LECTURE 3
1. LEXICAL CATEGORIES - the categories of single words, e.g.: a noun belongs to that category.
2. PHRASAL CATEGORIES - the categories of phrases, e.g.: NP (noun phrase) is the example of that category.
3. Nouns:
NOUN - the name of a person, place or thing (thing has to be interpreted very broadly as there are substances, abstract concepts, collections of things and phenomena, which are all nouns),
every category of words has its own range of MORPHOLOGICAL possibilities, e.g.: it has its own range of possible WORD FORMS; a morphological feature that indentifies all nouns is the GENITIVE and POSSESSIVE forms, e.g.: Laura's shoes, birds' wings,
sub-categories of the noun category:
PROPER NOUNS - they are names (written with a capital letter, such as Marta, New York, October,
COMMON NOUNS - they can be preceded by the definite article the to form a NP (noun phrase), e.g.: the book, the season, the girl,
COUNT NOUNS - nouns which can be counted:
they are preceded by the definite article the or indefinite article a/an to form a NP (noun phrase),
they can be preceded by numbers, e.g.: one, two, three, etc. and expressions such as a few, many, numerous, etc. to form a NP (noun phrase),
they appear in plural form in addition to a singular form, e.g.: cat - cats, mouse - mice,
NON-COUNT NOUNS or MASS NOUNS - they can't be preceded by indefinite articles or numerals but can be precede by for example: some; examples: furniture, water, pasta, bread, etc,
many nouns are both COUNT and NON-COUNT nouns, e.g.: theory, suspicion, charity, crisps, etc.,
proper nouns usually appear in singular.
4. Pronouns:
PRONOUNS - can replace complete NP (noun phrase), e.g.: they can stand for Tom and Jerry, Hansel and Gretzel or he for Tom, Jerry, Hansel or she for Gretzel, etc.,
sub-categories of pronouns:
DEFINITE PRONOUNS - I/me, we/us, you, she/her, they/them,
INDEFINITE PRONOUNS - some, something, someone, anything, anyone,
DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS - this/these, that/those,
POSSESSIVE PRONOUNS - mine, yours, his, hers, ours, whose,
INTERROGATIVE or QUESTION PRONOUNS - who, which, what, whose,
5. It is the head noun that determines the NUMBER (singular or plural) and the GENDER (feminine, masculine or neutral) of the NP (noun phrase) as a whole. Only one noun in a NP (noun phrase) can function as its head.
6. Adjectives and adverbs:
words such as dubious, little, excited, etc. are adjectives,
many adjectives have characteristic endings such as: -able, -al, -ate, -ful, -ic, -ing, -ish, -ive, -less,
-ous, -y, etc.,
however, there are many common adjectives without characteristic endings such as: old, green, long, new,
there are two major types of adjectives:
GRADABLE ADJECTIVES - one syllable adjectives, which accept -er/-est inflection; multi syllable adjectives modified by degree adverbs: more/most, less/least,
NON-GRADABLE ADJECTIVES - do not accept -er/-est inflection or modification by an adverb, e.g.: right, dead, medical, final, main, second.
7. Adjectives phrases and Adverb phrases:
adjective phrase is centered on adjective,
by contrast with adjectives and nouns, degree adverbs cannot themselves be modified; there is no distinction between a degree adverb and a degree AdvP (adverb phrase), so in phrase markers they will be referred to as degree/deg:
like degree adverbs, general adverbs, e.g.: Frankly, potentially, immediately can modify adjectives within AP (adjective phrases),
general adverbs can be modified by degree adverbs to form AdvP (adverb phrase), e.g.: very oddly, quite frankly,
AdvP (adverb phrase) can consist of a simple (general) adverb.
8. Prepositions and prepositional phrases:
PREPOSITIONS - they are usually short words that express relations, often locational relations in space or time (however not always, e.g.: of),
examples: to, from, with, towards, within, off, by, up, down, since, before, after, during, until, under, at,
PREPOSITIONAL PHRASE - when preposition is the head in the phrase like for example beside is the head in the phrase beside a stream, all phrases is called in that way.
9. Co-ordinate phrases:
CO-ORDINATED PHRASES - some phrases may have more than one head like for example in the phrase Tom and Jerry where Tom as well as Jerry are heads of that phrase - they are of equal importance; we should remember that only constituents of the same category can be co-ordinated,
example of co-ordinators: but, or, etc.
10.
IMMEDIATE CONSTITUENTS - a constituent of a linguistic construction at the first step in an analysis; for example, the immediate constituents of a sentence are the subject and the predicate,
CO-ORDINATED PHRASES - phrases which have more than one head like for example in the phrase Tom and Jerry where Tom and Jerry are heads of that phrase; both phrases are of equal importance and they are coordinated by coordinators like for example: but, or.