Linguistics Study Guide Syntax

Notes- Syntax The Basics of Syntax • Syntax: how words combine to give larger phrases and how the phrases pair with meanings • Syntactic Categories: grammatical categories like noun and verb • Distributional properties: influences syntactic categories • A “→” in a rule means “may consist of” or “can be” • Adj-bar: adjectives with additional characterization/more than one word o Adj-bar → Adj Phrase Structure Grammar • Phrase structure grammar: a series of rules specifying how basic expressions of various categories combine to form larger expressions o like prefixes/suffixes together one before another • if it’s a PSG, you can always draw rule trees Phrase Recursion • Example of phrase recursion: o S1: Roses are red o S2: Violets are blue o S1 + S2: Roses are red and violets are blue (S3) o S → S and S (a sentence may consist of sentences) Verbs • Transitive verb: a verb that happens to something o Ex: she places the book • Intransitive: a verb with no object o Ex: she walks • Ditransitive verb: a verb with 2 objects o ex: she walks the dog and the cat 8 Phrases NP = noun phrase • Noun phrase: words that collectively act as an object or subject o Ex: the big word • it’s a category CP = complementizer phrase • complementizer: words that can be used to turn a clause into the subject or object of a sentence • For example, the word that may be called a complementizer in English sentences like Mary believes that it is raining. PP = Prepositional phrase • a modifying phrase consisting of a preposition and its object. • At a minimum, a prepositional phrase consists of one preposition and the object it governs. The object can be a noun, a gerund (a verb form ending in “-ing” that acts as a noun), or a clause. • Example: the cat in the middle is cute VP Rules • VP → V1 (often called IV: elapse, die, etc) • VP → V2 NP (often called TV: devour the pizza, etc) • VP → V3 NP NP (often called DTV: give the dog the bone, etc) • VP → V4 NP PP (pit the book on the shelf, etc) • Maybe category labels themselves are actually feature bundles • They all have one feature ‘V’ but different subcategory features Distributional Facts vs Meaning • Not all distributional facts seem to follow from meaning • Example: eat vs devour 9 o Eat can be a transitive verb (ex: I eat pizza) or a verb on its own (ex: I have to eat) o Devour can be a transitive verb (ex: I devour pizza) but NOT a verb on its own (ex: I have to devour… no) • Example: like vs dislike o Like can occur with infinitival VP complements (ex: I like to play poker), gerundive VPs (ex: I like playing poker), and NPs (ex: I like poker) o Dislike can’t work with VP complements (ex: I dislike to play poker) but can work with gerundive VPs (ex: I dislike playing poker) and NPs (ex: I dislike poker) • Not all facts about syntax follow from meaning Complements + Arguments • the things a verb combines with in the VP are complements • complements and arguments are obligatory generally o Ex: I put the book (“the book” is needed for the verb) • Adjuncts: a thing added to something else as a supplementary rather than an essential part. o they are optional o are recursive o used to amplify or modify the meaning of another word or words Elaborating on English Recursion / Branching • English is primarily right branching, meaning trees usually expand from the bottom right up to the left • “Right branching”: something takes complements on the right, such as verbs because verb complements are put on their right o this is very common in English o VP → V5 S ▪ Ex: “Sally said Lee thinks Mary knows Loki howls” can be expanded to “Sally said Lee thinks Mary hopes Sandy knows Loki howls” o S can be a complement of the right sorts of verbs 10 ▪ since S itself can contain a VP with this same type of verb, we get these recursion chains o right daughter is expanded on (daughter being on of the things at the bottom of the triangle) • “Left branching”: something takes complements on the left o VP → VP PP o N → N RC o In English, modifiers (Adjuncts) tend to follow what they modify (so recursion occurs on the left) ▪ two exceptions: Adj → very Adj and N → Adj N lead to recursion on the right • Center embedding o can also have recursion in the middle o ex: a^n b ^n wit the rule S → a S A o ex: mirror image languages o ex: S → if S then S o ex: “The rat ate the cheese.” → modify rat with a relative clause: “The rat [that the cat chased] ate the cheese.” ▪ You could not modify the relative clause, though. “The rat that the cat [that the dog loves] chased ate the cheese.” • left and right are metaphors for temporality☺ because of course they are☺ PS grammars • PS grammars CAN do mirror image languages o a^n b^n • PS grammars CAN’T do copy languages 11 o a^n b^n c^n • Essentially, no cross dependencies Crossed dependencies • there are instances of crossed dependencies in natural language • classic case is Dutch embeds • common in germanic languages Rule Summary • S → NP VP • NP → Det N • Adj → very Adj • N → Adj N • N→ N RC • PP → P NP Rules that can be on trees • S → NP VP • VP → VP PP • VP → VP Adv • VP → TV NP (said) • VP → DTV NP NP (gave) • VP → SV S (believe, think, feel) • NP → Det N • PP → P NP • N → Adj N • N→ N PP • N → N RC (RC example: that is on the reading list) 12 Misc Syntax • X → X Y or X → Y X o ex: Adj → very adj, N → Adj N • In syntax, there are layers o movement rule: there can be a tree for the underlying structure and one for the true meaning o ex: “I looked the information up” vs “I looked up the information” • Center embedding: recursion in the middle of a sentence • RC = relative clause • triangles in trees avoid depicting internal structure • If you can swap two things in a sentence, they are likely the same grammatical category o ex: taylor sees the rabbit → taylor and “the rabbit” are both noun phrases 13