Syntax - Minimalism, X'-theory

Previously, Syntax I n Sentences are made of constituents, themselves possibly made of constituents, etc. n Any account of syntactic knowledge will need to provide this kind of hierarchical structure. Overall idea: The syntactic system we have in our head builds trees, such that all and only the trees that the system can build are grammatical. n n n Minimalism n n n As we try to determine what the properties of this grammatical system are, we should assume as little as we can get away with. Any language-like system that is going to create hierarchical structure is going to need something that takes two (or more, but let’s say that “two is simpler than any other number”) things and puts them together into something eligible for further combinations. So, the machine that builds the trees has at least the operation Merge. n n n n n maximal projection Every XP has exactly one: head (a lexical item) complement (another XP) specifier (another XP) for any X (N, V, A, P, I, etc.) intermediate projection XP YP specifier minimal projection A phrase is a syntactic object formed by combining (merging) two syntactic objects, with the properties inherited from one of them (the head of the phrase). maximal projection intermediate projection XP n A word is a syntactic object. YP specifier X¢ X head minimal projection ZP complement Radford and the X(P) In the ’70s and ’80s, these ideas went by the name “X¢-theory”. n To the extent that grammatical and ungrammatical sentences are distinguished in terms of the hierarchical structure, it must be part of the system. X¢-theory X¢-theory n [The kid [who [dropped [the cookie]]]] [ate [it]] n n To forestall confusion: lunch is both a minimal projection and a maximal projection. It functions as a phrase, an XP, but it has nothing in it but a head, an X. Since you need to write something, Radford generally opts to write X for these X/XPs. VP X¢ X head ZP complement V NP eat lunch 1 Radford and the X(P) Radford and the X(P) n In this class, and on my overheads, I will usually write X/XP as XP. You should do the same, but you should be aware that Radford does it differently. n In general, this will depend on whether the properties we are focusing on are those of phrases (XPs) or heads (Xs). In these ambiguous cases, it will almost invariably turn out that they act like phrases VP with respect to what we are focusing on. V NP eat n Another similar comment pertains to the status of IP below. It is an IP. It is not an I¢. It’s true that it will be an I¢ after we combine Pat with the IP, but it isn’t yet. Cf. Radford p. 120. N n n n n n n n n PP P NP at lunch IP E.g., Japanese, which is head-final, nevertheless has initial specifiers. lunch ringo-o tabeta (NP V = VP) apple ate toshokan de (NP P = PP) library at This seems to be a parameter that distinguishes languages (the head parameter) PP NP P toshokan de Narrowing in: NP? Whether the specifier comes before X¢ or after is independent of whether the head comes before the complement. Specifiers are overwhelmingly initial, although a few languages may be best analyzed as having final specifiers (sometimes). n NP eat In Japanese, the head follows the complement. Japanese is head-final. X, X¢, XP n V X, X¢, XP at lunch (P NP = PP) eat lunch (V NP = VP) will eat lunch (I VP = IP) But here, languages differ. English is a head-first (or head-initial) language. VP lunch In English, the head and the complement always seem to come in that order: head-complement. n I will X, X¢, XP n IP Pat NP I¢ Ringo-ga VP ringo-o tabe- n n Traditionally, a phrase like the students is called a noun phrase and written as NP. What does this imply about the structure? What category is students? What category is the? n Which one is the head? n Where is the other one? n n I ta 2 Narrowing in: NP? n n There are a couple of problems with this. There’s the headedness problem n n If the students is not an NP, it must be a DP. n n The syntactic object that combines with the head is the complement, not the specifier. n n DP! (Note: There is a way out of this, we’ll see it later) Supposing that the is a whole DP is suspicious, because it can never be NP ? modified by anything. Modifiability is a signature DP N property of phrases. the students n It’s head-initial, like English should be. The NP can of course be modified (happy students). There are several reasons to think that the students is a DP and not an NP, even better than these two, which we’ll see in DP ! due course (…at the appropriate juncture, in the fullness of time). D NP the DP n n n n n n DP n Consider the genitive (possessive) ’s in English: n John’s hat The student’s sandwich The man from Australia’s book The man on the hill by the tree’s binoculars n n n *The building’s the roof n *The tiger’s the eye Cf. The roof of the building Determiners like the and the possession marker ’s seem to be in complementary distribution—if one appears, the other cannot. You may recall a similar pattern from a couple of weeks ago. What was the explanation for the *s? n n Possessors The big fluffy pink rabbit *The my rabbit *The that rabbit *Every my rabbit Recursion n This suggests a structure like this for possession phrases: n n The possessor DP is in the specifier of DP. And of course, this can be as complex a DP as we like, e.g., the very hungry linguistics student by the tree with the purple flowers over there. n The possessed NP is the complement of D. It seems to be impossible to have both a ’s and a determiner. n Notice that the ’s attaches to the whole possessor phrase—in the last two examples, it isn’t even attached to the head noun (it’s the man’s book and binoculars, not Australia’s or the tree’s, after all). This is not a noun suffix. It seems more like a little word that signals possession, standing between the possessor and the possessee. (Recall, it’s a clitic). n students DP D¢ DP D NP D the student ’s n NP n Another noteworthy aspect of the possessor phrase is its recursive property. The possessor is a DP in the specifier of DP. That means that the DP possessor could have a possessor too… The student’s father’s book The student’s mother’s brother’s roommate book 3 X-bar theory: DP n X-bar theory: DP DP The student’s mother’s brother’s roommate D¢ DP DP D¢ DP D D¢ NP D D D n What do we do with apparently simple “NPs” like John or students (e.g., Students in the class complained bitterly)? Are these NPs or DPs? n Well, there are two options… NP NP ’s roommate n NP ’s brother One: They are NPs. n the student ’s mother n n Two: They are DPs. n n Pronouns n Consider: me, you, him (or I, you, he)… n Since a pronoun can be the subject of a sentence (e.g., I left), a pronoun must be part of a DP. For pronouns, however, there’s some reason to believe that they actually head the DP. That is, that the pronoun I is a D. n That is, not PRN as we’d called it up until now, but actually in the same category as the and ’s. X-bar theory: Bare nouns and proper names n n n How about something like students (in Students poured out of the auditorium at noon) or John (in John went for a walk)? For students, we want to believe that it is an instance of the N category (in order to make sense of the students or we students or John’s students. But if this N is contained in a DP (the complement of a D head), where is the D? In order to maintain consistency, we’ll suppose that in bare nouns D is present but null (it has no phonological representation; we write this as Ø). Pro: Subject, objects, etc. are always DPs. Con: Not obvious from the surface pronunciation. X-bar theory: Pronouns n n Pro: Just as they appear. Con: Subjects, objects, etc. can be either NPs or DPs. Consider the following: n n n n You politicians are all alike. We linguists need to stick together. The media always mocks us academics. These seem to have a pronoun followed by a noun inside the DP; we can make sense of this if the pronoun is a D which can optionally take an NP complement. DP D NP we linguists X-bar theory: Bare nouns and proper names n n So for the bare noun students, we have a structure like that shown here. DP D Ø As for proper names like Pat, we will assume that they are essentially like students. n Why? Why not like I, me, them? NP students DP D Ø NP John 4 Trees n A B C D E n n The “joints” of the tree are nodes. The nodes here are labeled (with node labels). Nodes are connected by branches. The node at the top of the tree (with no branches above it) is called the root node. A is the root node. Trees n A B D E n B D C D C E E n A node X dominates nodes below it on the tree; these are the nodes which would be pulled along if you grabbed the node X and pulled it off of the page. C dominates D and E. n B C D E n n A node X immediately dominates a node Y if X dominates Y and is connected by only one branch. A immediately dominates B and C. A is also sometimes called the mother of B and C. Nodes with branches beneath them are called nonterminal nodes. A, C are nonterminal nodes. Tree relations n A B D C D C E E n n Tree relations A n n Tree relations A n C Nodes with no branches beneath them are called terminal nodes. B, D, E are terminal nodes. A set of terminal nodes is a constituent if they are all dominated by the same node and no other terminal nodes are dominated by that node. “D E” is a constituent. “B D” is not. Tree relations n A B C D E n n n A node which shares the same mother as a node X is sometimes called the sister of X. B is the sister of C. C is the sister of B. D is the sister of E. 5 Tree relations n A B C D X-bar configurations A node X c-commands its sisters and the nodes dominated by its sisters. YP E The complement is the sister of the head. X¢ X Precedence n n XP ZP n The specifier is the sister of X¢ that is a daughter of XP. Precedence That is, V is pronounced before NP, meaning V is pronounced before all of the terminal nodes dominated by NP. n Even if the tree is drawn sloppily, nothing changes—(everything dominated by) V is pronounced before (everything dominated by) NP. This is still “saw the students”. VP V saw VP NP D the V saw N students D the NP N students No line crossing n One of the implications of this is that you cannot draw a wellformed tree with lines that cross. n The can’t be pronounced before V because The is part of DP and V has to be pronounced before all of DP. VP DP D the V meet NP students 6