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A Course in English Morpho-Syntax Syllabi for the Lectures Examples and Exercises Ludmila Veselovská and Joseph Emonds
A Course in English Morpho-Syntax
Syllabi for the Lectures Examples and Exercises
Ludmila Veselovská and Joseph Emonds
TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................ 1 1 PARTS OF SPEECH / WORD CATEGORIES ................................................................................... 3
1.1 THE NATURE OF CATEGORIES .......................................................................................................... 3 1.2 SEMANTIC-NOTIONAL CRITERIA FOR ESTABLISHING A CATEGORY (OFTEN IMPRECISE) ................... 4 1.3 MORPHOLOGICAL CRITERIA FOR ESTABLISHING AN ITEM'S CATEGORY (VERY RELIABLE) ............... 4
1.3.1 Derivational Morphology ........................................................................................................... 4 1.3.2 Inflectional Morphology ............................................................................................................. 5 1.3.3 Grammaticalisation .................................................................................................................... 5 1.3.4 Types of Features ........................................................................................................................ 6
1.4 EXERCISES ........................................................................................................................................ 7 1.5 SYNTACTIC CRITERIA FOR ESTABLISHING A CATEGORY (RELIABLE BUT NOT ALWAYS EASY) .......... 8 1.6 HEADS AND PHRASES ....................................................................................................................... 8 1.7 CATEGORIAL PROTOTYPICALITY ...................................................................................................... 9 1.8 SOME NON-LEXICAL CATEGOIRES OR MINOR PARTS OF SPEECH ...................................................... 10 1.9 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 10
SEMANTICS AND MORPHOLOGY OF NOUNS ..................................................................................... 14 1.10 CASE .............................................................................................................................................. 14
1.10.1 The Repertory and Realization of Morphological Case ............................................................ 14 1.10.2 The Source and Function of Case ............................................................................................. 15
1.11 COUNTABILITY AND NUMBER: COUNT VS. MASS ........................................................................... 17 1.11.1 Countability .............................................................................................................................. 17 1.11.2 Singular vs. Dual vs. Plural Number ........................................................................................ 18
1.12 DETERMINATION ............................................................................................................................ 19 1.12.1 Classification of Determiners w.r.t. Distribution ...................................................................... 19 1.12.2 Articles ...................................................................................................................................... 20 1.12.3 Types of Reference .................................................................................................................... 20
1.13 ANIMACY AND GENDER ................................................................................................................. 21 1.13.1 Animacy .................................................................................................................................... 21 1.13.2 The Gender Category ................................................................................................................ 22
1.14 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 24 2 SYNTACTIC CHARACTERISTICS OF THE NOUN ..................................................................... 29
2.1 INTERNAL STRUCTURE OF NOUN PHRASES ..................................................................................... 29 2.1.1 N-premodifiers .......................................................................................................................... 29 2.1.2 N-postmodifiers ......................................................................................................................... 30
2.2 DISTRIBUTION AND FUNCTIONS OF NOUN PHRASES ....................................................................... 30 2.3 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 31
3 PRONOUNS .......................................................................................................................................... 36 3.1 PERSONAL PRONOUNS .................................................................................................................... 36
3.1.1 Interpretation of Personal Pronouns ........................................................................................ 36 3.1.2 Pronoun Function and Form .................................................................................................... 37 3.1.3 The Pro-N One .......................................................................................................................... 38
3.2 RELATIVE PRONOUNS ..................................................................................................................... 38 3.2.1 The form of the relative Pronouns ............................................................................................ 39 3.2.2 Omitting the relative Pronoun .................................................................................................. 39
3.3 INTERROGATIVE PRONOUNS ........................................................................................................... 40 3.3.1 The form of the interrogative Pronouns .................................................................................... 40 3.3.2 The position of the WH-Pronouns ............................................................................................. 40
3.4 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 42 4 ANAPHORS (REFLEXIVES AND RECIPROCALS) ...................................................................... 45
4.1 REFERENCE .................................................................................................................................... 45 4.1.1 Co-reference (Antecedents and Indices) ................................................................................... 45 4.1.2 The linear position of an antecedent (above all with pragmatic anaphors) ............................. 46
4.2 THE FORM AND INTERPRETATION OF ENGLISH ANAPHORS ............................................................ 46 4.2.1 Antecedents of anaphors ........................................................................................................... 46 4.2.2 Binding of Anaphors ................................................................................................................. 47 4.2.3 Reciprocals ............................................................................................................................... 47
4.3 THE DISTRIBUTION/ USE OF REFLEXIVE/ RECIPROCAL PRONOUNS ................................................ 48 4.4 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 48
5 MODIFIERS .......................................................................................................................................... 50 5.1 SEMANTIC CHARACTERISTICS OF ADJECTIVES/ ADVERBS .............................................................. 50 5.2 ADJECTIVAL / ADVERBIAL MORPHOLOGY ...................................................................................... 50
5.2.1 Derivational Morphology ......................................................................................................... 50 5.2.2 Inflectional Morphology ........................................................................................................... 51
5.3 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 51 6 SYNTAX OF ADJECTIVES ................................................................................................................ 52
6.1 ADJECTIVE PHRASE ........................................................................................................................ 52 6.2 DISTRIBUTION/ FUNCTIONS OF ADJ PHRASES ................................................................................. 53 6.3 ADJECTIVAL PREDICATES ............................................................................................................... 53 6.4 ADJECTIVE PRE-/POST-MODIFIERS OF A NOUN ............................................................................... 54
6.4.1 Pre-modifying Adjectives .......................................................................................................... 54 6.4.2 Post-modifying Adjectives ......................................................................................................... 54
6.5 SUBJECT/OBJECT COMPLEMENTS (SECONDARY PREDICATES) ....................................................... 55 6.6 CENTRAL AND PERIPHERAL ADJECTIVES ........................................................................................ 56
6.6.1 Secondary Adjectives ................................................................................................................ 56 6.7 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 57
7 ADVERBS .............................................................................................................................................. 60 7.1 VERBAL, TEMPORAL, SENTENTIAL AND GRADING ADVERBS ........................................................... 60 7.2 NEGATIVE, PARTIAL NEGATIVE, POSITIVE ADVERBS ....................................................................... 61 7.3 ADVERBIALS AS COMPLEMENTS, ADJUNCTS, DISJUNCTS, CONJUNCTS .......................................... 62 7.4 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 62
8 SEMANTICS AND MORPHOLOGY OF VERBS ............................................................................ 64 8.1 SEMANTIC SPECIFICATION AND CLASSIFICATION ........................................................................... 64 8.2 VERBAL PARADIGMA (VERBAL MORPHOLOGY) ............................................................................. 65 8.3 TENSE ............................................................................................................................................. 66 8.4 ASPECT ........................................................................................................................................... 66 8.5 COMBINATIONS OF ASPECT & TENSE ............................................................................................. 67 8.6 MOOD, SENTENCE MODALITY ........................................................................................................ 68 8.7 VOICE ............................................................................................................................................. 69 8.8 SUBJECT-VERB AGREEMENT .......................................................................................................... 69 8.9 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 70
9 SYNTAX OF VERBS............................................................................................................................ 73 9.1 VERB PHRASE ................................................................................................................................. 73 9.2 DISTRIBUTION AND FUNCTIONS OF VP ........................................................................................... 75 9.3 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 75
10 AUXILIARIES AND MODALS .......................................................................................................... 76 10.1 SEMANTIC SPECIFICATION .............................................................................................................. 76 10.2 TWO KINDS OF MODALITY AMONG THE MODALS .......................................................................... 76 10.3 PHONETIC REDUCTIONS OF AUXILIARIES, MODALS AND LEXICAL VERBS ...................................... 77 10.4 MORPHOLOGICAL PROPERTIES ....................................................................................................... 77 10.5 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 78
11 SYNTAX OF AUXILIARIES, MODALS AND VERBS .................................................................. 80
11.1 QUESTION FORMATION: MODAL/*VERB - SUBJECT - ... .................................................................. 80 11.2 NEGATION (POSITION OF NOT) ........................................................................................................ 81 11.3 QUESTION TAGS, SHORT ANSWERS, QUESTIONS OF SURPRISE ....................................................... 81 11.4 NEGATIVE QUESTIONS (TESTING THE PROPOSED VERBAL STRUCTURE) .......................................... 82 11.5 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 83
12 THE ENGLISH VERBS DO, BE AND HAVE ............................................................................... 86 12.1 SPECIFICITY OF BE ......................................................................................................................... 86 12.2 SPECIFICITY OF HAVE ..................................................................................................................... 87 12.3 EXERCISES ...................................................................................................................................... 89
13 RELATED LITERATURE .................................................................................................................. 93
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INTRODUCTION
Working with this text
This text has been written to assist students of English in their work in courses on Morphology and Morpho-Syntax in the programme of English philology. It assumes a solid knowledge of English grammar and of traditional grammar at the level assumed for the grammar school courses of Czech language. This text, however, is in no way intended to replace any textbook specified in a course description, nor does the amount of material cover all of what students need to read for their exams. Instead, it provides syllabi for the lectures with many schemata and examples commented on and discussed in the course. Without careful attention to the general prsentations in the lectures, some of them may be difficult to understand. The students are strongly encouraged to make their own notes and remarks during the lectures and seminars; enough space is given between the paragraphs and in the margins to make possible such additions. Some students may still have problems with English terminology and with structuring of their study—this text should also provide them with the main terms used. The sections basically follow a pattern that can be used in preparing for English grammar exams, though not all topics are covered to the same extent and some require more individual reading. Apart from syllabi, the following text also contains a number of exercises. The function of the exercises is twofold. First, they introduce some new aspects or problems of the proposed analyses not mentioned in detail during the lectures. Second, they allow students to test their understanding of the topics under discussion. In some cases, however, there is no generally agreed solution to a problem, and the exercise provides more data for discussion of alternatives rather than being a simple minded test of knowledge. The Topics and Background Philosophy
The course concentrates in detail on the characteristics of the main lexical categories (and also the Pronouns) in English. Special attention is given to the forms and functions of Nouns, Adjectives, Prepositions and Verbs, including Auxiliaries and Modals. In this part many syntactic terms are introduced in as much as they are relevant for the categorial characteristics. Because the assumed readers are Czechs and many of them intend to translate or interpret in their future careers, English grammar is often compared with its Czech formal and/or pragmatic equivalents. Some other languages are also occasionally mentioned, to provide a more universal background for the topic under discussion. The volume is divided into sections which can be covered in some 10-13 two-hour classes (in the existing system in a semester). Each main part of a Chapter contains an introductory Revision section testing the assumed preliminary knowledge and a final Revision section which summarizes the basic topics covered in the course. The text concentrates on topics which the authors find most important, most interesting and sometimes neglected in other study materials. To complement these individual choices, at the beginning of most sections there are some bibliographical references to the literature which are recommended as study material for the course. The students are expected to go through at least some of these materials. A student who does no serious supplementary reading will almost certainly not do well in their final marks. The authors of the following text believe that linguistics, above all its grammar, is an autonomous science. In fact, the daily unconscious use of one’s native grammar is thought by leading researchers to underlie all human science and calculation. Therefore the analyses here assume that human language is a system which can be studied applying
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scientific methods with the result of acquiring some descriptively adequate and as explanatory as possible generalized hypotheses. Empirical data and argumentation are thus strongly preferred to the memorizing of any listed classifications, and no a priori analysis or theory is taken for granted or as definitive. Nonetheless, the presentation and hypotheses here, such as in the choices of categories, are based on traditional functional and structuralist grammar (which the students have used during their pre-university education) only slightly influenced by current theoretical proposals. Recent functional and generative approaches typically present themselves as returning to the empirical concerns of traditional grammar and at the moment provide a wide range of plausible frameworks. The grammatical analyses introduced in this course assume the need for empirical and scientific understanding of human language and although it concentrates on formal grammar, it assumes interactions with other disciplines such as a theory of communication, literary study, psychology, sociology, anthropology, etc. The authors hope that discussing and trying to understand basic grammar in a more universal and open-minded way turns out to be useful for all students of English language, who can then go on in their studies in whichever field or framework suits their fancy. Ludmila Veselovská Joseph Emonds
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1 PARTS OF SPEECH / WORD CATEGORIES
Huddleston & Pullum (2002) pp. 22; Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 188-203
1.1 T he Natur e of C ategor ies
The label for a part of speech expresses a number of properties shared by specific groups of words. Many specific structural relations can be derived from the categorial status of a given word. Therefore from the beginning of the theoretical study of language in ancient Greece, words were grouped into several categories according to various properties. (1) CRITERIA FOR ESTABLISHING PARTS OF SPEECH
1. SEMANTIC or “notional” - based on the meaning of words and/or their function in a larger group of words
2. MORPHOLOGICAL - based on the internal word-structure; each category has some typical morphology: (a) derivational morpheme(s) (b) inflectional morpheme(s)
3. SYNTACTIC - (a) based on distribution in well-formed sentences (b) co-occurrence restrictions (includes modification)
4. PHONETIC - complementary criteria mentioning e.g. a particular stress pattern or some specific phoneme. E.g. in Classical Greek Nouns had variable stress, while Verbs and Adjectives had a fixed rule for penult/final stress placement. In Igbo (Nigeria), Verbs begin with consonants while Nouns typically begin with vowels.
In an ideal case all the criteria applied to one lexical item agree, but they need not. In this situation some of the criteria are taken for more important, according to the kind of grammatical theory used and specific characteristics of the studied language. The definitions of word categories may therefore vary in different theoretical frameworks. In traditional grammar the notional and morphological criteria prevailed over the syntactic. In Czech traditional grammar , the following word categories are used: Nouns, Adjectives, Pronouns, Numerals, Verbs, Adverbs, Prepositions, Conjunctions, Particles and Interjections, and for English the categories of Articles (more generally, Determiners) and Modals could be added. The criteria for inflecting words (word categories) are mainly morphological, while with non-inflecting word categories, syntactic and semantic criteria are often used. The notion of a word category is closely related to the notion of ‘word’ and its definition may differ in different languages as well. ‘MAJOR’ or ‘OPEN CLASS’ or ‘LEXICAL’ CATEGORIES: N (Nouns...) A (Adjectives, certain classes of Adverbs...) V (Verbs...) P? (Prepositions taken in a broad sense). Unlimited number of items; productive formations of new items ‘MINOR’ or ‘CLOSED CLASS’ CATEGORIES: P? (some Prepositions), Pronouns, Auxiliaries, Complementizers (Conjunctions), certain Adverbial Particles, Quantifiers-Numerals etc. Limited number of items (a closed list) for each category.
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The existence of the major lexical categories seems to be quite universal, but the importance and roles of their members may differ substantially. Also the number and character of minor lexical or non-lexical categories may differ across languages. The awareness of some universal and some language-specific categorial features is also highly relevant when language acquisition is taken into account.
1.2 Semantic-Notional C r iter ia for establishing a C ategor y (often impr ecise)
(2) Prototypical correlations of syntactic categories (see Croft 1991, p.55, 65, 79) Noun Adjective Verb Semantic class object property action Stativity state state process, activity Persistence persistent persistent transitory Valency 0, sometimes 1 1, sometimes 2 1 to 4 Gradability nongradable gradable nongradable Pragmatic function reference modification predication
1.3 M or phological C r iter ia for establishing an item's C ategor y (ver y r eliable)
(a) derivational affixes...................create a new word usually with of a different category (b) inflectional endings.................create a new form within a paradigm of the same word
1.3.1 Derivational Morphology Derivational morphemes derive a new word, often in a different part of speech (category), e.g. the Verb ‘write’ + derivational morpheme ‘-er’ = action Noun ‘writer’; ‘write’ + derivational morpheme ‘-able’ = passive Adjective ‘writable’ The presence of the derivational morpheme (in the relevant position) is almost always a clear and sufficient argument in favor of some category. However, not all words have derivational morphemes and in languages where conversion and morpheme homonymy is frequent (e.g. English) a derivational morpheme can mislead. For example, British English ‘fiver’, based on a numeral, is a five pound note, and drug slang includes e.g. a ‘downer’. (3) The Righ-hand Head Rule - the head of a (complex) word in English, the element that
provides the category for the whole word, is the rightmost element. (a) nation-al = A (b) nation-al-ise = *A / V (c) nation-al-is-ation = *A / *V / N (4) (a) government The government funds are restricted. Effective government of desert areas is difficult. (b) reading I need new reading glasses/ glasses for easy reading. He was/ began/ kept reading a book of poetry. The reading public is hard to deceive.
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1.3.2 Inflectional Morphology Inflectional morphemes change a word / part of speech (category) within its own paradigm: e.g. the Noun muž has a Case/Number paradigm: muž, muže, muži, mužem, muži, mužích, mužů, mužům. e.g. the Noun child has a Case/Number paradigm: child, child's, children, children’s. Inflectional morphemes (e.g. plurals of Nouns) are specific/ typical for each part of speech: e.g. Nominal paradigm = nominal declension: Number, Case, etc. Verbal paradigm = verbal conjugation: Tense, Aspect, Mood, Person, etc. Inflectional paradigms can differ a lot across languages. Japanese nouns have case and politeness inflections, but none for number. Japanese verbs are inflected for tense, negative, causative, passive, politeness and other notions, but not for person or number.
1.3.3 Grammaticalisation
Inflection encodes the meaning/ features which a language has grammaticalised. Grammaticalization of a lexical semantic feature is a diachronic process. A semantic feature which becomes (in a given language) grammaticalised is: (i) simplified in meaning (appears only as a choice between a limited number of options) (ii) regular (has a canonic representation with a limited number of exceptions), (iii) often productive (frequent, can be used with new words) (5) (a) a tiny/ small/ little apple (a') jablí-čko
(b) female/ woman/ she doctor (b') doktor-ka (c) lion-ess, actr-ess, host-ess, *doctor-ess, *author-ess, *bakr-ess (d) care-ful, sorrow-ful, dread-ful, health-ful, respect-ful, hope-ful, mourn-ful The lexical morphemes (independent words) like tiny/ small/ little or female/ woman/ she can diachronically lose the irsemantic (lexical) richness and become simplified into productive grammatical formatives, in the extreme case becoming a regular/ predictable/ productive bound morpheme. Grammatical morphemes are nonetheless still semantic in that they are related to aspects of reality which can also be expressed lexically. They represent some simplified version of it. (6) Real vs. grammaticalised notion e.g. number 6, number three hundred and seven
(a) Rational Number (an infinite scale): 1/2/3/.../789/.../8723... ∞ (b) Grammaticalised Number: one vs. many, several, few book vs. book-s (-s can mean any of these) (7) Real vs. grammaticalised notion of Time = Tense
(a) Time, an infinite line: E.g. Future time: tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, next year, the next century, Dec.7, 2110... (b) Tense, Grammaticalised: established points (with respect to the speech act) Past vs. Present vs. Future Tense (= what precedes/ occurs with/ follows a speech act)
He stopped. (-ed means preceding the speech act) He will come. (will means following the speech act)
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Languages can differ as to which categories use which grammaticalised features (i.e., have specific kinds of inflectional morphology). Compare these English and Czech examples w.r.t. (= with respect to) grammaticalisation of (a/b) Gender and (c/d) Countability: (8) (a) The Great Emper-ess [Fem] was sitting on the throne. The Great Emper-or [Masc] was sitting on the throne.
(b) Velk-á císař-ovna seděl-a na trůně. Velk-ý císař seděl na trůně. (c) Mary bought many / few / *much /*little books. Mary seems to have so much / little / *many / *few time(*s). (d) Marie koupila mnoho / málo knih. Marie má mnoho / málo času Inflectional morphology on a lexical item reflects features of the following three types
1.3.4 Types of Features 1. PRIMARY (a) inherent (part of the lexical entry) (b) optional (depend on the choice of the speaker) 2. SECONDARY (c) configurational (‘kongruenční’, ‘agreement’, case) The kinds of features are illustrated in the following (9) (9) (a) Mary [Fem/*Masc] is an actress [Fem/*Masc]
- Mary/ actress are always/ inherently of [Fem] Gender. (b) Julie bought [Past]/ will buy [Fut] a book [Sing] / many books [Plur]
- the choice of Tense in bought /will buy depends on the speaker. - the choice of Number in book/ books depends on the speaker. (c) Hilary introduces/*introduce her friends to Bill. They introduce/*introduces their friends to Peter.
- the Agreement on the Predicate introduce(s) depends not on the Verb itself, but on some other (related) element - on the characteristics of the Subject.
(Speakers cannot chose the form of the Verb, once they have chosen the Subject.) (10) Jiřina poslal Petrovi velk-ou knih-u.
knih-u[Fem, Sg, Acc]
(a) Gender [feminine]: an inherent feature (the lexical entry kniha is in Czech formally feminine and cannot be otherwise). (b) Number [singular]: optional feature (the speaker was able to choose plural: knihy). (c) Case [accusative]: configurational (the Czech Verb poslat requires accusative Case and no other for its direct Object). velk-ou [Fem, Sg, Acc]
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All features on the Adjective are secondary, i.e. configurational; they reflect the properties of the superordinate element (knihu) to show that the Adj. is its (pre-) modifier. Inflectional morphology is the strongest signal of categorial status. In a language with rich inflectional morphology (e.g. Czech) each major class lexical item can have some typical inflectional ending, which identifies the part of speech rather unambiguously. However, in a language with poor inflectional morphology (e.g. English) the morphological signal is frequently absent and co-occurring elements decide the category. (11) (a) stop - stops (b) to stop, he stop-s vs. the stop, two stop-s (c) zastav-it, zastav-il vs. zastáv-ka, zastáv-ky (12) List of English bound inflectional morphemes
... Category Morpheme Example Meaning/Function type
1. N -s book-s Number [plural] optional 2. N 's Mary's Case [Saxon genitive] configurational 3. Pron -s/-r hi-s/ou-r Case [Possessive] configurational 4. V -s (he) read-s Agreement [3sgPres] configurational 5. V -ed stopp-ed Tense [Past] optional 6. V –en/ ed writt-en Aspect [Perfect] optional 7. V –ing read-ing Aspect [Progressive] optional 8. A -er small-er Grading [Comparative] optional 9. A -est small-est Grading [Superlative] optional 10. Num -th four-th Counting [Ordinal] configurational
1.4 E xer cises
(13) EXERCISE ===========================================
(i) Give the pronunciation of the morphemes –s and –ed. What are the options? (ii) What is 'assimilation in voicing'? How does it work for English inflections? (iii) Under which conditions does the pronunciation involve [-ә-]? (iv) Can you state this last rule in some general way? (a) books (a) cat's (a) he talks (a) he talked (b) dogs (b) dog's (b) he reads (b) he arrived (c) trees (c) Mike's (c) he tries (c) he tried (d) masses (d) James's (d) he fusses (d) he trusted (e) hedges (e) Butch's (e) he amuses (e) he traded (14) EXERCISE ===========================================
The morphemes –en, –er and -ing are not only inflectional but can be derivational. What are the meanings/ functions of the latter 3 morphemes? Give3 examples of each. Derivational -en .......................................................................................................................... Derivational -er ........................................................................................................................... Derivational -ing .........................................................................................................................
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1.5 Syntactic C r iter ia for establishing a C ategor y (r eliable but not always easy)
Syntactic criteria for establishing the category of an item are based on its distribution in sentences, i.e. co-occurrence restrictions with other categories around it. Each part of speech appears in some typical environments. There are typical elements which are subordinate to it (lower in a hierarchical arrangement) and typical elements which are superordinate to it (higher in a hierarchical arrangement). E.g. with Nouns: subordinate elements (which depend on N) are Adjectives, Articles, etc. while superordinate elements (what the N(P) depends on) are Verbs, Prepositions, etc. (15) (a) N: book, friend, road, oxygen, courage, flaw, explanation, etc. (b) NP: [NP some new book], [NP a friend of mine], [NP the road to take home] (c) V, [ __ NP]: to publish [NP some new book], to see [NP a friend of mine] P, [ __ NP]: about [NP the new book], about [NP the road to take home]
1.6 H eads and Phr ases
Every part of speech can become a head of a more complex structural unit = phrase. (16) Phrases can have pre-modifier(s) HEAD post-modifier(s) brother that big out of mine right was the door usually a bother The form of a pre-/post-modification is typical for a specific head/part of speech. Some, like articles with nouns or nouns after prepositions. can be more or less obligatory. (17) (a) N: boy [NP the little boy of mine ] (b) A: small [AP much smaller than Theo ] (c) V: read [VP to never saw the article ] (d) P: toward [PP right toward a door ] In a sentence, a “constituent” can appear as (i) simple/ bare, or (ii) complex. We call both “phrases” and say that sentences consist of phrases, not of words. Sentence functions like ‘Subject’, ‘Object’, ‘Attribute’ and ‘Predicate’ are phrases, although they can be bare phrases (i.e. they can look like only one word) or clauses (sentences inside sentences).. (18) (a) We saw a boy / [NP the little boy of mine ] Object is NP (b) This boy is small / [AP much smaller than Adam ] Predicate is AP (c) I want to read it. / [VP to quickly read the article ] Object is VP (d) He went up. / [PP right up the hill ] Adverbial is PP (e) This is a big step / [AP an extremely big] step Attribute is AP
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The main or major parts of speech N, V, A, P (in fact their phrases are NP, VP, AP, PP) typically have PROFORMS: grammatical words which can replace them. The kind of proform used for such substitution itself signals the kind of phrase: Pronouns replace NPs, Adverbials like there, then replace PPs, do so replaces VP, such and so replace AP. (19) The little boy was already running in the city's only park at 8 o’clock.
(a) NP [NP He ] was already running in the city's only park at 8 o’clock. (b) VP She wonders if [the little boy ] [VP did so ]. (c) PP The little boy was running [PP there ] at 8 o’clock. (d) NP The little boy was running in [NP our ] only park at 8 o’clock. (e) PP The little boy was running in the city's only park [PP then ]. (f) AP [AP Such] a boy was running in the city's park at 8 o’clock. (g) [NP He] is [VP dong so ] [PP there] [PP now].
1.7 C ategor ial Pr ototypicality
Ideally the words belonging to the same part of speech have the same (general) meaning, the same (predictable) forms and the same syntactic distributions/ functions/ pragmatics. Grammatical categories have ‘best case’ members and members that systematically depart from the ‘best case’. The optimal grammatical description of morphosyntactic processes involves reference to the degree of categorial deviation from the ‘best case.’ To ‘know' the characteristics of a specific part of speech means to know to which extent the members of the category are ‘the same’ (what they have in common), and to which extent they can differ from the best case (what are the frequent deviations). (20) (a) book/ books; flaw/ flaws but sheep/ *sheeps; courage/ *courages
(b) writing, arriving, doing but *musting/ *shoulding/ *bewaring ‘FUZZY’ CATEGORIES: The boundaries between categories sometimes seem indistinct. The reason for the ‘fuzziness’ of categories lies in the multiple criteria for each category; see (1) on page 3. ‘Category’ is defined separately on each linguistic plane; so the results of the multiple definitions can seem contradictory. If we still must choose only one category, our choice depends on what we focus on (recall that categories are abstract collections of features and properties). Consider the following examples. (i) Meaning is adaptable and there is no morphology:
(21) (a) ...stop... - meaning??? V?, N?, A? (b) The nearest stop is... N, *V, *A (c) The stop lights are broken. A, *N, *V (d) He should stop soon. V, *N, *A (ii) Meaning is adaptable and morphology is ambiguous
(22) (a) ...reading... - meaning of –ing???, V?, N?, A? (b) Reading about that is easy. ?V, ?N (c) This reading is easy. N, *V, *A (d) He was reading a book. V, *N, *A (e) Take the reading glasses. A, *N, *V
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(iii) Meaning is adaptable, morphology signals X and distribution (syntax) signals Y
(23) Should we go there or nearer the boss? -er → A; coordination with here and go →P. (24) That’s a must see movie. must → see is a verb; the syntax suggests see is an A.
1.8 Some non-lexical categoir es or minor par ts of speech
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 188-203; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp. 393-398; Dušková (1994) pp. 136-140, 273-306; Svoboda and Opělová-Károlyová (1989) pp. 138-162; Crystal (1987) pp. 91-93 Minor parts of speech (closed categories) have a limited, basically fixed number of members. They are lists of specific words. They can be (i) grouped together with some major category that they share properties with, or (ii) kept separate because of some special property. (25) (a) Pronouns = Nouns, Adjectives ? (b) Numerals = Nouns, Adjectives ? (c) Conjunctions = Prepositions ? In English and Czech, these categories influence morphology, but don’t exhibit it themselves. But these categories are central to grammatical systems, i.e. syntactic distribution. (26) Numerals
(a) I can see those three hundred (and) thirty-three silver fire-brigade vehicles. (b) The fifth one I see twice or three times a day. (c) The purpose of those plants is threefold. First, they take up space; second….… (d) Many of them are ugly but a few are not so bad. (e) They drank barrels of beer. Mike drank a lot of wine, too. (27) Prepositions, Conjunctions, Adverbs
(a) I haven’t done anything since Sunday, after the party. (b) Samuel hasn’t done anything since (he got up). (c) Peter arrived after she finished her work in the garden/ after(ward). (d) I arranged for a vcation and for her to get a free trip. For she really deserved it. (e) What are you looking at /for? What are you looking forward to? Consider the notion “transitivity” w.r.t distinctions among: Preposition/ Conjunction/ Adverb
1.9 E xer cises
(28) EXERCISE ===========================================
Use the ambiguous? /fuzzy? expressions use, love, top, after, back, book, open in at least two ways in contexts which clearly disambiguate their category as N, V, A or P. Think of other English words which are 'fuzzy' in a similar way. use ............................................................................................................................................. love ...........................................................................................................................................
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top ............................................................................................................................................. after .......................................................................................................................................... back .......................................................................................................................................... book .......................................................................................................................................... open............................................................................................................................................ (29) EXERCISE ===========================================
Recall the (semantic-notional) definitions you were using at primary school to characterize the category (part of speech): For each one, why is it (in)adequate? “Nouns are names of persons, places and things.” Verbs express ??... Pronouns ??....
(30) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give examples of 3 derivational morphemes that change each word category: Nouns: (i) govern+MENT, V + ment = N
(ii)............................................................. (iii).................................................................
Verbs: (i) modern+ISE, A + ise = V
(ii)............................................................. (iii).................................................................
Adjectives: (i) coffein+FREE, N + free = Adj
(ii)............................................................. (iii).................................................................
Adverbs: (i) east + WARD, X + ward = Adv
(ii)............................................................. (iii).................................................................
(31) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss what the underlined morphology in the examples below signals. (a) Jan a Marie jd-ou do kina. (d) John i-s in the garden. (b) Zelen-ou si neber. (e) There were you-r two boys there. (c) Petra js-em viděl-a já. (f) The man who-m I gave it to. (32) EXERCISE ===========================================
In the following examples circle all the morphemes which show the feature of Number. Explain the distinctions between Czech and English. (a) The other young girls came back from Prague very tired. (b) Ty druhé mladé dívky se vrátily z Prahy velmi unavené. (33) EXERCISE ===========================================
Which kind of morpheme are the –S/-ER/-ING/-ED morphemes in the following examples? Consider which category the word in the following context is. Justify your choices (a) (i) Joan is a bit quick-er than Louise. (ii) She is a quick read-er.
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(b) (i) I saw Adam'-s brother in front of the house. (ii) These article-s were written by my father. (iii) Josephine stop-s at every corner. (c) (i) Bill was shoot-ing the rabbits. (ii) His shoot-ing (of the rabbits) went on and on. (iii) Those shoot-ing sounds/ stars surprised me. (d) (i) The staff was soon retir-ed (by the management). (ii) My father is happily retir-ed (*by the management). (iii) A retir-ed (*by Harriet) person (*by the management). (34) EXERCISE ===========================================
In the following complexes find the elements which are subordinate / superordinate to the underlined head. Which categories are these elements? (a) Joe saw my younger brother. (b) She fell in love with that brother of mine last year. (c) Hillary always falls in love with quite young boys. (d) My brother is really much younger than her. (e) She is in very good terms with his mother. (35) EXERCISE ===========================================
The underlined words are in fact bare phrases (i.e. phrases which contain only a head). Replace them (in the text) by complex phrases which contain (i) the head and some premodifier(s) (ii) the head and some postmodifier(s) (iii) the head and both pre-modifier(s) and post-modifier(s). (a) [NP Mary ] went to [NP school]. (b) [AP Little] Mary run to the [AP closest ] shop. (c) And Mary [VP did], too. (d) And [PP then] Mary went [PP there], too. (36) EXERCISE ===========================================
(i) What types of phrases are the underlined parts of sentences? Which are their heads? (ii) Replace the underlined parts of the sentence by one word (and/or its proform). (a) My older brother will help you. (b) In the afternoon Mike will make supper in the kitchen. (c) Not everybody can read a novel in one day. (37) EXERCISE ===========================================
Say which part of speech the following proforms replace. Give examples in context. E.g. 'she': She is at home. → My sister is at home. She=NP (a) he, his, this ............................................................................................................. (b) one .............................................................................................................
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(c) here, now ............................................................................................................. (d) do ............................................................................................................. (e) so ............................................................................................................. (38) EXERCISE ===========================================
Consider the underlined words. Decide about their category and explain which criteria from those given in (1) on page 3 were the most important for your decision. (a) I wrote a long letter. = N, b(ii), c(i), (b) I saw three big whugs in my garden. = ................................................. (c) I want to plymise this book. = ................................................ (d) He is much hompler than George. = ................................................ (e) I was trumbling the whole afternoon yesterday. = ................................................ (f) Marcel is the most dimable guy I’ve ever met. = ................................................ (g) The book is fin the table, not under the chair. = ................................................ (h) This beautiful trouch of flowers is yours. = ................................................ (i) The letter is down the stairs. = ................................................. (j) I hate bending down. = ................................................. (k) I prefer to talk in the shower. = ................................................ (l) I prefer talking here to talking in the shower = ................................................ (m) He reads a newspaper every day. = ................................................ (n) He can’t read a newspaper every day. = ................................................ (39) EXERCISE ===========================================
Read the following expressions (a) 3,876 + 12.75 = 3888.75. 6 x 7 = 42. 72 : 9 = 8. (b) 32, 53,617, √9. (c) ½, ¼, ¾, 23/15. (d) Meow, cock-a-doodle-doo, woof-woof, shilly-shally, tick-tock, booky-wooky, oops... (40) EXERCISE ===========================================
Read the following joke: Proof that Girls are Evil. First state that girls require/equal time and money. (i) GIRLS = Time x Money And as we know “Time is Money” (ii) Time = Money Therefore (a) can be restated as (iii) Girls =Money x Money= Money2 We also know that “Money is the root of all Evil” (iv) Money = √ Evil Therefore (c) can be restated as (v) Girls = Money2= (√ Evil)2
And we are forced to conclude that (vi) Girls = Evil (41) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate and use in a sentence each of the following Prepositions/ Conjunctions: for, since, out, after, alongside, towards, within, (un)till, owing to, in spite of, despite, besides, beyond, by means of, according to, with respect/reference to, as opposed to, (al)though, as if, provided that, supposing for the moment that, lest, unless, whereas.
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SEMANTICS AND MORPHOLOGY OF NOUNS
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 70-107; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp. 241-332; Dušková (1994) pp.35-100; Svoboda and Opělová-Károlyová (1989) pp. 50-83; Leech & Svartvik (1975) Revise Section 1.1 above, especially topics mentioned in (1) on page 3. Semantic/ Notional definition of Nouns: 'Nouns denote persons, places, animals and objects/ things...' See also (2)on page 4 Semantic class: Object (in the mind)
Pragmatic function: Reference (1) Semantic Division: I. Common (a) countable concrete/abstract (book, song/ argument, concert) (b) non-countable concrete (water, bread, gas -these can have -s) abstract (time, evidence, research, courage) II. Proper (Henry, Egypt, Arabic) The above division is based on semantic properties, but at the same time each group has some formal characteristics (e.g. spelling conventions, lack of Article). Purely semantic divisions can be found in e.g. synonym dictionaries or a thesaurus, but have no use in grammar. (2) Formal characteristics of Nouns a) Morphology - Derivational morphology (nominal affixes) - Inflectional morphology (Declension Paradigm: Case, Countability/Number, Determination, Animacy/Gender...) b) Syntax - the structure within the Noun Phrase - the function/ distribution of Noun Phrases in the sentence
1.10 C ase
1.10.1 The Repertory and Realization of Morphological Case 7 Cases (=morphological forms of N) in Czech: nominative, genitive / partitive, dative, accusative, vocative, local, instrumental 2/3 Cases in English: (a) 3 with Pronouns: I - me - my/mine (b) 2 with Nouns: John - John's (3) (a) *Him saw Mary. *Our bought a book. (b) *Adam saw she. *John looked for my a long time. (c) *I house is near here. *Mary likes them son.
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(4) Classification of Cases in English with Nouns with Pronouns 1. COMMON Case 1. SUBJECT Case
2. OBJECT Case (a) of a Verb (b) of a Preposition
2. SAXON-GENITIVE Case 3. SAXON-GENITIVE Case
1.10.2 The Source and Function of Case Morphological Case is a specific form of a Noun, i.e. usually some special ending added to the word. In Czech there can be 7 forms; in English Pronouns can have 3 forms). Abstract Case is an abstract relation in a sentences between a superordinate Case Assigner and a Noun (NP). The relation can be morphologically realized (with an inflectional ending) or it can be signaled in a more abstract way by means of e.g. word order. = Morphological realization of the Case on a Noun is a configurational feature. (5) (a) číst [NP dlouhou knih-u] / *čist kniha / *číst knihou (b) bez [NP našeho dom-u] / *bez dům / * bez domem In (5) the Verb číst and Preposition bez are Case assigners. They are superordinate (higher in hierarchical structure) to the NPs velkou knihu / našeho domu, and they assign (‘give’) them Case. The Case shows that and how the two (Case assigner and Case-marked NP) are related. The function of Case: : Licensing Semantic Roles (marking sentence members) With Prepositions Case is marking a simple relation (esp. in English), while with Verbs, especially in Czech, the Case can also signal a specific meaning (semantic role). (6) The Czech Preposition ‘za’ can combine with the Nouns Petr/ hora in two ways:
(a) Zaplatil za PetraACC. (b) Přišel za PetremINSTR. (c) Měsíc zapadl za horuACC. (d) Město leží za horouINSTR. (7) The Verb ‘watch’ can combine with David and Mary in two ways:
(a) DavidNOM viděl MariiACC. (b) MariiACC viděl DavidNOM. (c) MarieNOM viděla DavidaACC. (d) DavidaACC viděla MarieNOM. There are two main semantic roles (relations) with the Verb ‘watch’: (a) Agent (the person performing the action) and (b) Patient (the person who is affected by the action). A language almost always makes clear which is which. Compare the Czech above with the following English. (8) (a) about/with/for us (b) *about/with/for we/our (c) David watched (d) Mary watched David. (e) Mary David watched. (f) He watched her. (g) *Him watched she. (h) Him she watched. (i) *He her watched.
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Canonical Formal Realization of the main Semantic Roles
To ‘know’ a language means to know how the language expresses/ realises/ encodes distinct ‘relational meanings’, e.g. the semantic roles. The semantic roles of a Verb are realized as specific sentence members, and these sentence members are signaled by specific Cases or by other means, e.g. word-order. In Czech morphological Case prevails; in English word order is primary. In the diagram below, the Verb send combines with several NPs (Peter, a parcel, John, afternoon). Each of the NPs is related to the Verb (= interpreted) in a distinct way. Some interpretation can be guessed from the meaning of the words (e.g. afternoon will probably be the time) but some cannot (Peter or John could be the sender). (9) verbal event action complementary conditions (manner/ place/ time) 1st participant 2nd participant 3rd participant (Agent) (Patient) (Recipient/Beneficiary) (a) Peter/He sent a big parcel/ one to John/ to him in the afternoon (b) Petr/On poslal velký balík Janovi v poledne Semantic Role → Syntactic Function → Case (Word Order) The realization of semantic roles (subject or object) depends on the Verb and its form. (10) (a) SheSUBJ saw himV-OBJ.
(b) HeSUBJ was seen by herP-OBJ. (c) TheySUBJ sent a bookV-OBJ to meP-OBJ. (d) TheySUBJ were sent to himP-OBJ. (e) HeSUBJ was sent the bookV-OBJ by herP-OBJ.
(f) HimV-OBJ sheSUBJ saw, but not meV-OBJ. CASE ASSIGNERS: Case is a relationship of a Noun to a Case assigner. Case assigner assigns a (specific) Case to a Noun (Phrase); see above in (5). Case assigner N CASE bez Petr-aGEN proti Petr-oviINSTR napsal dopisACC
What (which part of speech) can be a Case assigner? Are they the same in all languages?
(11) (a) Poslal knihu. Transitive Verb assigns ACC to its (direct/ structural) Object
(b) Pavel spal. Finite Verb assigns NOM to its Subject (c) Bál se duchů / jich. Verb assigns OBL to its indirect Object (d) Šel cestou přes les/ něho. Preposition assigns Case to its Object (e) Vidím přítele své sestry. Noun assigns GEN to its Object (f) Vidím sestřina/ jejího přítele. Possessive Adj agrees with the Noun (g) Viděl osm obrazů / jich. Numeral assigns PART to its Object (h) Je věrný své ženě. Adjective assigns OBL to its Object
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Case assigners in Czech: V, Vfin, P, N, Q, A (all major partsof speech). Case assigners in English: V, Vfin, P, N (12) (a) to see him Verb assigns OBJECT Case to its Object (b) about him Preposition assigns OBJECT Case to its ‘Object’ (c) He sleeps Finite Verb assigns SUBJECT Case to its Subject (d) his book Noun assigns POSSESSIVE/ GENITIVE Case (13) Saxon Genitive
(a) personal/ animal names/ Nouns George Washington's statue / the horse's tail (b) collective Nouns the central government's decision (c) geographical names Modern China's development (d) locative Nouns (esp. with superlatives) the Czech Republic's best university (e) temporal Nouns this year's sales (f) ‘human activity’ a great novel's structure (g) idiosyncratic idioms for heaven's sake, their money's worth Local genitives: at Bill's, from my aunt's, in Tiffany's, near St. Paul's The postnominal genitive: some friends of Adam's, several pupils of his/ of ours/ of mine
1.11 C ountability and Number : C ount vs. M ass
1. Quantity: semantic notion 2. Number: grammaticalized feature related to quantity (Articles, plural morphemes, Numerals). See (6) on page 5.
1.11.1 Countability Countability is an inherent feature of the noun category. (Countabilty is a property of a given lexical item; the speaker cannot change it without changing the lexical entry.) Prototypical people/ animals/ objects (=Ns) are countable (can appear in smaller or larger Number). In reality apart from individual discrete/countable items we also distinguish continuum phenomena (scalar, i.e. measurable but not countable) with mass nouns. Only countable Nouns can be counted, i.e. have Number. Mass nouns can only be measured. (14) (a) boy, tree, poem (b) water, justice, music (c) two boy-s, a million tree-s, five poem-s (d) a pint of water, much music, no justice (15) [±COUNTABLE] [+] [-] NUMBER [+] [-]
book-S book water/ justice/ oxygen/ courage/ music childr-EN child (*-s)
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In English Countability is a relevant formal feature because it affects the choice of articles and (some) Quantifiers. Compare these characteristics with the formal realization (visibility) of Countability in Czech. (16) Modifying count nouns Modifying mass nouns
MANY/ FEW/ SEVERAL *MANY/ *FEW/ *SEVERAL *MUCH/ *LITTLE MUCH/ LITTLE ALL/ EACH/ EVERY ALL/ *EACH/ *EVERY THE / A(N) THE/ *A(N) A LARGE NUMBER OF A GREAT DEAL OF
1.11.2 Singular vs. Dual vs. Plural Number (17) Dual: only a lexical property of some Determiners (a) both (vs. all), either (vs. any), neither (vs. none)... ?each other (vs. one another) After my accident, each/ *every arm hurt. Both/ *all of them had many bruises. (b) a pair of scissors/ binoculars/ trousers IS here (c) vezmi si *dvě / dvoje nůžky, koupil si ?pět kalhot / patery kalhoty (18) Plural: -(e)s
For pronunciation, an important property is “assimilation in Voicing”:
The pronunciation of the plural /s/ depends on the Pronunciation (not the spelling) of the final sound of the Noun. The relevant feature is [± Voice]. (a) [-z] assimilation to [+ Voice] ...... all vowels and voiced consonants (b) [-s] assimilation to [- Voice].......... [p], [t], [k], [f], [th] (c) [-iz] insertion of a reduced vowel after fricatives/ affricates. (19) Spelling only: (a) boys, families, volumes, radios, tomatoes Irregular pronunciation:(b) pence (pennies), dice.... houses, leaves, loaves,… (20) Blocking Effect: irregular inflections compete with or block the regular interpretations. glass, cloth, iron vs. glasses, clothes, irons (21) Zero plural: (a) a few animals: sheep, deer, moose, shrimp, fish (b) affricate/fricative nations: Chinese, Portuguese, Vennese, French, Polish, Swiss, Dutch (c) measure phrases: two dozen(*s) eggs a five-meter(*s)-(long) rope (22) Collective Nouns. Grammatically singular, but semantically plural:
(a) police, audience, senate, clergy, army (Can be grammatical plural in Brit. English) (b) china, linen, pottery, cutlery, jewelry, silverware, furniture, clothing (c) folk (vs. folks), people (vs. peoples). Unlike (a) and (b), these are inherently plural. (23) Singularia Tantum
Concrete countable, abstract, proper names, geographic terms, converted Adjectives, games, sciences, idiosyncratic items...
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bread/ honesty/ Wales/ loud THIS / *THESE (a game of) billiards/ darts IS/*ARE EXCELLENT acoustics/ news (24) Pluralia Tantum
Clothes, instruments, diseases, applied sciences, converted Adjectives, idiosyncratic items pyjamas/ measles *THIS / THESE acoustics/ homeless/ pins *IS/ ARE AWFUL. annals/ surroundings
1.12 Deter mination
Determination is a grammaticalised nominal requirement of English Nouns: Common Nouns (if regular) that are Countable must have a kind of Determiner. In Czech such determination is only optional; it is not grammaticalised as in English. (25) (a) I saw a/ the/ some boy/ concert/ big ship. (a') Viděl jsem nějakého/ toho chlapce. (b) *I saw boy/ concert/ big ship. (b') Viděla jsem chlapce.
1.12.1 Classification of Determiners w.r.t. Distribution Determiners occupy the left periphery (edge) of an NP, and they are followed by adjectival modifiers. One NP can have up to three Determiners (one in each slot).
(26) (a) all the many handsome BOYS ... (b) both those two beautiful GIRLS ... pre-determiner / central determiner / post-determiner + Adj. modifiers + NOUN determination field modification field (27) I. Central Determiners: (a) articles (a (an)/ the/ Ø) obligatory, unique, (b) demonstratives (this, these / that, those) usually only one possible (c) possessives including whose (d) what/ which (e) some/ any /no (f) every/ each/ either/ neither (g) Ø is excluded with singular count nouns. (28) II. Pre-determiners: (a) all / both/ half (precede Ia-c or stand alone) general Quantifiers (b) double/ twice/ three times/ one third (29) III. Post-determiners: (a) cardinal Numerals (three, fifty...) (b) ordinal Numerals (third, seventeenth...) (c) closed class Quantifiers (few/ a lot/ little...) (d) such (can follow which and Ie-f)
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1.12.2 Articles
ARTICLES (category) vs. DETERMINERS (function)
Recall the variation and rules of pronunciation.
(30) (a) a book vs. an orange This is an I think nice book. (b) the book vs. the orange This is I think the best solution. Notice the similarity and distinction between Articles and Demonstratives. (31) (a) (all) the/ this book; (half) the/ these books (b) ta /tato kniha Articles (i) are obligatory (part of the 'Noun Phrase') (ii) cannot (contrary to demonstrative Pronouns) replace the NP. (32) (a) We have the (small) book, a (small) book, *(small) book. (b) ta kniha, nějaká kniha, kniha (33) (a) Dej mi tamto/to. (b) Give me that. (c) *Give me the. Articles are related to countability (34) Articles: historically grammaticalised features of Number & Reference
(a) one > a > twice a week, one at a time, in a word (b) that > the > for the moment, nothing of the sort
1.12.3 Types of Reference (1) Generic (2) Specific (a) indefinite (b) definite
1.12.3.1 Generic Reference: neutralization of Number
(35) Cats are better than dogs. = “Cat is better than dog”. vs. A cat is better than a dog = The cat is better than the dog.
1.12.3.2 Specific Reference (Indefinite vs.Definite)
A. Indefinite Reference (36) (a) She carried a/ the small suitcase. She carried small suitcases. (b) ??She carried a smallest suitcase. (b) There might be a (*the) space in the middle of the room. (c) My sister would like to meet a/ ??the Czech who speaks German.
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B. Definite Reference
DEFINITE ARTICLE
(a) shared understood reference (extralinguistic context) (b) anaphoric reference (linguistic antecedent) (c) modification (i) postnominal of-phrase
(ii) restrictive relative clause (iii) attributive content clause (iv) unique pre-/post-modification
ZERO ARTICLE
(d) proper nouns (e) certain abstract nouns of time and place
(37) (a) Mind the step! Where are the scissors? The sun is too bright. Do you know the assignment for Morphosyntax?Which way is the toilet?
(b) I bought a book. She thought the/a book and a scarf would be a nice present. He thought of a plan. But I thoughtt the/ *a plan should be changed.
(c) (i) the Head of the Department (ii) the book that I bought yesterday (iii) the fact that he didn't come (iv) the right man, the only exception, the best Czech poet, all the windows here, the number seven, the poet Robert Burns (d) President Sarkozy will arrive soon, I saw Chairman Novak.
(e) Will winter be over soon? At plays I like intermission the best. How long does school last this year? Class will be late today.
1.13 A nimacy and G ender
1.13.1 Animacy
The grammatical feature [animate] is related to the notion of ‘living’ in reality. Animacy is an inherent feature: lexical items are ± animate because of their meaning/ form. The concept of ‘Animacy/ Life’ is a scalar (biological, cultural) concept. Grammatical features, however, are defined in a black-and-white manner: ± animate. (38) Semantic scale of Animacy (Universal) . The break is English/ Czech specific option. arbitrary (language specific) break HUMAN - DOMESTIC ANIMALS mammals-animals-plants– inorganic ‘things’ Animate Pronouns - Proper names
High in Animacy Low in Animacy Czech and English treat as [+animate] only [+human/ domestic animals].
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Animate are animals a human can relate to (can be loved, hated), who are ‘equal’ to human. Only [+ANIMATE] = [+HUMAN] in English reflects Gender....... HE vs. SHE (39) Some lexical entries inherently contain or relate to the feature of Animacy: = Polarity elements, relative and interrogative Pronouns, some body parts (a) Evelyne, Samuel, he, she (b) some/ any/ no/ every + body/ one vs. some /any/ no/ every + thing (c) interrogative who vs. what (d) relative who vs. which (e) boy's leg, dog’s leg, ?cow's leg, *rat’s leg, ??a table's leg, *a platform’s leg
1.13.2 The Gender Category
The grammatical feature Gender is related to the semantic notion of sexual dichotomy with many living creatures (above all humans). Gender is an inherent feature; lexical items have it either because of their meaning (semantic Gender) or because of their form (grammatical Gender). (40) Levels of formal GRAMMATICALIZATION of Gender in English (a) Special lexical entry: man vs. woman vs. child
(b) Compounds: boy student vs. girl student
(c) Derivation: steward vs. steward-ess widow-er vs. widow wait-er vs. wait-ress English expresses Gender above all (a) lexically, (b) by compounds (two morphemes, one of which is a simplified standard), or (c) with some non-productive morphology. (41) Levels of Grammaticalization of Gender in Czech. Compare with (40). (a) Special lexical entry: muž vs. žena vs. dítě(děcko) stroj vs. květina vs. město
(b) Compounds: ?? žena lékař
(c) Derivation: sportovk-yně, doktor-ka,
(c) Inflection (agreement): T-a kniha ležel-a na stole otevřen-á na str. 4. While in English Gender remains mainly a semantic concept realized through lexical means, Gender is highly grammaticalized in Czech.
(i) [+human] Nouns have Gender assigned acording to the real sex, (ii) [-human] inanimate nouns take Gender based on their morphology (ending), (iii) There are productive [Fem] Gender suffixes –ka, -yně, etc, and (iii) Gender appears as a configurational (agreement) feature in pronominal, adjectival and verbal paradigmas).
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(42) (a) pán, muž, // hrad, stroj, les .... consonantal (b) žena, růže... vocalic (c) město, moře vocalic (d) But: předseda, soudce Formal neutralisation of semantic Gender (rather rare) can be lexical or morphological:
(43) ta dívka vs. to děvče; German diminuatives are neuter: das Mädchen ‘the girl’
1.13.2.1 Semantic/ Natural Gender vs. Formal Gender
Semantic Gender is based on real/ intrinsic/ natural Gender of Humans (animate). Formal Gender is based on the similarity of the form (the ending) with the Animates. English: semantic Gender with [+HUMANs], Neuter for [-HUMANs] Czech: semantic Gender with [+HUMANs] and Formal Gender with [-HUMANs] Both English and Czech have a two-level strucure for the featurs of Animacy/ Gender. (44) (a) English (b) Czech
[±HUMAN] [±HUMAN] [+] [-] [+] [-] ±Semantic Semantic Formal GENDER GENDER GENDER [-] [+] Ø [-] [+] [Ø ] [-] [+] [Ø ] Adam Emma table pán/muž žen-a dí-tě hrad/stroj knih-a moř-e he she it ten ta to ten ta to Gender with inanimate nouns in English (more usual in poetic or figurative language) (45) (a) Sun, death ........ HE (b) Moon, Earth, justice, machines that are ‘personal’ ......... SHE Traditional Gender, transfer from Classical/ French languages, also from folk thinking, applied to some mythology or human-like gods. (46) (a) Personification: ANIMATE = HUMAN = subject to AFFECT animals, boats, pipes, countries (b) Stylistics: +GENDER = +FEMALE = small/ nice/ lovable/ positive = +MASCULINE = big/ dangerous/ negative (47) ‘Why do hurricanes have girls' names, because actually they are bad things?’
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1.13.2.2 Inflectional Morphology of Nouns (Summary)
The following table shows possibly universal features which appear with the category of Nouns. All of those features can be expressed in both English and Czech in some way (e.g. using some Adjective), but not all are grammaticalised (= obligatory and regular). Some are grammaticalised in both languages (e.g. Number), some are more grammaticalised in English (e.g. Referrence), some more in Czech (i.g. Gender), some are grammaticalised in neither English nor Czech (e.g. Shape). category example bound/free
morpheme Grammatical YES/ NO
inherent/optional /configurational
Number Eng. book-s bound suffix YES optional Cz. muž-i bound fused suffix YES optional
Case Eng. Mary's, him bound suffix YES configurational Cz. mužů, dítěte bound fused suffix YES configurational
Gender Eng. boy-student tigr-ess
compounding % suffix
% inherent
Cz. doktor-ka suffix YES inherent Size Eng. John-ie* suffix rare optional
Cz. Jení-ček suffix YES optional Definiteness Eng. the book free morpheme YES optional
Cz. ta kniha demonstrative NO lexical feature Alienability
Eng. my hands possessive NO lexical feature Cz. (moje) ruce zero morpheme rare lexical feature
Shape Eng. round table lexical morpheme NO lexical feature Cz. kulatý stůl lexical morpheme NO lexical feature
* doggie, veggie,and also A→NSMALL –ie/y: quickie, birdie, cookie etc.
1.14 E xer cises
(48) EXERCISE ===========================================
State which semantic roles the underlined NPs have w.r.t. the Predicate (Agent, Patient, Recipient, Possessor, Modifier, etc). (a) Joseph reads many books. (b) They called his sister Barbara. (c) Our Mary was called first. (d) Peter donated the clothes to the charity. (e) Bill was sent two letters the day before. (49) EXERCISE ===========================================
State what kind of Case (give Latin terminology) each of the Czech (pro) Nouns have. For the English nouns and pronouns use Englich terminology from (4) on page 15. (i) Nové kolo koupil tatínek bratrovi po Vánocích, ale mně už ho nekoupil nikdy. (ii) He saw Emily's brother introducing Bill to them at our brother’s. (iii) His book was written by her and her sister.
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(50) EXERCISE ===========================================
State which (i) semantic roles each underlined NP has w.r.t. its Predicate, (ii) what their syntactic functions are (which sentence member they are), (iii) which constituents they are (NP/ Pronoun, PP,VP, Clause). (a) She loves him. (b) Phoebe was given many presents for her marriage. (c) Paul threw the rusty gun into the ditch. (d) To read that book would kill me. (e) That she came proves that she loves him. (f) Little Mary introduced Joe to Peter's sister Vilma. (51) EXERCISE ===========================================
Consider how many N paradigms in Czech/English do have 7/3 distinct Case forms. How many have a distinction between NOM-ACC? Which is the richest/ poorest paradigm? (52) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate the Czech examples in (11) on page 16 into English using Pronouns (to observe the Case). Compare which elements (categories) assign a Case to a nominal phrase. (a) ......................................................................................................................................... (b) ......................................................................................................................................... (c) ......................................................................................................................................... (d) ......................................................................................................................................... (e) ......................................................................................................................................... (f) ......................................................................................................................................... (g) ......................................................................................................................................... (h) ......................................................................................................................................... (53) EXERCISE ===========================================
Make short sentences using a Pronoun she/ona and a Noun Jane/Jana in the following sentence functions. (a) Subject ........................................................................................................................ (b) Predicate ........................................................................................................................ (c) Object ........................................................................................................................ (d) Attribute ........................................................................................................................ (e) Indirect Object ................................................................................................................ (54) EXERCISE ===========================================
Write down inside brackets [...] the pronunciation of the final sound of the Noun, then make plurals and explain the pronunciation of the final –s. (a) dog -[......]+S = .................................................................................................. (b) state -[......]+S = .................................................................................................. (c) boy -[......]+S = .................................................................................................. (d) juice -[......]+S = ..................................................................................................
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(e) thigh -[......]+S = .................................................................................................. (f) window -[......]+S = .................................................................................................. (g) brigade -[......]+S = ................................................................................................... (h) garage -[......]+S = ................................................................................................... (55) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate the following expressions: (a) custom / customs ............................................... vs. ............................................ (b) pain / pains ............................................... vs. ........................................... (c) picture / pictures ............................................... vs. ........................................... (d) spirit / spirits ............................................... vs. ........................................... (e) spectacle / spectacles ............................................... vs. ........................................... (f) hair / hairs ............................................... vs. ........................................... (56) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in the demonstrative THIS/THESE and the form of the Verb BE (a) ........ contents ................ not nice. (e) ......... watch ................ very old. (b) ......... violin ................. mine. (f) …….. mice…………. not so tasty. (c) ......... young folk ................. charming. (g) ……. rice……………. tasty. (d) ......... earnings ................. low. (h) …….. hose ………….. torn. (57) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in the/ a correct form of MANY / MUCH or LITTLE / FEW: (a) I have .......................... time but not ........................... money. (b) I don't have ..................................... information. (c) This matter is of ..................................... interest to ...................................... people. (d) We have ...................................... evidence for these .....................................facts. (58) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give plurals of these Compounds (Underline any heads of the compounds). (a) forget-me-not ................................ (e) take-off...................................................... (b) manservant..................................... (f) coat-of-arms.............................................. (c) son in law ..... ................................ (g) hanger-on.................................................. (d) grown up ...................................... (h) lady-singer................................................. (59) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give plural forms (and pronunciations) of the following expressions (a) antenna....................................... (g) spectrum ................................................... (b) mouse............................................ (h) brother ..................................................... (c) one................................................. (i) half ............................................................ (d) tooth.......................................... (j) wife ............................................................ (e) focus............................................ (k) curriculum.................................................. (f) faux pas........................................ (l) roof ............................................................
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(60) EXERCISE ===========================================
Explain the reasons for the ungrammaticality of (a) * I didn’t buy a one book. (e) *I like that your brother. (b) *We bought expensive book on art. (f) *We went to Ukraine once long ago. (c) *This books were too expensive. (g) ??There might be the book on the table. (d) *We need a fresh air. (h) ?? I saw men you met yesterday. (61) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in the Articles Ø/ a/ the in the following examples: (a) Lincoln was ....... best president of ........ United States. (b) He lives in ......... city of New York. (c) ...... most famous member of ..... Hague Court is John Smith. (d) ....... Sahara Desert is ....... integral part of ......... Africa. (e) ........ Canary Islands are as beautiful as ........ Crete. (f) I don't like ...... Hyde Park but I am fond of .......... Westminster Abbey. (g) I saw .......... last film about .......... Titanic in ......... July. (62) EXERCISE ===========================================
State the distinction between Czech and English which follows from the examples: (a) He received a book from my mother. (a') Dostal jakousi knihu od mé maminky. (b) *He received book from my mother. (b') Dostal knihu od mé maminky. (c) I gave the present to Adam. (c') Dal jsem ten dárek Adamovi. (d) *I gave present to Adam. (d') Dal jsem dárek Adamovi. (63) EXERCISE ===========================================
Replace the word ‘chlapec’ with the word ‘stroj’ and discuss the distinction:
(i) Všichni ti velcí chlapci, kteří se objevili před chvílí, zmizeli za rohem. - Kdo to zmizel?
(ii) .........................................................................................................................................
.........................................................................................................................................
Do the same with the English translation of the above sentences and discuss the distinction. What does it show about which nominal features are used English and Czech?
(i) .........................................................................................................................................
(ii) .........................................................................................................................................
.........................................................................................................................................
(64) EXERCISE ===========================================
Explain the distinctions in acceptability. Compare with English. (a) Tatínkova / Petrova / ?koňova / *stolova / Alíkova noha. (b) Pod mostem ležel(i) muž a žena / ?muž a koza / ?? muž a puška.
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(65) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in the missing feminine (or neuter) forms.
(a) stallion vs. ....................... vs. ......................... (b) bull vs. ....................... vs. ......................... (c) rooster vs. ....................... vs. ......................... (d) father vs. ......................... (k) brother vs. ............................ (e) host vs. ......................... (l) doctor vs. ............................ (f) master vs. ......................... (m) heir vs. ............................ (g) sportsman vs. ......................... (n) man servant vs. ............................ (h) male readers vs. ......................... (o) gentleman vs. ............................ (i) laundryman vs. ......................... (p) tom-cat vs. ............................
(66) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fil inl the following table for English as suggested in the first line. category variety marked feature
morpheme(s) examples
Number singular, plural plural, -s /-en/ Ø book/books, ox/oxen, Chnese/Chinese
Case
Gender
Size
Referrence
(67) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss the distinction between lexical and grammatical features. Give English and Czech examples of nominal (a) ‘Number’, (b) ‘Gender’, (c) ‘Referrenc’' expressed with lexical morphemes and contrast themt with grammaticalised forms. Underline the relevant morphemes. (a) lexical ............................................................................................................................. grammaticalised............................................................................................................... (b) lexical .............................................................................................................................. grammaticalised................................................................................................................ (c) lexical .............................................................................................................................. grammaticalised................................................................................................................. (68) EXERCISE ===========================================
(a) Which nominal category does Czech grammaticalise more than English? (b) Which nominal category does English grammaticalise more than Czech?.
Consider the criteria for stating the level of grammaticalisation, and demonstrate relevant examples to support your claims.
......................................................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................................................
.....................................................................................................................................................
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2 SYNTACTIC CHARACTERISTICS OF THE NOUN
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 363-393; Svoboda (2004) pp. 18-23; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp. 1235-1352 Syntactic properties concern above all distribution, i.e. co-occurrence of a lexical item, that is, its ‘context’, (i.e. what does it combine with, in which order, in which hierarchy). I. Elements subordinate to N (these modify N and combine with N in complex NP) (1) Noun Phrase (NP) = a nice BOOK of stories II. The function/ distribution of NP: Elements superordinate to a (complex) NP What does the NP depend on? (2) Peter saw NP = a nice BOOK of stories already.
2.1 I nter nal Str uctur e of Noun Phr ases
(3) Complex nominal phrase
all the three [very tall] white city towers of Mordor [with black spires] (Q) - D/POSS - (Q) - A - A - N/A - N - [P - NP] - XP or Clause Elements preceding / pre-modifying the Noun Elements following / post-modifying the Noun
2.1.1 N-premodifiers
(4) (a) Determiners including possessives the/ this/my friend (b) Both in D position and Q position all three friends (c) Adjectives and their modifiers very interesting story (d) Secondary Adj (foremd from Ns) government funds (e) Etc... sideways motion, outer lmit, inside man Discuss the following properties of elements preceding the Noun.
(a) Determiners are obligatory and unique. See (26) on page 19!! (b) Possessives are not Adjectives, but NPs. See (13) on page 17. (c) Adjectives (and APs) are recursive i.e. they can follow each other. (d) Secondary Adjectives have the morphology of some other part of speech (5) (a) a/ the/ my/ which/ a friend’s book. I bought expensive book. (b) *the my book/ *the John’s book [NP my brother John]'s book (c) the big hairy stupid irritating dog (d) govern-ment funds/ iron bridge /(clean) ladies room/ busman’s holiday
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With the exception of recursive Adjectives (which follow a semantically determined order according to their scope), there is a strictly fixed order among the pre-modifiers of N. (6) (a) the big green monster (a') ta velká bílá kniha (b) *big the green monster (b') * velká bílá ta kniha (c) ? the green big monster (c') ? ta bílá velká kniha (d) some old French book (d’) *nějaká francouzská stará kniha *some French old book nějaká stará francouzská kniha
2.1.2 N-postmodifiers
(7) Postmodification
(a) complex adjectival phrases a student [AP more intelligent than Einstein] (b) of-phrase (unique, adjacent) that brother of mine from Brooklyn (c) other PPs (multiple) the student of philosphy with long hair the letter for John from Bill (d) V-ing, V-infinitive the student reading philosophy, a man to watch (e) clauses (e.g. relative clauses) the book which you gave me, the place you live (f) Etc. some travels abroad, the way home (8) The order of postmodifiers is correlated with their scopes (in the same way as the order
of A premodifiers) with the exception of the of-phrase, which must be adjacent. (a) a student of math with long hair (a') student chemie s aktovkou na zádech * a student with long hair of math *student s aktovkou na zádech chemie
(b) the letter for John from Bill (b') dopis od Petra pro Janu the letter from Bill for John dopis pro Janu od Petra
(c) a book of stories for Bill with a white cover
2.2 Distr ibution and F unctions of Noun Phr ases
The distribution of NPs (and their sentence functions) is very diverse. An NP of any complexity can be any sentence member. Some positions are more typical than others. (9) (a) Subject [NPThose three students of yours] arrived soon. (b) V-Object I saw [NP those three students of yours] nearby. (c) P-Object I spoke about [NP those three students of yours]. (d) PP Adverbial I stayed with [NP those three students of yours]. (d) Nominal Predicate John, Ann and Sue are [NP three students of mine]. (e) Possessive [NP those three students]'s books (f) Attribute/ Complement We appointed her [NP a chairwoman of a meeting]. The sentence functions illustrated above are syntagmatic relations, i.e. the sentence function is a relation between two members of a syntactic couple. An exception is the ‘Complement’, which is a ternary relation (there are three related constituents). No constituent can be a sentence member by itself, i.e. without a syntactic context. In the above, ‘those three students’ can be any sentence member, depending on the relation.
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2.3 E xer cises
(10) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in the slots for the most complex NPs you can construct. Include complex modifeirs such as (a) a lot of, (b) very tall, (c) twenty-year old, (d) V infinitives, (e) relative clauses. Q D/Poss Q A A N/A N P = of NP XP each --- --- tall blond play BOY in a Fiat
girl
love
Mary
story
air
Prague
reading
(11) EXERCISE ===========================================
Rewrite the sentences below using the Pronouns or Pro-forms indicated. Specify the parts of each sentences which you have replaced by the pronouns/ pro-forms. (i) The tall boy with long hair was irritated by the next question. (ii) To read such a long book would not please my beloved little brother. (iii) The fact troubled me last year me that my little brother did not seem very interested. he (i) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
(ii) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
(iii) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
one (i) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
(ii) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
(iii) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
it (i) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
(ii) ……………………………………………………………………..............……
so (iii) The fact………………………………………………………………..................
then (iii) The fact ………………………………………………………………..................
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EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss (i) the terminology, (ii) the obligatory or optional ordering and (iii) unique or multiple occurrence of separate pre-/post-modifiers of the head nouns. (a) all the boys (a’) *the all boys (b) a brother of mine (b’) *a my brother / *my a brother (c) that big boy (c’) *big that boy (d) the old big black dog (d') ?the big black old dog (e) the two towers of the city made of steel (e’) *the two towers made of steel of the city (f) the book of stories in a green cover for my sister Emily (12) EXERCISE ===========================================
Compare the ordering/ uniqueness of elements of the complex NP in Czech with the data from English in (5) on page 29. Fill in the inverted examples and add * (and supply your own examples) whenever needed. (a) všichni ti chlapci (a') ti všichni chlapci (b) *ten bratr mne (b') ten můj bratr / * můj ten bratr (c) ten velký chlapec (c') ...................................... (d) ten velký černý pes (d') ...................................... SCOPE (e) kniha pohádek v zeleném obalu pro mou sestru (f) sestra mojí kamarádky v červeném kabátě s dlouhými vlasy (13) EXERCISE ===========================================
How can a NOUN / NOUN PHRASE (e.g. city / the large city and sister / my little sister) modify another Noun (e.g. plan, room)? Compare English and Czech. Evaluate the acceptability (assuming the proposed reading) of the following examples. Then compare the category, complexity and position of the underlined modifiers. Give more examples if necessary to make your points. (a) the two tall city towers (a’) the two the large city tall towers (b) the two towers of city (b’) the two towers of the large city (c) chudák ženská (c’) město věže (14) EXERCISE ===========================================
Commenting the following examples, compare POSSESSIVEs and their equivalents in English and Czech w.r.t. their (i) position (pre- or post-N), (ii) complexity (N or NP or PP), (iii) Number & Animacy, (iv) category (A or N/NP).
(a) * the Jim's book (a’) ta Janova kniha (b) a book of (our) Jim (b’) ?? kniha Jana / kniha vašeho Jana (c) ?? the table's leg / paint (c’) * stolova noha/barva (d) pupil's / pupils' book (d’) žákova / * žác? kniha (e) mother's / father's / child's room (e’) matčin/ otcův/ dítět? pokoj (f) your mother's book (f’) * tvoj? matčina kniha
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(15) EXERCISE ===========================================
Complex compounds containing chains of N/ A/ Adv: Discuss the interpretation of the following ‘Bracketing paradoxes’. Translate the examples into Czech. (a) the Yorkshire wool industry wage dispute (b) a starving children relief fund (c) the ship-to-shore telephone experiment (16) EXERCISE ===========================================
Mark sentence members in the following sentencs and give the names of the syntagmatic relations which form them. (i) Tvoje sestra pozorovala včera ptáky na plotě. (ii) The other boy gave his book of stories to Adam. (17) EXERCISE ===========================================
(i) What is the function (sentence member) of the underlined NP? (ii) What does the NP depend on (what are the syntagmatic = syntactic/ binary relations)? (a) I saw a man at noon. (i)........................................ (ii)...................................... (b) Run over the hill now (i)........................................ (ii)...................................... (c) Are new pupils' books here? (i)........................................ (ii)....................................... (d) Is that boy big enough? (i)........................................ (ii)...................................... (e) There is a boy over there. (i)........................................ (ii)...................................... (f) He must be a teacher. (i)........................................ (ii)...................................... (g) They elected him President. (i)........................................ (ii)...................................... (h) He was elected President. (i)........................................ (ii)...................................... (18) EXERCISE ===========================================
Which elements do you need to add to create the given syntagmatic relations? Give at least two examples for each of (a)-(c). What are those elements? (a) Joe (=Subject) .................................................................................................... (b) Joe (=Object) .................................................................................................... (c) Joe (=Attribute) .................................................................................................... (19) EXERCISE ===========================================
Relate the following words by means of the given syntagmatic relations. Make short sentences using the words and underline the relevant couple. (a) Peter – see (Subject - Predicate) ................................................................................. (b) Peter – see (Verb - Object) ................................................................................. (c) book – old (Noun – Attribute) ................................................................................. (c) book – see – Adam – old (Attribute-noun / Subject-Predicate / Verb-Object) .........................................................................................................................................
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(20) EXERCISE ===========================================
In the following phrases: which elements are higher (superordinate) and which elements are lower (subordinate)? How do we decide about this? Are the signals of hierarchy the same in Czech and in English? Make your own examples to test your claim. (a) to see Mary / *Mary to see - vidět Marii / *vidět Marií / Marii vidět (b) this book / *these book /*book this - tato kniha /*touto kniha / ? kniha tato (c) about him / *about he / *him about - o něm / *o ním / *něm o (d) she arrives / *she arrive / *her arrives - ona přijela /*ní přijela / přijela ona
(21) EXERCISE ===========================================
Create the relevant syntagmatic relation (add the other member of the phrase). Discuss the hierarchy and the way it is signaled. (a) he (=Subject) .................................................................................................... (b) he (=Object) .................................................................................................... (c) he (=Attribute) .................................................................................................... (22) EXERCISE ===========================================
Can a Pronoun or Noun appear as Adverbial or Complement? Find some examples. (a) Adverbial .................................................................................................... .................................................................................................... (b) Complement .................................................................................................... .................................................................................................... (23) EXERCISE ===========================================
Mark the relations in the following structure. Explain how morphology (if possible) is a signal of hierarchy. (a) šel do školy (b) (he) went to school (c) dopis pro něho (d) a letter for him (24) EXERCISE ===========================================
What are the most typical sentence functions of Nouns? Which are more rare?Why? (25) EXERCISE ===========================================
Are the underlined elements heads (N) or phrases (NP? Can you support your claim? (Can you substitute pronouns for them? What does this imply?) (a) Your sister arrived later than Hillary. (b) I met Jim in front of the house. (c) William introduced his new girlfried to all the school-mates. (d) Those tall city towers had been rebuilt before the castle was finished.
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(26) EXERCISE ===========================================
Are the sentence functions of Subject and Object phrasal constituents (NPs) or are they heads (Ns)? Give examples and discuss their properties to prove your claim. (27) EXERCISE ===========================================
What follows Prepositions in Czech and in English? NPs or Ns? Give examples and show how they support your claim. (28) EXERCISE ===========================================
First look at the arguments for the example below which show that the word organization in a given sentence is a Noun. Then give similar arguments for the capitalised words (assuming they are Nouns) in the following sentences. Try to cover all arguments (semantic, morphological, and syntactic). Use substitution, if necessary. Example: Several new ORGANIZATIONS of young people took part in the program. 1. semantics: the word ORGANIZATION independently refers to some entity. 2. phonetics: the word takes main (possibly multiple) stress = a major category. (Grammatical elements have no secondary or non-initial stress.) 3. morphology (derivational and inflectional)
(a) derivational morphology:
(i) -tion is an English morpheme used for the derivation of Nouns: e.g. organize → organiza-tion (like nationalization) (ii) It can be a derivational stem: N+al→Adj, e.g. organization-al (like national).
(b) inflectional morphology: the word may take the nominal morphemes of
(i) plural -s, e.g. many organization-s (like many boys), (ii) possessive 's, e.g. our organization-'s decision (like Mary's decision). 4. syntax (subordinate and superordinate elements)
(a) the word projects according to (3) on page 29 to a typical Noun Phrase, i.e. it is modified by a Determiner (several), Adjective (new) and of-P (of young people),
(b) the complex headed by the word appears in a sentence in the function of Subject of the finite Verb take part.
(a) There are some heavy CLOUDS on the western HORIZON.
(b) Every normal MOTHER feels a kind of LOVE to her CHILD.
(c) Because of the crisis, the new GOVERNMENT funds were restricted.
(d) The main CITY in Northern Moravia is Ostrava.
(e) He was impressed by the CITY towers of Carcassone but I like more those of Ávila.
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3 PRONOUNS
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 108-128; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp. 333-398, 817-822; Dušková (1994) pp.101-135; Svoboda and Opělová-Károlyová (1989) pp.84-112 (1) Classification of English Pronouns, from Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) a) personal I/ me, we/ us... 1. CENTRAL b) reflexive myself, ourselves... c) possessive i) determinative my, your, his, her, its, our... ii) independent mine, yours, his, hers, ?its, ours... 2. RECIPROCAL each other, one another 3. RELATIVE the wh-series, that, Ø 4. INTERROGATIVE the wh-series, how, why 5. DEMONSTRATIVE this/ these, that/ those a) positive i) universal all/ both, each/ every 6. INDEFINITE ii) assertive, or
existential some-, one, half, several, enough, (an)other
iii) non-assertive any-, either b) negative no-, neither
3.1 Per sonal Pr onouns
3.1.1 Interpretation of Personal Pronouns (2) (a) To call oneself "James Bond" is appropirate only if one is James Bond (and not
Ludmila Veselovská. (b) To call oneself "I" is always correct, no matter whether one is James Bond or
Ludmila Veselovská. In (3) (a) is true no matter who says so only when James Bond actually did so. (b) is true if the person, who pronounces it, did so.
(3) (a) James Bond was flying to Hawaii. (b) I was flying to Hawaii. Contrary to referrential Nouns, Pronouns do not have independent referrence. Their semantic interpretation can be defined only in the terms of discourse, i.e. according to the conditions and circumstances of the specific speech act. (4) (a) this and that [±PROXIMATE] (b) here and there (c) now and then (d) Give me that. (e) This one here is better than that one there. (f) I am reading this book here and now, not that one.
37
Discourse bound interpretation of personal Pronouns:
(a) I (=1sg) = the speaker (= the person who performs the speech act) (b) you (=2sg) = the hearer (= the intended adresee of the speech act) (c) (s)he (=3sg,m/f) = the ‘other’ (human non-participant of the discourse) (d) it (=3sg) = non-human non-participant (e) we (=1pl) = a set of people one of which is the speaker. The hearer can be a member of the group (inclusive we) or not (exclusive we). (f) you (=2pl) = a set of people including the hearer, not the speker (g) they (=3pl) = the ‘others’ (non-participants of the discourse) Consider the characteristics of Number [plural] with personal Pronouns
(5) (a) books / boys [plural] = book+book+book... / boy+boy+boy (b) we [1 plural] ≠ speaker + speaker + speaker.... (c) you [2 plural] = / ≠ hearer + hearer + hearer... (d) they [plural] = the other + the other + the other (6) Stylistic / Pragmatic usage of we
(a) As we can see in Chapter 3... , As we just showed... (Inclusive/authorial/ editorial WE) (b) Today we are much more concerned ... (Rhetorical WE) (c) How are we feeling today? (= you) (d) We are really in a bad mood today... (= he) (7) it and there: referential and expletive Pronouns
(a) I want this book. She wants it, too. (Referring it) (b) It is raining. (Weather it) (c) It is not true that he did it. (Propositional it and Linking it) (d) There is a man in the middle of the room. (Expletive there)
3.1.2 Pronoun Function and Form Case : English pronouns have three/ four morphologically distinct Case forms. See 1.10. (8) Case: (a) SUBJECT (I, you, he, she, it, we, they) (b) SAXON-GENITIVE (my/mine. your/yours, her/hers, their/theirs...) (c) OBJECT (me, you, him, her, it, us, them) (9) (a) Possessives This is my book. (b) Pndependent /predicative The book is mine. That brother of mine is here.
(10) (a) Object of a Verb I saw him /*he frequently. (b) ‘Object’ of a Preposition I went there with him/*he last week. Subject Case in English is more marked (less used) than the nominative is in Czech. Consider the Case on the English Pronouns below. Compare with the Czech translations. (11) (a) Who did it? - Me. It was me. (c) Mary and him often go abroad. (b) It was she/ her that Adam criticised. (d) Nobody but her/ ?she/ does it well. (e) We/ us students have many expenses. (f) We got home before them/ ?they.
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In current English, subject pronouns are preferred and obligatory only as uncoordianated subjects of overt predicates that immediately follow them. Otherwise spoke Enlgish prefers object pronouns. Recall which part of a structure is replaced by (which) Pronouns. (12) [The smart girl] with [the two foreign friends] was awarded [the first prize] SHE THEM IT (13) (a) My younger brother bought a new car. (b) *My younger he bought * a new it. (c) He bought it. (d) My younger one bought a new one. Personal Pronouns replace Noun Phrases (not Nouns). See also exercise (11) on page 31. Pronouns therefore can express nominal functions. See section 2.2. There are some distinction between Ns/NPs/and pronominals. Restricted (Post) Modification of Pronominals Unlike Nouns, Pronouns cannot be freely modified, they cannot be the head of a phrase like Nouns in (3) on page 29. There are some idiosyncratic exceptions, e.g. relative clauses: (14) (a) hardly any, nothing at all, almost anybody (b) We all......, They each....., You both.... (vs. floating Qs) (c) emphasis: you yourself (d) Silly me! we doctors, us visitors (e) you there, you in the raincoat (f) we of the modern age (g) He/ she who hesitates is lost. (h) Those/ we/ you/ *they who work hard deserve some reward. (i) cf. *It that/ What stands over there is a church.
3.1.3 The Pro-N One (15) Numeric one (pro-Q) (a) I met one young boy / two other boys. (b) One / many of the boys arrived at five.
(16) Substitute one (pro-N) (a) I'd like another steak /one other big one. (b) Those red cars / red ones I like most.
(17) Generic one (pro-NP) (a) One / they would assume that... (b) She makes one / my brother Adam feel well.
3.2 R elative Pr onouns
These Pronouns introduce a relative clause.
(18) (a) kdo, co, jaký, který, čí, jenž. (b) wh-Pronouns (who, whom, whose, which, and also: that, Ø
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3.2.1 The form of the relative Pronouns
The wh-Pronouns show (agree with) the morphological features of Nouns and Adjectives. The agreement is built with two elements: (a) Gender (Animacy)/ Number features depend on the head Noun (in the main clause). (b) Case depends on the function of the Pronoun in the relative clause. (19) (a) Znám ženu [Fem, Sg, ACC], která (= ta žena NOM) nosí na hlavě šátek. (a) singular (b) feminine (c) NOM
(b) I know a woman [Human, ACC], whoNOM/*whomACC (=the woman NOM) wears scarves.
(a) animate/human (b) NOM
The WH relative Pronouns (only) can be preceded by Prepositions or other material: (20) (a) The boys with who(m)/ which/ *that I go out
(b) I can see the book, the name of which I have forgotten (c) Here is the answer, the importance of which you did not realize in time. (d) I can see the guy whose name I have forgotten.
Case with relative Pronouns Relative Pronouns show pronominal Case morphology, i.e. Subject/ Possessive/ Object: (21) (a) he - his - him (b) who - whose - whom The Object Case of the relative Pronoun is more likely to appear overtly in English if the Pronoun is close/ adjacent to its Case assigner (Verb/ Preposition), and much less likely if the Case assigner is dissociated/ stranded from the Pronoun. (22) (a) I know the man who/ %whom you met yesterday. (b) I know the man who/ %whom everyone says they like. (c) Let’s not rely on your cousein, to find whom/ *who might be difficult. (d) I know the man with whom/ %who you were talking. (e) I know the man who/ *whom you were talking with. Preposition stranding
3.2.2 Omitting the relative Pronoun
Only those relative Pronouns can be deleted in English which neither have the function of a Subject nor follow a Preposition or other fronted material. (23) (a) I know the man whom you invited for dinner. (b) I know the man --- you invited for dinner. (c) Can you give me the book which is laying on the table? (d) *Can you give me the book --- is laying on the table? (e) Show me the man at whom you are looking. (f) *Show me the man at --- you are looking. (g) Show me the man -- you are looking at.
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3.3 I nter r ogative Pr onouns
3.3.1 The form of the interrogative Pronouns
Interrogative Pronouns are elements used in WH-questions, i.e. questions which ask to identify some sentence constituent. The form of the Pronoun depends on the constituent it replaces. The repertory and forms are like relative Pronouns plus how (many/ Adjective) and why but not including that or Ø. Consider which constituents (parts of speech, phrases, sentence members?) can be questioned and what is the right morphological form of the WH Pronoun. (24) Her younger brother/ He met her/ my sister very briefly yesterday in front of their new school twice. (a) Who met her yesterday in front of their new school twice? (b) Whom/ Who did he meet yesterday in front of their new school? (c) When did he meet her in front of their new school? (d) Where did he meet her yesterday twice? (e) In front of which school did he meet her yesterday? - In front of their new school. (f) In front of whose new school did he meet her yesterday? -In front of their new school. (g) How many times/ How often did he meet her yesterday in front of their new school? (h) How did he meet her yesterday in front of their new school? (i) Why did he meet her yesterday in front of their new school? As with relatives, the Case marking of the interrogative WH Pronouns depends on their sentence function, i.e.on the function of the sentence member they are asking about. In Modern English overt Case marking is most likely if the Pronoun is adjacent to the Case assigner. (The same phenomenon as in (22) above.) (25) I am waiting for hi-m. The P for is a Case assigner
(a) Who are you waiting for? (b) % Who-m are you I waiting for? Pronoun is stranded from the Case assigner (for)
(c) For who-m are you waiting? (d) % For who are you waiting? Pronoun is adjacent to the Case assigner (for) (26) I saw hi-m. The V saw is a Case assigner
(a) Who did she meet? Prounoun is not adjacent to the Case assigner (meet) (b) % Whom did she meet? (c) In order to meet whom did she go to the square? Pronoun is adjacent to meet.
3.3.2 The position of the WH-Pronouns
The interrogative Pronoun in the WH-question is moved from its position, it is fronted in the clause. Notice that the size of the fronted interrogative element (the material preceding the inverted Auxiliary and containing some interrogative WH element) can be far bigger that one word. It is a phrase (it replaces the whole sentence member we are asking about).
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(27) He bought [OBJECT NP the three books] [ADVERBIAL PP in the new shop on the square].
(a) [OBJECT NP What ] did he buy in the new shop? (b) [OBJECT NP How many books ] did he buy in the new shop? (c) [ADVERBIAL PP Where ] did he buy the three books? (d) [ADVERBIAL PP In which shop on the square] did he buy the three books? If there is more than one WH Pronoun (in so called Multiple Wh-questions), only the hierarchically highest is fronted in Standard English. The other(s) remain in the position of the sentence member they represent, i.e. they remain ‘in situ’. (28) [SUBJECT NP Emily] bought [OBJECT NP several books] [ADVERBIAL PP in the new shop].
(a) Who bought what where? *What did who buy where? (b) What did Emily buy where? *What did who buy on the square? (c) *Where did Emily buy what? (d) What did Mary buy why? *Why did Mary buy what? Notice that in English the interrogative element can appear in a clause which it does not belong to (often in an initial main clause). Consider the sentence functions of the WH Pronouns in such Long-distance WH-Movement: (29) (a) When do you think that Emily arrived? (b) Who(m) did Emily tell you (that) Bill met at the raiway station? (c) Which jacket did John persuade Emily (that) she should take on the trip? (d) Who did Emily say (that) Bill thought (*that) would arrive late? (e) How/ Why should Mary make public (that) she plans to divorce? While the long distance WH-questions appear often in English, in Czech this kind of WH question is 'substandard', and their frequency is highest with Adverbials. (30) (a) Kdo si myslíš, že Marušce pomohl? (O kom so myslíš, že Marušce pomohl) (b) Kam si myslíš, že Petr řekl, že to Jana dala. (c) ??Který kabát se Petr ptal Marie že si Jan vzal na výlet? Interpretation of interrogative Pronouns
Indefinite (who, what) vs. definite (which) Independent vs. determinative function (31) (a) Who is your favourite conductor? What is your favourite type of music? (b) Which is your favourite conductor/ type of music?? (32) (a) What's the name of this tune? *Which is the nature of music?
(b) What / Which conductor do you like best? (c) What / Which newspaper do you read? (d) Which (of these) do you prefer? *What of these do you prefer?
(33) (a) Whose jacket is this? - This is Peter's jacket. (b) Whose is this jacket? - This jacket is Peter's.
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3.4 E xer cises
(34) EXERCISE ===========================================
Explain the (discourse related) interpretation of the underlined words. (a) Do you think that they saw us? (b) He praised a man. Can he be praising himself? (b) He thinks that this book is more interetsting than those old ones. (c) ?! I am there just now. (35) EXERCISE ===========================================
Which category (part of speech) is one in the following sentence? Replace it with another member of the same category. (a) I do not want this one, but you can buy me one from that counter. (b) I do not want this …………, but you can buy me …………from that counter. (36) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate the following sentences (find Czech equivalents of one). How do we call these kinds of ‘one’? (a) One boy arrived at five. ................................................................................. (b) I'd like another one. ................................................................................. (c) Those blue ones I like most. ................................................................................. (d) One would think that impossible. ................................................................................. (e) Public speaking gives one confidence. ……….................................................................. (37) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give examples of English Pronouns which reflect Animacy/ Gender ANIMATE INANIMATE Gender marked no Gender personal possessive reflexives emphatic relative interrogative (38) EXERCISE ===========================================
Make WH questions related to the following sentence with the proposed answers. Underline the WH Pronouns and discuss their form/ size. Yesterday our little Emily passed well both the difficult tests at school. (a) .................................................................................................? - Our little Emily. (b) .................................................................................................? - Both the tests.
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(c) .................................................................................................? - Yesterday. (d) .................................................................................................? Our (little) one. (e) .................................................................................................? - Two. (f) .................................................................................................? - The two tests. (g) ..................................................................................................? - Well. (h) ..................................................................................................? - Passed well both. (39) EXERCISE ===========================================
Match the questions and the answers: (a) What is her husband? (a') He is Paul Jones. (b) Which is her husband? (b') He is a tall handsome guy. (c) Who is her husband? (c') He is the man on the right. (d) How is her husband? (d’) He is a film director. (40) EXERCISE ===========================================
(i) Explain the agreement morphology on the relative Pronoun in the (a) example below. (ii) How are the same features expressed in the examples (b) and (c)? (a) To je ten kluk, kterému Maruška předevčírem nesla kytici růží. (b) To je ten kluk, co mu Maruška předevčírem nesla kytici růží. (c) To je ten chlapec, jemuž Maruška předevčírem nesla kytici růží. (41) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in all the correct forms (including Ø) and explain the morphology: (a) Benjamin saw the book ...................................... you ordered last month. (b) Benjamin saw the book .................................... was lying on the window sill. (c) Benjamin saw the book ...................................... title I have forgotten. (d) Benjamin saw the book, the title of ............................ I have forgotten. (e) Benjamin saw the book about .................................... you were writing your essay. (f) Benjamin met the man ..................................... you invited for dinner. (g) Benjamin met the man .................................... was looking out of the window. (h) Benjamin met the man .................................... name I have forgotten. (i) Benjamin met the man the name of ........................... I have forgotten. (j) Benjamin met the man about ............................ you were writing your essay. (k) Benjamin met the man ................................... Hillary asked me to introduce to her. (42) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in all the correct form(s) and explain which is the standard/ marked morphology of the interrogative Pronoun for each of the sentences. (a) .......................... do you imagine likes her the most? - Hugo. (b) For ........................ are you working? - For Hugo. (c) ......................... is she working for? - For Hugo. (d) Do you know anyone ......................... she could work for? - Hugo.
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EXERCISE ===========================================
Consider the forms of the WH-questions asking for a Subject. Give examples of (a) a direct WH-question, (b) an indirect WH-question, (c) an echo WH-question. "Hillary will read her paper tomorrow." (a) ......................................................................................................................................... (b) ......................................................................................................................................... (c) ......................................................................................................................................... (43) EXERCISE ===========================================
Find nominal phrases headed by an underlined head N/Q. How many parts do they consist of? Do all their parts appear in one place or is the NP split (divided)? (a) Jaké si Anna nakonec koupila auto? (b) Kolik znáš dobrých knih od Updika? (c) Takových jsem jich viděl včera na ulici opilých nejmíň osm. Translate the examples to English and explain the distinction, referring to the structure of the Nominal Phrase (see (3) on page 29), namely to its potential to be split when questioned or topicalised. (44) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate the following examples to English and explain the distinction between the languages w.r.t. multiple WH-questions. (i) How many WH elements can be fronted in a Czech clause and how many in English? (ii) What is the order of constituents in English/ Czech? (a) Kdo komu pomáhal s úlohou? ............................................................. (b) Co kdo viděl? ............................................................. (c) Komu kdo co u vás daroval pod stromeček?............................................................. (d) Kdy komu co dala? ............................................................. (e) Kdo kdy co komu dal zadarmo? ............................................................. (45) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss the following examples of Long-distance Wh-Movement. (i) Which sentence memeber is the fronted WH-member? What is its phrasal type? (a) When do you think Monica arrived? (b) Who do you think did it? (c) Who did Julien say that Monica saw? (d) How many books did Julien say that Monica claimed she had read? (e) Who did Julien say that Monica wrote that Joseph spoke with? (ii) Translate the above sentences to Czech and discuss the distinction(s).
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"James Bond"
4 ANAPHORS (REFLEXIVES AND RECIPROCALS)
Huddleston, Rodney and Pullum, Geoffrey K. (2002) XXX
4.1 R efer ence
Nominal expressions refer to something/ somebody. Some of them have independent referrence (= Referrential Expressions), others require co-referrential antecedents (= anaphors). REFERENCE [A] to non-linguisitc context → to reality [B] to some linguistic context or a context of pointing (ostension) [C] to some syntactically definable linguistic context (1) [A] R-expression [B] pronominal [C] anaphor Everybody hates JAMES BOND , and HE even hates HIMSELF .
Nominal elements can be divided according to their reference into three groups. (2) R-expressions (a) Hercule Poirot invited Miss Marple.
(b) Miss Marple invited Hercule Poirot. (c) One boy invited another boy.
(3) Pronominals (a) He invited her. pragmatic anaphors (b) She invited him.
(c) He invited him.
(4) Syntactic Anaphors (a) Hercule Poirot invited himself. (b) *Himself invited Hercule Poirot. (c) *They invited himself.
4.1.1 Co-reference (Antecedents and Indices) Formal marking of the co-reference: indices: subscripts (variables) show the co-referrential expressions (those are marked with the same index) (5) (a) ? Everybody hates [Beckett], even [Beckett] hated [Beckett].
(b) Everybody hates Becketti, even hei hated himselfi. (c) Hei saw him*i/ j at the last second. (d) Hei was looking at himselfi/*j in the mirror.
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(e) PitJ described Patriciam to himselfj / herselfm.
4.1.2 The linear position of an antecedent (above all with pragmatic anaphors) (6) (a) anaphor Johni came late, because hei had missed the train. (b) cataphor Before hei joined the Navy, Geraldi made peace with his family. Both anaphors and cataphors are, however, hieararchically similar; an antecedent is superordinate to both anaphors and cataphors (it is 'higer,' i.e. formally more prominent).
4.2 T he F or m and I nter pr etation of E nglish A naphor s
English Reflexive Pronouns: complex (personal Pronoun in OBJECT Case + SELF/ SELVES). Czech Reflexive Pronouns: simple SE/ SI. Do not contain the personal Pronoun. (7) (a) He/ she/ they saw himself/ herself /themselves. (b) On/ Ona/ oni viděli sebe. Reflexive Pronouns are syntactic anaphors, i.e. they need antecedents. (8) (a) Hei introduced him*i. vs. Hei introduced himselfi. (b) Oni představil ho*i. vs. Oni představil se(be) i. /////// not co-referrential co-referrential In the example above He is the antecedent of himself (it is not the antecedent of him). He and himself are bound to each other, he is not bound to him, i.e. him is free.
4.2.1 Antecedents of anaphors
Distinguish (a) unmarked reading vs. contrastive reading (= it can be so and so) (b) obligatory reading vs. impossible reading (= it must be so and so) (9) (a) John arrived. I love him. him can be John. (Construct a context for this.) (b) John saw him. him must NOT be John (c) John saw himself. himself must be John (10) Bill met John. He didn't see him. He was looking at himself (in the window glass). Bohuš potkal Jendu. Neviděl ho. Díval se na sebe (do výlohy). (a) Billi met Johnj. / Bohuši potkal Jenduj.
Bill and John are referrential expressions. They refer to two distinct people (outside of some schizophrenic context). Bill and John are not bound to each other. (b) Hei/ j/ x didn't see himi/ j/ x. (i) Neviděl ho (=Bohuš Jeníka) (ii) On ho neviděl (=Jeník Bohuše)
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- If (b) follows (a), the most salient (pragmatically probable) reading is that He in (b) is co-referrential with Bill in (a). With marked stress it can, however, also be John and if more sentences preceded and the discourse suggests it, it can be anybody else as well. - In any case, whoever is He in (b), it is not the same person as him in (b) = He and him in (b) can not be co-referrential. (c) Hek was looking at himselfk/*x ... Onk se díval na sebek
The reference of He is vague as in (c). As for himself, however, there is no vagueness, it must be the same person as the preceding Subject/Agent He. He and himself in (c) above are co-referrential = himself (reflexive) is a linguistic anaphor.
4.2.2 Binding of Anaphors
Look at the scheme (1) on page 45, and consider the place in the structure where we find the antecedent of the anaphor. (What is the domain in which the antecedent appears? How far away is the antecedent from the anaphor?) The Clause Bound Nature of Syntactic Anaphors
(11) (a) Miss Marple believes that Poirot invited himself. (b) * Poirot believes that Miss Marple invited himself. (c) * Poirot believes that himself is the best detective. (12) Binding Theory (“BT”), from Chomsky (1981):
(a) R-expressions have no formal/ structural antecedent, they are always free.
(b) Pronominals (pragmatic anaphors) have an antecedent in the context (linguisitc or extralinguistic) but NOT in the same clause. In their clausal domain they are free.
(c) Syntactic anaphors (reflexives/ reciprocals) must be bound (have an hierarchically higher antecedent) in the same clause, usually in the position of Subject/ Agent.
4.2.3 Reciprocals
(13) (a) They saw each other. (b) We saw one another.
Reciprocals are syntactic anaphors, ie. Subject to BT as in (12) above. Contrasted with reflexives, they moreover require their antecedent to be plural (the action or relation takes place between the members of the set, reciprocally). (14) (a) John and Mary introduced them. ......... ≠ John, ≠ Mary (b) John and Mary introduced themselves. (c) John and Mary introduced each other.
(b) themselves = [John→John + Mary→Mary] or [John+Mary→John+Mary] (c) each other = [John→ Mary + Mary →John] (15) (a) Představili se (= představili každý sám sebe). (b) Představili se (= představili se(be) navzájem).
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4.3 T he Distr ibution/ Use of R eflexive/ R ecipr ocal Pr onouns
(16) argument of a transitive Verb/ Preposition (replacing an NP)
(a) * John blamed. ...requires an Object (b) John blamed the girl / her / himself.
(c) * He thinks too much about. ...requires an Object (d) He thinks too much about the girl / her / himself. (17) part of a complex Verb
reflexive Verb semireflexive Verb (obligatory) (optional)
(a) * She always prides on X. (a) Behave now! (b) She always prides herself on X. (b) Behave yourself now! (c) * She always prides him on X. (c) * Behave him now! (18) emphatic Pronouns (doubling another NP)
(a) The President himself arrived. (a') Přijel sám president. (b) Myself, I wouldn't take any notice. (b') (Já) sám bych si ani nevšiml... (19) Jan to dělal sám. (a) John did it himself. (= personally) (b) John did it alone. (= without another person)
4.4 E xer cises
(20) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in the correct reflexive Pronoun. Underline the co-referential antecedent. (a) The coroner concluded that he killed ....................... (b) The police did not have to move a finger, the kidnappers shot ............................. (c) It became clear that not even James can do it ............................ (d) I guess that Bonnie gave that small picture of ............................ to her boyfriend. (e) To wash ................................ is a must for most civilised people. (f) G7 or 8, it makes no difference, African people must help....................................... (21) EXERCISE ===========================================
Mark the co-referrence. Fill in the missing indexes to the Pronoun and its antecedent. (a) Tobiask saw him . (b) Timi and Monicak saw themselves . (c) Martink saw her at the last second. (d) Monica was looking at herselfi in the mirror. (e) Johni promised Peterk to shave himself . (f) Johni made Peterk shave himself . (c) God will help you if you help yourselfk.
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(22) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate into English. Discuss the meanings/ the distinctions. (a) Viděli se v zrcadle. (a') .................................................................. (b) Políbili se. (b') .................................................................. (c) Přinesli si dárky. (c') .................................................................. (d) Psal jsem tu úlohu sám. (d') .................................................................. (e) Byl jsem na to sám. (e') ..................................................................
(f) Sám Superman by se bál zůstat v tom pokoji sám. ................................................................................................................................... (23) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate into Czech. Fill in indices. Discuss the meanings/ the distinctions. (a) They killed them . (a') ............................................................... (b) They killed themselves . (b') ................................................................ (c) They killed each other . (c') ................................................................ (24) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in correct /possible forms of an anaphoric Pronoun. Fill in the correct indices. (a) He was looking in the mirror at ....................... (b) She saw Emma looking at ............................. in the mirror. (c) The kidnappers shot ............................. (d) Freeing ......................................with a sharp knife, Vincent lurched towards the door. (e) They asked Julie to invite .................................... (f) Even the King ............................ must help .................................. (g) They promised Martha to wash...................................... (h) They ordered Martha to wash....................................... (25) EXERCISE ===========================================
‘Long distance’ anaphors: Fill in the indices, notice the distinctions. (a) The professori made the studentk read his article. (b) Profesori nutil žáka číst svůj článek.
(c) Johni saw Peterk beating his wife. (d) Jani viděl Petrak bít svou ženu. (26) EXERCISE ===========================================
Define the semantic frame = thematic roles = valency of the Verb help, and explain which element expresses which role. Fill in the indices. (a) They themselves helped them (b) They helped themselves (c) The Presidents helped the committee themselves
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5 MODIFIERS
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 129-157; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp. 399-474; Dušková (1994) pp. 141-164; Svoboda and Opělová-Károlyová (1989) pp.113-134; Leech & Svartvik (1975) pp.189-203
5.1 Semantic C har acter istics of A djectives/ A dver bs
(1) Semantic types of Adjectives (static property). An adjective is a word which enlarges the meaning and narrows the application of a Noun. There are many possible groups, e.g.: (a) value (good, bad, important) (g) dimension (big, long, large) (b) similarity (different, similar, other) (h) position (high, low, near) (c) age (old, new, young, ancient) (i) color (red, dark, black) (d) quantification (whole, numerous, third) (j) qualification (true, possible, plausible) (e) physical property (hard, wet, open) (k) human quality (happy, clever dead) (f) speed (fast, slow, rapid) (l) nationality etc (English, Slavic, Asian) (2) Semantic types of Adverbs.
An adverb is a word which enlarges the meaning and narrows the application of a Verb (and other parts of speech). Again, there are many possible groups, e.g.: (a) focusing (also, even, too, just, only) (e) frequency (never, always, often) (b) degree (very, well, how, as, really) (f) modal (perhaps, actually, obviously) (c) aspectual (still, yet, already) (g) temporal (soon, late, long, sudden) (d) connective (however, thus, indeed) (h) manner (quickly, easily, well) General characteristics: As MODIFIERS, Adj/Adv modify some other word/ constituent.
(3) (a) his quick run (b) certain doubts jeho rychlý běh určité obavy (4) (a) he runs quickly (b) he certainly doubts it běhá rychle určitě o tom pochybuje
5.2 A djectival / A dver bial M or phology
5.2.1 Derivational Morphology (5) (a) new (c) green-ish Adj→Adj (b) agreee-able, V→Adj (d) friend-ly, N→Adj (6) (a) bad-ly, clever-ly, legal-ly .... synthetic way: bound suffixes (b) up-wards, back-wards, home-wards (c) clock-wise, time-wise, weather-wise (d) in an interesting /fast way .... analytic/ periphrastic way
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5.2.2 Inflectional Morphology Features: (i) INTRINSIC ...0 (ii) OPTIONAL ...Grading (comparative, superlative) (iii) DERIVED ...N features (‘secondary’ agreement) (in Czech, not English) Grading: Standard Adjectives /Adverbs are gradable. (7) (a) synthetic (bound morphemes): -er, (the) –est: nice, nicer, the nicest
(b) analytic (periphrastic): more, (the) most (i) important, more important, (the) most important (ii) ... in a more interesting way, in the most interesting way
(c) irregular (i) good/ well, better, the best (ii) bad/ badly, worse, the worst (8) Non-gradable As (a) finite, *more finite, *the most finite (b) last, *laster, *the lastest
5.3 E xer cises
(9) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give 5-10 derivational morphemes which create Adjectives. Find some which have some additional meaning apart from deriving a category. (Consult Appendix.)
................................................................................................................................................... (10) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give the category of the underlined elements. Discuss the distinction between a/b/c and d/e/f. Find more Adjective/Adverb couples with similar properties. Make a generalisation. Try to explain the phenomena, referring to the blocking effect. (a) The child has a high temperature. (d) Elisabeth likes hard work. (b) The airplane flies really high. (e) He likes to work hard. (c) Marcel is highly experienced. (f) Mary hardly ever works (11) EXERCISE ===========================================
State precise rules for using syntetic vs. analytic forms of English Grading Adjectives. (12) EXERCISE ===========================================
Is semantics important for the order of pronominal modifiers/ adjectives? Consider the examples below, change the order and discuss acceptability. Compare with Czech. (a) a handsome three-year old boy ................................................................................. (b) a huge Italian pizza ................................................................................. (c) Shakespeare's new sonnet ................................................................................ (d) a new Shakespearian sonnet .................................................................................
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6 SYNTAX OF ADJECTIVES
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 129-157; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp. 399-474; Dušková (1994) pp. 141-164; Svoboda and Opělová-Károlyová (1989) pp.113-134; Leech & Svartvik (1975) pp.189-203
6.1 A djective Phr ase
(very/extremely/as) interesting (as the other one) (1) Grad. ADV / Measure Phrases - A - PP / that-CL / Vinf elements premodifying A elements postmodifying A (A) PREMODIFICATION of A (pre-A elements) -- comparative & level of quality (2) Grading Adverbs / intensifiers Adv + A (= ADJ or ADV) (a) more/ the most important (a') more/ the most easily (b) very/ rather/ too/ so nice/ important (b') ver /rather/ too/ so easily (c) exclusively/ surprisingly nice/ important (c') exclusively/ surprisingly easily (3) Measure Phrases (a) a [AP three-meter long] bridge (a') to look three meter-s long (b) a [AP five-year old] boy (b') to be five year-s old (c) a [AP five-meter-seventy-centimeter high] wall (B) POSTMODIFICATION of A, A-complements (post-A elements) (i) A + Prepositional Phrase:
(4) (a) a man [AP (very) proud of his son ] (b) a women [AP (extremely) faithful/ loyal to her husband ] (c) some heroes [AP (certainly) ready for a fight with aliens ] (5) good at, afraid of, ready for, keen on, worried about/over, bad at, annoyed at/with,
successful in, interested in, conscious of, convinced of, based on, dependent on, subject to, compatible with, disappointed with, etc.
(ii) A + that-clause:
(6) (a) I'm sure (that) you can come. (b) He seems glad / surprised / amazed / certain / confident / proud/ sad/ alarmed/ annoyed / astonished / disappointed / pleased / shocked (that) you can come. (7) (a) It is odd that he should be late. (b) It is appropriate / extraordinary / fortunate / important / odd / alarming / embarrassing / fitting / frightening / irritating that he should be late.
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(iii) A + to-infinitive:
(8) (a) He was ready / splendid / proud to help his neighbors. (b) He was furious / slow / eager to react. (c) They were careful / wrong / clever / cruel / kind / rude / silly not to follow us. (9) Some complex structures related to modifiers (both pre- and post-modifying):
Adjectives Adverbs
(a) he is as big as ... (a') she runs as quickly as ... (b) he is bigg-er than ... (b') he runs quick-er than ... (c) he is not as/ so dangerous as ... (c') she runs not as/ so quickly as ... (d) he is far from dangerous ... (d') she runs far from well ... (e) the bigg-er they are, the more stupid... (e') the high-er they fly, the less fuel ... (f) It is too heavy to fly. (f') She runs too well to be defeated. (10) Discontinuous structures: (a) He is a much bigger IDIOT than me.
(b) John is not as easy a target as Jim.
6.2 Distr ibution/ F unctions of A dj Phr ases
There are 3 main functions of Adjective Phrases, all related to a nominal category. (A) ADJECTIVAL PREDICATE (copula-AP) ... Predicate Nominal (B) ADJECTIVAL PRE-/POST-MODIFIERS (N-AP) ...Attribute (C) ADJECTIVAL COMPLEMENTS ...Subject/ Object Complements
6.3 A djectival Pr edicates
(11) His brother John IS [AP very handsome SUBJECT - copula - AP The status of a constituent as Predicate Adjective or Predicate Nominal is bound up with a framework: How do we define Copula? What is a Complement? What is an Object? etc... These questions are far from trivial. Consider (a) Case on the verbal complement, (b) selection of Adj or Adv, (c) the meaning. (12) (a) The boy is a student. (a') The boy saw a student. (b) Chlapec je student(em)NOM-INSTR. (b') Chlapec viděl studentaACC. (c) John is quick. (c') John runs quickly. (d) Jenda je rychlýADJ.NOM (d') Jenda běhá rychleADV. A copula: (a) has two arguments referring to the same entity (it expresses identity), (b) does not assign Object Case (to Nouns), (c) can be followed by an Adjective (agreeing with the Subject). How many Verbs have these properties of a copula? (One in Czech, several in English.)
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How complex can a Predicate Adjective be? Discuss the ‘complexity’ of the Predicate Adjectival Phrases in English in (13) in terms of (1) on page 52. (13) (a) Emma is/ sounds silly / very silly / unbelievably silly. (b) Samuel is/ seems to be foolishly proud of his few achievements. (c) Helen got/ grew/ became about twice as mad at her mother as Piers did .
6.4 A djective Pr e-/Post-modifier s of a Noun
The most standard function of Adjectives is to modify the meaning of some Noun – they are Noun modifiers. They can appear both in front of and after the head N. The position of the AdjP with respect to the head Noun depends on (a) the characteristics of the Adj, (b) the complexity of the AdjP. NP = (Q) - DET/POSS - (Q) - AP - AP N/A - N - AP
6.4.1 Pre-modifying Adjectives
In the following examples notice that Adjective modifiers are phrases (APs), because they can be enlarged. See adjectival phrase in terms of the scheme (1) on page 52. (14) (a) Mary is a very SCARED child
(b) How FAITHFUL a woman did she turn out to be? (c) I know an extremely PROUD man. (d) Elisabeth jumped over a two-meter WIDE ditch. (e) Elisabeth jumped over the DEEP AND DANGEROUS ditch.
(15) (a) * Mary is a SCARED of monsters child. (b) * Did she turn out to be a FAITHFUL to her husband woman? (c) * I know an PROUD of his achievements man. Premodifying APs are syntactically "simpler"; they can be either bare (most often) or premodified themselves (e.g. by very/ extremely/ how/ two-meter etc. (i.e. they are complex phrases). However, they canNOT have their own postmodifying PPs or clauses (e.g. -of monsters, -to her husband, -of his achievements, -glad we arrived, -eager to react.
6.4.2 Post-modifying Adjectives
These result from: (a) lexical or idiosyncratic properties of some A, (b) Romance loans, (c) complex APs (=with their own postmodification). (16) Idiosyncratic As (a) Syntax proper, president elect (c) the people (who are) involved (d) the men (who were) present
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(17) Romance loans (French) (a) Court Martial (b) Princess Royal, battle royal (c) attorney general, postmaster general (d) notary public (18) (a) un file gentille (b) un livre cher (c) un pierre lourde Det girl nice Det book expensive Det rock heavy 'the nice girl' 'the big book' 'big rock' (19) (a) la niña bonita (b) el libro grande (c) gran piedra /piedra grande Det girl nice Det book big big rock / rock big 'the nice girl' 'the big book' 'big rock' Even Germanic-based English Adjectives must appear in the postnominal position if they are ‘complex’. Compare (14)/(15) with (20)/(21) and discuss the ‘complexity’ of the post-modifying adjectival phrase in terms of (1) on page 52. (20) (a) *Mary is a child very SCARED.
(b) *She turned out to be a woman very FAITHFUL. (c) *I know a man extremely PROUD. (d) *Elisabeth jumped over a ditch two-meter WIDE. (e) ?Elisabeth jumped over the ditch DEEP AND DANGEROUS. (ok in narratives)
With English Adjective Phrases, postmodifed APs MUST themselves be postmodifiers: (21) (a) Mary is a child (very) SCARED of monsters.
(b) She turned out to be a woman (extremely) FAITHFUL to her husband. (c) David is a man very FOND of English literature. (d) I saw a girl as BEAUTIFUL as Mary / more BEAUTIFUL than Mary.
6.5 Subject/Object C omplements (Secondar y Pr edicates)
Syntactic relations (involving phrases) are typically binary (e.g. V +Object, N + attribute). Complement (doplněk), however, enters into a ternary relation. Compare with (11) on page 53 and (a/c) with (b/d) below. (22) (a) The girl is as happy as before. = Adjectival Predicate (b) The girl smiles as happily as before. = Adverbial (of Manner) (c) The girl remained as happy as before. = Subject Complement (a) Adj related to a "copula" is a Nominal Predicate (binary relation) (b) Adv modifier of a "lexical Verb" is an Adverbial (binary relation) (b) Adj related to a "lexical Verb" and in the same time to sone NP (Subject or Object) is a
Subject/Object Complement (trenary relation) (23) (a) John painted the door green. V > Obj (painted → the door) V +Obj > Object Complement (painted→green, the door → green)
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(b) Mary came back very tired. Subj > Vfin V + Subj > Subject Complement (c) David likes the girls very blond. (d) The girl remained as happy as before. He IS tired. He arrived tired. subject + predicate subject + predicate (predicate =copula+nominal part) Complement If is is a Copula → tired is a part of a predicate If arrive is a Lexical Verb → tired is a (Subject) Complement BUT: The distinction between 'copula' and 'lexical Verb' is fuzzy, and so many Czech Adverbials can be analysed as Complements in English (alternatively several English Verbs can be called "semicopulas" i.e. they are followed by a correferrential Adjective.) (24) (a) Peter is/seems old. copulas?
(b) Peter became/grew/turned old. change of state Verbs (c) Peter looks/feels old. Verbs of sensual perception (25) (a) To je těžk-é/dobr-é. copula + Predicate Nominal (b) Pracuje těžc-e/dobř-e/piln-ě. V + Adverbial (c) He works hard/ well/ diligent-ly. V + Adverbial (d) Jídlo chutná/ voní *dobré / dobře. = (b/c) = V + Adverbial (e) The food tastes/ smells good/ *well. V?/copula? + Subject Complement ?
6.6 C entr al and Per ipher al A djectives
(26) Typical Adjectives: (a) - are Attributes: (pre-)modify Nouns (b) - can follow "Copulas" such as seem/ remain/ look, (c) - are gradable (combine with very and more...than).
(27) (a) A (very) big boy... (b) He seems very big / bigger than me. Not all Adjectives are prototypical. There is a ‘gradient’ between CORE vs. PERIPHERAL members of the ADJ class. (See categorial prototypicality in section 1.7.)
6.6.1 Secondary Adjectives
(28) (a) those tall city towers (b) the new government project (c) another top model (d) an inside story (e) the [stick-in-the-mud] attitude (f) the stay-at-home American Secondary Adjectives: have forms of Nouns/Adverbs/etc. (derivational morphemes) but function as Attribute. They often have frozen inflectional morphology and no modification. (a) * those tall cities towers ........................................ cannot take plural (N morphology)
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(b) * citi-er towers, *more government project .......... cannot take Adj morphology (c) * some interesting [a new government] project .... cannot form a full NP (d) * some interesting [very government] project ....... cannot form a full AP (29) Secondary Adjectives/Adverbs (conversion) (V. Mathesius, O. Jespersen) Arguments for their adjectival (?) nature (i) coordination (a) She is quite vulgar and commonplace. (b) *The funds are new and government.
Assuming that only the same categories can be coordinated, vulgar and commonplace are to be the same category but new and government are not. (ii) A - N/ A - A (c) He is reading the new evening radical paper.
Assuming (?) a fixed position (or field) for Adjectives in front of a Noun, the position of evening seems to suggest adjectival characteristics. (iii) ‘A - one’ (d) Electric engines are cheaper than steam ones.
Assuming 'one' combines with Adjectives, (d) suggests that steam is an Adjective. (iv) too - A (e) That' a too London point of view A - most (f) the topmost picture, the uppermost/ bottommost line A - est (g) the choicest fruits
Assuming 'too/ -most/ -est' are Grading elements and that only Adj/Adv category can be graded, then expressions like London/ top/ bottom/ etc. must be some sort of perhipheral A.
6.7 E xer cises
(30) EXERCISE ===========================================
The morpheme –ly can be used to derive Adverbs from Adjectives (Adj→Adv), e.g. nice→nicely. Is this always the case? Analyze the morphological structure of the words below concentrating on the character of the morpheme -ly. (To distinguish between Adj and Adv you can use the word in prenominal and postverbal positions.) E.g. (i) daily a daily newspaper -ly: N→Adj, (ii) really a real thing, really interesting -ly: Adj→Adv (a) friendly ....................................................................................................................... (b) hardly ....................................................................................................................... (c) early ....................................................................................................................... (d) nearly ....................................................................................................................... (e) worldly ....................................................................................................................... (f) lovely ....................................................................................................................... (g) madly ....................................................................................................................... (h) ugly ....................................................................................................................... (i) manly ....................................................................................................................... (j) nearly ....................................................................................................................... (k) clearly .......................................................................................................................
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(31) EXERCISE ===========================================
Given your analyses in (30) above, can you predict which forms ending in -ly can be graded by the bound morpheme -er? (a) friendly - friendlier (b) hardly - *hardlier (c) early - earlier (d) nearly - *nearlier (e) lovely - lovelier (f) madly - *madlier (g) ugly - uglier (h) nearly - *nearlier (32) EXERCISE ===========================================
Can you relate the data in (31) above to the following examples?
(a) ugly → uglish / ugliness (a') quickly →*quicklish / *quickliness (b) friendly → friendliness (b) hardly→*hardliness (c) early → earliness (c') nearly→*nearliness / *nearlihood (33) EXERCISE ==========================================
The following A-E are properties typical of Adjectives Considering the data in (i-vii), fill in the table below with +/- and discuss the level of prototypicality of these ‘Adjectives.’
A. ADJECTIVE occurs after the Verbs /copulas ‘seem, appear, feel, remain’, B. ADJECTIVE occurs between the Article and the Noun (Attribute), C. ADJECTIVE can be (pre)modified by ‘very / so / too / rather / somewhat’, D. ADJECTIVE can be graded by –er/ -est or more/ most, less/ least, E. ADJECTIVE can form Adverbs by use of –ly. (i) (a) A (very) hungry child... (ii) (a) A (*very) infinite mercy… (b) Adam seems (so) hungry. (b) God's mercy seems (*very) infinite. (c) He is more hungry than me. (c) *God's mercy is more infinite than mine.
(iii) (a) ? (Rather) afraid people... (iv) (a) a (*rather) utter fool (b) People seem (rather) afraid. (b) * Bob’s foolishness seems (rather) utter. (c) He is more afraid than me. (c) * Bob’s rashness is more utter than hers.
(v) (a) * that (so) asleep baby (vii) (a) * The (very) abroad country. (b) The patient seems (*so) asleep. (b) * The place seems (very) abroad. (c) * He is more asleep than me. (c) * Korea is more abroad than Slovakia.
A B C D E category? hungry infinite afraid utter asleep abroad
(34) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in the blaks for complex APs (inside the complex NP):
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D/Poss AP AP N AP
Adv A Adv A PP a tall extremely nice MAN more thoughtful than X... BOOK
LOVE
(35) EXERCISE ===========================================
Make an AP headed by A = ‘clever’ according to the description. See (1) on page 52.
(a) ‘bare AP’ [AP A] .....[AP clever]...... (b) ‘AP with premodified A’, [AP --- A] …….............................................................. (c) ‘AP with postmodified A’ [AP A --- ] ....................................................................... (d) ‘AP with both pre- and post-modified A’ ....................................................................... (36) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill the forms of APs from (35) into the proposed contexts. Mark the acceptability of the resulting structures and then repeat the generalisation about the pre-/post-nominal )distribution of Adj-Attributes. (i) AP Predicate (a) Josephine is clever. (c) ........................................................... (b) ......................................................... (d) ...........................................................
(ii) Premodifying AP (a) It was a clever proposal. (c) ........................................................... (b) ......................................................... (d) ...........................................................
(iii) Postmodifying AP (a) * She is a girl clever. (c) ........................................................... (b) ......................................................... (d) ...........................................................
(iv) Complement AP (a) Josephine appeared clever. (c) ........................................................... (b) ......................................................... (d) ........................................................... (37) EXERCISE ===========================================
How can you explain the order of elements in the following Czech examples?
(a) tlustá kniha / ?? kniha tlustá (b) skokan zelený, kysličník uhličitý (38) EXERCISE ===========================================
Is the distribution of nominal modifiers in Czech the same as in English? Give relevant examples for pre- and post-modyfying APs. (39) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss the syntactic relations of the underlined elements in the structures below.
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Which sentence members are they? (What are they related to?)
(a) Marion likes girls. (d) Samuel painted the floor. (b) He knows many blond girls. (e) He likes dark floors. (c) He likes his girlfriends blond (f) He painted the floor dark. (40) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss the distinctions.
(a) Petr je chytrý. (b) Peter is clever. (c) Petr vypadá chytře. (d) Peter looks clever. 7 ADVERBS
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 158-187 Semantic specification: modifiers. See section 5.1 on page 50. Adverbs are modifiers which do not combine with nominal features. Typically the modification concerns Manner, Place, Time, Frequency, etc., i.e. adverbs modify a verbal action (i.e. Adverbs are typically related to the Verbs). (1) (a) He runs quickly.
(b) He runs away /there. (c) He runs daily/ now.
But consider also other parts of speech modified by Adverbs (notice their positions). (2) Adj. (a) We are very/ so/ too/ rather/ somewhat late. (b) He is more/ less clever than her. (c) I saw the three most/ least beautiful girls in London. (d) a tall very/ more/ strikingly beautiful girl
(3) Adv. (a) He runs very quickly. (b) She will do it probably slowly but certainly well. (c) The airplane flew very/ more/ extremely far.
(4) Prep. (a) He ran right up/ down the hill. (b) He put them directly into the boxes. (c) They were sitting just outside the hut.
(5) Nouns (a) There is the road upwards. (b) His travel abroad lasted more than a year. (c) The sideways movements were most unpleasant.
(6) Pronouns hardly anybody , precisely that , almost nothing
(7) Clause Well, I will do it. Of course, he did arrive. Perhaps I can help you.
7.1 V er bal, tempor al, sentential and gr ading adver bs
Adverbs can actually modify any part of speech.
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Some Adverbs share properties with Prepositions (particles) and/or Prepositional phrases. The distribution of these Adverbs is similar to the distribution of PP. These adverbs/ adverbials can even be coordinated with PPs. (8) (a) Jessica went up (the hill) (b) Jessica ran away.
(c) Jessica read the book carefully / in a carefull way. (d) Jessica arrived there / home / to school / at the cinema.
(e) Jessica performed the job work well and with creativity. (f) They will be arriving tomorrow and on Friday.
The positions of the sentence/ verbal adverb/ials are: (i) Initial, (ii) Middle, (iii) at the End/ Final.
Their distribution depends on the interpretation and complexity. (9) (a) He never runs (*never).
(b) He (*very quickly) runs very quickly. (c) (Certainly) he can (certainly) do it.
"I" (Initial) "M" (Middle) "E/F" (End/Final) position
sentential "temporal" verbal (Manner, Place, Time) ADV - ... - ADV - V - ... - ADV (10) Naturally he often runs very quickly
(a) Sentential Adv: usually precede the Verb or are at the very end. (b) Temporal Adv: rather free, espeicially Adverbs of frequency. (c) Verbal/Manner Adv: must be close to the Verb. (d) Grading Adverbs: Adverbial/ Adjectival pre-modifier; see also (1) and (2) on p. 52.
7.2 Negative, par tial negative, positive adver bs
Compare the adverbs often, never and hardly w.r.t. their positive/negative meaning and formal scope properties. Notice that positive/negative polarity of the sentence is signaled with (i) the presence of not, (ii) pronouns (some- vs. any-), (iii) positive vs. negative question tag and (iv) neg inversin after ADV fronting. (11) (a) He often says something stupid, doesn't he. / *does he. *He often says anything stupid...
(b) Often John helped Mary with her homework. *Often did John help Mary with her homework. ....... often is a positive ADV
(12) (a) He never says anything stupid, does he. / *doesn't he. *He never says something stupid....
(b) *Never John helped Mary with her homework.
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Never did John help Mary with her homework. .......never is a negative ADV
(13) (a) He hardly says anything stupid, does he. / *doesn't he. *He hardly says something stupid..
(b) *Hardly John helped Mary with her homework. Hardly did John help Mary with her homework.
.......hardly is a partially negative ADV: its meaning is ±positive but formally it is negative (it negates the clause in the same way as never does)
7.3 A dver bials as C omplements, A djuncts, Disjuncts, C onjuncts
a) Complements1 are obligatory complementations of a Verb. b) Adjuncts enlarge the VP (V+Complement), they are related to the Verb (one can WH-
question them: when/ where/ why?), c) Disjuncts/ Conjuncts are external to the Clausal Modality. (14) (a) She runs there on Sundays. *She runs on Sundays there. (b) He runs quickly to school every day. ?He runs every day quickly to school. (c) Probably he runs to school quickly. *He runs probably to school quickly.
The SCOPE of the Adverb: (a) the verbal action, (b) the domain of polarity/tense (scope of negation/tense) (c) the whole sentence (proposition) Consider some positions of the adverbs:
(15) (a) Mathew speaks English naturally / fluently/ * certainly. (b) Mathew speaks naturally / fluently/ * certainly in English. (c) Mathew will naturally/ fluently/ certainly speak English. (d) Naturally / *Fluently/ Certainly, Mathew speaks English.
7.4 E xer cises
(16) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss the kind/ function of the underlined modifiers. Describe the scope (and type) of the Adverbs. (a) Jitka určitě odpověděla. (b) Jan odpověděl určitě. (c) Jude will always help Mary. (d) Sure he will do it well. (e) Emily is a nice girl. (f) Well, Emily is too nice. (g) I do not like the green door. (h) This door seems really green. (i) Emily painted the door green (j) Emily can run most quickly. (k) Emily can certainly answer. (l) Emily can certainly answer rather well. (m) Emily is so extremely beautiful. (n) Of course I arrived soon enough.
1 Notice that Complement here does not mean 'doplněk' but is closer to the notion of Object because it is the subcategorised (obligatory) element required by the lexical Verb.
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(17) EXERCISE ===========================================
Which part of speech do the bold elements modify? (a) Emma speks well/quickly. (b) Marion is very lazy. (c) George ran right up the hill. (d) Vilma will work unbelievebly patiently. (18) EXERCISE ===========================================
Make an Adverbial Phrase according to the description. (a) ‘bare AP’ [AP Adv] .....briefly....................................................... (b) ‘AP with premodified A’, [AP --- Adv] ....................................................................... (c) ‘AP with postmodified A’ [AP Adv --- ] ....................................................................... (d) ‘AP with both pre- and post-modified Adv’..................................................................... (19) EXERCISE ===========================================
In which position of those in (10) on page 61 is the’'size’ of the Adverbial Phrase important? Give relevant examples that illustrate contrasts. (20) EXERCISE ===========================================
Replace the Adverbs by more complex constituents. Which phrases should they be? (a) He runs quickly. (b) He runs away/ there on Sundays. (c) He runs daily/ now. (d) He runs very /most often. (21) EXERCISE ===========================================
State and justify the categories of the underlined elements. For a similar example for the Noun category see (28) on page 35. Try to give all possible
(i) semantic/ notional criteria, (ii) morphological criteria (derivational, inflectional morphemes present or possible), (iii) syntactic criteria (for a potential AP a discuss its function).
(a) I have a very big dog. (b) She is the least pretty child I know. (c) She made his daughter pretty. (d) He is pretty silly. (22) EXERCISE ===========================================
Look to the dictionary and find derivational morphemes which create ADJ/ADV. Give several examples for each and notice, what is the category which allows that morpheme. ADJECTIVE ADVERB e.g. –able, V→Adj, : read-able, vis-ible ................................................................ ................................................................ ................................................................ . ...............................................................
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8 SEMANTICS AND MORPHOLOGY OF VERBS
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 24-69; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp.93-240; Dušková (1994) pp. 165-272; Svoboda and Opělová-Károlyová (1989) pp. 7-50;Leech (1971), Leech & Svartvik (1975); Svoboda (2004) pp. 24-36
8.1 Semantic Specification and C lassification
(1) VALENCY (a Verb and its arguments, verbal action and its participants) verbal event action complementary conditions (Manner/ Place/ Time)
1st participant 2nd participant 3rd participant
(Agent) (Patient) (Recipient/ Beneficiary)
(2) (a) Peter/He sent a parcel/ it to John/ to him in the afternoon. (b) Petr/ On poslal balík Janovi v poledne. ‘Transitivity, Thematic frame, Valency’: a Verb is a relation with participants/ arguments. Classifications are based on semantic distinctions (which have formal consequencies). (3) Number of arguments Transitive Verbs: Agent ← VERB → Patient Intransitive Verbs: Agent ← VERB (4) (a) The farmers built a new house. (b) A new house was built (by the farmers). (c) Marilyn often laughs. (5) Copulas, see (11) and (12) on page 53:
(a) Zach is a lawyer / Zach is silly. (b) Zach seems/ appears silly. (c) Zach became/ grew/ got older. (6) Ergative/ Unaccusative Verbs: Theme ← VERB
(i) Ergative causative Vs (sink, break, close) (a) The enemy sank the boat. (b) The boat was sunk. Unaccusative usages of these verbs: (c) The boat sank. (atelic, intransitive) (d) Some windows broke.
(ii) Unaccusative (a) come, go, return, fall Vs of movement and change of state (b) turn, grow, become, get
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(iii) Telic vs. atelic (a) There arrived three men. (b) There came several students to the party. (7) Inchoative Vs - start (to read) , finish (reading) (8) Vs of sensual perception -see (him run), hear (her coming) Vs ‘dicendi’ (indirect speech) - say, tell, cry, think (9) Causative Verbs - make (John leave), force (them to work) (illocutionary/ performative) - order (Mary to leave), tell (him to leave) (10) Reflexive Vs - perjure oneself, absent oneself (11) Verbal complexes
(a) Phrasal Verbs (V+particle) - take off, look up, put away, think through, look after (b) Verbo-nominal complexes - have fun/ a shower, take time, make money/ trouble
8.2 V er bal Par adigma (V er bal M or phology)
English VERBAL FORMS
bare form 0 stop, choose -s form -S stop-s, choose-s -ing Participle -ING stopp-ing, choos-ing Past Tense -ED or Vowel change stop-ed, chose Passive Participle -ED/ -EN stop-ed, chos-en
(12) Simple vs. Periphrastic Forms (a) He stops... / He stoppede... / She chooses… / She chose… (b) He might have been being stopped/ chosen by the police. (13) Finite--See (12)--vs. Infinitive Forms (a) (to) choose / (to) have chosen present/ past (bare) infinitive (b) stopping / having stopped present/ past participle (or gerund) (14) (a) He must/should go home. → He must/should have gone home. (b) Saying good bye, John left. →. Having said good bye, John left. (15) Verbal Features (finitness) (I) Aspect ....................................................... optional (Eng) /intrinsic (Cz) (II) Tense ......................................................... optional (III) Mood / Voice ............................................. optional (IV) Nominal features ....................................... ‘secondary’, i.e. agreement (Person, Gender/ Animacy, Number)
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8.3 T ense
Time and Tense: Tense refers to the main pragmatic/ semantic notions of Time. Real Time is an open and infinite phenomenon. Language works uses a simplified (=grammaticalised) version of Time = Tense which is related to the moment of the speech act. (a) Past = before the speech act (b) Present = includes "now" (i.e. the moment of the speech act) (c) Future = after the speech act (as yet unrealised) Tense is an optional verbal feature, i.e. a standard Verb can take any of the Tenses depending on the intended meaning. (16) Morphology of Tense [+PAST] [+PRES] [+FUT] Hugo help-ed >>> Hugo help-s >>> Hugo will help. Recall the rules for pronunciation (assimilation in voicing). (17) Absolute Tense (with finite verbs) (a) past Hugo stopp-ed >>> Did Hugo stop? (b) present Hugo stop-s >>> Does Hugo stop? (c) future Hugo will stop >>> Will Hugo stop? (18) Relative Tense (with infinitives) (a) Saying good bye, Hugo drove/is driving off in his car. (b) Having said good bye, Hugo drove/is driving off in his car. (a) ‘the same’ (as the related finite form) to finish - finish-ing (b) ‘preceding’ (the related finite form) to have finish-ed - having finished-ed
8.4 A spect
Aspect is added to the main Tense system providing additional conditions for the action. (a) Progressive Aspect: continuation/ repetition, etc., (b) Perfective Aspect: reference to another Tense/ finishing, telicity, etc. (19) ASPECT (a) PROGRESSIVE BE V-ing
(b) PERFECTIVE HAVE V-en (a) +PROG circumfix: Hugo is explain-ing/ choosing (b) +PERF circumfix: Hugo has explain-ed/ chosen Aspect is an optional verbal feature. The Verb can occur with no Aspect (simple Tenses), or it can have one Aspect or two Aspects.
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(20) e.g. [PRES] (a) [-PROG/ -PERF] Hugo helps (b) [+PROG] Hugo is help-ing (c) [+PERF] Hugo has help-ed (d) [+PROG] [+PERF] Hugo has been help-ing
8.5 C ombinations of A spect & T ense
In English, grammatical temporal concepts are expressed by a combination of the 3 Tenses and the 2 Aspects. 3 Tenses + 2 Aspects = 12 verbal forms
Using the 12 forms, English can express a wide variety of meanings. For a proper analysis it is necessary to distinguish between the form (presence of the Tense+Aspect morphemes) and the interpretation. Interpretation of specific forms is influenced by the presence of morphemes but also by other factors, e.g. the existence of marked and unmarked usages in a given language: each form must be considered as a part of the system, i.e. as contrasive with the other existing forms. (21) Temporal framing related to specific discourse (communication model) PAST PRESENT FUTURE (22) (a) I am leaving (now / tomorrow / every day / *yesterday). (b) I believed that she would do it as soon as I asked her. (23) English 12 verbal forms (Tense + Aspect Combinations) (1) He [-ed] finish-ed (7) He was finish-ing
(2) He [-s] finish-s (8) He is finish-ing
(3) He will finish (9) He will be finish-ing
(4) He had finish-ed (10) He had be-en finish-ing
(5) He has finish-ed (11) He has be-en finish-ing
(6) He will have finish-ed (12) He will have be-en finish-ing
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8.6 M ood, Sentence M odality
The category of Mood refers to the framing of the speech act (sentence) w.r.t. its intended communicative function. (A) communicative function (B) standard formal realization
(a) statement (informs about facts) : → indicative Mood (sentence) (b) question (asking about information): → interrogative Mood (c) order (influencing the hearer): → imperative Mood (d) wish (expressing a wish): → optative Mood In English the main sentence modality is not a part of verbal morphology. There is no verbal inflection signalling sentence modality that is encoded syntactically (by bound morphemes or in periphrastic way). Compare the following English and Czech examples. (24) (a) Indicative He can read. (b) Interrogative Can he read? no morphology but distribution (c) 2nd sg/pl Imperative Read! no morphology but distribution (25) (a) Indicative Čte knihu. (b) Interrogative Čte knuhu? no morphology but intonation (c) 2nd sg/pl Imperative Čt-i! Čt-ěte imperative morphemes (26) Periphrastic imperative
(a) Let's go. (a') Jděme. (b) Let me help you. (b') ?? (c) Let him do it. (c') Ať to udělá on. (c) Let it be. (c') ?? Nech to být. Ať to je jak chce... The category of Mood refers also to the concept of probability of the action. This feature is optional and it does have a morphological representation in English.
(a) simple conditional (past, present) (b) perfect conditional (past, present) (27) CONDITIONAL WOULD bare V-infinitive
(a) Hugo would write (= present infinitive) (b) would have written (=perfect infinitive) (28) Conditional clauses. A realis main clause is indicative; an irrealis main clause uses the
conditional. (a) Bernard will come tomorrow if you ask him within the next hour. (b) Bernard would come tomorrow if you asked him within the next hour. (c) Bernard would have stayed here if you had asked him politely.
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8.7 V oice
The category of Voice is related to the distribution of the semantic roles among verbal arguments (sentence members). See (9) and (10) on page 16 ando (3) and (4) on page 64. English Voice is an optional feature of the V. Verbs can take active or passive morphology. (29) (a) Active She saw/ introduced Milan. (b) Passive Milan was seen/ introduced by her. (30) ACTIVE vs. PASSIVE BE -EN
(a) The book was (being) writt-en... (b) is being writt-en... (c) will have been writt-en...
8.8 Subject-V er b A gr eement
Verbal morphology related to the characteristics of the Subject in English is not very rich. In Czech the complex verbal morphology allows dropping the Subject (pro-drop language). (31) (a) Naše malá Jana/Ona šl-a domů. (a') Our little Jane/She goe-s home. (b) Šl-a domů. (b') *Goe-s home. Alternative realization (free vs. bound grammatical (inflectional) morpheme) Also clausal subject can be expressed in the form of free or bound morpheme (or both). (32) (a) more bautiful → (a') nic-er (more = -er)
(b) to read, you read → (b') čís-t, (ty) čte-š (to = -t, you/ty = -š) Still, language is pro-drop because of the whole complex system of characteristics; not only morphology.Not every type of overt morphology allows dropping the Subject. (33) (a) I am reading now. (b) * Am reading now. The English verbal morpheme of agreement is therefore a purely formal configurational feature. (Bout also other languages with more morphology, e.g. French, can be like English in that they require overt pronoun subjects.) Find out in the Table in (23) on page 67 the precise position of the morpheme of English Subject-Verb agreement -s . (Which part of the complex verbal form carries it?) (= secondary/ derived Nominal features reflect the Subject) (34) (a) He /she/ it call-s rather often. (b) He/ she/ it do-es call (*s) rather often. (c) Doe-s he/ she/ it call(*s) very often? (35) What is -s? .... 3 sg. present. (a) Person BUT - they call(*s) ‘a fused morpheme’ of two features (b) Number BUT - I read(*s) and - book vs. book-s (c) Tense BUT - he wa-s Think about the following examples of (dis)agreement:
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semantic (36) (a) His only success was his short stories. vs. formal agreement (b) His short stories were his only success. (c) What we need most is/ are sufficient funds. (d) Two years is a long time to wait. (e) Bread and butter is a nice breakfast. (f) A large number of students are granted scholarships. (g) Every year, a group of excellent students is/ are granted scholarships. (h) Either he or you are/ *is mistaken. (i) Either you or he is/ *are mistaken. (j) For a birthday, flowers or a book is/ *are a good present. (k) For a birthday, a book or flowers is/ are a good present. (l) The police is/ are looking for the criminal.
8.9 E xer cises
(37) EXERCISE ===========================================
Is a semantically based division of lexical (content) Verbs (Movement, Perception, etc.) relevant for their form (morphology and/or syntax)? (a) Verbs of movement (e.g. move, go) …………………………………………........……. (b) Verbs of perception (e.g. see, feel) …………………………………………........……. (c) Causal Verbs (e.g. make, force) …………………………………………........……. (38) EXERCISE ===========================================
(a) Say briefly what is the most common/ general interpretation of the feature [+PERF] in English. (What do all perfect Tenses have in common?) (b) Say briefly what is the the most common/ general interpretation of the feature [+PROG] in English. (What do all progressive Tenses have in common?) (39) EXERCISE ===========================================
In the following table fill in the Czech 1st person sg of ‘stavět‘ (stavět dům) / ‘zastavit‘ (zastavit auto). Recalling that linguistic signs are symbols, i.e. arbitrary, pay attention to morphological form and interpretation - are they the same? PAST Tense PRESENT Tense FUTURE Tense no ASPECT (nedokonavé)
1. 2. 3.
+ PERF Aspect (dokonavé)
4. 5. 6.
Time in Czech is expressed by a combination of 3 Tenses and 1 Aspect (one form is missing).
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(40) EXERCISE ===========================================
Fill in all finite verbal forms of the English Verb arrive. Mark with distinct colours: (a) Tense morphemes, (b) the Progressive Aspect circumfix, (c) the Perfect ASPECT circumfix.
PAST Tense PRESENT Tense FUTURE Tense ‘simple’ = no ASPECT
1. 2. 3.
+ PROG Aspect
4. 5. 6.
+ PERF Aspect
7. 8. 9.
+ PROG Aspect + PERF Aspect
10. 11. 12.
(41) EXERCISE ===========================================
How is the morphological feature combination [+PERF][+PRES] interpreted in English and how in Czech? Find examples in both languages. ..................................................................................................................................................
(42) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give the feature range and existing inflectional morphemes of English. a) Tense ................................................................................................................................ b) Aspect ................................................................................................................................ c) Voice ................................................................................................................................ (43) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give the feature characteristics w.r.t. [Tense, Aspect etc] of the underlined verbal forms. (a) Emanuel looks at Jane. ................................................................................. (b) Emanuel is looking at Jane. ................................................................................. (c) Emanuel was being looked for by Jane. …..…............................................................... (d) Emanuel will look at Jane. ................................................................................. (e) Emanuel has got a book. ................................................................................. (f) Emanuel has been reading a book. ................................................................................. (g) Emanuel was introduced first . ................................................................................. (h) Emanuel had had a shower. ................................................................................. (i) Emanuel had been stopped. ................................................................................. (j) Emanuel will have finished it. .................................................................................
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(44) EXERCISE ===========================================
Write these forms of the English Verb ‘help’ (underline the inflectional morphemes). (a) [+PAST] [+PERF] [-PROG] ................................................................................. (b) [+PRES] [+PERF] [-PROG] ................................................................................. (c) [+PAST] [-PERF] [-PROG] ................................................................................. (d) [+PAST] [+PERF] [+PROG] ................................................................................. (e) [+FUT] [+PERF] [-PROG] ................................................................................. (f) [+FUT] [+PERF] [+PROG] ................................................................................. (g) [+PAST] [-PERF] [+PROG] ................................................................................. (h) [+PRES] [-PERF] [+PROG] ................................................................................. (i) [+FUT] [-PERF] [+PROG] ................................................................................. (j) [+PRES] [+PERF] [+PROG] ................................................................................. (45) EXERCISE ===========================================
Write the forms of the English Verb INTRODUCE as in the list above, with the additional feature [+/--PASSIVE]. Underline the inflectional morphemes. (a) ............................................................... (f) ................................................................ (b) ............................................................... (g) ................................................................ (c) ............................................................... (h) ................................................................ (d) ............................................................... (i) ................................................................. (e) ............................................................... (j) ................................................................ (46) EXERCISE ===========================================
Compare and explain the Tenses in the examples below. List the elements (connectors of some elements in the main clause) which influence the Tense in the subordinate clause. Define exactly the conditions under which Tense shift applies in English. Give examples (mention exceptions). (a) Marie bude pracovat, hned jak budeš pracovat ty. (b) Hillary will start work as soon as you start work. (c) Jana myslela, že tam nejsi. (d) Jane thought that you were not there. (e) Jan řekl, že to udělá, když mu budeš pomáhat. (f) George said that he would do it if you helped him. (47) EXERCISE ===========================================
Give simple/ practical/ precise/ working rules for the usage of simple past vs. present perfect in English (mention Adverbials of time). (a) Caroline wrote a letter. (b) Caroline has written a letter. (c) Peter was born in 1985. (d) *Peter has been born in 1985. (e) Mary never saw such a book. (f) Mary has never seen such a book. (g) Audrey read the book yesterday and she loved it a lot and remembers it all. (h) *Audrey has read the book and she loved it a lot and remembers it all.
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9 SYNTAX OF VERBS
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 335-362 (1) (a) the form of a VP (Verb Phrase) (b) the distribution (function) of a VP
9.1 V er b Phr ase
(2) VP: ADV - V - NP / PP / COMPLEMENT / Vinf / Clause To form a VP (Verb Phrase), a Verb (head) combines with a range of constituents: NPs, PPs, VPs, APs. If the combination is obligatory, we say that the Verbs lexically select (subcategorize for) the NPs, PPs, VPs, APs. The number of the selected complements (the obligatory ones) ranges from 0 to 2 but in a given clause it can be larger if optional ones are also taken into account. (3) VP = [VP V + OBJECT(S) ] to hand a book to Peter / Peter a book [VP V + ADVERBIALS or PPs ] to dash home/ back/ into the office/now [VP V + OBJ + COMPLEMENT ] to call Mary a beauty [VP V + OBJ + CLAUSE or Vinf ] to warn Peter that we will come late (4) Some obligatory verbal complementation. See verbal valency in (3) etc. on page 64. (a) I can find the girl (e) I can swim. (b) to gave the book to Benjamin. (f) I gave Benjamin the book. (c) to dash to the cinema. (g) I got tired. (d) to call him a hero. (h) Bush Jr. was elected President. (5) Some optional modification of the Verb. See also (1) etc. on page 60. (a) He often reads books silently, in the kitchen. (b) Last year Henry visited his grandparents twice in Prague and once in Berlin. (c) To invite Mary to the cinema was not a good idea. (d) For Peter to introduce his sister to Bill was painful. The main formal clasification of Verbs is based on the specification of the obligatory complementation of the Verb (i.e. the number and characteristics of its complements). (a) transitive Verbs ..... require complementation (b) intransitive Verbs ..... do not require complementation (6) (a) *to find ..... the Verb is transitive (b) to find a book ..... the Verb selects NP V, [ _ NP] (c) *to find into the hall …. the Verb does not select PP
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The complementation of the Verb is stated in terms of the function or a category (part of speech) of the following selected phrasal constituent(s): Object/NP, Adverbial/PP, etc. (7) Kinds of lexical Verbs w.r.t. their obligatory complementation (their selection):
..... Example sentence functions
kind of phrase (category)*
1. The tramp laughed. S - V V, [---] intransitive V 2. Mary found a diary. S – V - Od V, [---NP] monotransitive V 3. The tramp leaned toward
the girl. S – V – Adv V, [---PP] V of movement
4. Bill started to read. S – V –V/Com.** V, [---VP] 5. He is/seemed tired. S – V –
pred./com. V, [---AP] linking/copula V
6. He told a girl an interesting story.
S – V – Oi – Od V, [---(NP) NP] ditransitive V <Patient+Beneficiary>**
7. He sent a letter to John. S – V – Od – Oi V, [---NP (PP)] 8. John put a book on the
shelf. S – V – Od – Adv V, [---NP
PP/Adv] <Patent+Location>
9. He called her idiot.. S – V – Od – com. V, [---NP NP] complex transitive V+Complement
10. He saw Bill run. S – V – Od – com. V, [---NP VP] 11. The music drives me mad. S – V – Od – com. V, [---NP AP]
* Many non-VP complements can be replaced by a (semi)clause. ** Patient’ is sometimes called ‘Theme’ when change of Location is involved. *** Complement means 'doplněk' here.
Many Verbs can select (are followed by) other Verbs (VPs). This is typical for Auxiliaries and Modals but also for many other Verbs. The selected VP is in the form of an infinitive (bare or with to) or an –ing form. These infinitival structures are often called semi-clauses.
(8) (a) I am reading the book. I have read the book. I have to read the book. (b) We must read that huge book. She makes/ has us read that huge book.
(c) I reluctantly started/ finished/ kept reading that huge book. (d) I wanted to read the book. She wanted us to read the book. (e) I love/ hate to read those books. My mother loved/ hated us to read them. (f) I love/ hate reading those books. My mother loved/ hated us reading them. (g) I saw/ heard the students fall asleep/ falling asleep. (h) I decided/ arranged/ hoped to read the book. (i) I promised Anne to read it. (i) I convinced/made/ordered Anne to read it. (j) I arranged for Anne to read it.
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9.2 Distr ibution and F unctions of V P
Typical function: (A) Finite Verb = Predicate: see above in (23) on page 67. (B) Infinitive = -ing form, to-infinitive, bare infinitive Both infinitives (–ing and to-infinitives) can appear in any sentence function.
(9) (a) To read so many books to Adam every day must be maddening. (b) To read (such books) is to know (many facts about life very soon). (c) I like to read/ reading (books at night). (d) A letter to read (quickly/ to Adam/ *a paragraph). (e) Reading (books to Adam every day ) is easier than writing (poems every day). (f) Saying good bye to Bill, he left. (g) Hillary went to the pub, having finished her work. (h) We asked (her) when to read to Adam. (i) We talked to Adam about studying hard.
9.3 E xer cises
(10) EXERCISE ===========================================
Write down examples of complex VPs with both premodification and postmodification. Make the verbal head (i) finite and (ii) infinitival. (a) VP = Adv+V+ OBJECT(S) (i) .................................................................................... (ii) ................................................................................... (b) = Adv+V+ADVERBIAL (i) ………....................................................................... (ii) ………...................................................................... (c) = V+N+COMPLEMENT (i) .................................................................................. (ii) ………...................................................................... (11) EXERCISE ===========================================
Divide the sentences in (9) above to sentence members (constituents).
(12) EXERCISE ===========================================
Write down example sentences with complex VPs (e.g. transitive Vs) in the function of (a) Subject ............................................................................................................. (b) Predicate ............................................................................................................. (c) Object ............................................................................................................. (d) Attribute ............................................................................................................. (e) Adverbial ............................................................................................................. (f) Complement ............................................................................................................. (13) EXERCISE ===========================================
In which contexts does English use the bare infinitive (infinitive without 'to')? Write down all of them. If necessary, mention the distinctions in active/ passive Voice and American/ British norms. ..................................................................................................................................................
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10 AUXILIARIES AND MODALS
Dušková (1994) pp. 165-272; Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 24-46; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp. 93-172; Leech (1971)
10.1 Semantic Specification
Full meaning vs. complementary meaning? (How do we measure a meaning?) >> MOD/AUX requires a V complement >> MOD/AUX has no thematic frame. Cf. (3) on page 64. (1) (a) *Emma found. / Emma found a job.
(b) Emma is (not) findiing / has (not) found a job. (c) Emma has to / ought to / must find a job. (WHO/WHAT makes her?)
Assuming that the main property of Modals and Auxiliries is their lack of lexical meaning, then Auxiliaries are part of verbal paradigms and Modals express modality (they have rather idiosyncratic behavior). There are several distinguishable groups of these Verbs; see (2) below. Each group has special formal characteristics which can be contrasted. (2) English Auxiliaries and Modals (Quirk, 1985) (a) Auxiliaries be, have, do (b) Central Modals can, will, may, shall, must could, would, might, should (c) Marginal Modals dare (neg. polarity), need (neg. polarity), ought to, used to (d) Modal Idioms had better, would rather, have got to... (e) Semi-Auxiliaries have to, be about to, be going to, (be to) Some of the non-lexical Verbs have their lexical counterparts. Compare the paradigm of the Modals need/ dare in (a/b/c/d) below with the Verbs need/ dare illustrated in (e/f/g/h). (3) Marginal Modals
(a) She need /dare not (*to) see a doctor. (e) She does not need /dare to see one. (b) Needn’t she (*to) see a doctor? (f) Doesn’t she need/ dare to see one? (c) Dare she (not) see a doctor? (g) Does she (not) dare to see one? (d) *She now needs/ dares see a doctor. (h) She now needs/ dares to see one.
10.2 T wo K inds of M odality among the M odals
Modals express the obligation (duty) or level of certainty. (4) (a) I must go to school Deontic modality (still Verbal) = I have a duty/ am obliged to go to school.
(b) It must be 5 o'clock Epistemic modality (a kind of Adverbial) = It is certain that it is 5 o'clock.
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There is not much formal distinction between the deontic and epistemic Modals in the Present Tense (but compare the influence of Aspect/ Negation with may). However, the distinction is clear in Past Tense. In the past the more ‘verbal’ element which is marked for Tense: the Modal (periphrastic) with deontics, the infinitive with epistemics. (5) He must be at home. With past deontic meaning, If must is epistemic, i.e. if must has i.e. if must is ‘verbal’, the ‘past’ ‘adverbial’ characteristics, the infinitive must be expressed in Past Tense, of the Main Verb expresses ‘past’ by means of and so had to replaces must. the perfect infinitive, in this case have been. (a) He had to be at home yesterday. = deontic modality (b) He must have been at home yesterday. = epistemic modality (6) (a) He had to go to school. (= It was his duty to go...)
(b) He must have gone to school. (= He certainly went...) (c) ??It had to be 5o'clock. (=??Soneone’s duty was at 5 o'clock) (d) It must have been 5o'clock. (=It certainly was 5 o'clock)
10.3 Phonetic r eductions of A uxiliar ies, M odals and L exical V er bs
(7) Auxiliary (a) he is > he's > he isn't (b) I have/ had > I've/ I'd > I haven't/ I hadn't (8) Modal (a) I can/ will > *I'n/ I’ll > I can't/ I won’t (b) he must > *he'st > he mustn't (9) Lexical Verb (a) I read/ I kill > *I'd/ *I’ll > *I readn’t/ *I killn’t (b) he goes > *he's > *he goesn’t The above examples show a growing level of standard phonetic reduction which appears (a) in declarative sentences between the Subject and the first verbal element, (b) in negative contexts with the bound form of the particle not = -n't. The Auxiliaries have and be have reduction in both cases, the Modals have only some reductions, and lexical Verbs usually do not reduce (in standard speech).
10.4 M or phological Pr oper ties
(10) Auxiliary (a) He is / was / will be reading... SUBSTITUTION: be (b) He has / had / will have written... is suppletive but has a (c) I want to be reading.../ I want to have written... full paradigm as in 8.2. (d) (While) Being examined, Elisabeth broke into tears. (e) He seems to have examined her carelessly. (f) Having been examined, Elisabeth left.
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(11) Modal (a) *William is can-ing/ must-ing/ will-ing .... (visit his parents). (b) *William has can-ed/ must-ed / will-ed ... (visit his parents). (c) I want * to can/ * to must/ * to shall... (visit my parents). (12) Tense (could?/ would?/ *might/ *should)
(a) Constantine stopped. (b) Constantine can/ could march to new conquests. (Past? Conditional?)
(c) Did Constantine stop? (d) Constantine will / would march to new conquests. (Past? Conditional?) (13) Aspect
(a) Constantine is marching again. (b) *Constantine is canning march again. (c) Constantine has marched again. (d) *Constantine has canned march again. (14) Voice (a) Better novels were written/ *canned/ *musted by new authors. Mood (b) New authors (would) write/*can/ *must better novels. (15) Subject-Verb Agreement (secondary/ derived Nominal features)
(a) Constantine reads a lot. (b) *He cans/ wills a lot. (c) Constantine hopes to read a lot. (d) *He hopes to can/ to will read a lot. With respect to morphology, the main Auxiliaries group together with the lexical Verbs, because both have full verbal pardigms including infinitival forms. Central Modals (and Modal Idioms) are unique, because they lack verbal morphology.
10.5 E xer cises
(16) EXERCISE ===========================================
Underline the words (the part of the Predicate) which express the main ‘meaning’ of the verbal complex. (a) Mathew is looking at Jane. (e) Mathew is looking for Jane. (b) Mathew has got a book. (f) Mathew has been reading a book. (c) Mathew has had to go home. (g) Mathew is having a shower. (d) Mathew will make trouble, I am sure. (h) Mathew started to read a book. (17) EXERCISE ===========================================
Consider the thematic/ semantic roles of the Predicates. Does the number and charactersitics of the participants related to the Verb change with the presence of an Auxiliary or Modal? How? (a) Hilary sang a song for Steve. (b) Hilary is singing a song for Steve. (c) Hilary will be singing a song for Steve. (d) Finally Hillary's mother said yes and Hillary was allowed to go to the cinema. (e) Hillary may go to the cinema.
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(f) Hillary was able to climb the mountain. (g) Hillary must sing a song. (h) Hillary has to sing a song. (i) Hillary must have sung a song. (18) EXERCISE ===========================================
Translate the sentence 'Musí být doma' with (a) deontic and (b) epistemic meanings. Explain the distinction in interpretation. Then put both sentences into the past. . (a) ............................................................. → ..................................................................... (b) ............................................................. → ..................................................................... (19) EXERCISE ===========================================
Paraphrase to express the meaning of the modal element. Translate into Czech. (a) We were able to finish before noon. (b) We could have finished before noon. (c) He had to help her with her work. (d) He must have helped her her work. (e) You should have told me yesterday, I then need not have worried. (f) For all we ought to have thought but have not thought, for all we ought to have said but
have not said, for all we ought to have done but have not done I pray thy God for forgiveness.
(20) EXERCISE ===========================================
Find out from Table (23) on page 67 in which part of the complex verbal form the Subject-Verb agreement -s is realized. Compare the Auxiliary, Modal and Lexical Verbs. (21) EXERCISE ===========================================
Check which kinds of Modals in the Table (2) on page 76 have morphology typical for Modals, i.e. which of them lack -s, -ed, -ing, to-infinitives etc. (22) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss what the element ‘to’ is in the following sentences. (a) I gave the book to Peter (b) Who did you give the book to? (c) I want to introduce you to Peter. (d) I want to go home now, but when does Peter want to? (e) I have to go home. (f) I am able to go home. (g) He dared to visit the princess, but he ought not to have. (23) EXERCISE ===========================================
Which Modals in Table (2) on page 76 are followed by bare infinitives and which are followed by a to-infinitive?If an item allows both, what else correlates with the choice?
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11 SYNTAX OF AUXILIARIES, MODALS AND VERBS
Consider the word orders in the following sentences. (V = Lexical Verb) (1) (a) Marcel reads American novels. = S -V-O (b) Does Marcel read American novels? = S -V-O (c) Marcel does not read American novels. = S -V-O Simply referring only to the ’Verb’ is not enough to describe (the word order of) main clause structures in English. The Predicate is analytic. We must divide the Predicate (‘Verb’) into several elements making up complex verbal forms/ complex Predicates. How many and which elements are involved?
11.1 Question for mation: M odal/*V er b - Subject - ...
(2) INVERSION: WHAT inverts?
(a) Marcel can read. → Can Marcel read? (b) Marcel is reading. → Is Marcel reading? (c) Marcel reads. → *Reads Marcel? (d) Marcel (DOES) read. → Does Marcel read? Assuming the (d) example is showing the hidden structure of an English clause with no Aux/Mod, we can propose the following scheme. Notice the importance of the first phonetically present Mod/Aux, and that is is distinct from VLEX. This first element inverts with Subject, not the Verb. (3) Question Inversion: the first Aux/Mod moves in front of the SUBJECT. Marcel can read will Inverted might semantically empty Position is (…-ing) nonemphatic do ‘do’ provides DO-support SUBJECT Mod/Aux VERB In English the V position is to be divided into a ‘Mod/Aux + VLEX’ complex. We provisionally call this the ‘Ω position’. Auxiliary do: In declarative positive nonemphatic structures the initial Aux do remains phonetically empty. It is, however, visible in interrogative, negative or emphatic structures, where it provides DO-support.
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11.2 Negation (Position of not)
Clausal Negation: inserting the particle NOT. What is the position of not? (4) (a) Marcel canNOT be reading. (b) ?Marcel can be NOT reading. (c) *Marcel can be reading NOT. (d) *Marcel NOT reads. (e) *Marcel reads NOT. (f) Marcel does NOT read. The negative particle not appears in front of some Verbs but after others. Assuming the structure proposed in (3) on page 80, we can propose the following uniform scheme. Notice the importance of the first phonetically present Mod/Aux, distinct from VLEX. This element precedes the particle not (or its bound form -n't ). (5) Negative particle (+negative/ short Adverbs) follows the first Aux/Mod : Ω Marcel can NOT - - - read
will never semantically empty might just nonemphatic do becomes lexicalised is (-ing) to provide DO-support ‘do’ for the particle not. SUBJECT Ω NEG - - - VERB
11.3 Question T ags, Shor t A nswer s, Questions of Sur pr ise
The role of Ω ‘operator’ (the first Mod/Aux) is again crucial. DO-support reappears. (6) (a) John can see us, can't he? - Yes, he can. - Can he? (b) John has been reading, hasn't he? - Yes, he has. - Has he? (c) *John reads them, reads he not? - *Yes, he reads. - *Reads he? (d) John reads them, doesn't he? - Yes, he does. - Does he? Conclusion:
With respect to their distribution/ syntax, MOD/AUXs form a special group within the category of VERBS and their characteristics can be stated as in (9) on page 82. Morphological vs. syntactic criteria
The morphological template of an English Predicate consists of up to 5 elements, the 5-slot Predicate model (Quirk, 1985): (7) Modal Perfect Progressive Passive Lexical John will/can have been being introduced
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For syntactic analysis, however, i.e. when discussing the word order of English clause, the 2-slot Predicate is sufficient as well as more elegant. The first slot is the ‘operator’ Ω (= the ‘first’ Modal MOD/AUX , preceding any NEGATION); the others are all the followingAux/Vs. (8) Ω V(s) = one or more AUXs / Vs John will/can have been being introduced (9) Classification of the verbal elements
a) Modals : central Modals appear always in the Ω position b) Auxiliaries: appear either in Ω or in some following (V) position c) Lexical Verbs: never appear in the Ω position The above allows us to define Central Modals in English in a more precise way. (10) Central Modals in English:
a) lack verbal morphology b) always appear in Ω i.e. - they are unique and - always precede Aux (11) The specific properties of 'the first modal/auxiliary' position (here as Ω): Huddleston & Pullum (2002) : NICE (NICCEE) a) Negation → Ω takes not, lexical V does not b) Interrogation → Ω inverts in questions, lexical V does not c) Coda → Ω is used in short reactive structures (question tags, questions of surprise), lexical V is not (i) John must speak English, mustn't he?. - Must he? (ii) John speaks English, speakn't he? - *Speaks he?
d) Contraction → Ω contracts, lexical V does not e) Emphasis → Ω is used to emphasize the polarity, lexical V is not (i) A: John cannot speak English. - B: (No,) John can so speak English. A: John can speak English. - B: (No,)John can't either speak English. (ii) A: John speaks English. - B: *(No,) John speaks so English. f) Ellipsis → Ω is used in ellipsis, lexical V is not (i) John can speak English - and so can/should/do I. – but/so Mary needn't. John could speak English - before Mary could /did. - if Mary did. (ii) John spoke English - *and so spoke I. - before Mary spoke.
11.4 Negative Questions (T esting the pr oposed ver bal str uctur e)
Notice the pattern, referring to (3) on page 80 and (5) on page 81. Negative questions should (i) have inversion, and (ii) contain the particle not (or -n't ). Discuss in more detail which element (how many of them) inverts with a Subject, reflecting on the categorial status (= particle) of not (or -n't ). (12) (a) Marcel will often be reading. (b) Will Marcel often be reading?
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(c) *Will be Marcel often reading? (d) *Will often Marcel be reading? (e) *Will be reading often Marcel? (13) The above issues are clarified by the possible morpho-phonetic contraction of not:
(a) David won't be reading. (e) David will not be reading. (b) Won't David be reading? (f) *Will not David be reading? (g) Will David not be reading? (c) David doesn't read. (h) David does not read. (d) Doesn't David read? (i) *Does not David read? (j) Does David not read?
11.5 E xer cises
(14) EXERCISE ===========================================
Assuming the syntactic distinction(s) between Aux/Mod and Verbs, i.e. referring to (i) their need for DO-support, (ii) their ability to invert, and (iii) infinitive or agreement morphology, discuss the underlined Verbs and state their category (V or Aux or Mod). (A) (a) Do you go swim often? - No, I don't go swim. (b) * Go you swim? - * No, I go not swim. Example shows a typical (c) I want to go swim. pattern of ......................... (B) (a) * Do you can go? - * No, I don't can go. (b) Can you go? - No, I cannot go. Example shows a typical (c) * I want to can go. pattern of ......................... (C) (a) * Do you be going now? - * No, I don't be going now. (b) Are you going now? - No, I am not going now. Example shows a typical (c) I want to be going now. pattern of ......................... (15) EXERCISE ===========================================
Explain the ungrammaticality of the following sentences, referring to the rule for Subject-Verb agreement in English. (Giving a possible correct form is NOT an explanation! Use the reasoning in terms od the model (8) on page 82) (a) *A lot of guests arrives today. (e) *Bill wills read a journal. (b) *Their type arrive pretty often. (f) *Knows John about the situation? (c) *Mary or John are reading the book. (g) *Do John knows about the situation? (d) *Bill will reads a journal. (h) *Do John know about the situation? (16) EXERCISE ===========================================
Referring to your rules for question formation and for making clause negation in English, explain the ungrammaticality of the following examples. (a) *Can be John running? (f) *Will not John come soon? (b) *John not reads much. (g) *John reads never novels. (c) Does he understand? - *Not (so). (h) *John don't reads good books.
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(d) *Can Mary haven’t read that book? (i) *Needs Bill do anthing about this? (e) *Dare John to notify the police? (j) *Does John will know about it soon? (17) EXERCISE ===========================================
Construct relevant examples which show whether the following underlined Verbs are Aux/Mod Verbs. For the criteria see (8) on page 82 and (10) on page 82.
(a) Julien can be leaving London just now. (b) Mary has been writting her essay for two weeks already. (c) Livia was introduced to Martin. (d) Claire has to read this paper tonight. (e) Hugo is to help his mother with the shopping. (18) EXERCISE ===========================================
Assuming the properties of the best case Modals as discussed above, see (8) on page 82 and (10) on page 82, and considering above all: (i) no do-support, (ii) no inflectional morphology, (iii) followed by bare infinitive,
find out what makes central Modals distinct from the marginal Modals, modal idioms and semi-Auxiliaries. (See (2) on page 76.) (19) EXERCISE ===========================================
Write the correct forms and explain the ungrammaticality referring to the model (8) on page 82.
(a) *William need to go to school. ....................................................................... (b) *Harry dares now go to the cinema. ....................................................................... (c) *Needn’t they to go to school? ....................................................................... (d) *Don’t they dare go to the cinema? ....................................................................... (e) *Needs he not to go to school? ....................................................................... (f) *Does he not dare see his friend? ....................................................................... (20) EXERCISE ===========================================
Compare the particle not with the negative Adverb(ial) never. Discuss their properties suggested by the questions below. Use the examples below (and create more of your own) to demonstrate the phenomena. (i) Is their position the same? (ii) Do they both require DO-support ? (iii) Where do they appear in (negative) questions? (iv) Can both of them contract? (v) Under which condition can they appear in front of the Subject? (vi) Can they be used alone in isolated answers? (vii) Which kind of verbal inflections can(not) appear after them?
(a) Livia will not be (*not) reading. (a') Livia will never be (not/ *never) reading. (b) *Livia not reads. (b') Livia never reads. (c) Livia does not read. (c') ??Livia does never read. (d) Will Livia not read? (d') Will Livia never read?
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(e) Won't Livia read? (e') *Will never Livia read? (f) *Not will he help her. (f') Never will he help her. (g) Will you help? - *Not. (g') Will you help? - Never. (h) *Livia not does read.. (h') Livia never does read. (21) EXERCISE ===========================================
To describe the English vord order, the simple model S – V – O is often used, which employs a single (synthetic) symbol V for the whole Predicate. In this section we have been using a 2-slot model for the analytic English Predicates in model (8) on page 82 and mentioned the 5-slot Predicate (see (7) on page 81) for the complex verbal forms of English. A. What is the distinction? Make a schematic picture of both, label the components and give examples
5-slot-model 2-slot-model B. How would you define (= describe) the element labeled here Ω?
C. In the following examples underline the full Predicates and describe their structure. Which model seems to you descriptively most adequate? What are the reasons for
your choices?
(a) This house must have been being built for years already. (b) The picture could not be seen because of the shadow. (c) Your money is being spent just now. (d) *Will not you help your brother? - Will you not help your brother? D. Using the two models, try to answer tha following questions?
(i) How many elements can appear in each slot? (ii) Is the order of the units obligatory? Try to give relevant data (give examples)! (iii) Are all/ some of the members of the form(s) in a given slot obligatory? (iv) What is the position of negation (NOT) in each scheme? (v) Which element (slot?) inverts in questions? (vi) In which element (slot?) does the 3sg morpheme –s appear in the Present Tense? (22) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss (explain, comment) the distinctions between the 'first modal/auxiliary' Ω providing examples of all the diagnostics NICE. (Negation, Inversion, Coda, Emphasis).
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12 THE ENGLISH VERBS DO, BE AND HAVE
Greenbaum & Quirk (1990) pp. 24-69; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik (2004) pp.93-240; Dušková (1994) pp. 174-180; Svoboda and Opělová-Károlyová (1989) pp. 7-50; Leech (1971) Every English Auxiliary and Modal is rather idiosyncratic (= specific, “sui generis,” with some unpredictable property or properties). Recall the following: (1) Classification of the verbal elements a) Modals: central Modals always appear in the Ω position
b) Auxiliaries: appear either in Ω or in some following (V) position
c) Lexical Verbs: never appear in the Ω position The following examples illustrate that apart from the Auxiliary "do", there also exists in English a lexical Verb "do". Considering all the distinction(s) among Aux/Mod/Lexical Verbs discussed in the above sections, the two kinds of "do" are distinct lexical items, each of which behaves regularly with respect to its characteristics. (2) Lexical do Auxiliary do (a) Emma did her homework. (a') Emma did read the novel. (b) Did he do his homework? (b') *Did he do read the novel? (c) *Did he his homework? (c') Did he read the novel? (d) He wants to do his homework. (d') *He wants to do read the novel. (e) Don’t do your homework again. (e') *Don’t do read the novel again. (f) *She didn’t her homework yet. (f’) She didn’t read the novel yet. (g) *Do not your homework heree! (g’) Do not read the novel here!
12.1 Specificity of be
The English Verb be can be analyzed as several different elements, depending on its complementation. (3) Kinds of be
(a) He is reading some novel, isn't he? be (+ing) = progressive Aux (b) It is written in English, isn't it? be (+en) = passive Aux (c) Peter is a teacher/ silly, isn't he? be (+NP/AdjP) = Copula (d) Mary is at home, isn't she? be (+PP/AdvP) = location (e) There is a man in the garden, isn't there? there construction = existential be (f) I am to read this article by next week. be (+ to-infinitive) = Modal The position of "be" in the English analytic Predicate In terms of the 2-slot Predicate model (8) on page 82, notice the special properties of the English Verb "be" as illustrated below. Consider all formal distinction(s) among Aux/Mod/Lexical Verbs discussed in earlier sections.
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(4) (a) Is he at home? (b) *Does he be at home? be inverts like an Aux/Mod. (c) He is not reading any books. (d) *He does not be reading any books. be precedes NEG like an Aux/Mod. (e) We arranged for it to be translated. (f) I want to be a teacher. be can be non-finite like Lexical Vs. (g) There are men here. There is a man here. be has inflection like an Aux. (h) He can/ will (not) be (*not) at home. be can appear after Mod/Aux. (i) Don't be silly! be co-occurrs with Aux do. As schematically illustrated in (3) on page 80 and (5) on page 81, a standard Predicate in an English sentence has (at least) two syntactic positions: Ω (an ‘operator’, the first Mod/Aux) and a second V position for (Aux and Lexical) Verbs. The Verb be is special, because it can occupy both positions. (5) Schematic structure for all uses of the Verb be (within the analytic Predicate) (a) Emma IS not at home. (b) Emma can BE at home. Emma IS not Ø at home.
can BE SUBJECT Ω=Mod/Aux Neg VERB analytic Predicate Note: It seems that only one use of be, Modal be, occurs only in the Ω position: *We may be to read that article next week. *I wouldn’t want to be to report to the office. The Verb be occupies (in some abstract sense) the position of the lexical Verb, i.e. is NOT followed by another (bare) V. In a sentence, however, unlike any other V, any be can also appear in the position of the Ω when this position would otherwise be empty. Another way to say this: In finite ( non-imperative) clauses with be, there is no do-support.
12.2 Specificity of have
Using the 2-slot Predicate model (8) on page 82, compare the examples of the Verb have below with the structure of be in (5) above. (6) Archaic stative have .... a structure identical with be.
(a) I (can) have a book here. I want to have more books. (b) Have you a book here? (c) I haven't any book here.
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The Predicate in Old English was not as analytic as in Modern English, and the examples above suggest that the archaic usage of the stative (possessive) Verb have is structurally similar to the Verb be, i.e. have (a) is NOT followed by another V (b) is able to move to the position of the AUX/MOD (in front of negation) whenever possible/ needed. Languages, however, have a tendency to get rid of irregularity and Modern English does not freely use the archaic form of have as illustrated above. Look below at the strategies applied in Modern British and American English. The following examples (7) show that British English has made stative (possessive) have into a non-lexical element, Auxiliary. The position of the lexical Verb is represented by got. (7) Stative/ possessive have in Modern British English (Consider its similarities with the standard perfective Aux have.) (a) I (*will) have got new books. (a') I (will) have received new books. (b) Have you got a new book? (b') Have you received a new book? (c) * Do you have got a good book? (c') * Do you have received a good book? (d) I haven't got any books. (d’) I haven't received any books. (e) * I don't have got any books. (e') * I don't have received any books. (f) You’ve got new ones, haven’t you? (f’) You’ve received them, haven’t you? The following example (8) shows that in contrast to the British usage, American English treats stative (possessive) have as a lexical Verb. (Consider its similarities with standard lexical Verb receive.) (8) (a) Do you have new books? (a') Do you receive new books?
(b) Yes, I (do) have new books. (b') Yes, I (do) receive new books. (c) No, I don't have any books. (c') No, I don't receive any books. (d) You (do) have some, don’t you? (d’) You do receive some, don’t you?
(9) Schematic picture of the stative/ possessive Verb have Compare the structure below with structure of be in (5) on page 87. Archaic HAS not Ø
British Emma HAS not got any toys
American (does) not HAVE
SUBJECT Ω =Mod/Aux Neg VERB Apart from stative/ possessive have, English uses other kinds of have, too. In these usages, British and American are the same. The following examples show that have can be Aux, Mod, and Lexical Verb as well. (10) Perfective have: You (may/ *can) have written a letter.
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(a) Have you written a letter? (a') * Do you have written a letter? (b) I haven't written a letter. (b') * I don't have written a letter. (c) You have written one, haven’t you? (c’) * You have written one, didn’t you? (d) For Jane to have written a letter would surprise me. (11) Modal have: I (may/ *can) have to go there immediately. (a) *Have you to go there? (a') Do you have to go there? (b) *I haven't to go there now. (b') I don't have to go there now. (c) *You have to go now, haven’t you? (c’) You have to go now, don’t you? (d) For Jane to have to go now would surprise me. (12) Dynamic have : (i) You (can) have a look around. (ii) They (can) have good times later. (iii) I (could) have lunch with Joe. (a) *Had you a look around? (a') Did you have a look around? (b) * I haven't a look around often. (b') I don't have a look around often. (c) * Had they some good times later? (c') Did they have some good times later? (d) * I haven't good times lately. (d') I don't have good times lately. (e) * Have you lunch with Joe today? (e) Did you have lunch with Joe today? (f) * I hadn't lunch with Joe. (f') I didn't have lunch with Joe. (g) * She often has lunch, hasn’t she? (g’) She often has lunch, doesn’t she? (13) (a) John has a shower every day. Agentive/Experiencer have
(b) John has Mary carry his suitcase. Causative have (b) John has his car repaired. Concern have
12.3 E xer cises
(14) EXERCISE ===========================================
Assuming the 2-slot predicate model (8) on page 82 and considering the position of negation (and the ability to invert in questions), does the Verb be occupy the position of Aux/Mod or the position of a Verb? (a) Julie is not at home. (b) Emma cannot be at home. (c) Be ready to go at five! (d) Don't be late again! (e) Aren’t they ready yet? (f) To be or not to be, that is the question. (15) EXERCISE ===========================================
Considering the distinction between the following examples
i) w.r.t. the meaning (epistemic vs. deontic interpretation) ii) wtr the characteristics of the finite verb (see criteria (8) on page 82 and (10) on page
82). iii) Explain the distinction in making the past tense of the two forms.
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(a) He must be at home ... (...every day / - mustn't he? / -Isn't he?) (b) He has to be at home... (16) EXERCISE ===========================================
Assuming the 5-slot predicate model (see (7)on page 81), make English sentences putting the correct form of be into the bold framed slot (try to fill the other positions with some element, too, if possible). Are all positions available for be? Which of the verbs “be”illustrated in (3) on page 86 is in which position? How would the same exercise look assuming the 2-slot predicate model? Mod Perf Prog Pass Verb (a) Adam (b) Adam (c) Adam (d) Adam (e) Adam (17) EXERCISE ===========================================
Consider the examples of Modal be below which test (i) the form of negation and question formation, (ii) the ability to appear in every Tense/ Aspect, (iii) the ability to appear as infinitive. Try to test the same properties with the other kinds of be given in (3) on page 86. (a) I am (not) to leave at six o'clock. (a') He is (not) to leave at six o'clock. (b) I was (n't/ not) to leave before six. (b') They were (n't/ not) to leave before six. (c) Am I (not) to leave at six o'clock? (c') Were they (not) to leave at six o'clock? (d) *He will be to leave at six o'clock. (d') *They had been to leave at six o'clock. (e) * To be to leave at six a.m. is irritating. (18) EXERCISE ===========================================
Consider the same questions as in excercise (14) above for the Modal have (to) and also the other kinds of have. (19) EXERCISE ===========================================
Explain the ungrammaticality of the following sentences in terms of the syntactic distinctions among the LEX-AUX-MOD Verbs. (a) *Had you a quick look at this book? (b) *Have you to write a letter to Julie already? (c) *Do you have written a letter to Wilma? (d) *I’m surprised that John had not a good time in London. (e) *For him to haven’t written yet worries me. (20) EXERCISE ===========================================
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Which form of a Verb follows the ‘Modal’? A bare infinitive or to-infinitive? Consider the following sentences and find similar examples to demonstrate your claim. (a) I must go now. (a') *I have go now. (b) *I must to go now. (b') I have to go now. (c) I must have gone too early. (c') *I had go too early. (d) *I must to have gone too early. (d') I had to go too early. (e) *I don’t want to must live forever. (e') I don’t want to have to live for ever. (21) EXERCISE ===========================================
In the following sentences classify all the verbal elements among Lex-Aux-Mod. Give relevant arguments for your decisions. (a) Theo is looking at Jane. (f) Theo is looking for Jane. (b) Theo has got a book. (g) Theo has gotten a book. (c) Theo has had to go. (h) Theo is having a shower. (d) Theo will make trouble, I am sure. (i) Theo started to read a book. (e) Theo may have read that book. (j) Theo has been reading that book. (22) EXERCISE ===========================================
Discuss the properties of the following dynamic usages of have. Give more examples of the kind. I. Agentive: Tourists (can) have a look around the museum before they leave.
(a) *Have you often a look around it? (a') Do you often have a look around it? (b) *I haven't always a look around it. (b') I don't always have a look around it.
(c) .........................................................................................................................................
II. Causative: You (can) have somebody help you with the homework.
(a) *Had you somebody help you? (a') Did you have anybody help you? (b) *They haven't anybody help them. (b') They don't have anybody help them.
(c) .........................................................................................................................................
III. Concern: They (will) have their house repainted every year.
(a) * …, haven’t they? (a') …, won’t they?/ …, don’t they? *Have they really? Will they really?/ Do they really? (b) *I haven't ever mine repainted. (b'). I didn't/ won’t ever have mine repainted.
(c) .........................................................................................................................................
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(23) EXERCISE ===========================================
In (substandard) spoken American English the possessive Verb ‘have’ (see (8) on page 88 above) is often replaced by 'got', especially in a positive declarative context. Consider the examples below. Notice that this paradigm of ‘got’ looks like a ‘lexical Verb’ paradigm, but because of example (d), it cannot be taken for a regular type. (a) I/ You/ We/ They got a new book. = I/ You/ We/ They have a new book. (b) I/ You/ We/ They don't got a new book. = I/ You/ We/ They don't have a new book. (c) Do I/ you/ we/ they got that book? = Do I/ you/ we/ they have that book?
(d) *He gots a new book. (d') He's got a new book. (e) He hasn't got a new book. (f) Has he got a new book? Notice that the form used is "got" not "get" (Standard English: to get to V = to have of advantage of V-ing) (g) We get to (can, manage to) visit the museum free every Wednesday. (24) EXERCISE ===========================================
Consider also the following examples in which ‘gottә’ is replacing ‘have to = must’. (The written form is unlikely to appear since these forms are more or less colloquial only.) Is ‘gottә’ in the V position or the Ω ‘operator’ position? Why? (a) You [gottә] go, don't you? (b) They [gottә] go, don't they? (c) You don't [gottә] go, do you? (d) He's [gottә] go. (e) Has he [gottә] go? (f) You [gottә] get the book soon, don't you? (g) *You [gottә]not come back soon. (h) To [gottә] go now is a pain. (25) EXERCISE ===========================================
i) Find all the sentence members in the following examples. ii) Which constituents (phrases) represent the sentence members? Make the phrases more
rich // replace them by a short variety of the same category. iii) Find the VP and discuss the valency of the Verb. How are the Arguments
realised?Which kind of Verb is it using the Table 7 on p. 74 iv) Look in more detail at each word, giving its category and explaining its form. (a) His younger brother saw your friend in front of the main building. (b) I introduced Mary's boyfriend to my granfather. (c) They were determined to put all the exercise books to the bottom shelves. (d) The free people of Uganda will be electing their President soon. (e) To read all those huge books of short stries every day is more than extremely boring. (f) While at school, all the students must respect the official rules.
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13 RELATED LITERATURE
(A) The list A below gives practical manuals of English grammar which can help students not fully familiar with the pratical usage of the structures discussed. The working knowledge of this manuals is assumed for the course. (B) The list B provides bibliography for the more theoretical manuals covering the topics in more detail. They provide some discussion of the phenomena, provide much more data and demonstrate alternative terminologies and analyses. (C) The list C provides bibliography for the cited works and some additional literature related to the topics discussed in the course. A. PRACTICAL MANUALS Alexander, L.G. (1993): Longman Advanced Grammar. Reference and Practice. Longman.
Hewings, Martin (2005): Advanced Grammar in Use (2nd edition) with answers and CD ROM. CUP.
Jones, Leo (1991): Cambridge Advanced English. Cambridge: Cambridge UP.
Leech, Geoffrey & Svartvik, Jan (1975) A Communicative Grammar of English. Longman, London.
Murphy, Raymond (2004): English Grammar in Use With Answers and CD ROM : A Self-Study Reference and Practice Book for Intermediate Students of English. 3rd edition. CUP.
Svoboda, Aleš & Opělová-Károlyová, Mária (1998) A Brief Survey of the English Morphology. Filozofická fakulta Ostravské univerzity, Ostrava.
B. THEORETICAL MANUALS
Dušková, Libuše (1994) Mluvnice současné angličtiny na pozadí češtiny. Academia Praha, Prague.
Huddleston, Rodney and Pullum, Geoffrey K. (2002) The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Huddleston, Rodney and Pullum, Geoffrey K. (2005): A Students Introduction to English Grammar. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Leech, Geoffrey (1971) Meaning and the English Verb. 3rd edition. Longman, London 2004.
Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G. & Svartvik, J. (2004) A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. Longman, London
Quirk, R., and Greenbaum, S. (1991): A Student´s Grammar of the English language. Longman1991.
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C. FURTHER RELATED / CITED LITERATURE Akmajian, A., Demers, R.A., Farmer, A.K. & Harnish, R.M. (1990) Linguistics: An
Introduction to Language and Communication. MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass.
Chomsky, Noam (1981), Lectures on Government and Binding. Foris, Dordrecht.
Comrie, Bernard (1989) Language Universals and Linguistic Typology. Blackwell, London.
Croft, William (1991) Syntactic Categories and Grammatical Relations. Chikago: University of Chikago Press.
Crystal, David (1987) The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Demers, Richard A. & Farmer, Ann K. (1991) A Linguistics Workbook. The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass.
Finegan, Edward & Besnier, Niko (1990) 'Structured Meaning in Words.' In: Language: Its Structure and Use. HBJ.
Fromkin, Victoria & Rodman, Robert (1990) 'Morphology : The Words of Language.' In: An Introduction to Language. HBJ.
Katamba, Francis (1993) Morphology. The Macmillan Press Ltd.
Matthews, P.H. (1974) Morphology. Cambridge University Press.
Spenser, Andrew (1991) Morphological Theory. Blackwell, Oxford UK & Cambridge USA.
