grammatical foundations

Exercise 10

(9)a In the present situation, we cannot but wait. (Adj) b He gave me a fabulous present for my birthday. (N)

c The mayor will present the prizes after the competition. (V)

(10)a Do not dare to touch it, it is mine. (pronoun)

b This is the only copper mine of this country. (N)

c An Australian company will mine for gold in this village. (V)

(11)a It is not probable that the left will win the elections. (N) b My uncle writes with his left hand. (Adj)

c Turn left at the corner. (Adv)

d Her boyfriend left without a word. (V – past tense of leave)

(12)a It has been a long night. (Adj)

b Have you been here long? (Adv) c I long to be with my husband. (V)

(13)a I do not like fast food very much. (Adj) b You drive too fast. (Adv)

c Muslims fast during Ramadan. (V)

d In order to lose weight, she went on a fast. (N)

Exercise 10

The words are classified according to their category in the following table.

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Lexical entries are given here:

Verbs

Auxiliaries

a

will category: [+F, –N, +V] subcat: [verbal]

b

can category: [+F, –N, +V] subcat: [verbal]

c d e

have category: [–N, +V] subcat: [verbal]

c d e

be category: [–N, +V] subcat: [verbal]

d

may category: [+F, –N, +V] subcat: [verbal]

-ed category: [+F, –N, +V] subcat: [verbal]

e

might category: [+F, –N, +V] subcat: [verbal]

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Exercise 11

Degree adverbs

a c

very category: [+F, +N, +V] subcat: [adjectival]

d

most category: [+F, +N, +V] subcat: [adjectival]

e -est category: [+F, +N, +V] subcat: [adjectival]

Exercise 11

a) F; b) N; c) F; d) N; e) F; f) N; g) F; h) N; i) N; j) F; k) F; l) N; m) N; n) N;

Exercise 12

The lexical entry of a predicate contains a theta-grid that specifies the number and the type of arguments the predicate has and the subcategorisation frame that provides the categorical status of the complements (all the arguments but the subject) of the predicate.

a My brother ate a lot of chocolate.

Eat is a two-place predicate that expresses an activity in which an “eater” and an entity which is eaten are involved. The “eater” performs the “eating” activity on the entity that is eaten. The thematic roles associated with the two arguments are the agent role (the “eater” who instigates the activity) and a patient role (the entity that undergoes a change of state caused by the agent). The subcategorisation frame specifies the categorical status of the patient, which is a noun phrase therefore it is categorically nominal.

eat category: [–F, –N, +V]-grid: <agent, patient> subcat: nominal

b John is keen on wild animals.

Keen is a two-place predicate, an adjective that expresses a psychological state of the subject with respect to the object. The subject has experiencer theta role, the object has theme theta role. The subcategorisation frame specifies the categorical status of the complement, which is a preposition phrase therefore it is categorically prepositional.

keen category:[–F, +N, +V]

-grid: <experiencer, theme> subcat: prepositional

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c John gave a book to his friend.

give is a three-place predicate, a verb that describes a situation in which the object (theme) changes its position as the result of the activity of the subject (agent), that instigates the action, that is causes the change of place of the theme. The entity (goal) expressed by the prepositional phrase is the target of the movement of the theme. The subcategorisation frame specifies the categorial status of the two complements, which are a noun phrase and a prepositional phrase.

give category:[–F, –N, +V]-grid: <agent, theme,goal> subcat: nominal, prepositional

d He always parks his car near a nice old hotel.

park is a verb that has three arguments, an agent he that performs the action of parking, theme his car that get ‘suffers’ the result of parking and a location near a nice old hotel that specifies the location of the theme as the result of parking. The subcategorisation frame specifies the categorical status of the two complements, which are a noun phrase and a prepositional phrase.

park category:[–F, –N, +V]

-grid: <agent, theme,location> subcat: nominal, prepositional

e I love Vermeer’s painting of the young girl.

love is a two-place predicate whose meaning is almost identical with the meaning of the adjective keen. It has a subject (experiencer) that is in a psychological state with respect to the object (theme). The differences between the two words are that love is a verb and keen is an adjective and that love takes a nominal complement, while keen has a prepositional complement.

love category:[–F, –N, +V]

-grid: <experiencer, theme> subcat: nominal

painting is a derived nominal that inherits the argument structure of the verb paint it is derived from. Painting expresses an activity in which the subject (agent) creates an object (theme) in a certain way. The subcategorisation frame specifies the categorical status of the complement, which is a prepositional phrase.

painting category:[–F, +N, –V]-grid: <agent, theme> subcat: prepositional

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Exercise 13

f Jane broke the vase.

The verb break in this sentence is a two-place predicate; the subject (agent) causes the object (theme) to undergo a change of state. Its complement is a nominal phrase.

break category:[–F, –N, +V]-grid: <agent, theme> subcat: nominal

g The vase broke.

The verb break in this sentence is a one-place predicate, whose meaning is very similar to the verb break in sentence (1f). The subject (theme) undergoes the same change of state as the object in sentence (1f), but as opposed to sentence (1f), in sentence (1g) the causer is not specified. There is no agent only a theme that is nominal.

break category:[–F, –N, +V]

-grid: <theme> subcat: nominal

h Everybody got a letter from the Prime Minister.

get is a three-place predicate, which expresses movement of some entity, the object (theme) of the clause that undergoes some change of place. The source of movement is expressed with prepositional phrase (source). The target of movement is the subject (goal). The verb has two complements, the nominal theme and the prepositional source. The subject argument has the role of beneficiary.

get category:[–F, –N, +V]

-grid: <beneficiary, theme, source> subcat: nominal, prepositional

Exercise 13

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Check Questions

Chapter 2

Check Questions

Q1 Sentences are made up of words but these words are also organised into units which are smaller than the sentence itself. The best way to identify phrases is by having a look at their distribution: sometimes a single word can be substituted by another structure containing several words that cluster together, e.g. in Mary is dancing the constituent Mary can be substituted by The girl we met yesterday. These two structures (Mary and the girl we met yesterday) have the same function in the sentence and wherever Mary is used the girl we met yesterday can be used, too. Phrases come in different types, they are always identified by an element contained in the phrase. That central element in the girl we met yesterday is girl, a noun, so the whole structure is a noun phrase. Phrases can have a rather complex internal strucure, they can contain other phrases or even clauses as can be seen in the girl (that) we met yesterday, too.

Q2 Rewrite rules describe what constituents a certain structure can be made up of. The rewrite rule DP → D NP means that what is on the left side of the arrow, DP, can be rewritten as a D and an NP. Generative grammar is a set of rewrite rules with the help of which all and only the grammatical expressions of the language can be formed.

Q3 A rewrite rule can be recursive, which means that it can contain the same symbol on both sides, e.g. sentence → word*, sentence*. This rule states that a sentence can contain another sentence, an embedded sentence. Recursive rules can be applied again and again. It is the presence of such rules that accouts for how a finite system (remember, the number of rules is finite, and the lexicon, however big, also contains a finite number of elements) can be turned into an infinite one, since human languages are limitless.

Q4 The subject is the argument that precedes the verb. In finite clauses it shows agreement with the verb and appears in nominative Case. Finite clauses always have visible subjects, even if there is no semantic motivation for it. In these cases the subject is an expletive element, e.g. it in It is important to finish with the project today. Non-finite clauses can have an unpronounced subject, if they have a visible subject it appears in accusative Case.

Q5 direct object (DO): the object that is usually next to the verb, having a theme or patient theta role in the most typical case, e.g. Botanics in I study Botanics.

indirect object (IO): the object that has the beneficiary theta role in doubleobject constructions, in such structures it is the that IO appears next to the verb preceding the DO: I sent him a parcel. In this structure the IO is him. prepositional object: an object that appears after a preposition, e.g. him in I went to the theatre with him.

Q6 The double-object construction has a dative alternate: I sent him a parcel can also be expressed as I sent a parcel to him with no particular change in meaning. The order of the theme and goal/beneficiary arguments are different and there are also

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Suggested Answers and Hints - Chapter 2

differences in how the structures can be passivised: in the double-object construction only the indirect object can be passivised, if we want o passivise the direct object we have to use the dative structure and express the goal argument in the form of a PP.

Q7 Substitution: if a constituent can be replaced with another constituent they belong to the same constituent-type. E.g. pronouns are DPs and whatever pronouns can substitute will also be DPs in the structure.

Coordination: only identical constituents (with the same function) can be coordinated.

Movement: only constituents can undergo movement. E.g. the sentence *The boy was seen with blue eyes by Mary is ungrammatical as the boy is not an independent constituent in this sentence.

Exercise 1

S → DP VP

DP → D NP

NP → N S

VP → V VP VP → V DP PP

PP→ P DP

Exercise 2

a[S [DPthe postman] [VP lost [DP his key] [DP yesterday]]

b[S [DP the student [S [DP who] [VP has just passed [DP the exam]]]] [VP is [AP very happy]]]

c[S [DP this theory [PP of [DP [DP language] acquisition]]] [VP is [AP easy [PP for [DP students [S [DP who] [VP understand [DP mathematics]]]]]]]]

Exercise 3

a Only identical constituents can be coordinated. Here we have a DP coordinated with a PP.

b Only constituents can undergo movement. Here whose is not a constituent, it forms a constituent together with film, so they shouls move together.

c Pronouns, in spite of their name substitute full DPs, not only nouns. She in the ungrammatical sentence could stand for the woman with long hair, it cannot be understood as referring to woman only.

d Again, only constituents can undergo movement. The constituent that could be moved in this sentence is the student of Physics.

e Identical constituents can be coordinated, but only if they have the same function in the sentence. In this sentence the first PP is an instrument, the second expresses manner.

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Check questions

Chapter 3

Check questions

Q1 Rewrite rules establish the nature of structures in languages. They become maximally general via the use of category variables which may stand both for thematic and functional categories. The complement rule (X©→ X YP) introduces the head and the complement; the order of the elements on the right side of the arrow may be swapped, thereby it is possible to achieve cross-linguistic generalisations about the relative order of head + complement. The specifier rule (XP → YP X©) introduces the structural position associated with specifiers which, in English, appear to the left of the constituent containing the head + complement (X©). The adjunct rule differs from the other two in that what is on the left hand side of the arrow may be a head or a bar-level constituent or a maximal projection. In addition, the adjunct may also be of two types: a zero-level category or a maximal projection. Finally, the adjunct rule is recursive, i.e. a constituent appearing on the left hand side of the arrow also appears on the right hand side, thus inclusion of any number of adjuncts in a structure is made possible.

Q2 (i) head to head: compound nouns

(ii) phrase to bar-level constituent: pronominal APs

X©→ X©YP

X©→ YP X© (popular smart student) (iii) phrase to phrase: relative clauses

XP → XP YP

XP → YP XP

It must be noted that the order of the constituents on the right side of the arrow may vary, i.e. adjunction to either side is possible and that in case of adjunction to a head the adjoining element is itself a head, whereas in the other two cases it is a maximal projection.

Q3 The constituent that is not projected in a phrase is called the head (the zerolevel projection). A head projects its properties (e.g. its category), thus the maximal projection containing that head will share the category of the head and so will intermediate projections between the two. Projection is sharing category among the three levels of constituents. The properties of a given head which is inserted into a head position are idiosyncratic, in other words, if a word is picked from the lexicon, all the relevant pieces of information about it specified in the lexicon are also automatically available. Thus, depending on what category a given word has, the phrase it heads will acquire the same category.

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Q4 An endocentric phrase has a head that lends its properties to the whole projection, while an exocentric phrase lacks such a head, hence the properties of an exocentric phrase do not necessarily follow from the properties of the elements it contains. It must be pointed out that all phrases are assumed to be endocentric. It is possible to rely on the discussion on imperatives in the text and exemplify a potential candidate for an exocentric construction.

Q5 a) yes; b) no; c) no; d) no; e) no; f) no

Q6 Heads select the number and type of complements they take but there only seem to exist restrictions related to compatibility of meaning with the meaning of the head for specifiers. Specifiers and complements (i) are both arguments of thematic heads, (ii) both receive theta-roles, but (iii) while it is possible for certain verbs to take more than one complement, there can only be a single specifier in a phrase.

Q7 The rule by itself might seem to general and would seemingly allow (generate) ungrammatical sequences. However, given the restriction that movement cannot change basic X-bar configurations (structures), the vast majority of potentially arising ungrammatical structures disappears.

Q8 There are two levels of representation assumed, D-Structure and S-Structure. At D-Structure elements occupy their base-position, i.e. for arguments a position where they can receive a theta role from the predicate. However, a D-Structure position may not be a position where they can receive case from a case assigning element, hence elements may potentially be moved to another position which we call S-Structure position. This is what happens in passive constructions, as we will see in more detail later on in the book. Thus, we can say that the two levels of representation are linked via movement.

Q9 A theta-marking head theta marks arguments in its immediate vicinity, that is, arguments which are associated with the specifier position and the complement position of the phrase headed by the theta-marking head.

Q10 Nominative: subjects of finite clauses; accusative: subjects of non-finite clauses, complements of verbs and prepositions, e.g. Peter/He loves Mary/her; Peter saw John/him climbing up the tree; Peter often talks about Mary/her.

Q11 In both of these constructions there is no argument associated with the subject slot. In addition, the arguments present in them remain Caseless unless they leave the D-Structure position where they receive their respective theta-roles. As the subject position is empty but it can be case-marked, passivisation or raising can occur, depending on whether the structure contains a passive verb or a raising verb or a raising adjective.

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