introduction to english linguistics - startseite · ellipsis and ism given material is ......

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Introduction to English Linguistics

Winkler

WS07/08VLS03

Phrases, Clauses and Movements

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Sentences:

Phrases, Clauses and Tree diagrams

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Model of Grammar in The Minimalist Program[Chomsky 1998, 1999, 2001, 2002]

LexiconSyntax

syntactic structure

PF component

PF representation˜

SPEECH SYSTEMS

semantic component

semantic representation˜

THOUGHT SYSTEMS

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Environment (cf. Fodor 1983)

Transducers Visual Auditory Sensory other...

Input Systemsvertical facultiesor „instincts“

Language Vision Audition Motor Processes

Central Processes: Memory, Attention, Judgement, Thought, Beliefs, Fixation of Belief, Plans of Action

horizontal faculty or „intellect“

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Ellipsis and ISM

Given Material is deleted. Accent is realized on nongiven entity.

Givenness Marking Ellipsis

Sati: Are you from the Matrix?Neo: Yes. No. I mean, I WAS.Sati: Why did you leave?Neo: I HAD to.Sati: I had to leave my home, too.

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Structure of the Lecture

4. movements (next time)

1. the notion of syntactic structure

2. merger operations

3. tree diagrams

Recap of VLS02: Evidence for word classes

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Building Words: morphological processes

Morphological Processes

Inflection Word-Formation

Derivation Compounding

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Q: How can we represent the structure of nationalization?

Labelled bracketing:

[ nation ]N[ A al ] [V ize ][N ation ]

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N

nation

Af

al

A Af

ize

V Af

ation

N

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COMPOUNDING:involves the combination of two words (with or without accompanying affixes)

N - N: mail-box, doghouse, steamboat ; Walkman;N - A: seaworthy, winedarkN - V: stagemanage , babysitA - A: blue-green

In English, compounds can be found in all the major lexical categories - N, A, V, but nouns are by far the most common type of compounds. Verb compounds are quite infrequent.

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N

steam

N

N

boat

A

strong

N

N

man

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N

blood

A

A

thirsty

A

red

A

A

hot

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baby sit hang glide

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N

N

food

N

dog

N

box

N

N

N

age

N

stone

N

N

dweller

N

cave

N

Complex N Compounds

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Ambiguities: Compounds vs. Noncompounds

Compound word Phrasal Expression(non-compound word)

gréenhouse

bláckboard

primary stress on the first component

grèen hoúse

blàck boárd

wèt súitwét sùit

secondary stress on the first component

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Ambiguities in Compounds: California history teacher

N

N

history

N

California

N

teacher

N

N

California

N

history

N

teacher

N

N

[NCalifornia ][N [N history]] [N teacher][N ]Q:

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Structural Representation of : ticket-counter flight technology

N

N

counter

N

Ticket

N

N

N

flight

N

technology

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2. Syntactic evidence for assigning words to categories:

Q: What element can occur in the position of the dash?

They have no ---[NOUNS]

car / conscience / ideas

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They have no *went [verb]*for [preposition]*older [adjective]*readily [adverb]

Def. Noun: the class of nouns is defined as the set of words which can terminate a sentence in the position marked --- in They have no --.

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Claim: Different categories of words have different distributions.

They occupy a different range of positions within phrases or sentences.

Q: What element can occur in the position of the dash?

They can --- stay / leave / hide / die / cry[VERB]

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Def. Verb: only a verb (in its infinitive/ base form) can occur in the position marked --- in the above sentence to form a complete (non-elliptical) sentence

Other categories are ungrammatical:

They can --- *gorgeous [adjective]*happily [adverb]*down [preposition]*door [noun]

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Def. Adjective: the only category of word which can occur in the position marked --- in the following sentence:

They are very --- tall /pretty /kind /nice[ADJECTIVE]

*slowly [adverb]

*child [noun]

*astonish [verb]

*outside [preposition]

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Def. Preposition: they alone can be in-tensified by right in the sense of ‘completely’, or by straight in the sense of ‘directly’:

Go rightHe went right He walked straight He fell straight

up the ladder.inside.into a wall.down.

[PREPOSITION]

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How would you classify better ?

He is better at French than you.

He speaks French better than you.

He is more fluent/*more fluently at French…

He speaks French more fluently/*more fluent …

Substitution Test!

ADJ

ADV

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List of abbreviations:

Summary of the last lecture:

Lexical categories: N, V, A, P, Adv

Functional categories: D, T, C, PRN, Q

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Lexical categories (open class): have idiosyncratic descriptive content: N, V, P, A, Adv;

Lexical vs. functional categories:

Functional categories (closed class): serve primarily to carry information about the gramma-tical properties of expressions; e.g. information about number, gender, person, case.

Determiners (D), Quantifiers (Q), Pronouns (PRN);

Auxiliaries (AUX), Infinitival to (T), Complementizers (C);

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They have an idea.

What else do we need?

They have this idea.

They have two ideas.They have no idea.

They have many ideas.

They have one.

Determiners (D)

Quantifiers (Q)

Proform

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Def.:The substitution test is a technique to determine the category which a givenexpression belongs to. An expression belongsto a given type of category if it can besubstituted (i.e. replaced) in the phrase orsentence in which it occurs by anotherexpression which clearly belongs to thecategory in question.

The Substitution Test:

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In determining the syntactic category of a given lexical item, morphological clues must be used in conjunction with syntactic tests, like the substitution test.

[[The fact that the president will resign] won’t change anything].

We determined five major categories of English: N, V, P, A, Adv.

Summary:

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"Our enemies are innovative and re-sourceful, and so are we.

What else do we need?

Pronouns (PRN): establish referencerelations in discourse; Proforms: e.g. so; ellipsis;

They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." G. W. Bush —Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004

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Republicans believe in an America run by theright people, their people, in a world in whichwe act unilaterally when we can [-----------], and cooperate when we have to [-----------].

(W. Clinton 26-07-04).

Attested Example:

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Ellipsis and ISM

GME without linguistic antecedent (VPE)

Harry: That's Pettigrew.He wants to rise, but Hermione grabs him.Hermione: Harry! You can't!Harry: Hermione, that's the man who betrayed

my parents! You don't expect me to just sit here …

Hermione: Yes, and you must!

HP2-02

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Complementizers (C):Def.: a C is a word which is used to introduce complement clauses;

I think [that you may be right] ? finite clauseI wonder [if you can help me] ? finite clause

- finite C: that (declarative), if (interrogative);

e.g. that, if, for;

I want [for you to receive the best training].

- infinite C: for (hypothetical, or irrealis)

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List of abbreviations:

Labelled Bracketing:

Lexical categories: N, V, A, P, Adv

Functional categories: D, T, C, PRN, Q

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[PRN ][T ] [V ] [T ] [V ] [Adv ]

[A ]

You don't seem to be too

many of the shareholders may

now vote against your revised

takeover bid .

worried about the possibility that[P ] [D ] [N ] [C ]

[Q ] [P ] [D ] [N ] [T ]

[Adv ] [V ] [P ] [PRN ] [A ]

[N ] [N ]

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Syntactic Structure: Phrases

SPEAKER A: What are you trying to do?

SPEAKER B: Help you.

Merger (or merging operation):

An operation by which two constituents are combined together to form a single larger constituent.

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We are trying to help

We are trying to help you

You are very difficult

*Help you are very difficult

The notion Head:The head of a phrase is the key word which determines the properties of the phrase. The head of the VP help you is help.

The result of merging help and you in help youhas verb-like rather than noun-like properties.

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Labelled Bracketing

[VP ][V help] [PRN you ]

Labelled Tree Diagramm

help

V

you

PRN

VP

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Technical term: ProjectionA projection is a constituent containing a head word.

This is a term used to denote a specific grammatical function. A complement is an expression which is directly merged with (and hence is the sister of) a head word, thereby projecting the head into a larger structure of essentially the same kind. The PRN youis the complement of the V help.

Technical term: Complement

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GOAL: -a theory of Universal Grammar -uncover general structural principles governing the formation of phrases and sentences

Merger Hypothesis: All phrases are formed in essentially the same way as the phrase in the example help you namely by a binary (i.e. pairwise) merger operation which combines two constituents together to form a larger constituent.

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Phrases SPEAKER A: What was your intention?SPEAKER B: To help you.

They ought [ to help you ]

*They ought [ help you ]

They should [ help you ]

*They should [ to help you ]

What kind of phrase is to help you?

TP

VP

VP

TP

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help

V

you

PRN

VP

to

T

TP

Tree Diagram: to help you

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SPEAKER A: What are you doing?SPEAKER B: Trying to help you.

help

V

you

PRN

VP

to

T

TP

trying

V

VP

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Headedness Principle:

Binarity Principle:

Every syntactic structure is a projection of a head word.

Every syntactic structure is binary-branching.

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Clauses:Major Question: How are clauses and sentencesformed?

Tree-Structure of a sentence in the 1960s:

S-Analysis

SPEAKER A: What are you doing?SPEAKER B: We are trying to help you.

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help

V

you

PRN

VP

to

T

TP

trying

V

VP

are

T

We

PRN

S

S-Analysis violates the:

Headedness PrincipleBinarity Principle

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TP

help

V

you

PRN

VP

to

T

TP

VP

trying

Vare

T

T’

We

PRN

Tense Phrase/TP

A: What are you doing?B1: *Are trying to help you.

B2: We are trying to help you.

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Extended Projection Principle/EPPA finite tense constituent T must be extended into a TP projection containing a subject.

EPP-Feature Requirement: Tense auxiliaries like arecarry an EPP-feature which requires them to have an extended projection TP which has a subject.

The EPP-Feature Requirement is syntactic and not semantic in nature.

It was alleged that he lied under oath.

There has been no trouble.

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Generalization:All heads can have more than one kind of projection.[NP American ]

She arrived at the solution [AP quite [A’ [A independently ] [PP of me ] ] ]

He has gone [PP straight [P’ [P to ] [N bed ] ] ]

caused considerable controversy[N intervention][N’ [PP in Vietnam ] ]

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TP

to

P

bed

N

P’

straight

ADV

PP

VP

gone

Vhas

T

T’

He

PRN

He has gone straight to bed

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Clauses containing complementisersSPEAKER A: What are you saying?SPEAKER B: That we are trying to help you.

S´/S-bar Analysis: (Bresnan 1970)

are

T

we

PRN

S

*S´

C

that

trying to help you

VP

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TP

help

V

you

PRN

VP

to

T

TP

VP

trying

Vare

T

T’

we

PRNThat

C

CPCP-Analysis:A: What are you saying?

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The End


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Assignments1. Read Radford (2004), Chapter 5 and start on 6.

2. Do the following exercises of Chapter 2 in Radford (2004), p.

Ex. 2.1: Analyze (1a, b, e, f; 2a, b, f; 3a, g);

3. Reread „Course Notes“


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