ENGL 672

March 19, 2012

Simple sentence
OUTLINE

Finish English articles and definiteness [MARCH 12 HANDOUT] Questions on GQ Ch. 6 (pronouns)? Prepositions: brief comments on Ch. 9 Simple and multiple sentences Clause elements and clause types (verb classes, syntactic characterization of clause elements (GQ: 10.7): review these Semantic roles revisited (semantic roles and subjects, objects) Concord (grammatical vs. notional concord, coordination, collective Ns, coordinated subjects, indefinites) Negation (clause/VP/syntactic negation, other types of negation, assertive/nonassertive elements, scope of negation, focus of negation) Sentence types and discourse functions: major types (short introduction; learn independently; see accompanying handout with exercises) ==========================================================================

1.

simple sentence: consists of single independent clause: you can borrow my car. VP is always finite. multiple sentence contains one or more clauses. Multiple sentences are either COMPOUND or COMPLEX.
COMPOUND:

immediate constituents are two or more COORDINATE clauses. you can borrow my car and you can do the shopping. one or more of its elements (S, Od, A) are realized by a subordinate clause. you can borrow my car if you need it (subordinate clause functioning as adverbial)

COMPLEX:

a simple sentence may be complex, however, because its phrases are complex, e.g. On the recommendation of the committee, the temporary chair, who had previous experience with medical issues concerned, made the decision that no further experiments on living animals should be conducted in circumstances that might lead to unfavorable publicity. 2. 3. 4. a. b. c. d. e. f. g. Clause types: GQ 10.1, Verb classes: GQ 10.3, Complementation GQ 10.4, Multiple class membership GQ 10.2 Parallel between obligatory adverbials and complements: GQ: 208 notes: read on your own Clause types: Exercise (SV SVA SVC SVO SVOC SVOA SVOO) J.R.R. Tolkien wrote The Lord of the Rings. The story is about the Hobbits. All Hobbits are fat . One of the Hobbits was Bilbo Baggins. Bilbo Baggins was at his door. I am the wizard Gandalf. Gandalf handed Bilbo a sealed note. ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________

h. i. j. k. 5. 6.

An odd looking dwarf with a white beard blew smoke rings. Gollums eyes flashed. People called the ancient dragon Smaug. The ring proved a curse.

____________ ____________ ____________ ____________

Syntactic characterization of clause elements (GQ: 10.7): learn on your own Semantic roles (GQ and Payne labels: review Payne)
AGENTIVE (AGENT): animate participant that initiates action; typically has direct object AFFECTED (PATIENT): does not cause happening; typical role of the direct object. RECIPIENT (RECIPIENT): animate being that is passively involved by the happening or

state typical role of the indirect object. EXTERNAL CAUSER (FORCE): unwitting (generally inanimate) cause of event. INSTRUMENT (INSTRUMENT): entity used by agent to perform action. EXPERIENCER (EXPERIENCER): animate (usually human). see and hear require experiencer subject. look at and listen to are agentive. LOCATIVE: designates place of state or action. TEMPORAL: designates time of action ATTRIBUTE: typical role of subject and object complement. Two types: IDENTIFICATION (Pats a substitute teacher) and CHARACTERIZATION (Apparently the whole group is depressed)

7. a. b. c. d. e. f. g. 8.

Subjects in English can have various roles. Indicate whether: AGENT, PATIENT, RECIPIENT, EXPERIENCER, INSTRUMENT, LOCATIVE, TEMPORAL. Underline the subject and identify its role. The astronaut flew the ship to Mars. Rocket power flew the ship to Mars. Space is lonely. The fish is frying. One astronaut heard noises behind the blueberry patch. The sauce thickened. 2004 may be a good year to make change. ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________ ____________

concord: agreement. Defined as the relationship between two grammatical units such that one of them displays a particular feature (e.g. plurality) that agrees with a displayed (or semantically implicit) feature in the other. The most important type of concord in English is concord of 3s between subject and verb. a. grammatical concord The pup loves steak. The pups love steak. notional. Ns can be grammatically sg or pl in a given language or dialect and not match its notional (conceptual) plurality. e.g.: collective Ns (team, government, faculty) can be construed as sg or pl (BrE The public are tired of self serving officials, England have won the cup.) proximity: denotes agreement of the verb with a closely preceding NP in preference to agreement with the head of the Subj NP.

b.

c.

e.g.: Everything Ive heard about their appeals and interventions suggest that theyre going to delay us. d. GQ 10.22-10.30: review details of concord with collective Ns, coordinated subjects, indefinite expressions as subjects

9. a. b. c. d. e. f. 10.

Choose the form of the verb that is most appropriate and say why you think it is. Sports occupies/occupy the full time of many of the amateurs. One out of four contestants was/were in the last Olympics. The Canterbury Tales includes/include many stories in verse. Either the referees or the coach need/needs new glasses. The inside of the boxes was/were covered with wallpaper. No one other than the Russians wins/win any of the children events. negation is a very broad and complex topic. a. logical negation: a. b. c. d. e. b. I am happy. I am not happy. I am unhappy. I am not unhappy. I am sad. not (not) p = p logical negation a & d, b&c not synonymous logical negation inherent negation (word negative in meaning, not form)

negation is usually a strong assertion. Typically based on a tacit assumption that the hearer presupposes the affirmative (expectations/knowledge). Negation is also used to show politeness, softening. Main kind is clause negation (GQ 10.33-10.39). But can also have local negation (GQ 10.40), in which one constituent is negated; also morphological negation, e.g. disbelieve Problems for ESL/EFL students at beginning level. Has to do with differences in languages with respect to where the negative particle goes (below). Also languages can have a variety of negative markers, and some languages require multiple negation. Spanish (preverbal): German (postverbal): English (post aux): Juan no habla ingls Johan geht nicht zur Schule goes not to school John will not talk to Pat.

c. d.

11.

assertive vs. nonassertive: assert truth of some proposition (positive, affirmative). negatives and questions dont claim truth. Not usually possible to use nonassertive forms in affirmative, e.g. *I have any ideas, but it is possible to use assertive forms in negative statements or questions, e.g. Do(nt) you have some ideas? a. nonassertive: any, anybody, anywhere, yet (any and its compounds. I dont have any ideas ~ *I have any ideas): GQ: 225, NOTE b for contexts for nonassertive elements.

b. 12.

assertive: some, somebody, somewhere, already

Scope of negation: GQ 10.38 a. The scope of negation normally extends from the negative item itself to the end of the clause, but it need not include an end-placed adverbial a. b. The ambulance did not come to the house quickly enough. the ambulance did not come to the house, strangely enough.

b. If something is out of the scope of negation, it means its not part of whats being negated. 13. Insert the words indicated in two different ways in each of the following sentences to give the meanings shown, making any other small changes necessary. a. I dont like oysters (particularly) i. (But I dont mind them) c. I advised him to complain (not) i. (I felt strongly it wasnt a good idea to complain) ii. (I offered no advice) d. Thats not acceptable (simply) i. (It is unacceptable. Totally!) ii. (Its more than acceptable - very welcome indeed.)

ii. (I really dislike them) b. I dont know whats happening (definitely) i. (I am totally ignorant)

ii. (I have sort of a rough idea) 14. Focus of negation: GQ 10.39 The tech didnt repair the computer The tech didnt repair the computer The tech didnt repair the computer The tech didnt repair the computer