Syntax and Sentence Structure: A Comprehensive Guide
Movement: Particle movement
Particles are words such as up or over that may occur as prepositions when they take their own NP objects or as adverbs when they modify Vs or VPs.
Topicalization: Phrases are assigned semantic roles by virtue of their grammatical relations within the sentence, specifically by virtue of their relation to a verb, preposition, or noun.
Deletion: Imperatives
VP deletion Yet another deletion rule deletes the VP of a sentence when it is identical to the VP of a preceding sentence, as in:
(37) a. Fred can go to the movies, and Mary can too.
Insertion: Existential there sentences
English contains pairs of sentences such as the following, which, like active and passive pairs, are essentially synonymous, but with some subtle differences:
a. A unicorn is in the garden.
b. There is a unicorn in the garden.
Passive
We introduced the passive voice in various other chapters, so here we begin with a functional description:
(43) Subject Be Ven (Agentive phrase)
A note on the use of passive sentences: First, they are alleged to be deceitful: they can and often do omit reference to the agent responsible for an event. Second, because they begin with an NP whose semantic role is not an Agent and include a form of be, they are alleged to be “weak.”
Recursion
Recursion is the possibility of allowing a grammatical category to recur inside another instance of the same category, for example, an NP within an NP, or an S within an S, and so on.
Complex sentences: Clauses that function in the nominal range
The subordinate clause in a complex sentence may function as its subject, direct object, indirect object, object of a preposition, or as a complement.
Clauses that function as subjects
Subordinate clauses can appear as subjects of main clauses:
(3) a. That students enjoy grammar proves my point.
Clauses that function as direct objects
The italicized clauses in (6) are the direct objects of the higher verb:
(6) a. John claims he has earned his first million already.
b. We believe he exaggerates a great deal.
Indirect question clauses
I wonder who the culprit is. [wh-clause]
Clauses that function as indirect objects
In (18) the italicized clause is the indirect object of gave:
(18) We gave whoever was there a French pastry.
Clauses that function as objects of prepositions
Prepositions also may take sentential objects, most readily when they begin with who(ever) and similar words. The following italicized clauses are the objects of the prepositions that precede them:
(20) a. We gave the pastry to whoever would eat it.
c. We slept in what we had worn all day.
Clauses that function as complements
Subordinate clauses also function as subject or object complements and as complements within NPs. For example, The problem is that it is not my phone.
Object complements
Some verbs that take object complements allow those complements to be expressed as clauses:
She dyes her hair whatever color her car is.
Benefactive
The benefactive is the entity that is offered positively or negatively by the action of the verb. For example, My sister bought a toy for Hellen.
Recipient
The recipient is the entity that actually receives the action showed by the verb. For example, The boy gives flowers to his girlfriend.
Complementizer
A complementizer is an expression that introduces a subordinate clause, e.g., that. It occupies the non-argument, structural position (comp) that such an expression occupies, viz immediately under S' (S-bar).
Deep structure
Deep structure is the abstract level of syntactic/structural representation posited by transformational grammar and created by phrase structure rules, into which lexical insertion rules place lexical items, and which transformational rules alter by moving, deleting, or inserting items.
Surface structure
Surface structure is the level of syntactic/structural representation posited by transformational grammar and derived from deep structure by applying transformational rules.