Unit 4 The Structures of English (1)

Contents 5.1 Defining syntax （句法学） 5.2 Syntactic patterns in English 5.3 Syntactic relations 5.4 The hierarchical structuring of English sentences 5.5 Surface and deep structures

5.1 Defining syntax  Syntax is the study of how words combine into sentences; specifically the syntactic patterns of sentences /internal structures of sentences /syntactic properties and functions, and the rules governing the syntactic combinations.

Syntax accounts for: -- the grammaticality of sentences; -- word order; -- hierarchical organization of sentences; -- grammatical relations -- whether different structures have different meanings or the same meaning; -- the creative aspect of language.

 The boy found the ball.  *The boy found quickly.  *The boy found in the house.  Bill hired Mary.  Mary hired bill.  Mary was hired by Bill.  He has everything a woman wants, -- and he wants everything a woman has.

 Recursiveness/ Recursion  PP No. 1

 A children's rhyme  This is the farmer sowing the corn,  that kept the cock that crowed in the morn,  that waked the priest all shaven and shorn,  that married the man all tattered and torn,  that kissed the maiden all forlorn,  that milked the cow with the crumpled horn,  that tossed the dog,  that worried the cat,  that killed the rat,  that ate the malt,  that lay in the house that Jack built.

5.2 Sentence patterns/types in English i) SVC Mary is a nurse/poor. ii) SVA Mary weighs 120 pounds. iii) SV Mary came. iv) SVO Mary cheated me. v) SVOC Mary called me Jim. vi) SVOA Mary put her child down. vii) SVOO Mary lend him some money.

Language types SVO: English, French, Swahili, Hausa, Thai VSO: Tagalog, Irish, (Classical) Arabic, (Biblical) Hebrew SOV: Turkish, Japanese, Persian, Georgian OVS: Apalai (Brazil), Barasano (Colombia), Panare (Venezuela) OSV: Apurina and Xavante (Brazil) VOS: Cakchiquel (Guatemala), Huave (Mexico)

 The most frequent word orders in languages of the world are SVO, VSO, and SOV, while languages with OVS, OSV, and VOS as basic word orders are much rarer. P. 78 No. 8

5.3 Syntactic relations  Positional relation (word order, horizontal relations, syntagmatic relations--Hjemslev; chain relations-- Halliday)

 Syntagmatic relation refers to the sequential or linear arrangement of words in a language.  Any language has its patterns of arrangement.  Word order determines syntactic relations and sentence meaning, esp. for those analytical languages like Chinese.

 Relation of substitutability (associative relations--Saussure; paradigmatic relations--Hjemslev; vertical relations; choice relations--Halliday) (1) He is fond of dancing/swimming/his pretty cousin/literature, etc. (2) He left yesterday/at midnight/before he had finished his homework/ the moment I arrived.

5.4 The hierarchical structuring of English Sentences are not strings of words put together linearly but rather hierarchical constructions.  e.g. young boys and girls

IC analysis  Form classes  Form classes: phonetic and grammatical features (distribution, grammatical function, inflectional features)

 John likes singing Chinese songs. John likes? likes singing? singing Chinese? BUT: likes (singing (Chinese songs))  John (likes (singing (Chinese songs)))

IC analysis

Some concepts 1) Binary cutting 2) Immediate constituent/ ultimate constituent 3) Tree diagram/ labeled tree diagram 4) IC analysis: the approach to analyze sentences into immediate constituents by binary cuttings until obtaining the ultimate constituents

Labeled tree-diagram

 Practice: Apply IC analysis onto the following sentence: The world today is highly competitive.

Ambiguity  PP No. 2, 3

Two ways of IC analysis Eye drops off shelf Eye drops off shelf drops off shelf offshelf Eye drops off shelf Eyedropsoffshelf

 But IC analysis cannot -- remove the ambiguity as found in Flying planes can be dangerous. -- explain why structures like the following look similar but basically different: -- explain why structures like the following look similar but basically different: a. He is easy to please. a. He is easy to please. b. He is eager to please. b. He is eager to please. P. 77 No. 6

 e.g. He is easy to please.  He is eager to please. 5.5 Surface and deep structures

Analysis in terms of Chomsky’s TG grammar

Presentation session Interrogative sentences in English

Assignments:  P. 80 No. 2, 3  P. 81 No. 6  Collect at least two cases of ambiguity from newspaper headlines, advertisements, etc.