syntax
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Syntax. LING 200 Spring 2002. Overview. What is syntactic competence? Morphology and syntax: inflectional morphology Word order Representing the structure of sentences Arguments for structure Transformations Cross-linguistic variation. Syntactic competence. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
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Syntax
LING 200
Spring 2002
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Overview
• What is syntactic competence? • Morphology and syntax: inflectional morphology • Word order • Representing the structure of sentences• Arguments for structure• Transformations• Cross-linguistic variation
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Syntactic competence
• Possible vs. impossible sentences
• Restricted distributions of words/ morphemes
• What sentences mean
Characterizing what native speakers know about:
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Sources of evidence in syntax
• Observation of native speaker productions
• Elicitation of native speaker grammaticality judgements – from self– from others
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Establishment of syntactic paradigms
• declarative
The Mariners will beat the Yankees. • subordinate (embedded) clause
I bet (that) the Mariners will beat the Yankees. • negative:
The Mariners won’t beat the Yankees. • yes/no question:
Will the Mariners beat the Yankees?
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Syntactically relevant morphemes
Derivation Inflection
1. Category changing?
often
-able: likeable
-ness: happiness
no
-s pl.: apples
-s 3sS: sees
2. Productive? often restricted:
-hood: brotherhood, *daughterhood
yes, but subject to blocking:
-s pl.:
child, children
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Syntactically relevant morphemes Derivation Inflection
3. Morpheme order
inner: usu. added before inflectional; industrializationalize
outer: usu. added after derivational: industrializationalizes
4. Syntactic relevance
not sensitive to syntactic information
often sensitive to syntactic information
Rose sees (vs. I see_)
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Some verbal inflectional affixes
visit I ___ Virginia on the weekends.
-ing present participle
visiting I am ___ Virginia now.
-ed past visited I ___ Virginia yesterday.
-ed past participle visited I have already ___ Virginia.
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Agreement• Spanish: adjectives agree with nouns in gender, number
entrada ‘ticket (to a show)’ vs. boleto ‘ticket’
‘the’ ‘this’ ‘expensive’
entrada la entrada esta entrada entrada cara
entradas las entradas estas entradas
entradas caras
boleto el boleto este boleto boleto caro
boletos los boletos estos boletos boletos caros
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Agreement
Vendiste las entradas? ‘Did you sell the tickets?’No, las (*los) tengo todavía. ‘No, I still have them.’
entrada ‘ticket (to a show)’ vs. boleto ‘ticket’
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Word order • English vs. Witsuwit’en
1. Prepositions precede nouns in English. count for me Postpositions follow nouns in Witsuwit'en:
spe c’otw me for you (sg.) count
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Word order
2. In English, adjectives precede nouns. narrow rope In Witsuwit'en, an adjective follows a noun: t'o tet ‘fine babiche’rope narrow
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Word order3. In English, the possessor noun normally precedes the possessed noun.
my friend's tanning stretcher
but can follow the possessed noun:the tanning stretcher of my friend
In Witsuwit'en, the possessor noun always precedes the possessed noun: sq'aqh pmstimy friend his/her tanning stretcher
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Word order
4. In both Witsuwit'en and English, subjects precede verbs: Driftwood is floating around. tz ntdriftwood is floating around
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Word order
5. In English, the direct object follows the verb.
We bought food. In Witsuwit'en, the direct object precedes the verb:
t'a nets'ottqhtfood we bought
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Attested word order patterns(S = Subject, O = Object, V = Verb):
SOV Witsuwit'en
SVO English
VSO Irish
OSV Apurinã (Arawakan, Brazil)
OVS Parecís (Arawakan, Brazil) (also SOV)
VOS Oro Win (Chapacura-Wanham, Brazil) (5 speakers)
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Frequency of each type< Sample of 402 languages.
Word Order Number of languages
SOV 180 45%
SVO 168 42%
VSO 37 9%
VOS 12 3%
OVS 5 1%
OSV 0 0%
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Recursion and phrase structure (Potentially) infinitely long sentences: This is the house that Jack built.This is the malt
that lay in the house that Jack built.This is the rat
that ate the maltthat lay in the house that Jack built.
...
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This is the priest all shaven and shornthat married the man all tattered and tornthat kissed the maiden all forlornthat milked the cow with the crumpled hornthat tossed the dogthat worried the catthat killed the ratthat ate the maltthat lay in the house that Jack built.
...
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How to characterize (potential) infinity?
Phrase structure rules. Properties of phrase structure rules: specify word order are recursive (output of one rule can be rewritten via another rule)
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General schemaX --> Y Z (“X consists of/is Y Z”) examples:
English: PP --> P NPWitsuwit'en: PP --> NP P
PP = Pre/postpositional phraseP = Pre/postpositionNP = Noun phrase
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Equivalent representational devices
phrase structure rule: PP --> P NP labeled bracketing: PP[P NP]
tree structure: PP v P NP
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Some terminology
constituentsyntactic unit consisting of one or more words
= node (in tree)root nodebranching node
terminal node
PP v P NP g gwith N g Fritz
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More phrase structure rules
S --> NP (Aux) VP=S --> NP VPS --> NP Aux VP S = sentenceNP = noun phraseVP = verb phrase
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More phrase structure rules
NP --> (Det) (Adj) N (PP) Det = determinerAdj = adjectiveN = noun
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Determiners vs. adjectivesNP --> (Det) (Adj) N (PP)Det --> a/an, some, the, your (etc.)Adj --> big, green, juicy (etc.)
One determiner per NP:your pickle, the pickle, *your the pickle
More than one Adj is possible:your big pickle, your big green pickle, your big green juicy pickle
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More phrase structure rules
VP --> V (NP) (PP) (Adv)
VP = verb phraseV = verbAdv = adverb
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Some simple tree structures
S --> NP VPNP --> (Det) (Adj) N (PP)VP --> V (NP) (PP) (Adv) S v NP VP g g N V g g cats sleep
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Some simple tree structures
NP --> (Det) (Adj) N (PP)PP --> P NP NP v N PP g v fog P NP g v in Det N g g the morning
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NP fgh Det N PP g g fi the piano P NP g fgi on Det N PP g g gi the stage P NP g r g i in Det N PP g g gi the music building P NP g g on N g campus
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Some simple tree structures
VP --> V (NP) (PP) (Adv) VP f g h V NP PP g v v put Det N P NP g g g v the car in Det N g g the garage
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Constituent structure Some tests:
•Structural ambiguity
•Coordination
•Substitution
•Movement
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Structural ambiguity
• Synonymy– words
• pail = bucket
• couch = sofa
– phrases• It's hard to find a good latte.
• = A good latte is hard to find.
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Ambiguity
• Ambiguous words– homophones [dr] (dear), [dr] deer (2 different
morphemes)
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Structurally ambiguous words
Adj Adj t g g y un Adj V able g y t g V able un fold g fold 2 readings:‘not capable of being folded’ ‘capable of being unfolded’
un- negative: Adj[___Adj[ un-‘reverse’: V[___V[
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Structurally ambiguous phrases
Fritz spilled the beans.
figurative/idiomatic reading: Fritz inappropriately released the information.
literal reading: There were some beans and Fritz spilled them.
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Structurally ambiguous headlines
• “Enraged cow attacks man with axe.”
• "The nomination of Dr. Henry Foster to the Surgeon General's office appears to be in trouble after he admitted that he had performed at least 39 abortions on TV last night."
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Structural ambiguity reveals constituent structure
“Enraged cow attacks man with axe.”
the real world reading: S tu NP VP fh v Adj N V NP g g g gi enraged cow attacks N PP g v man P NP g g with N g axe
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“Enraged cow attacks man with axe.”
the humorous reading: S ru NP VP f h fhi A N V NP PP g g g g venraged cow attacks N P NP g g g man with N g axe
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Structural ambiguity and constituency"he admitted that he lied yesterday" VP V S’S’ --> that S‘he lied yesterday’ reading: S f h NP VP g f h N V S’ g g fh he admitted that S fi NP VP g fh N V Adv g g g he lied yesterday