8

Syntax◈

Timeflieslikeanarrow;fruitflieslikeabanana.

Oettinger(1966)

In an early observation on the difficulties of getting computers to processnatural language,Anthony Oettinger used the example above to illustrate

howwetendtointerpretsentencesbasedonanexpectedstructureandwhen

wearriveataproblematic interpretation,weareable togobackand try touse a different structure. This process brings to light the importance ofrecognizingtheunderlyingstructureofsentencesinordertomakesenseofthem.Ifwekeepthinkingthat thestructureof thesecondexpressionis thesameas the first in theexample,wewilldefinitelymiss something. (Forahelpfulanalysis,seeFigure8.9,onpage122.)InChapter7,wemovedfromthegeneralcategoriesoftraditionalgrammar

to more specific methods of describing the structure of phrases andsentences.Whenweconcentrateonthestructureandorderingofcomponentswithin a sentence, we are studying the syntax of a language. The word“syntax” comes originally from Greek and literally means “a puttingtogether” or “arrangement.” In earlier approaches, therewas an attempt toproduceanaccuratedescriptionof thesequenceorordering“arrangement”ofelementsinthelinearstructureofthesentence.Inmorerecentattemptstoanalyze structure, there has been a greater focus on the underlying rulesystemthatweusetoproduceor“generate”sentences.

SyntacticrulesWhenwesetout toprovideananalysisof thesyntaxofa language,we try toadheretothe“allandonly”criterion.Thismeansthatouranalysismustaccountfor all the grammatically correct phrases and sentences and only thosegrammatically correct phrases and sentences in whatever language we areanalyzing. In other words, if we write rules for the creation of well-formedstructures,wehavetocheckthatthoserules,whenappliedlogically,won’talsoleadtoill-formedstructures.

Forexample,wemightsayinformallythat,inEnglish,weputapreposition(near) before a noun (London) to form a prepositional phrase (near London).Thiswilldescribealargenumberofphrases,butdoesitdescribeall(andonly)the prepositional phrases inEnglish?Note that, ifweuse this as a rule of thegrammartocreatestructuresinvolvingaprepositionandanoun,wewillendupproducingphrases like*near tree or*withdog. These don’t seem to bewell-formedEnglishstructures, sowemark themwithanasterisk*, indicating thattheyareungrammatical.

We clearly need to bemore careful in forming the rule that underlies thestructureofprepositionalphrasesinEnglish.Wemighthavemoresuccesswitharulestatingthatweputaprepositionbeforeanounphrase(notjustanoun).InChapter7,wesawthatanounphrasecanconsistofapropernoun(London),apronoun(me)orthecombinationofanarticle(a,the)withanoun(tree,dog),sothat therevisedrulecanbeused toproduce thesewell-formedstructures:nearLondon,withme,nearatree,withthedog.

AGenerativeGrammar

When we have an effective rule such as “a prepositional phrase in Englishconsists of a preposition followed by a noun phrase,” we can imagine anextremely large number of English phrases that could be produced using thisrule. In fact, the potential number is unlimited. This reflects another goal ofsyntacticanalysis,which is tohaveasmallandfinite (i.e. limited)setof rulesthatwillbecapableofproducingalargeandpotentiallyinfinite(i.e.unlimited)numberofwell-formedstructures.Thissmallandfinitesetofrulesissometimesdescribed as a generative grammar because it can be used to “generate” orproducesentencestructuresandnotjustdescribethem.

This typeofgrammarshouldalsobecapableof revealing thebasisof twootherphenomena: first,howsomesuperficiallydifferentphrasesandsentences

are closely related and, second, how some superficially similar phrases and

sentencesareinfactdifferent.

DeepandSurfaceStructureOur intuitions tell us that theremust be some underlying similarity involvingthese two superficially different sentences:Charlie broke thewindow andThewindow was broken by Charlie. In traditional grammar, the first is called anactive sentence, focusing on what Charlie did, and the second is a passivesentence, focusing on The window and what happened to it. The distinctionbetween them is a difference in their surface structure, that is, the differentsyntactic forms they have as individual English sentences. However, thissuperficialdifferenceinformdisguisesthefactthatthetwosentencesarecloselyrelated,evenidentical,atalesssuperficiallevel.

Thisother“underlying”level,wherethebasiccomponents(NounPhrase+Verb+NounPhrase)sharedbythetwosentencescanberepresented, iscalledtheir deep structure. The deep structure is an abstract level of structuralorganization inwhichall the elementsdetermining structural interpretation arerepresented.Thatsamedeepstructurecanbe thesourceofmanyothersurfacestructures such as ItwasCharliewho broke thewindow andWas thewindowbrokenbyCharlie?. In short, thegrammarmustbe capableof showinghowasingleunderlyingabstractrepresentationcanbecomedifferentsurfacestructures.

StructuralAmbiguity

Let’s say we have two distinct deep structures. One expresses the idea that“Annie had an umbrella and she bumped into a man with it.” The otherexpressestheideathat“Anniebumpedintoamanandthemanhappenedtobecarryinganumbrella.”Now,thesetwodifferentversionsofeventscanactually

beexpressedinthesamesurfacestructureform:Anniebumpedintoamanwithanumbrella.Thissentenceprovidesanexampleofstructuralambiguity.Ithastwodistinctunderlyinginterpretationsthathavetoberepresenteddifferentlyindeepstructure.NotethatthisisnotthetypeofambiguitythatweexperienceinhearingTheirchildhasgrownanother foot,which illustrates lexicalambiguitymainlybecause theword foot hasmore than onemeaning. (SeeTaskH, page120,forfurtheranalysis.)

The comedian Groucho Marx knew how to have fun with structuralambiguity.InthefilmAnimalCrackers,hefirstsaysIonceshotanelephantinmypajamas,thenfollowsitwithHowhegotintomypajamasI’llneverknow.Inthenon-funnyinterpretation,partoftheunderlyingstructureofthefirstsentencecouldbesomethinglike:“Ishotanelephant(whileIwas)inmypajamas.”Intheother(ho,ho)interpretation,partoftheunderlyingstructurewouldbesomethinglike: “I shot anelephant (whichwas) inmypajamas.”Thereare twodifferentunderlying structures with the same surface structure, revealed by syntacticanalysis.

SyntacticAnalysisIn syntactic analysis we use some conventional abbreviations for the parts ofspeechidentifiedinChapter7.ExamplesareN(=noun),Art(=article),Adj(=adjective)andV(=verb).Wealsouseabbreviationsforphrases,suchasNP(=nounphrase)andVP(=verbphrase).InEnglish,theverbphrase(VP)consistsof the verb (V) plus the following noun phrase (NP).We can take the simplesentence from Table 7.3 (page 98) and label the constituents using thesecategories,asinFigure8.1.

Figure8.1

Figure8.1presentsastaticanalysisofasinglesentence.Wewouldliketobeabletorepresentthesamesyntacticinformationinamoredynamicformat.One

way of presenting the concept “consists of” is with an arrow (→), alsointerpretedas “rewrites as.”The following rule states that anounphrase (NP)

suchasthedogconsistsoforrewritesas(→)anarticle(the)andanoun(dog).Thissimpleformulais theunderlyingstructureofmillionsofdifferentEnglishphrases.

NP→ArtN

However,itisnottheonlyformanounphrasecantake.Wewanttobeableto include another constituent (Adj) in the rule so that it is good for not onlyphraseslikethedog,butalsothebigdog.Thisconstituentisoptionalinanounphrase,soweuseroundbracketstoindicatethatAdjisanoptionalconstituent,asshownhere:

NP→Art(Adj)N

Anothercommonsymbolisintheformofcurlybrackets{}.Theseindicatethat only one of the elements enclosed within the curly brackets must beselected.Wehavealreadyseen,inFigure7.3,onpage96,thatanounphrasecan

also contain a pronoun (it), or a proper noun (John). Using the abbreviations“Pro” (for pronoun) and “PN” (for proper noun), we canwrite three separaterules,asshownontheleft,butitismoresuccincttowriteonerule,ontheright,usingcurlybrackets.

NP→Art(Adj)N

NP→Pro NP→{Art(Adj)N,Pro,PN}

NP→PN

PhraseStructureRulesWhatwehavestartedtocreateisasetofsyntacticrulescalledphrasestructurerules.Asthenamesuggests,theserulesstatethatthestructureofaphraseofaspecifictypewillconsistofoneormoreconstituentsinaparticularorder.

The first rule in the following set of simple (and necessarily incomplete)phrasestructurerulescapturesaverygeneralruleofEnglishsentencestructure:“a sentence (S) rewrites as a noun phrase (NP) and a verb phrase (VP).”Thesecond rule states that “a noun phrase rewrites as either an article plus anoptionaladjectiveplusanoun,orapronoun,orapropernoun.”Inthethirdrule,averbphraserewritesasaverbplusanounphrase.

S→NPVP

NP→{Art(Adj)N,Pro,PN}

VP→VNP

LexicalRules

Phrasestructure rulesgenerate structures. Inorder to turn thosestructures intorecognizableEnglish,wealsoneed lexicalrules that specifywhichwordscanbeusedwhenwerewriteconstituentssuchasPN.Thefirstruleinthefollowingset states that “a proper noun rewrites as John orMary.” (It is a very smallworld.)

PN→{John,Mary} Art→{a,the}

N→{girl,dog,boy} Adj→{big,small}

V→{followed,helped,saw} Pro→{it,you}

We can rely on these rules to generate the grammatical sentences shownbelowin(1)–(6),butnottheungrammaticalsentencesshownin(7)–(12).

(1)Adogfollowedtheboy. (7)*Dogfollowedboy.

(2)Yousawit. (8)*Youitsaw.

(3)Johnsawthebigdog. (9)*JohnMarysmalldog

(4)ItfollowedMary. (10)*FollowedMarythedogbig.

(5)Thesmallboyhelpedyou. (11)*Thehelpedyouboy

(6)MaryhelpedJohn. (12*MaryJohnhelped.

TreeDiagramsOne of the bestways to create a visual representation of underlying syntacticstructureisthroughtreediagrams.Wecanusethesymbolsintroducedearliertolabelpartsofthetreewhenwecreatearepresentationofhoweachpartfitsinto

theunderlyingstructureofphrases.The information inaphrase structure rule,

ontheleft,canbeexpressedinatreediagram,ontheright,asinFigure8.2.

Figure8.2

Althoughthiskindof“tree,”withits“branches,”ontheright,seemstogrowdownrather than up, it functions ratherwell as a diagram representing all thegrammatical information found in the other analysis on the left. It also showsveryexplicitly that there aredifferent levels in the analysis.That is, there is alevelofanalysisatwhichaconstituentsuchasNPisrepresentedandadifferent,lower,levelatwhichaconstituentsuchasNisrepresented.

WecanuseasimilartreediagramtorepresentthemorecomplexstructureofanEnglishverbphrase (VP),as shown inFigure8.3.Once again, this typeofdiagram provides a way of representing the hierarchical nature of underlyingstructure.Inthishierarchy,theverbphrase(VP)inhigherthanandcontainsthe

verb (V) and a noun phrase (NP). The noun phrase (NP) is higher than andcontainsthearticle(Art)andthenoun(N).

Figure8.3

TreeDiagramsofEnglishSentences

We can now put together tree diagrams for whole sentences, hierarchicallyorganized,as shown in Figure 8.4.Notice that essentially the same basic treediagramstructureis thefoundationforall thedifferentsentences(1)–(6), frompage112,withvariableconstituentsincludedineachone.

Figure8.4

JustScratchingtheSurfaceAtthebottomofallthetreesinFigure8.4aresurfacestructurevariationsofasingle underlying deep structure, revealing the generative power of the phrasestructure rules involved.There areotherphrase structure rules involved in thecompositionofmorecomplexsentences.SomearepresentedinTaskConpage117andTaskIonpage120forEnglish,andTasksEandF,onpages118–119forotherlanguages.Aswetrytodevelopbetterwaysofanalyzingthesyntacticstructureofcomplexsentences,weinevitablyneedalargeranalyticframework.(We have barely scratched the surface structures.) However, having exploredsomeofthebasicissues, terminology,representationsandmethodsofsyntacticanalysisinordertotalkaboutbasicstructuresintheEnglishlanguage,wewillnowmoveontoconsiderhowwemightincorporatetheanalysisofmeaninginthestudyoflanguage.

StudyQuestions1WhatwastheoriginalliteralmeaningofsyntaxinGreek?

2 What is wrong with the following rule of English syntactic structure? “Aprepositionalphraserewritesasaprepositionfollowedbyanoun.”

3Which of the following expressions are structurally ambiguous and inwhatway?

(a)Thesearedesignedforsmallboysandgirls.

(b)Theparentsofthebrideandgroomwerewaitingoutside.

(c)Howcomeabedhasfourlegs,butonlyonefoot?

(d)WemetanEnglishhistoryteacher.

(e)Flyingplanescanbedangerous.

(f)Thestudentscomplainedtoeveryonethattheycouldn’tunderstand.

4Whatpartofspeechislovelyinthefollowingsentence?

Wesawalovelyrainbowyesterday.

5Howmanynounphrasesarethereinthefollowingsentence?

George sawa smalldog in theparknear the fountainand it followedhimwhenheleftthepark.

6WhichpartofthefollowingsentenceistheVP?

Noneofthepeopleinthebuildingsupportedtheproposedrentincrease.

7 Which of the following expressions would be generated by this phrase

structurerule:NP→{Art(Adj)N,Pro,PN}?

(a)alady (c)her (e)thewidow

(b)thelittlegirl (d)Annie (f)she’sanoldwoman

8Whatkindofgenerativeruleisthis:N→{girl,dog,boy}?

9Dophrasestructurerulesrepresentdeepstructureorsurfacestructure?

10Completethefollowingtreediagrams.

Figure8.5

TasksAWhatisthedistinctionmadebetween“competence”and“performance”inthestudyofsyntax?

BWhat ismeant by the expression “an embedded structure”?Were there anyexamplesinthischapter?

C In someversionsof syntactic analysis there are also “movement” rules thatmovepartsof structures todifferentpositions.Forexample, the statementYoucanseeitbecomesthequestionCanyouseeit?bymovingoneelement(can)tothefront.Thiselementisanauxiliary(or“helping”)verb,asarecould,should,will,would.Theyattach toverbs (follow,help,see) in thebasic tree,ason theleftinFigure8.6,andaremovedtothefronttocreateanewtree,asontherightinFigure8.6.Insomedescriptions,thischangeiscalled“inversion.”

Figure8.6

A special arrow (⇒) is used to indicate that a constituent can be moved, asshowninthisruleforAux-movement:NPAuxVP⇒AuxNPVP.WhichofthesestructureswouldresultfromapplyingtheAux-movementrule?

(1)JohnwillfollowMary.

(2)Canyouseethedog?

(3)Coulditfollowyou?

(4)Thegirlhelpedyou.

(5)Couldyouhelpthedog?

(6)Maryshouldseeit.

(7)Willtheboyseeyou?

(8)WouldJohnhelpthegirl?

(9)Itcanseeyou.

(10)Can’tyoufollowit?

DInspokenEnglish,thesequencewanttoissometimescontractedtowanna,asinIdon’twannagoorWhatdoyouwannadotonight?.However,asillustratedinthefollowingsetofsentences,therearesomestructureswherewanttocannotbe contracted. English-speaking children knowhow to usewanna in the rightplaces (and none of thewrong places) at a very early age.Can youwork outwhatitisthattheyknowaboutusingwanna?

(1)Whodoyouwanttoorwannavisit?

(2)Whowouldyouwanttoorwannagooutwith?

(3) How many of your friends do you want to or wanna invite to thewedding?

(4)Whodoyouwantto(*wanna)winthegame?

(5)Whowouldyouwantto(*wanna)lookafteryourpets?

(6)Howmanyofyourfriendsdoyouwantto(*wanna)staywithus?

E The following simplified set of phrase structure rules describes part of thesyntaxofa languagecalledEwe,spoken inWestAfrica.Basedon theserules,which of the following sentences (1)–(10) should have an asterisk * beforethem?

S→NPVP N→{oge,ika,amu}

NP→N(Art) Art→ye

VP→VNP V→{xa,vo}

(1)Ogexaika (6)Voogeika

(2)Yeamuvooge (7)Amuyevoika

(3)Ikaogexaye (8)Yeikaxayeoge

(4)Ogeyevoikaye (9)Xaamuye

(5)Amuxaoge (10)Ogeyexaamu

FUsingthesesimplephrasestructurerulesforScottishGaelic,identify(with*)the ungrammatical sentences and draw tree diagrams for the grammaticalsentences.

S→VNPNP NP→{ArtN(Adj),PN}

Art→an Adj→{ban,beag,mor}

N→cu,{duine,gille} V→{bhuail,chunnaic,fhuair}

PN→{Calum,Mairi,Tearlach}

(1)Calumchunnaicangille.

(2)BhuailanbeagcuTearlach.

(3)Bhuailangillemorancu.

(4)ChunnaicTearlachangille.

(5)Banancuanduinebeag.

(6)FhuairMairiancuban.

GThebasicstructureofasentenceinTamasheq,spokeninnorth-westAfrica,isillustratedas(1)inthesentencesonpage120,butanemphasizedelementcanbe

movedtofrontposition,asshownintheotherexamples.AlltheseexamplesarefromSudlow(2001:47),withminorchanges.

(i)After looking at the syntactic structureof eachTamasheq sentence, canyouaddtheseEnglishtranslationstoappropriateplacesinthechart?

“Itisn’tmenwhocookporridge.”“Porridge,menaren’ttheoneswhocookit.”“Mendon’tcookporridge?”“Menaren’ttheoneswhocookporridge.”

(ii)UsinginformationfromChapters7and8,canyoudecidewhichoftheselanguageshas the samebasic sentence structure asTamasheq, as shown inexample(1):English,Ewe,Gaelic,Japanese,Latin?

(1)

war səkədiwan meddan asink “Mendon’tcookporridge.”

(not) (cook) (men) (porridge)

(2)

meddanawarenisəkədiwasink _________________________

(3)

asink,meddanawarent-isəkədiw _________________________

(4)

waddemedanaisakadawanasink _________________________

(5)

meddanwarsəkədiwanasink? _________________________

H Which of the following two tree diagrams could be used to represent theunderlyingstructureofthesentence:Georgesawtheboywithatelescope?

Figure8.7

ITheconceptofrecursionisusedinsyntaxtodescribetherepeatedapplicationofaruletotheoutputofanearlierapplicationoftherule.Forexample,wecanusetheterms“complementizer”(C)fortheEnglishwordthat,and“complementphrase”(CP)forthatMaryhelpedyouaspartofthesentenceCathyknewthatMaryhelpedyou.Inthecomplementphrase,thepartMaryhelpedyourepresents

a sentence (S), so theremust be a rule:CP→CS, or “a complement phraserewritesasacomplementandasentence.”Thisprovidesuswithasmallsetof rules incorporatingrecursion. (Note that

when you reach the end of this set of rules, you can keep going back to thebeginningandrepeatingthesequence.Thatistheessenceofrecursion.)

S →NPVP

VP →VCP

CP →CS

Usingtheserules,fillinthemissingelementsinthetreediagraminFigure8.8.

Figure8.8

DiscussionTopics/ProjectsIThereisaprincipleofsyntaxcalled“structuredependency”thatisoftenusedtoshowthattherulesoflanguagestructuredependonhierarchicalorganizationandnotonlinearposition.Forexample,someonetryingtolearnEnglishmightbe tempted to think that questions of the type in (2) are formed simply bymoving the second word in a statement (1) to become the first word of aquestion(2).

(1)Shaggyistired. (2)IsShaggytired?

Youwillhelphim. Willyouhelphim?

Using thesentences in (2)–(6), try todecide if this is thebestway todescribehowalloftheseEnglishquestionsareformedand,ifitisnot,trytoformulateabetterrule.

(3)Aretheexercisesinthisbooktooeasy?

(4)IsthecatthatismissingcalledBlackie?

(5)Willthepriceofthenewbookyou’veorderedbereallyexpensive?

(6)Wastheguywhoscoredthewinninggoalinthefinalplayingforloveormoney?

(For background reading, see chapter 3 of Fromkin, Rodman and Hyams,2014.)

IIWe could propose that passive sentences (GeorgewashelpedbyMary) arederived from active structures (Mary helped George) via a rule such as the

following:

(active)NP1VNP2=>NP2beV-edbyNP1(passive)

Notethatthetense,pastorpresent,oftheV(e.g.helped)intheactivestructuredeterminesthetenseofbe in thepassivestructure (e.g.washelped).Whichofthe followingactivesentencescanbe restructured intopassivesentencesusingthisrule?Whatpreventstherulefromworkingintheothercases?

(1)Thedogchasedthecat.

(2)SnowWhitekissedGrumpy.

(3)Helovesthem.

(4)BetsyborrowedsomemoneyfromChristopher.

(5)Theteamplayedbadly.

(6)Thebankmanagerlaughed.

(7)Theyhavetwochildren.

(8)Theducklingbecameaswan.

(9)Someonementionedthatyouplayedbasketball.

(10)Thepolicewillarrestviolentdemonstrators.

(Forbackgroundreading,seeMorenberg,2013.)Note:ThedifferentunderlyingstructuresinOettinger’s(1966:168)example,

Timeflieslikeanarrow;fruitflieslikeabanana,citedatthebeginningofthischapter, can be represented in the following tree diagrams. The differentstructuresdependonsomelexicalambiguitysincefliesisaverbinthefirstpartandanoun in thesecondpart.Also like isapreposition in the firstpartandaverbinthesecondpart.

Figure8.9

FurtherReading

BasicTreatments

Miller,J.(2008)AnIntroductiontoEnglishSyntax(2ndedition)EdinburghUniversityPress

Thomas,L.(1993)BeginningSyntaxBlackwell

MoreDetailedTreatments

Morenberg,M.(2013)DoingGrammar(5thedition)OxfordUniversityPress

Tallerman,M.(2014)UnderstandingSyntax(4thedition)Routledge

SpecificallyonEnglishSyntax

Jonz,J.(2013)AnIntroductiontoEnglishSentenceStructureEquinoxPublishing

Radford,A.(2009)AnIntroductiontoEnglishSentenceStructureCambridgeUniversityPress

OnGenerativeGrammar

Baker,M.(2001)TheAtomsofLanguage:TheMind’sHiddenRulesofGrammarBasicBooks

OnStructuralAmbiguity

Pinker,S.(1994)TheLanguageInstinct(chapter4)WilliamMorrow

TreeDiagrams

Carnie,A.(2012)Syntax(3rdedition)Wiley-Blackwell

OtherReferences

Fromkin,V.,R.RodmanandN.Hyams(2014)AnIntroductiontoLanguage(10thedition)Wadsworth

Sudlow,D.(2001)TheTamasheqofNorth-EastBurkinaFasoR.KöppeVerlag