
-----
work
_ing
_ed
could
have
------
been
stole
_n
• e.g. She may have been working in the garden.
• e.g. My car could have been stolen.
 What is the grammatical function of auxiliaries?
 They are specifiers.
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Adjectives
Adjectives describe nouns or pronouns.
 For example:
• Ahmad is smart.
• He is smart.
 Adjectives may have different forms depending
on the degree of quality they express:
(base
> comparative
> superlative)
• Mary is nice, Philip is nicer, but James is the nicest.
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Adjectives
 Longer adjectives cannot be graded by adding -er, -est
to the base. We must add more and most before the
adjective to form comparative and superlative like e.g.
:
• She is ambitious,
• She is more ambitious than her sister
• She is the most ambitious student in the first year.
 There are also irregular degree of comparison
such as:
• good > better > best
----- bad > worse > worst
• little > less > least
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Adverbs
Adverbs modify verbs.
 Adverbs may have corresponding adjectives and
they are formed by adding -ly
 For example:
• kind (Adj) > kindly (Adv).
• beautiful (Adj) > beautifully (Adv).
 There are other adverbs which have no
corresponding adjectives like :
• e.g. soon, well, then, there , fast , now.
 Some elements can be both adverbs and
adjectives such as early, fast, hard and late.
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Adverbs
 Like adjectives, adverbs may have different
forms depending on the degree of quality they
express:
(base > comparative > superlative)
• early > earlier
> earliest.
• slowly > more slowly > most slowly
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Adjective phrases (AdjP)
Adjectives are Heads of adjective phrases.
 An adjective may be preceded by an adverb
phrase which specifies it.
• e.g. Ahmad is[AdjP [AdvP [Adv very ]] [Adj smart ]].
 An adjective may also be followed by a PP or a S
which serves as a complement.
• e.g. Ahmad is [AdjP [ Adj worried ][PP about the future]].
• e.g. Mary is[AdjP [Adj afraid] [S that she might die]].
 e.g. Mary is[AdjP [AdvP [Adv extremely] [Adj afraid] [S that
she might die]].
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Adjective phrases (AdjP)
Function
Specifier
Head
Complements
Category
(AdvP )
adjective
PP / S
[Adj handsome]
[Adj worried]
[Adj afraid]
-----[PP about his future]
[S that she might die]
[AdvP very]
Examples [AdvP extremely]
[AdvP extremely]
 Adjective phrases may occur as a Premodifier (adjunct)
inside a NP or as Predicative complement inside VP:
• He likes [NP the [AdjP German] [N girl] ]
• Her voice [VP was [AdjP very soft]]
• She [VP is [AdjP afraid that she might die]]
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Adverb phrases (AdvP)
Adverbs are Heads of adverb phrases.
 An adverb may be preceded by another adverb
which specifies it.
• e.g. Ahmad came [AdvP [AdvP [Adv very ] ] [Adv soon ]].
 Adverb phrases may occur inside a VP or an
AdjP
• He [VP left [AdvP [AdvP [Advvery] ] [Adv early] ] ]
• She is [AdjP [ AdvP [Adv typically] ] [ Adj British] ]
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Adverb phrases (AdvP)
Function
Specifier
Head
Category
(AdvP )
adverb
[AdvP very]
[Adv recently]
[Adv typically]
[Adv slowly]
Examples
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[AdvP extremely]
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Prepositional Phrases (PP)
Prepositions function as the Head of a PP.
 Prepositions may consist of:
• only one word like e.g. on, at, in, over, under, inside, outside, …
etc.
• or more than one word like e.g. in relation to , with respect to
, because of , in favour of , in aid of
 Prepositions can be followed by some elements
which are called prepositional complements like:
• [PP [P in] [NP the corner] ]]
• [PP [P with ] [NP red hair] ]]
• [PP [P about ] [NP this topic] ]]
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Prepositional Phrases (PP)
Prepositions can be preceded by some element
which are called specifiers like:
•
•
[PP [ AdvP [Adv right]] [P on ] [NP the spot]]
[PP [AdvP [Adv straight ]] [P through ] [NP the wall]
PPs may occur within other phrases such as
VPs , NPs.
• e.g. He [VP met her [PP at the entrance]].
• e.g. [NP the noise [ PP in the room]]
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Function
Specifiers
Head
Complements
Category
AdvP / NP
Preposition
NP
Examples
[AdvP straight]
[NP two minutes]
[P before]
[NP his arrival]
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Conjunctions
Conjunctions serve to link sentences/clauses, or
phrases.
 Conjunctions can be subdivided into:
 Coordinators like e.g. and, or, but , for … etc.
• a) John got up and walked out.
• b) Not Paul, but Bill failed his finals.
• c) We had to hurry, for we were late.
 Subordinators like e.g. when, before, that, if, because
,although , so that, as soon as … etc.
• a) The snake killed the rat before it swallowed it.
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Conjunctions
• b) He didn’t go, because he felt ill.
• c) They came back early, in order that they could see the film on
TV.
 A subordinator is referred to as Complementiser
because it appears in COMP position.
 Coordinators appear between two clauses
whereas subordinators are parts of the
subordinate clauses. As a result, subordinators can be
fronted but not coordinators:
•
•
a) Before it swallowed it, the snake killed the rat.
b) * And it swallowed it, the snake killed the rat.
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Clauses and sentences
Sentences are used to give information
(Declarative sentences) or to ask for information
(interrogative sentences).
 Interrogative sentences may be:
 Yes/ no question
• They are used to ask for the answer yes or no.
• They are introduced by an auxiliary.
• e.g. Do you like swimming?
 Wh-question
• They are used to ask for a specific information (e.g. time, reason,
thing, place, ...)
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Clauses and sentences
 Wh-question
• They are used to ask for a specific information (e.g. thing, time,
reason, place, ...).
• They are often introduced by a wh-word (what, where, when and
which) or by a word like how.
 Examples:
• What did she say?
• When did she go?
• Where did she go?
• How did she get to know you?
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Clauses and sentences
Declarative sentences are used to make
statements. They may be:
 Simple sentences are those that normally contain one statement.
• e.g. Ahmad works in the airport.
(Main clause)
 Compound sentences are those which contain two or more
clauses of equal status joined by a coordinator (and, or , but).
• e.g. [[ The snake killed the rat] and [ it swallowed it]].
(Main clause)
(Main clause)
• [ S1 [S2 ] coord [S3] ].
 Complex sentences are those which contain two or more
clauses that are not equally balanced ( i.e. one main clause + one or
two subordinate clauses).
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Clauses and sentences
Examples:
• [S1 I knew [S2 that the snake killed the rat.]]
• [S1 The snake killed the rat [S2 before it swallowed it.]]
• [S1 The policeman ask me [S2 what I had seen there]]
(main clause)
(subordinate clause)
• [ S1 [S2 subord ] ]
 A clause is a group of words that contain a verb.
 A clause may be a part of a sentence or it may be a
complete sentence in itself.
 A main clauses is the one that makes sense on its own.
 A subordinate clause depends on the main clause for its
meaning. It cannot stand alone.
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Clauses and sentences
Complementizers and COMP position
 Elements such as that, whether, if and for , etc are
called complementizers and they occupy COMP
position.
• [ S They know [CP [comp that ] [S the snake killed the
rat.]]]
• [ S They asked [CP [comp whether ] [S they might go home
early]]]
• [ S They asked [CP [comp if ] [S they can go home]]]
• [ S The asked [CP [comp why ] [S the snake killed the
rat.]]]
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Clauses and sentences
Complementizers and COMP position
S
NP
PRN
VP
V
CP
C
They
They
They
They
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S
know
the cat killed the rat
asked if
they can go home
asked whether they can go home
asked why
the cat killed the rat
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Clauses and sentences
Finite and nonfinite clauses
 Finite VPs are those which are marked for tense (past or
present).
 Finite clause is a clause that contains an auxiliary or
nonauxiliary verb and have a nominative subject like I
/we / he / she / they.
 For example, compare the two bracketed clauses in:
• (i) What if [people annoy her]?
• (ii) Don’t let [people annoy her]
• In (i), we can have a nominative pronoun like they in the subject
position instead of people
• In (ii), the subject people cannot be replaced by a nominative
pronoun like they (only by an accusative pronoun like them)
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Clauses and sentences
• (iii) What if [they annoy her]?
• (iv) Don’t let [them/(*they) annoy her]
(Finite)
(Nonfinite)
 Nonfinite forms include:
 a). Infinitive forms like:
• e.g. [John believes [the prisoner to be innocent]]
•
(Finite)
(Non-finite)
 b). –ing / -ed participle forms like:
• e.g. [I saw [Mary leaving]]
•
(Finite)
(Non-finite)
• e.g. [I found [all the seats occupied]]
•
(Finite)
(Non-finite)
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Word order
 Consider the following:
Oxford – recently – graduated – John – form
a) John graduated from Oxford recently.
b) Recently John graduated from Oxford.
c) From Oxford John graduated recently.
d) From Oxford John recently graduated.
e) John recently graduated from Oxford.
 Consider also the following:
a) John died.
b) * died John.
 English has Subject- verb (SV) word order.
 Arabic, for example, has both SV and VS word order.
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What to do next week
Read chapter 3.
Prepare for your quiz.
See you next lecture.
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