Indra U.

Nggeabak
A121 16 028
Class A
Resume of English Syntax
UNIT 19
SENTENCE STRUCTURE
A. MARGER

SPEAKER A: What is the government planning to do?

SPEAKER B: Reduce taxes.

As speaker B’ reply ilustrates, the simplest way of forming a phrase is by

joining two words together: for examples, by combining the words reduce taxes.
Just as a very compund word has a head ( so that mill is a head of the compound
windmild because a windmill is a kind of mill, not a kind of wind:section 10). So
too every syntactic phrase has a head word. For example, the heard word of the
phrase reduce, and accordingly the overall phrase reduce taxes is said to be a verb
phrase.

Moreovecr, since tne head word of a phrase determines not only is semantic
properties but also its grammatical properties, our claim that the verb reduce is the
head of the phrase with a noun like taxes, the resulting phrase reduce taxes has
verb-like properties( as opposed to noun-like properties or propertiees which are
neither verb-like nor non-like). This can be seen from the fact that the phrase
reduce taxes can occupy the same range of positions as a verb like resign, and
hence, for example, occur after the infinitive particle to:

(250) a. The government ought to resign

b. The goverment ought to reduce taxes

By contrast, reduce taxes cannot occupy the kind of position occupied by a

plural noun such as taxes. As we see from (251):
(251) a. Taxes are at the heart of the debate about policy

b. *Reduce taxes are at the heart of the debate about policy

We can say that the verb reduce, and not by the noun taxes are determined
by the verb reduce is the head of the ohrase reduce taxes , and conversely that
the phrase reduce taxes is a b projection of the verb reduce (i.e. a larger expression
whose head word is the verb reducce) sice the head of the resulting phrase is the
verb reduce the phrase reduce taxes is averb phrase: and in the same way that we
abbreviate category labels like verb to V, we can abbreviata the category label
verb phrase to VP. If we use the labelled bracketing technique (section 10) to
represent the category of the overall phrase reduce taxes and off its component
word reduce ad taxes, we can represent the structure of the resulting phrases as in
(252);

(252) [vp[v reduce] [N taxes]

What (252) tells us is the that the overall phrase reduce taxes is a verb phrase
(VP) and that it comprises the verb (V) reduce and the noun (N) taxes. The verb
reduce is the head of the overall phrase, and the noun taxes is the complement of
the verb reduce. The operation by which the two words are combined to form a
phrase is called marger.

(253)

VP

V N

Reduce taxes

The tree diagram in (253) in entirely equivalent to the labelled bracketing in

(252) in the sense that the two provide us with precisely the same information
about the structure of the phrase reduce taxes: so (253)-like(252)-tells us that
reduce is a verb (V), taxes is a noun (N) and reduce taxes is a verb phrase (VP).
The differences between a labelled brcketing like (252) and a tree diagram like
(253) purely national:each category is represented a single node (i.e point) in a
tree diagram, but by a pair of brackets in a labelled bracketing.

(254) SPEAKER A : What’s the government’s principal objective?

SPEAKER B: To reduce taxes.

The head of the resulting phrase to reduce taxes is evidence which

indicates that this head is the infinitive particle to, so that the resulting string (i.e
continuous sequence of words) to reduce taxes is an infinitive phrase. The
evidence is that strings such as to reduce taxes have a different distribution from
the phrases , as is indicated by sentences such as those in (255) and (256):

(255) a. They ought [to reduce taxes]

b. *they ought [to reduce taxes]

(256) a. They should [reduce taxes]

b. *They should [to reduce taxes]

if we assume that reduce taxes is a verb phrase whereas to reduce taxes is

an infinitive phrases, we can then account for the data (255) and (256) by saying
that ought is the kind of word which requires an infinitive phrase after it as its
complement, whereas should is the kind of word which requires a verb phrase as
complement.

(257)a. everyone is expecting [the government will reduce taxes before the
election]

b. Everyone is expecting [the government to reduce taxes before the

election]

Moreover, the fact that the auxilary will and the infinitive particle to
occupy the same position in the two clauses (between the subject te government
and the verb phrase reduce taxes before the election) makes it plausible to suggest
that the two are different exponents of the same category.

(258)

TP

T VP

to VP

V N

Reduce taxes

The resulting TP is headed by the T to (indicating that the action of

reducing taxes is intended to take place at some unspecified time in the future),
and the VP produce taxes is the complement of to.

(259)

VP

V TP

Try

T VP
to
 V N

Reduce taxes

The head of the overall VP is the verb thy,and is complement is the TP to

reduce taxesi. Now, (260) illustrates the important property of recursion, which
we introduced in section 10, when discussing English compounds. Our analysis is
claiming thad thy to reduce taxes is a VP, reduce taxes, and it is easy to see that
further applications of marger will yield a lager VP-expect to try to reduce
including the VP in (260).

(261) SPEAKER A: What will the government do?

SPEAKER B: They will try ti reduce taxes.

An obvious question to ask is how clauses are formed –or, in more

concrete terms, what the structure of speaker B’s is in (261).

(262) a. I dont really want to go to the dentist’s, but i know i eventually will

b. I know I should go to the dentist’s, but I just don’t want to

c. *I know I should go to the dentist’s, but I just don’t want

The fact that to patterms like the auxilary will in several respects
strengthens the case for regarding them as belonging to the same category. As
noted earlier, since it is a core propertyof auxilaries that they mark tense, and
since a clause containing infinitival to often has future time reference, it has been
suggested in much recent work that the two are different exponents of the
category of T (ense).

Having that established auxilaries like will are exponentsof the category
T, let’s how return to the question of how clauses like that produced by speaker B
in (261) are formed . the simplest assumption (and hence the most desirable
theoritically) is to posit that clauses are formed by exactly the same binary (i.e
pairwise) marger operation which leads to the formation of phrases.

At first sight, it might seem plausible to claim that the expression will try
to reduce taxes is a TP(i.e tensed auxilary phrase), and that when combined with
the pronoun they it forms a pronoun phrase. But this can’t be right, since it would
provide us with no obvious way explaining why it is ungrammatical for speaker is
to reply as in (263)below:

(263) SPEAKER A: What will the government do?

SPEAKER B: *Will try to reduce taxes.

If complete phrases can be used to answer questions,and if will try to

relate taxes is a complete TP, how come it can’t be used to answer A’s question
(263)?

The answer which we shall give to this question here is that will try to
reduce taxes is an incomplete phrase. Why? Because auxilaries require a subject,
and the auxilary will doesn’t have a subject in (263) .

(264)

TP

PRN T

They

T VP

Will

V TP

Try
 T VP

Reduce

V
N

Reduce
Taxes

In a structure such as (264), the position occupied by the pronoun

(PRN)they which serves as the subject of will is said to be the specifier position
within TP. It is important to be clear that the term specifier (like the term subject
and complement) is the label of grammatical function and not a grammatical
category, thus, in (264) the function of specificer is fulfilled by the PRN (i.e word
belonging to the PRN category of pronoun) they.

B. TEST OF CONSTITUENCY

Tree diagram such as (264) provide a visual representation of what we

claim to be the syntactic structure of the corresponding sentence. But this raises
the question of how we can test whether claims made about structure in tree
diagrams are correct. One way to do this is to make use of traditional tests which
the designed to determine structure. We shall look at just one of these, relating to
the phenomenon of co-ordination.

(265)

a. [Fond of cats] and [afraid of dogs]

b. [slowly] but [surely]

c.[to go] or [to stay]

in each of the phrases in (265), a co-ordinating conjunction has been used

to conjoin the bracketed pairs of expressions. Clearly any adequate grammar of
English will have to provide a principled answer to the question of what kinds of
strings (i.e sequences of words) can and cannot be co-ordinated.

(266)

SPEAKER A: What did he do?

SPEAKER B: Run up the hill and up the mountain.

(267)

SPEAKER A: What did he do?

SPEAKER B:*Ring up the electricity company and up the gas company.

In (266) is a constituent of the phrase run up the hill (up the hill is a PP),
and so can be co-ordinated with another similar type of phrase (e.g App such as
up the mountain, or down the hill, or a long the path, etc), converslely, however,
we can maintain that the string up the electricity company in (267) is not a
contituent of the phrase ring of the electricity company, and so cannot be co-
ordinated with another similar string (up is assosiated with ring in such
constructions, and the expression ring up forms a complex verb which carries the
sense of ‘to telephone’). On the basic of contrasts such as these, we can suggest
that the following contraint (i.e grammatical restriction) is part of an adequate
grammar of English:

(268)

Only like constituents can be conjained,non-constituent strings cannot be

conjoined.

( a non-constituent string being ‘a string of words which are not a constituent’)

Having established (268), we can now make use of it as away of testing

the tree diagram in (264) above. A crucial claim made in (264) is that the strings
reduce taxes, to reduce taxes try to reduce taxes and will reduce taxes are all
constituents (of various different types). Evidence for the correctness of this claim
comes from co-ordination faces fact in relation to sentences such as those in
(269):

(269)

a. they will try to [reduce taxes] and [increase pensions]

b. they will try[ to reduce taxes] and [to cut bureaucraxy]

c. they will [try to reduce taxes] and [attempt to elliminate poverty]

d. they [will try to reduce taxes] but [may not succeed]

(269a) provides evidence for analysing reduce taxes as a VP since it can

be conjoined with another VP such as increase pension. Likewise, (269b)indicates
the correctness of analysing to reduce taxes as an infinitival TP, since it can be co-
ordinated with another infinitival TP like to cut bureaucracy. Similaryly,(269c)
shows us that try to reduce taxes is VP since it can be conjained with another VP
such as attempt to eliminate property. And in much the same way, (269d) tells us
that will try to reduce taxes is a finite T’ because it can be co-ordinated with
another finite ‘T such as may not succeed. Overall, then, we see that the
assumption about structure of clauses amboided in tree diagrams such as (264)
receive independent support from tests such as the co-ordination test (exercise 1).

C. AGREEMENT, CASE ASSIGNMENT AND SELECTION

(270)

a. He has/*have resigned

b. We have/*has resigned
(271)

TP

PRN T

a.He T

b.We V

Has resigned

Have resigned

This suggest that the derivation of sentence structures (i.e the way in
which they are built up) involves not only marger opersations but also agreement
operations. One such operation is specificer-head agreement, which we can
sketsch in simplified from as follows:

(272) specifier-head agreement

A finit T constituent agrees in person and number with its specifier/subject.

(273)

a. he has resigned

b.*Him has resigned

In the grammatical sentence (273a), the subject of the clause is the

nominative pronoun he, whereas in the ungrammatical sentence (273b), the
subject is the accusative pronoun him.

(274)

a. She’s keen [for him to be there]

b.She wants [him to be there]

 The obvious difference is that nominative-subject clauses are finite (by
virtue of containing a finite T constituent),whereas accusative-subject clauses are
not.
 UNIT 20
EMPTY CATEGORIES

A. EMPTY CONSTITUENT

As a first illustration consider how we might analyse the following set of

examples from African American Vernacular English (AAVE).

(279)

a. I’m playin’basesball

b. We/you/he/they playin’baseball

examples(279a) contains an overt from of the T-auxilary be-namely the

contracted from m’. However, the examples in (279b) contain no overt from of be,
yet there are good reasons to suppose that they contain a covert/null/empty
Variant of are/is which we will symbolyse as o. If this is so, (279,b) we have
essentially the same structure, namely (280a,b):

(280)

TP

PRN T VP

A.I ‘m V N

Playin’ baseball

B.We Q playin’ baseball

(281) a. He gonna be there I know he is

As we see in standar English, examples like (282) below, in structure like these,
the italiced auxiliary in the second clause (i.e the clauses after the comma) is
generally a copy of that in the first clause:

(282)

a. you can do it, I know you can/*are/*have

b. He is trying. I know he is/*must/*did

so, the fact that the auxiliary is appears in the second clause in (281)
suggest that that the first clause contains a null counterpart of is.

Althought, stardard varieties of English don’t allow the use of null

auxiliary in sentence like (279), there are specific types of constructions in which
auxiliarys can be null.

(283)

a. he was laughing and was crying

b. he was laughing and she- crying

The second sentence seems to caintain gap in the position marked-. The
auxiliary was has been omitted in (283b) to avoid repetition, and we say that it has
undergone a particular kind of ellipsis known as gapping.

That is, the clause is a TP headed by a null auxiliary q. If we assume that q

here is a null variant of was, we can account for the fact that the subject is she
(since a finite T such as was requires a third person singular nominative subject
like he or she , or the first person singular nominative subject I), and the verb
crying is in the progressive-ing form (since is requires a complement headed by a
verb in form).

(285)

a. he DID enjoy syntax

b. he enjoy syntax

Here (285a) is clearly a TP headed by an over T-auxiliary did which is a

past tense form. If we look at the internal morphological structure of did we fiind
that is carries the same past tense affix-d as we find in other past tense verb forms
such as score-d-die,-d, owe-d-etc. So that did comparies an irregular past tense
stem di- of the auxiliary DO and the past tense affix-d

(287)

a. he is working, is he?

b. he can speak swahili, can she?

c. you will help me, wo’t you?

d. they might suspect him, might’n they?

e. he could plead guilty, couldn’t he?

(287a) contains the T-auxiliary is (which is a present tense from marking

progressiveaspect), and this is copied in the tag.. if auxiliaries in tags copy
grammatical features carried by the T constituent in the main clause, consider how
we account for the fact that a sentence like (285b) he enjoyed syntax is tagged by
the past tense auxiliarie did in (288)

(288) he enjoyed syntax, did he?

If we assume, as in 286b above, that 285b is a TP headed by a T

constituentcontaining a past tense affix, and that T in tags contains a matching
affix, we can account for sentences like 288 by supposing that the auxiliary DO is
used in thetag in 288 in order to support the past tense affix in the tag (i.e in order
to provide it with a suitable auxiliary stem to attach to). For obvious reasons, this
phenomenon is known as Do-support.

(289)
a. he had gone to Paris

b. he had a specialist examine the patient

Evidence in support of this claim comes from facts about cliticisation, a

process by which one word attaches itself in a leech-like fashion to another. The
word had can cliticise onto the pronoun he in (289a) forming he’d, but not in
289b.

(290)

a. he’d gone to paris

b.*he’d a specialist examine the patient

in much the same way, we can argue that so-called bare infinitive
clauses (I.e clauses which contain a verb in its uninflected infinitive form, but
which lack the overt infinitive particle to) contain a covert counterpart of to. In
this regard, consider the syntax of the brackted infinitive clauses.

(292)

a. I have never known [You to lie]

b. I have never known [you lie]

In 292a is a TP headed by the infinitival T constituent to and has the structure

293a below. In order to maximise the symetry between to infinitives and bare
infinitiv, we can analyse th bracketed bare infinitive complement clause 29b as a
TP headed by a covert infinitive particle.
B. PRO: the empty subject of infinitive clauses

(296)

a. we would like [you to stay]

b. we would like [to stay]

Each of the breacketed infinitive clauses in 296 is a TP headed by the infinitval T

constituent to and each brecketed TP serves as the complement of the verb like
and so is a complement clause. An apparent difference between the two is that the
brecketed infinitive clause in 296a has an overt sucject you whereas its
counterpart in 296b appears to subjectless. However, we shall argue that
apparently sucjectless infinitve clauses has much the same grammatical properties
as pronouns, it is conventionally designated as PRO.

Introducing the relevant technical terminology, we can say that the nnull
subject PRO is controlled by (i.e refers back to) the subject we of the would
clause, or equivalently that we (i.e the expressionwhich PRO refers back to)is the
controller or antecedent of PRO.

C. Covert complement

Just as both is subject can be covert, so too the complement of T can be

covert in structures where it undergoes ellipsis. For example:

(302)

SPEAKER A : Do you think he will resign?

SPEAKER B: He may.

(303)

TP
 PRN T

He

T V

May q

IN (303) q is understood as having the same grammaical semantic features

as resign, differing from resign only in that it has no phonetic features (and so is
‘silent’)if this is so,clauses are always TPs of the form subject +T+ complement,
and the subject may be overt or covert, T may be overt or covert,and the
complement may be overt or covert.

D. Empty complementisers

The overall conclution to be drawn from our discussion to this point is that all
clauses contain an overt or null T constituent which marks properties such as
tense. However,given that clauses can be introduced by claused-introducing
particles such as if /that/for (traditionally called conjuctions, but in more recent
work termed complementisers)

(304)

a. we didn’t know [if he had resigned]

b. we didn’t know [that he had resigned]

c.we didn’t know [he had resigned]

The bracketed complement clause interpreted as introgative in type in (304a) and

declarative in type in (304b) and the force of the clause is determine by the choice
of italiced complementiser introducing the clause: in other words, the bracketed
clause is introgative/type in (304a) because it is introduced by the interrogative
complementiser if and is declarative in force in 304b because it is introduced by
the declarative complement that.

Empty determiners

The kind of reasoning we have used here to argue that are clauses the CPs
can be extended to the analysis of nominal (i.e noun-containing) expressions. In
this connectionsm consider the italiced nominals in the two replies produced by
speaker B in th dialogue below:
(318)

SPAKER A: what did you learn from your visit to Milan?

SPEAKER B: that the italians do love the opera (reply 1)

Italians love opera (reply 2)

The italiced determinate (i.e determiner-containing) nominals the Italians and the
opera in the first reply given by speaker B in (318) comprise a determiner (D) the
and a following noun (N) Italians/opera, and so can be analysed as determiner
phrase (DPs).