Syntax Syntax
Syntax Syntax
The study of phrases, clauses, and sentences.1957 Noam Chomsky “Syntactic Structures”
ObservationsObservations
The biggest house vs. theest big houseThe big house vs. big the houseAmerican history teacher or American history teacher ?What will Tiny Abner put on his head? Vs. what will Tiny Abner put a hat on his head?Katznelson is expected to run vs. Katznelson is expected will run
Categories as Categories as theoretical constructstheoretical constructs
Words are classified into categories according to their behavior:◦Nouns can be made plural…◦Adjectives can be made comparative and
sup….◦Determiners : only one article can precede the
noun…◦Verbs agree with their subjects …..
categoriescategories
Lexical: nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbsPhrasal: noun phrase, verb phrase,
adjective phrase, adverb phrase
Each phrase contains at least one lexical category of the same basic type
NP, VP, AP, DP, AdvP, QP….
Look!Look!
The brick house the old house
Is brick an adjective?
Use syntactic theory to account for the behavior of the following words:
Walk-walkedWeek-
weekestWok-woked
Weak-weakestBeast-beasts
Best-bests
Left to right orderingLeft to right ordering
See: The red car vs. red the carPhrase structure (PS) rules:- which elements are permitted in a type of
phrase- the left-to-right ordering of those elements-whether any of the elements are optional
English PS rulesEnglish PS rules
SENTENCE: SNP-VPNOUN PHRASE: NP(Det)-(AP)-N-(PP)Ex. Leea is eating the apple
VERB PHRASE: VP V-( NP )-(PP) AP
Ex. The battery died Chris hit the ballHe drove the car into a treeThey are in the kitchenThe teacher is angryMy boss was very happy with her decision
Types of phrases in EnglishTypes of phrases in English
ADJECTIVE PHRASE: AP (I) –AdjEx. He jumped very high AP
Adj N
PREPOSITIONAL PHRASE: PP Prep-NPEx. I was at the hospital
PP
Prep NP
PracticePractice
• Ice floats• The red car• John• In a bad mood• In a very bad mood• Gave a party for Mary• Was a fool• Was extremely silly• Ran those people hit
that man on the head• Ran with difficulty• Ran extremely
quickly
English PS :
SENTENCE: SNP-VP
NOUN PHRASE:
NP(Det)-(AP)-N-(PP)
VERB PHRASE: VP V-( NP )-(PP)
AP
ADJECTIVE PHRASE:
AP (I) –Adj
PREPOSITIONAL PHRASE:
PP Prep-NP
Tree diagramsTree diagrams
S dominates all of the other nodesNode S directly dominates NP and VPNodes NP and VP are daughters of SNodes of Det (art) , N, and PP are sisters
Practice with treesPractice with trees
The children laughed at the clown.
Haste makes waste.Two very small packages
arrived.A meteor hit my red car.The fastest runner won
the longest race of all.Learning a new language
can be exhausting.