english syntax [email protected]
TRANSCRIPT
ENGLISH SYNTAX
• Linguistics is scientific study of language• Language is a system of arbitrary vocal
symbols used for human communication.• As a system language has two system
- System of Sound• - System of Meaning
Where is the position of Syntax?
PHONEMEPHONEME
MORPHEMEMORPHEME
SENTENCESENTENCE
PHONOLOGYPHONOLOGY
SYNTAXSYNTAX
MORPHOLOGYMORPHOLOGY LINGUISTICSLINGUISTICS
SEMANTICSSEMANTICS
FORM/ LOGICAL MEANING
FORM/ LOGICAL MEANING
FORMFORM
FORM, FORM, MEANING, MEANING, FUNCTIONFUNCTION
LANGUAGE LANGUAGE UNITSUNITS
LANGUAGE SCIENCE
LANGUAGE SCIENCE
INTERDICIPLINARY VIEWINTERDICIPLINARY VIEW
ENGLISH SYNTAXLinguistic Unit and the
Sentence• Syntactic descriptions have traditionally taken the sentence as their starting point and the smaller units being primarily regarded as ‘building-blocks’ of sentences.
• Sentence consits of string of words, in sequence, and meaningful.• Sentences are interpreted not as strings of individual words but as sequence of groups of words and between them exist certain relations called sentence structure e.g word order.
* He wanted to marry Jane. * He wanted jane to marry.
ENGLISH SYNTAXConstituents
• The parts into which a sentence can be segmented are the constituents of the sentence.
• Immediate Constituents (IC) refers to those constituents which together form a higher-order constituent.– Jane wants a cake
a and cake are the IC’s of a cakewants and a cake are the I.C’s of wants a cakeJane and wants a cake are the IC of the sentence
ENGLISH SYNTAXRankscale and Rankshift
• Rankscale is the hierarchy of units of linguistic description in which morphemes function as constituents of words, words function as constituent of phrases, and phrases as constituent of sentences.
Correct-ion-sMorpheme
CorrectionsWord
some minor correctionsPhrase
We’ve made some minor correctionsSentence
ENGLISH SYNTAXRankscale and Rankshift
• Rankshift : unit of given rank functions as a constituent of a unit of the same rank or even lower down the rankscale, e.g. Sentences function as constituent of other sentences, phrase to other phrases, word to other words, etc.
1. I know Peter is in the army setentence
2. At the corner of the street phrase
3. Treetop - gorldsmith - Blackbird word
ENGLISH SYNTAXFunctions and Categories
• There is a distinction between linguistic units as constituents of larger structures and as linguistics objects in their own right; i.e Function and Category.
Category refers to a linguistic unit viewed as something that has individual charateristics which it shares with other units of the same kind
Function refers to a linguistic unit viewed as an element that plays its role in a larger linguistic structure.
ENGLISH SYNTAXFunctions and Categories
The unit of John and a walk viewed individually are Noun; so they belong to the same category or word class
John took a walkJohn took a walk
The unit of John and a walk viewed as constituents of the sentence, both John and a walk belong to different function. John function as Subject and a walk function as Object
ENGLISH SYNTAX
MorphemeMorpheme
Morpheme Morpheme The minimal unit of gramatical
description in the sense that it cannot be segmented any further at the grammatical level of analysis .
There are two kinds of Morpheme; Free and bound .
Free Morpheme can be used independently, whereas Bound Morpheme can not.
Morpheme Morpheme Unfriendly
1. Un bound2. Friend free3. Ly bound
root friendbase (of unfriendly) friendly
MorphemeMorpheme Root of a word is that part which
remains when all the affixes have been removed.
A Base is any form to which an affix can be added, but not every base is a root.
Impression
Impress base
Press root
MorphemeMorpheme• Allomorphs is the variants within a morpheme.
Plural morpheme
hat-/s/,dog-/z/, bus-/iz/, deer-/o /
– /s/, /z/, /iz/, /o / allomorph
– /o / Zero allomorph
The pluralThe pluralThe plural morpheme {S1} is regularly realized in three ways:/s/ : after basis ending in voiceless sounds except sibilants, eg: books, roofs, lips, hats, /z/ : after bases ending in voiced sounds except sibilants, eg: trees, bars, laws, zoos, days,
boys, ribs, beds, dogs, flames, pens, bootless/iz/ : after bases ending in a sibilant:
/s/ : horses, nurses, kisses/z/ : noises, seizes, noses/ʃ/ : brushes, dishes, clashes/t / : churches, torches, witches/dз/ : pledges, bridges, languages
The genitiveThe genitiveIn the singular the genitive morpheme {S2} is regularly realized in three ways:
/s/ :after bases ending in voiceless sounds except sibilants, eg: Dick -Dick’s car Ship -the ship’s crew Dentist -the dentist’s drill Wife -his wife’s lover
/z/ :after bases ending in voiced sounds except sibilants, eg: Fred -Fred’s salary Play -the play’s title Brother -my brother’s cottageFirm -the firm’s losses
/iz/ :after bases ending in a sibilant, eg: Horse -horse’s tail Keats -Keats’s poetry George -George’s children
Five Signal of Syntactic Structure
ENGLISH SYNTAX
Five Signal of Syntactic Structure
1. Word orderPosition of words relative to each other
2. ProsodyCombinations of Pattern of pitch, stress, and juncture.
3. Function wordsWords with little or no lexical meaning which are used in combining other words into larger structures.
Five Signal of Syntactic Structure
4. Inflections Suffixes, always final, which adapt words to fit
varying structural positions without changing their lexical meaning or part of speech.
5. Derivational Contrast Derivational prefixes and suffixes which
change words from one part of speech to another.
Eight Main Groups of Function Words
1. Noun Determinersthe, a/an, my, her, their…,that/thisone, two…,some, all, many, few, other, more……
2. Auxiliariescan, may, could, will, would, shall, should, need, do, be, have, be going to….
Eight Main Groups of Function Words
3. QualifiersVery, quite, rather, a little, so, more, most, less, enough, too, …
4. Preposition - simple: after, around, before, … - Compound: back of, due to, together with.. - Phrasal: by means of, in front of, on account of,…
Eight Main Groups of Function Words
5. Coordinatorsand, not, but, nor, rather than, either, …
6. Interrogators - simple: when, where, how, why - Interrogative Pronoun: who, what, which,
whoever, whatever
Eight Main Groups of Function Words
7. Includers- Simple: after, although, how, since,…- Relative Pronoun: who, which, that, when,
etc
8. Sentence-linkers - Simple: consequently, furthermore, hence - Phrasal: at least, in addition, in fact, etc
FOUR TYPES OF SYNTACTICSTRUCTURE
ENGLISH SYNTAX
• Structures of Modification– Consist of two immediate constituents a head
and a modifier.
Hungry people M HHome town
M HEasily superior
M H
FOUR TYPES OF SYNTACTICSTRUCTURE
FOUR TYPES OF SYNTACTICSTRUCTURE
• Structures of Predication– Consist of two immediate constituents a subject
and a predicate.
The sun sets in the westThe snow was cold
• Structures of Complementation– Consist of two immediate constituents a verbal
elements and a complement
we are learning grammarHe gives a lessonHe caught and ate the fish
FOUR TYPES OF SYNTACTICSTRUCTURE
• Structures of Coordination– Consist of two or more immediate constituents
which are equavalent units joined in a structure which function as a single unit.
He bought his friend a doctor and a gentlemen
FOUR TYPES OF SYNTACTICSTRUCTURE
THANK YOUTHANK YOU