English SyntaxLingua e Traduzione – Lingua inglese 2

Paolo DonadioUniversità di Napoli Federico II

www.docenti.unina.it/paolo.donadiopdonadio@unina.it

Levels of analysis (pp 53-70)

[[Tim] [thought that Katy believed the story]]

1. Word – Phrase – Clause - Sentence

Word / Phrase levels

Word (7 elements):[N Tim] [V thought] [Comp that] [N Kate] [V believed]

[Det the] [N story]

Phrase (5 elements):[NP [N Tim]] [VP [V thought] [Comp that] [NP [N Kate]]

[VP [V believed] [NP [Det the] [N story]]]

Clause / Sentence levels

Clause (2 elements): [MC [NP [N Tim]] [VP [V thought] [SubC [Comp that]

[NP [N Kate]] [VP [V believed] [NP [Det the] [N story]]]]]]

Sentence (1 elements): [S/MC [NP [N Tim]] [VP [V thought] [SubC [Comp that]

[NP [N Kate]] [VP [V believed] [NP [Det the] [N story]]]]]]

Tree diagram

Example n.2

(22) Tim thought that Kate believed that Greg is a liar.

Levels of analysis : Word …Phrase…Clause…Sentence…

Tree diagram, ex. N. 2

Classification of sentences

Syntactic properties:

1. Declarative2. Interrogative3. Imperative 4. Exclamative

Syntactic vs. Pragmatics properties

Declarative sentences

(24) My aunt likes books. (25) You haven’t closed the door.

They display an unmarked (i.e. expected) order of the functional categories: 1) Subject, 2) Predicator, 3) Direct Object, etc.

Interrogative sentences

(26) Can you see this? (27) Do you agree? (28) Will you dance with me? (29) What did you eat? (30) Why did you leave? (31) How did you open the door? (32) Do you want lasagna or spaghetti? (33) Is it red or is it blue? (34) Should I turn left or right?

Imperative sentences

(37) Go home. (38) Mind your own business. (39) Shut up. (40) Don’t eat that sandwich.

Syntactic property: NO subject

Exclamative sentences

(42) What a load of nonsense he talks! (43) How absolutely disgraceful he

looks!Exclamatives differ from interrogatives:in the exclamatives, the Wh-word usually functions as a

modifying element inside a phrase (NP and APrespectively in the sentences above); in theinterrogatives, the Wh-word is usually an NP.

(29) What did you eat?

Tree diagrams: abstract representation

Tree diagrams are hierarchicallinguistic structures.

Hierarchical structures = Dominance

In (53) X still dominates Y and Z, but italso dominates T, U, V and W. Todistinguish the dominance relationbetween X and Y/Z from that between Xand T/U/V/W, let us draw a distinctionbetween dominance and immediatedominance: X dominates all the nodesbelow it, but immediately dominates onlyY and Z.

A new definition of constituency

ConstituentY is a constituent of X if and only if X

dominates Y.

Immediate constituents: Y is an immediate constituent of X if and

only if X immediately dominates Y.

Ex. N. 6 p. 69 (Identify the right TD)

(i) Doctors cure patients.

TD 1

TD 2

TD 3

TD 4

NEXT TIME…

Exercises pp. 65-70The form – function interface

Arguments and Theta roles (ch. 6)(interaction between syntax and semantics)