Descriptive grammar 6
9.12.2008
I. Well-formedness
-native speakers have grammatical competence (intuitions about well-formedness of sentences)
-sentences considered well-formed can serve to generate (specify how to form) grammatical sentences
examination of well-formed sentence
division of set of rules how to build sentences from phrases
This boy must seem incredibly stupid to that girl.
* Rules discovered:
S NP M VP
VP V AP PP
AP AdvP A
PP P NP
NP D N
II. Lexicon
Categorical information - words stored in your brain have syntactic category specified
This boy must seem incredibly stupid to that girl
This girl must seem incredibly stupid to that girl
This man must seem incredibly stupid to that chap
Any word can replace these nouns
Boy: N girl: N must: M seem: V
(we must know to which categories the words belong to know how and where to use them)
-lexicalisation principle: any member of the syntactic category can be inserted under the corresponding category made in a P-marker (tree)
a set of rules generates infinite number of well-formed sentences
the information about syntactic category is not enough
Subcategorisation frame – information what may precede and follow the word
Rely: categorical information [v]
Subcateg. frame [NP-NP]
I rely on John
Admire: categorical information [v]
Subcateg. Frame [NP-NP]
John admires Mary
?The car admires Mary?
subcategorisation frame is not enough
Selectional restrictions – semantic/pragmatic restriction on the choice of expressions from a given category (e.g nouns) which can occupy a given sentence-position
Murder: categorical information [v]
Subcateg. Frame [NP-NP]
Selection restrictions <human-human> subject-object
You have convinced my mother
You have convinced my cat
You have convinced my car
You have convinced my idea
words denoting rational creature
-verbs can select the type of subject, e.g impose restrictions which NPs can serve as a subject
My mother fainted
My dog fainted
My toothbrush fainted
My idea fainted
Sincerity may frighten the boy
The boy may frighten sincerity
’frighten’ allows abstract subjects and human objects
Thematic-roles – each subject and complement of a verb bears a particular thematic role (theta-role)
Agent - instigator of the action (John killed Bill)
Patient – entity undergoing action (Mary fell over)
Experiencer – entity experiencing (John was happy)
Benefactive – entity benefiting (He gave flowers to Mary)
Instrument – means by which sth happened (He killed Mary with a knife)
Locative – place (He put it under the bed)
Goal – entity towards which sth moves (He passed the book to Mary)
Source – entity from which sth moves (He returned from Paris)
John opened the door with a hammer
(agent) (patient) (instrument)
III. the role of thematic-roles
-thematic roles help explain similarity between different uses of the same lexical item
John rolled the ball down the hill
The ball rolled down the hill
in both sentences ‘the ball’ has the same theta-role (patient)
without the notion of thematic-role you cannot capture the similarity of the two sentences
-thematic roles help explain differences between apparently similar uses of the same lexical item
The vase shattered the glass
The vase shuttered
in both sentences ‘the vase’ has the same grammatical function: subject
but it has different theta-role (instrument and patient)
without the notion of thematic-roles you cannot capture the different role of ‘the vase’ in the sentence
Mark killed the burglar
Mark killed
Killed the burglar
Mark killed the burglar in the kitchen
the lexicon needs to include information about theta-roles needed for a particular verb
Kill: categorical information [v]
Subcat. Frame [NP-NP]
Sel. Restr <human-human>
Theta-grid: Agent, Patient
John broke the window
The hammer broke the window
John and the hammer broke the window
(agent) (instrument)
different thematic-roles shouldn’t be conjoined
IV. theta-marked subjects
Like: categorical info. [v]
Subcateg. Frame [NP-NP]
Sel. Restr [alive]
Theta-grid [experiencer, benefactive]
John tried to understand the problem +
My cat tried to escape +
Your kettle is trying to boil over –
Your theory is trying to prove right –
There is trying to be a misunderstanding –
It is trying to be likely that he will come –
the verb ‘try’ poses restriction on the subject – it has to be rational, so it assigns the subject theta-role of agent
John seemed to understand the problem +
My cat seems to have escaped +
Your kettle seems to be boiling over +
Your theory seems to prove right +
There seems to be a misunderstanding +
It seems to be likely that he will come +
the verb ‘seem’ poses no restriction on the subject, it takes nonthematic subject (the one to which it assigns no theta-role)