1 LIN 1310B Introduction to Linguistics Prof: Nikolay Slavkov TA: Qinghua Tang CLASS 12, Feb 13, 2007

2 Today Announcements and Reminders: -Continue reading chapter 5. -DGDs resume as of this week (Feb 13). -Test results are posted on the web site Today’s Lecture: -Finish going over Test 1 -Continue with Syntax

3 Review from last time Lexicon, computational system, move, merge Sentence structure is hierarchical Words combine to form phrases and phrases combine to produce larger phrases and sentences Syntactic trees represent the hierarchical organization of sentence structure. Syntactic categories: lexical vs non-lexical (functional). Criteria for determining syntactic categories: meaning, inflection, distribution.

4 Auxiliaries: Modal and Non Modal Non-modal auxiliaries are: be, have Modals include: will, can, may, must, should, could, etc. How are these different from verbs? What are the properties of modal and non-modal auxiliaries?

5 Modals: Meaning Consider the following data: Imay go must can should could will What can we say about the meaning of modals? => Modals express: possibility, obligation, choice, ability, duty, necessity, possibility, intention.

6 Modals: Inflectional Properties Consider the following data: I may go.vs. I go. He may go. He goes. He will eatHe eats. He should leaveHe leaves *They mayed playThey played. What can we say about the modals and inflection? => Modals do not take inflection.

7 Modals: Distributional Properties Consider the following data: He will eat. He may eat. => (co-occurrence): Yes he can… (do this). =>(order): modal precedes the verb. *He eat may; Cannot have more than one modal. *He will may eat.

8 Modals: Distributional Properties * We are maying. vs. We are walking. =>You cannot replace a verb with a modal. We should be eating. vs. *We want be eating. => Nor can you replace a modal with a verb.

9 Modals: Distributional Properties Modals can co-occur with perfect aux ‘have’. He may have eaten. Modals can co-occur with progressive aux ‘be’. He may be eating.

10 Modal or (main) Verb? Using distributional properties, determine if the following are modals or (main) verbs might, enjoy, posses, shall, like, could.

11 Non Modal Auxiliaries progressive be perfect have Consider the following data: I am happyvs. I am walking I have an apple vs. I have seen this film. main/regular verbauxiliary

12 Non modal auxiliaries: distribution He may have eaten. He may be eating. vs. * He be may eating. *He have may eaten =>Non modal auxiliaries follow modals.

13 Modals vs. Non modal Auxiliaries How do we distinguish between the two? -Modal comes first and non modal follows. I may have eaten. -Modals cannot co-occur with one another *I may will go. -A modal and a non-modal auxiliary can co-occur. I may have gone.

14 Phrases Now that we have discussed both lexical and non lexical categories in some detail, we can go on to the issue of how they combine with one another. Recall that phrases are syntactic units: He went to the store last week the store=phrase, to the store=phrase store last≠phrase Phrases combine to produce larger phrases and ultimately sentences. Note that we find remarkably similar syntactic phrases (especially based on lexical categories) across languages. This lends support to the idea of Universal Grammar.

15 Phrase Structure It is generally assumed that phrases across languages have a common structure (or a blueprint into which the different items from our mental lexicon are plugged in). This common structure is known as X’ (pronounced X-bar) (Note that X-bar has recently become controversial and it has been proposed that syntactic theory should dispense with it)

16 X’ schema XP (Specifier)X’ X(Complement) Head 1.All phrases have a three level structure 2.All phrases must contain a head, X 3.An optional compliment may be attached at the X’ level (sister of X) 4.An optional specifier may be attached at the XP level.

17 X’ schema: Heads The head (X) is the obligatory nucleus of the phrase. The most common (lexical) heads are nouns, verbs, adjectives and prepositions. The phrase is named after its head: Noun Phrase, Verb Phrase, Adjective Phrase and Perpositional Phrase NP, VP, AP, PP (draw trees for books, eat, certain, in)

18 X’ schema: Specifiers Specifiers are optional elements in phrase structure. They ‘specify’ or make more precise the meaning of the head. They typically mark the phrase boundary. They attach at the XP level. The type of specifier depends on the category of the head (table 5.4, p. 137)

19 X’ schema: Specifiers Table 5.4 Some specifiers CategoryTypical funcionExamples Determiner (Det)specifier of N the, a, this those, no Adverb (Adv)specifier of V never, perhaps, often, always Degree word (Deg)specifier of A or P very, quite, more, almost (add specifiers to the trees on the board)

20 X’ schema: Complements Complements are optional items in a phrase They provide further information about the head. They are phrases themselves. They attach at the X’ level (sister to the head). (add complements to the trees on the board)