Japanese Syntax

Outline  Review of typological characteristics of JL  Syntactic Structures Syntactic Constituency Phrase Structures Phrase Structure Rules Notion of the Head Subcategorization Structural Relations

1. Taroo ga Hanako ni hon o yatta. 2. sono san-nin no ookina otoko 3. Taroo no hon

1. Taroo ga katta hon 2. Taroo ojisan 3. hijooni hayaku hashiru

1. ikenai 2. Taroo yori kashikoi 3. Taroo ga kita.  Taroo wa kita ka. 4. Taroo ga hon o katta.  Taroo ga nani o katta ka shiranai.

Syntactic Structures  Syntactic Constituency combination of words that are considered meaningful eg. Toshokan de fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon-wo yomu. Constituents:  fukuzatsu na nihongo, fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon, fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon wo yomu, hon wo yomu, nihongo no hon wo yomu

Syntactic Structures  fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon a. fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon b. fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon hon fukuzatsu na nihongo no fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon a.book about complicated Japanese b. a complicated Japanese book

Syntactic Structures  Phrase Structures lexical categories, phrasal categories NP NP N AP N A fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon NP AP NP A NP N N fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon

Syntactic Structures  Phrase Structures PP NPP N toshokan de VP NP V N hon-o yomu VP PP V NP P N toshokan de yomu

Syntactic Structures  Phrase Structures S NPVP NPPNPV NP PAP NP N A NP N N Watashi wa toshokan de fukuzatsu na nihongo no hon wo yomu

Syntactic Structures  Phrase Structure Rules generate unlimited number of grammatical sentences and phrases a. S  NP VP b. NP  (NP) (AP) N c. VP  (PP) (NP) V d. AP  (Adv) A e. PP  NP P

Syntactic Structures  Phrase Structure Rules a. Ane ga katta hon wo yonda.  S  NP VP  NP  (S) N b. Watashi wa sono hon wa takai to omotta.  S  NP VP  VP  (S ’ ) VP  S ’  S COMP

Syntactic Structures  Phrase Structure Rules a. S NP VP S N V NP VP N NP V N Ane-ga [ ] katta hon-wo yonda

Syntactic Structures  Head obligatory meaning associated with the head is always associated with the phrase  Subcategorization specifies the constituents that appears with the verb  Intransitive verbs: [___]  Transitive verbs: [NP ___] [PP ___]  Di-transitive verbs: [NP NP ___]

Syntactic Structures  Structural Relations Domination – downward path from a node at one level to a node at another level Immediate Domination – a node dominates another node and they are apart by one hierarchical level Sister Relation – two nodes sharing the same node that immediately dominates them C-command – (i) A and B do not dominate each other, (ii) the first branching node dominating A also dominates B

Syntactic Structures  Structural Relations A BC D E F G A dominates B, C, D, E, F, G B dominates D, E C dominates F, G A immediately dominates B, C B immediately dominates D, E C immediately dominates F, G B and C are sisters D and E are sisters F and G are sisters B c-commands C, F, G C c-commands B, D, E

Syntactic Structures  Exercises: Show the structure using a tree diagram. c. Miguelito-san ga Martina-san ni hana wo ageta. d. Dana-san ga Maki-san ni okane wo karita. e. Kat-san ga Maryz-san ga takai hon wo katta hon to itta. d. Martin-san ga Cristopher-san ga Suwaki- sensei ni homerareta to omotteita.