Introduction to Generative Grammar

8/9/2019 Introduction to Generative Grammar

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1 Foundational issues

• Prescriptive versus descriptive grammar

• Rule formation and syntactic structure in language acquisition

o A thought experiment

o Rule-based word formation

o Question formation

• More evidence for syntactic structure

o Intuitions about words belonging together

o tructural ambiguity

• !niversal "rammar

o #ormal universals

o Recursion

o Parameters

• "enerative grammar

o $lementary trees and substitution

o "rammaticality

o "rammar versus language

• %otes

• $xercises and problems

• upplementary material

o $xpletive elements in $nglish

o Modals and auxiliary verbs in $nglish

o Questions

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&his boo' is an introduction to generative grammar from a (homs'yan perspective) *y

the time you finish this chapter+ you will have a clearer understanding of what we mean

by this sentence+ and by the time you finish the entire boo'+ your understanding of it

will be clearer and deeper still) *ut for the moment+ you have probably gained theimpression that this boo' is about grammar of some sort) And right there+ we have a

problem) &he problem is that there is an everyday sense of the term ,grammar, and a

quite different sense in which the term is used in linguistics)

Prescriptive versus descriptive grammar

In the everyday sense+ ,grammar, refers to a collection of rules concerning what counts

as socially acceptable and unacceptable language use) ome of these rules+ li'e the ones

in ./+ ma'e reference to particular words and apply to both spo'en and writtenlanguage)

./ a) 0on,t use ain't.

b) 0on,t use seen as the past tense of see as in I seen him at the party last night).

c) 0on,t use contractions)

*ut mainly+ the rules in question concern the proper composition of sentences in written

language) 1ou may recall being taught rules at school li'e those in 2/)

2/ a) 0on,t start a sentence with a con3unction) b) 0on,t use sentence fragments)

c) 0on,t end a sentence with a lin'ing verb)

d) 0on,t use dangling participles)

e) 0on,t end a sentence with a preposition)

f) 0on,t use an ob3ect pronoun for a sub3ect pronoun in a con3oined sub3ect)

g) 0on,t use a plural pronoun to refer bac' to a singular noun li'e everyone, no-

one, someone, and the li'e)

h) 0on,t split infinitives)

i) !se whom, not who, as the ob3ect of a verb or preposition)

omeone who composes sentences in accordance with rules li'e those in 2/ is said to

have good grammar+ whereas someone said to have bad grammar doesn,t apply the rules

when they ought to be applied. and so produces sentences li'e 4/)

4/ a) 5ver there is the guy who I went to the party with. violates 2e/+ 2i/

b) *ill and me went to the store) violates 2f/

#rom the amount of attention that people devote to rules li'e those in ./ and 2/+ it is

easy to get the impression that they are the only linguistic rules there are) *ut it is also

easy to see that that can,t be so) &he reason is that even people who don,t follow the

rules in ./ and 2/ don,t produce rampantly variable+ confusing word salad) #or

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instance+ even people who invariably produce sentences li'e 4/ do not produce the li'es

of 6/)

6/ a) 5ver there is guy the who I went to party the with)

b) 5ver there is the who I went to the party with guy)

c) *ill and me the store to went)

&he sentences in 4/ may be instances of bad grammar in the everyday sense+ but they

are still $nglish sentences) *y contrast+ we don,t need to rely on school rules to tell us

that the examples in 6/ are not $nglish sentences - even though they contain exactly the

same $nglish words as the sentences in 4/)

ince native spea'ers of $nglish do not produce a variable mishmash of words of the

sort in 6/+ there must be another type of rules according to which sentences are

composed) 7e can determine what some of them are by ta'ing a closer loo' at the

sequences in 6/) 7hy exactly is it that they are word salad8 In 6a/+ the article the is in

the wrong order with respect to the nouns that it belongs with+ guy and party. In 6b/+

the relative clause who I went to the party with/ is in the wrong order with respect to

the noun that it modifies guy/) In 6c/+ the preposition to is in the wrong order with

respect to its ob3ect the store/) In other words+ the sentences in 6/ do not follow the

rules in 9/)

9/ a) Articles precede the nouns that they belong with)

b) Relative clauses follow the noun that they modify)

c) Prepositions precede their ob3ects)

&here,s a further rule that,s not followed in 6/+ which you are as'ed to formulate in the$xercise .).)/

Rules li'e those in 9/ have a different intention than those in 2/) &he rules in 2/ are

prescriptive; those in 9/ are descriptive. Rules of prescriptive grammar have the same

status as rules of etiquette li'e table manners or dress codes/ or the laws of society+

which divide the spectrum of possible human behavior into socially acceptable or legal

behavior+ on the one hand+ and socially unacceptable or illegal behavior+ on the other)

Rules of prescriptive grammar ma'e statements about how people ought to use

language) In contrast+ rules of descriptive grammar have the status of scientific

observations+ and they are intended as insightful generali:ations about the way that

spea'ers use language in fact+ rather than about they way that they ought to use it)

0escriptive rules are more general and more fundamental than prescriptive rules in the

sense that all sentences of a language are formed in accordance with them+ not 3ust a

more or less arbitrary subset of shibboleth sentences) A useful way to thin' about the

descriptive rules of a language to which we return in more detail below/ is that they

produce+ or generate, all the sentences of a language) &he prescriptive rules can then be

thought of as filtering out some relatively minute/ portion of the entire output of the

descriptive rules as socially unacceptable)

In syntax+ as in modern linguistics more generally+ we adopt a resolutely descriptive

perspective concerning language) In particular+ when linguists say that a sentence isgrammatical, we don,t mean that it is correct from a prescriptive point of view+ but

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rather that it conforms to descriptive rules li'e those in 9/) In order to indicate that a

sequence of words or morphemes is ungrammatical in this descriptive sense+ we prefix

it with an asteris') "rammatical sentences are usually not specially mar'ed+ but

sometimes we prefix them with ,o', for clarity) &hese conventions are illustrated in ;/

and 6a//

b) = 5ver there is the who I went to the party with guy) > 6b//


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*ut by that reasoning+ ..a/+ where the verb and its ob3ect are ad3acent+ ought to be

preferable to ..b/+ where they are not) In fact+ however+ ..a/ is completely

ungrammatical in $nglish)

../ a) = Adopt which cat did your friend8

b) o' Which cat did your friend adopt 8

It is important to understand that there is no conceptual or semantic reason that

prepositions can be separated from their ob3ects in $nglish+ but that verbs can,t) #rom a

descriptive perspective+ the grammaticality contrast between .Ca/ and ..a/ is simply a

matter of fact+ irreducible to more basic considerations at least given our present state

of 'nowledge/) .2/ highlights the difference between the relevant prescriptive and

descriptive rule)

.2/ 7hen the ob3ect of a preposition appears in a position other than its ordinary

one as in a question/+ )))

a) Prescriptive

rule

))) it should be preceded by the preposition)

b) 0escriptive

rule

))) it can either be preceded by the preposition+ or it may stand

alone+ with the preposition remaining in its ordinary position)

&he contrasting attitude of prescriptive and descriptive grammar towards linguistic

variation has a quasi-paradoxical consequence namely+ that prescriptive rules are never

descriptive rules) &he reason for this has to do with the way that social systems not 3ust

language/ wor') If everyone in a community consistently behaves in a way that is

socially acceptable in some respect+ then there is no need for explicit prescriptive rules

to ensure the behavior in question) It is only when behavior that is perceived as sociallyunacceptable becomes common that prescriptive rules come to be formulated to 'eep

the unacceptable behavior in chec') #or example+ if every customer entering a store

invariably wears both a shirt and shoes+ there is no need for the store owner to put up a

sign that says B%o shirt+ no shoes+ no service)B (onversely+ it is precisely at illegal dump

sites that we observe B%o dumpingB signs) In an analogous way+ in the domain of

language use+ rules of prescriptive grammar are only ever formulated in situations

where linguistic variation is common) *ut being prescriptive+ they cannot treat all of the

occurring variants as equally acceptable - with the result that they can,t ever be

descriptive)

Rule formation and syntactic structure in language acquisition

As we have 3ust seen+ prescriptive and descriptive rules of grammar differ in intention)

In addition+ they differ in how they come to be part of a spea'er,s 'nowledge)

Prescriptive rules are taught at school+ and because they are taught+ people tend to be

conscious of them+ even if they don,t actually follow them) *y contrast+ we follow the

rules of descriptive grammar consistently4 and effortlessly+ yet without learning them at

school) In fact+ children have essentially mastered these rules on their own by first

grade) 5rdinarily+ we are completely unconscious of the descriptive rules of language) If

we do become conscious of them+ it tends to be in connection with learning a foreign

language whose descriptive grammar differs from that of our native language) In order

to emphasi:e the difference between the unconscious way that we learn a native

language or several/ in early childhood and the conscious way that we learn a foreign

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language later on in life+ the first process is often called language acquisition rather

than language learning)

As you consider descriptive rules li'e those in in 9/+ you might not find it all that

surprising that a child raised in an $nglish-spea'ing community would acquire+ say+ the

rule that articles precede nouns) After all+ you might say+ all the child ever hears arearticles and nouns in that order)6 o why would it ever occur to such a child to put the

article and the noun in the other order8 Isn,t it 3ust common sense that children learn

their native language by imitating older spea'ers around them8

7ell+ yes and no) It is true that children learn some aspects of their native language by

imitation and memori:ation) (hildren in $nglish-spea'ing communities learn $nglish

words+ children in %ava3o-spea'ing communities learn %ava3o words+ children in

wahili-spea'ing communities learn wahili words+ and so on) *ut language acquisition

isn,t purely a process of memori:ation) In fact+ given current human life spans+ it

couldn,t possibly beD

A thought eperiment

&o see this+ let,s consider a toy version of $nglish that contains three-word sentences

consisting of a noun+ a transitive verb+ and another noun) &he toy version contains

sentences li'e .4/ that are sensible given the real world as well as sentences li'e .6/

that aren,t+ but that might be useful in fairy tale or science fiction contexts)

.4/ a) (ats detest lemons) .6/ a) Eemons detest cats)

Becret life of citrus fruitsB/

b) (hildren eat tomatoes) b) &omatoes eat children)BAttac' of the genetically modified

tomatoesB/

c) (heetahs chase

ga:elles)

c) "a:elles chase cheetahs)

BAvenger ga:elleB/

Again for the sa'e of argument+ let,s assume a small/ vocabulary of .+CCC nouns and

.CC verbs) &his gives us a list of .+CCC x .CC x .+CCC > .CC million/ three-word

sentences of the type in .4/ and .6/) %umbers of this magnitude are difficult to put in

human perspective+ so let,s estimate how long it would ta'e a child to learn all the

sentences on the list) Again+ for the sa'e of argument+ let,s assume that children can

memori:e sentences quic'ly+ at a rate of one sentence a second) &he entire list of three-word sentences could then be memori:ed in .CC million seconds+ which comes to 4).<

years) o far+ so good) Fowever+ the minute we start adding complexity to &oy $nglish+

the number of sentences and the time it would ta'e to memori:e them quic'ly

mushrooms) #or instance+ adding only .C ad3ectives to the child,s vocabulary would

cause the number of five-word sentences of the form in .9/ to grow to .C billion .CC

million x .C x .C/)

.9/ a) *lac' cats detest green peas)

b) Fappy children eat ripe tomatoes)

c) Fungry cheetahs chase speedy ga:elles)

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$ven at the quic' rate of one sentence per second that we,re assuming+ the list of all

such five-word sentences would ta'e a bit over 4.< years to learn) (learly+ this is an

absurd consequence) #or instance+ how could our memorious child ever come to 'now+

as every $nglish spea'er plainly does+ that the sentence in .;/ is ungrammatical8 If

grammatical 'nowledge were based purely on rote memori:ation+ the only way to

determine this would be to compare .;/ to all of the .C billion five-word sentences andto find that it matches none of them)

.;/ = (ats blac' detest peas green)

And even after performing the comparison+ our fictitious language learner still wouldn,t

have the faintest clue as to why .;/ is ungrammaticalD

In addition to this thought experiment with its comically absurd consequences+ there is

another reason to thin' that language acquisition isn,t entirely based on rote

memori:ation - namely+ that children use what they hear of language as raw material to

construct linguistic rules) Fow do we 'now this8 7e 'now because children sometimes produce rule-based forms that they have never heard before)

Rule!"ased word formation

5ne of the earliest demonstrations that children acquire linguistic rules+ rather than

simply imitating the forms of adult language+ was the well-'nown wug experiment

*er'o .@9?/) In it+ the psycholinguist Gean *er'o used invented words to examine

among other things/ how children between the ages of 6 and < form plurals in $nglish)

he showed the children cards with simple line drawings of ob3ects and animals and

elicited plurals from them by reading them accompanying texts li'e .


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.@@249/+ but they are important because they clearly show that even the acquisition of

words can,t be completely reduced to rote memori:ation)

$uestion formation

In addition to morphological rules which concern the structure of words/+ children alsoacquire syntactic rules which concern the structure of sentences/) ome of these rules

are of particular interest because they differ from the corresponding adult rules that the

children eventually acquire) At the same time+ however+ the children,s novel rules don,t

differ from the rules of the adult grammar in completely arbitrary ways) Rather+ the

children,s rules share certain abstract properties with the adult rules+ even when they

differ from them)

&o see this+ let,s consider how young children form yes-no questions) ome 4- to 9-year-

olds form such questions from declarative sentences by copying the auxiliary element to

the beginning of the sentence+ as in .@/ (rain and %a'ayama .@?


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If the sub3ect consists of a single word or a clause+ then the simple sub3ect is

identical to the sub3ectL otherwise+ the simple sub3ect of a sentence is obtained

by stripping the sub3ect of any modifiers yielding girl and pig as the simple

sub3ects of 2C//) &he notion of sub3ect is basic to syntactic theory+ but we will

have no further use for the notion of simple sub3ect)

*oth rules in 2./ give the same result for simple sentences+ which are li'ely to form

most of the data that young children attend to) *oth rules also require children to

identify auxiliary elements) Fowever+ the adult rule additionally requires children to

identify the sub3ect of the sentence by grouping together sequences of words li'e the

girl or the red pig into a single abstract structural unit) *ecause of this grouping

requirement+ the adult rule is called structure!dependent) *y contrast+ the alternative

rule in 2.b/ is not structure-dependent+ since it requires the child only to classify words

according to their syntactic category Is this word an auxiliary element8/+ but not togroup the words into structural units) &he rule in 2.b/ is simpler in the sense that it

relies on fewer+ as well as computationally less complex+ cognitive operations+ and

children might reasonably be expected to experiment with it in the course of acquiring

question formation) %evertheless+ (homs'y .@


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Recall that (homs'y predicted that children would not use structure-independent rules+

even though they are simpler than structure-dependent ones) &his prediction was tested

in an experiment with 4- to 9-year-old children by (rain and %a'ayama .@?


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imilarly+ the second the in 2;/ belongs with cat and not with chase. *ut a word

doesn,t always belong with the following word) #or instance+ in 2


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'tructural am"iguity

A particularly stri'ing piece of evidence for the existence of syntactic structure is the

phenomenon of structural am"iguity. &he classified advertisement in 4./ is a

humorous illustration)

4./ 7anted Man to ta'e care of cow that does not smo'e or drin')

7orld 'nowledge tells us that the intent of the advertiser is to hire a clean-living man to

ta'e care of a cow) *ut because of the way the advertisement is formulated+ it also has

an unintentionally comical interpretation - namely+ that the advertiser has a cow that

does not smo'e or drin' and that the advertiser wants a man possibly a chain-smo'ing

alcoholic/ to ta'e care of this clean-living cow) &he intended and unintended

interpretations describe sharply different situationsL that is why we say that 4./ is

ambiguous+ rather than that it is vague) Moreover+ the ambiguity of the sentence can,t be

pinned on a particular word+ as is possible in ambiguous sentences li'e those in 42/)

42/ a) As far as I,m concerned+ any gender is a drag. Patti mith/

b) 5ur bi'inis are exciting) &hey are simply the tops.

entences li'e those in 42/ are examples of lexical ambiguityL their ambiguity is based

on a lexeme > vocabulary item/ with two distinct meanings) In 4./+ on the other hand+

the words themselves have the same meanings in each of the two interpretations+ and

the ambiguity derives from the possibility of grouping the words in distinct ways) In the

intended interpretation+ the relative clause that does not smo"e or drin" modifies manL

in the unintended interpretation+ it modifies cow.

&o avoid any confusion+ we should emphasi:e that we are here considering structuralambiguity from a purely descriptive perspective+ focusing on what it tells us about the

design features of human language and disregarding the practical issue of effective

communication) As writers of advertisements ourselves+ we would ta'e care not to use

4./+ but to disam"iguate it by means of an appropriate paraphrase. #or the ordinary

interpretation of 4./+ where the relative clause modifies man, we might move the

relative clause next to the intended modifiee+ as in 44a/) &he comical interpretation of

4./+ on the other hand+ cannot be expressed unambiguously by moving the relative

clause) If it were the desired interpretation+ we would have to resort to a more drastic

reformulation+ such as 44b/)

44/ a) 7anted Man that does not smo'e or drin' to ta'e care of cow) b) 7anted Man to ta'e care of nonsmo'ing+ nondrin'ing cow)

(niversal )rammar

Formal universals

&he structure-dependent character of syntactic rules is a general property of the human

language faculty the part of the mindJbrain that is devoted to language/+ often also

referred to as (niversal )rammar, especially when considered in abstraction from any

particular language) &here are two sources of evidence for this) #irst+ as we have seen+

the syntactic rules that children acquire even when they are not the rules that adults use+

are structure-dependent) econd+ even though structure-independent rules are logically

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possible and computationally tractable+ no 'nown human language actually has rules

that disregard syntactic structure as a matter of course) #or instance+ no 'nown human

language has either of the computationally very simple question formation rules in 46/)

46/ a) &o form a question+ switch the

order of the first and secondwords in the corresponding

declarative sentence)

&he girl is tall) K "irl the is tall8

&he blond girl is

tall)

K *lond the girl is

tall8

b) &o form a question+ reverse the

order of the words in the

corresponding declarative

sentence)

&he girl is tall) K &all is girl the8

&he blond girl is

tall)

K &all is girl blond

the8

&he structure-dependent character of syntactic rules often referred to more briefly as

structure dependence/ is what is 'nown as a formal universal of human language - a

property common to all human languages that is independent of the meanings of words)

#ormal universals are distinguished from su"stantive universals, which concern the

substance+ or meaning+ of linguistic elements) An example of a substantive universal is

the fact that all languages have indeical elements such as I, here, and now. &hese

words have the special property that their meanings are predictable in the sense that they

denote the spea'er+ the spea'er,s location+ and the time of spea'ing+ but that what

exactly they refer to depends on the identity of the spea'er)

Recursion

Another formal universal is the property of recursion. A simple illustration of this

property is the fact that it is possible for one sentence to contain another) #or instance+

the simple sentence in 49a/ forms part of the complex sentence in 49b/+ and the

resulting sentence can form part of a still more complex sentence) Recursive embedding

is illustrated in 49/ up to a level of five embeddings)

49/ a) he won)

b) &he &imes reported that

she wonN)

c) Gohn told me that

the &imes reported that

she wonNN)

d) I remember distinctly that

Gohn told me that

the &imes reported that

she wonNNN)

e) &hey don,t believe that

I remember distinctly that

Gohn told me thatthe &imes reported that


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she wonNNNN)

f) I suspect that

they don,t believe that

I remember distinctly that

Gohn told me that

the &imes reported thatshe wonNNNNN)

Parameters

#ormal universals li'e structure dependence and recursion are of particular interest to

linguistics in the (homs'yan tradition) &his is not to deny+ however+ that individual

languages differ from one another+ and not 3ust in the sense that their vocabularies differ)

In other words+ !niversal "rammar is not completely fixed+ but allows some variation)

&he ways in which grammars can differ are called parameters.

5ne simple parameter concerns the order of verbs and their ob3ects) In principle+ two

orders are possible verb-ob3ect O5/ or ob3ect-verb 5O/+ and different human

languages use either one or the other) As illustrated in 4;/ and 4


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Gust as in $nglish+ preposition stranding and pied piping are both grammatical in

wedish) In wedish+ it is preposition stranding that counts as prescriptively correctD

Pied piping is frowned upon+ on the grounds that it sounds stiff and artificial)/

4@/ a) wedish o' Vilket hus bor din kompis i?

which house lives your friend in'Which house does your friend live in?'

b) o' I vil*et hus bor din 'ompis8

In other languages+ such as #rench and Italian+ preposition stranding is ungrammatical)

pea'ers of these languages re3ect examples li'e 6C/ as word salad+ and accept only the

corresponding pied-piping examples in 6./)

6C/ a) #rench = Quelle maison est-ce que ton ami habite dans?which house is it that your friend lives inIntended meaning 'Which house does your friend livein?'

b) Italian = Quale casa abita il tuo amico in?which house lives the your friend inIntended meaning 'Which house does your friend livein?'

6./ a) #rench o' &ans quelle maison est-ce que ton ami habite8

b) Italian o' In quale casa abita il tuo amico8

)enerative grammar

At the beginning of this chapter+ we said that this boo' was an introduction to

generative grammar from a (homs'yan perspective) !ntil now+ we have clarified ouruse of the term ,grammar+, and we have indicated that a (homs'yan perspective on

grammar is concerned with the formal principles that all languages share as well as with

the parameters that distinguish them) Eet,s now turn to the notion of a generative

grammar)

62/ A generative grammar is an algorithm for specifying+ or generating, all and

only the grammatical sentences in a language)

7hat,s an algorithm8 It,s simply any finite+ explicit procedure for accomplishing some

tas'+ beginning in some initial state and terminating in a defined end state) (omputer

programs are the algorithms par excellence) More ordinary examples of algorithmsinclude recipes+ 'nitting patterns+ the instructions for assembling an I'ea boo'case+ or

the steps on the bac' of a ban' statement for balancing your chec'boo')

An important point to 'eep in mind is that it is often difficult to construct an algorithm

for even trivial tas's) A quic' way to gain an appreciation for this is to describe how to

tie a bow) Ei'e language+ tying a bow is a s'ill that most of us master around school age

and that we perform more or less unconsciously thereafter) *ut describing not

demonstrating/ how to do it is not that easy+ especially if we,re not familiar with the

technical terminology of 'not-tying) In an analogous way+ constructing a generative

grammar of $nglish is a completely different tas' than spea'ing the language+ and much

more difficult or at least difficult in a different way/D


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Gust li'e a coo'ing recipe+ a generative grammar needs to specify the ingredients and

procedures that are necessary for generating grammatical sentences) 7e won,t introduce

all of these in this first chapter+ but in the remainder of the section+ we,ll introduce

enough ingredients and procedures to give a flavor of what,s to come)

+lementary trees and su"stitution

&he raw ingredients that sentences consist of are voca"ulary items. &hese belong to

various syntactic categories, li'e noun+ ad3ective+ transitive verb+ preposition+ and so

forth) 0epending on their syntactic category+ vocabulary items combine with one

another to form constituents+ which in turn belong to syntactic categories of their own)

#or instance+ determiners a category that includes the articles a and the and the

demonstratives this, that, these and those/ can combine with nouns to form noun

phrases+ but they can,t combine with other syntactic categories li'e adverbs+ verbs+ or

prepositions)

64/ a) o' a house 66/ a) = a slowly

b) o' the cats b) = the went

c) o' those boo's c) = those of

It,s possible to represent the information contained in a constituent by using la"eled

"rac*eting. $ach vocabulary item is enclosed in brac'ets that are labeled with the

appropriate syntactic category) &he constituent that results from combining vocabulary

items is in turn enclosed in brac'ets that are labeled with the constituent,s syntactic

category) &he labeled brac'etings for the constituents in 64/ are given in 69/)

69/ a) %ounPhr 0eta N %oun house N N b) %ounPhr 0etthe N %oun cats N N

c) %ounPhr 0etthose N %oun boo's N N

%oun phrases can combine with other syntactic categories+ such as prepositions or

transitive verbs) Prepositions combine with a noun phrase to form prepositional phrases)

A transitive verb combines with one noun phrase to form a verb phrase+ which in turn

combines with a second noun phrase to form a complete sentence)

6;/ a) PrepPhr Prep on N %ounPhr 0etthe N %oun table N N N

b) OerbPhr &rOerb drafted N %ounPhr 0eta N %oun letter N N N

c) entence %ounPhr 0etthe N %oun secretary N N OerbPhr &rOerb drafted N %ounPhr 0eta N %oun

letter N N N N

Again+ however+ noun phrases don,t combine with any and all syntactic categories) #or

instance+ noun phrases can,t combine with determiners at least not in $nglish/)

6


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of enclosing an element in brac'ets that are labeled with a syntactic category+ the

category is placed immediately above the element and connected to it with a line or

"ranch. &he labeled brac'etings that we have seen so far translate into the trees in 6?/

and 6@/) topmost/

node in &ree b/ has the

same syntactic category

as the substitution node

in &ree a/)

ubstitution occurs

when the root node of

&ree b/ is identified

with the substitution

node in &ree a/)

$lementary trees don,t necessarily contain substitution nodes+ thoughL ones that

invariably play the role of &ree %o) 2 in the substitution operation don,t) &he elementary

tree for the noun in 92b/ is an example)

%otice+ by the way+ that there are two conceivable ways to arrive at trees for noun

phrases li'e those cats+ depending on whether it is the noun that is ta'en as the

substitution node+ as in 92/+ or the determiner+ as in 94/) At this point+ there is no

reason to prefer one way over the other+ but in (hapter 9+ we will adopt a variant of92/)

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a noun with a relative clause+ and sentences containing nouns that are modified in this

way+ li'e those in 9;/+ are ordinarily perfectly acceptable and easily understood) Fere

and in the following examples+ the relative clauses are brac'eted and the modified noun

is underlined)/

9;/ a) &he mouse that the cat chasedN escaped) b) &he cat that the dog scaredN 3umped out the window)

*ut now notice what happens when we modify the noun within the relative clause in

9;a/ with a relative clause of its own)

9


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" " "######" " " " "##########################" " "#################################################"

A final important point to bear in mind is that any sentence is an expression that is

paired with a particular interpretation) "rammaticality is always determined with

respect to a pairing of form and meaning) &his means that a particular string can be

grammatical under one interpretation+ but not under another) #or instance+ 9@/ is

ungrammatical under an sub3ect-ob3ect-verb 5O/ interpretation that is+ when the

sentence is interpreted as !ue hired om/)

9@/ ue &om hired)

9@/ is grammatical+ however+ under an ob3ect-sub3ect-verb 5O/ interpretation that

is+ when it is interpreted as om hired !ue/) 5n this interpretation+ !ue receives a specialintonation mar'ing contrast+ which would ordinarily be indicated in writing by setting

off !ue from the rest of the sentence by a comma) In other words+ the grammaticality of

9@/ depends on whether its interpretation is analogous to ;Ca/ or ;Cb/)

;C/ a) o' Fer+ he hired) &he other 3ob candidates+ he didn,t even call bac')/

b) = he him hired)

)rammar versus language

7e conclude this chapter by considering the relationship between the concepts ofgrammar and language) &he notion of language seems straightforward because we are

used to thin'ing and spea'ing of Bthe $nglish language+B Bthe #rench language+B Bthe

wahili language+B and so forth) *ut these terms are actually much vaguer than they

seem at first glance because they cover a plethora of varieties+ including ones that differ

enough to be mutually unintelligible) #or instance+ $thnologue distinguishes 42 dialects

of $nglish in the !nited ingdom alone) In addition+ distinct dialects of $nglish are

spo'en in former *ritish colonies+ including (anada+ the !nited tates+ Australia+ %ew

ealand+ India+ and many African+ Asian+ and (aribbean nations+ and many of these

dialects have subdialects of their own) imilarly+ $thnologue distinguishes .. dialects of

#rench in #rance and .C dialects of wahili in enya+ and there are further dialects in

other countries in which these languages are spo'en) Moreover+ we use terms li'e Bthe$nglish languageB to refer to historical varieties that differ as profoundly as present-day

$nglish does from 5ld $nglish+ which is about as intelligible to a spea'er of modern

$nglish as "erman in other words+ not very/)

Although the most salient differences between dialects are often phonological that is+

spea'ers of different dialects often have different accents/+ dialects of a so-called single

language can differ syntactically as well) #or instance+ in standard #rench+ as in the

Romance languages more generally+ ad3ectives ordinarily follow the noun that they

modify) *ut that order is reversed in 7alloon+ a variety of #rench spo'en in *elgium)

&he two parametric options are illustrated in ;./ *ernstein .@@429-2;/)

;./ a) tandard #rench un chapeau noir

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a hat black

b) 7alloon on ne$r tchap%a black hat'a black hat'

Another example of the same sort+ though considerably more cathected for spea'ers of

$nglish+ concerns multiple negation in sentences li'e ;2a/)

;2/ a) &he 'ids didn,t eat nothing)

b) &he 'ids didn,t eat anything)

In present-day standard $nglish+ didn't and nothing each contribute their negative force

to the sentence+ and the overall force of ;2a/ isn,t negativeL rather+ the sentence means

that the 'ids ate something) In many nonstandard varieties of $nglish+ however+ ;2a/

conveys exactly the same meaning as standard $nglish ;2b/L that is+ the sentence as a

whole has negative force) In these dialects+ the negation in nothing can be thought of as

agreeing with and reinforcing/ the negation in didn't rather than cancelling itL hence theterm negative concord for this phenomenon ,concord, is a variant term for

,agreement,/) %egative concord is routinely characteri:ed as BillogicalB by

prescriptivists+@ and it is one of the most heavily stigmati:ed features in present-day

$nglish).C Fowever+ it was productive in earlier forms of $nglish+ and it is attested in

renowned masters of the language such as (haucer and ha'espeare) Moreover+

negative concord is part of the standard forms of languages li'e #rench+ Italian+ panish+

and modern "ree') #rom a descriptive and generative point of view+ negative concord is

simply a parametric option of !niversal "rammar 3ust li'e any other+ and negative

concord is no more illogical than the noun-ad3ective order in ;.a/ or preposition

stranding)

In both of the examples 3ust discussed+ we have dialects of Bthe same languageB

$nglish and #rench+ respectively/ differing with respect to a parameter) &he converse is

also possible two Bdifferent languagesB that are parametrically all but/

indistinguishable) #or example+ the same linguistic variety spo'en on the 0utch-

"erman border may count as a dialect of 0utch or "erman depending on which side of

the political border it is spo'en+ and the same is true of many other border dialects as

well) According to Max 7einreich+ Ba language is a dialect with an army and a navy)B A

stri'ing and sad/ confirmation of this aphorism concerns the recent terminological

history of erbo-(roatian) As long as 1ugoslavia was a federal state+ erbo-(roatian

was considered a single language with a number of regional dialects) &he .6th edition

of $thnologue+ published in 2CCC+ still has a single entry for erbo-(roatian) In the .9th

edition+ published in 2CC9+ the single entry is replaced by three new entries for *osnian+

(roatian+ and erbian)

As the previous discussion has shown+ the notion of language is based more on

sociopolitical considerations than on strictly linguistic ones) *y contrast+ the term

,grammar, refers to a particular set of parametric options that a spea'er acquires) #or this

reason+ the distinction between language and grammar that we have been drawing is

also referred to as the distinction between +!language and &!language mnemomic for

,external, and ,internal, language/ (homs'y .@?;/)

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As we have seen+ the same language label can be associated with more than one

grammar the label B$nglishB is associated with grammars both with and without

negative concord/+ and a single grammar can be associated with more than one language

label as in the case of border dialects/) It is important to distinguish the concept of

shared grammar from mutual intelligibility) &o a large extent+ standard $nglish and

many of its nonstandard varieties are mutually intelligible even where their grammarsdiffer with respect to one parameter or another) 5n the other hand+ it is perfectly

possible for two or more varieties that are mutually unintelligible to share a single

grammar) #or instance+ in the Indian village of upwar "umper: and 7ilson .@


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2) &he prescriptive rule is actually better stated as B0on,t separate a preposition from its

ob3ect+B since the traditional formulation invites exchanges li'e i/)

i/ A 7ho are you going to the party with8

* 0idn,t they teach you never to end a sentence with a preposition8

A orry+ let me rephrase that) 7ho are you going to the party with+ Mr) now-it-all8

4) As 7illiam Eabov has often pointed out+ everyday speech apart from false starts and

other self-editing phenomena/ hardly ever violates the rules of descriptive grammar)

6) Actually+ that,s an oversimplification) %ot all the articles and nouns an $nglish-

spea'ing child hears appear in the article-noun order) &o see why+ carefully consider the

underlined sentence in this footnote)

9) 7hen children didn,t respond this way+ they either repeated the original invented

word+ or they didn,t respond at all) It,s not clear what to ma'e of these responses) $ither

response might indicate that the children were stumped by the experimental tas')

Alternatively+ repetition might have been intended as an irregular plural cf) deer and

sheep/+ and silence might indicate that some of the invented words for instance+ cra/

struc' the children as phonologically strange)

;) &he term ,pied piping, was invented in the .@;C,s by Gohn Robert Ross+ a syntactician

with a penchant for metaphorical terminology)


24/27

i/ a) &hey never told nobody nothing)

b) &hey never told nobody)

.C) *ecause of the social stigma associated with it+ it is essentially impossible to study

negative concord in present-day $nglish) &his is because even for those spea'ers of

negative concord varieties who don,t productively control standard $nglish as a seconddialect+ the influence of prescriptive grammar is so pervasive that if such spea'ers re3ect

negative concord sentences as unacceptable+ we don,t 'now whether they are re3ecting

them for grammatical or for social reasons)

+ercises and pro"lems

+ercise 1.1

&he sentences in 6/ violate several descriptive rules of $nglish+ three of which were

given in 9/) As mentioned in the text+ there is a fourth descriptive rule that is violated in

6/) #ormulate the rule you shouldn,t need more than a sentence/)

+ercise 1.

./-6/ illustrate the facts of sub3ect-verb agreement in the nonstandard variety of

$nglish spo'en in *elfast+ Ireland data from Fenry .@@9+ chapter 2/) 0escribe the data

as clearly and briefly as you can)

In order to avoid conflating morphological form with semantic content+ youcan refer to BisB and BareB as Bthe i- formB and Bthe a- formB+ rather than as

BsingularB and BpluralB)

./ a) o' &he girl is late) 2/ a) = &he girl are late)

b) o' he is late) b) = he are late)

c) o' Is S the girl+ she T late8 c) = Are S the girl+ she T late8

4/ a) o' &he girls are late) 6/ a) o' &he girls is late)

b) o' &hey are late) b) = &hey is late)

c) o' Are S the girls+ they T late8 c) = Is S the girls+ they T late8

+ercise 1./

7hich of the newspaper headlines in ./ are lexically ambiguous+ which are structurally

ambiguous+ and which are a mixture of both types of ambiguity8 $xplain)

./ a) *eating witness provides names

b) (hild teaching expert to spea'

c) 0run' gets nine months in violin case

d) $nraged cow in3ures farmer with ax

e) Prostitutes appeal to pope

f) &eacher stri'es idle 'ids

g) &eller stuns man with stolen chec'

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+ercise 1.0

In the text+ we showed that sentences are recursive categories) In other words+ one

instance of the syntactic category ,sentence, can contain another instance of the same

category) Provide evidence that noun phrases and prepositional phrases are recursive

categories+ too)

*e careful to give examples that are recursive+ and not 3ust ones in which

the syntactic category in question occurs more than once) #or instance+ ./

does not provide the evidence required in this exercise+ because the second

prepositional phrase is not contained in the first) &his is clearly shown by

the fact that the order of the prepositional phrases can be switched)

./ &he cat 3umped PP onto the table N PP without the slightest

hesitation N)

+ercise 1.

7hich+ if any+ of the sentences in ./-9/ are ungrammatical8 7hich+ if any+ are

semantically or otherwise anomalous8 *riefly explain)

./ a) &hey decided to go tomorrow yesterday)

b) &hey decided to go yesterday tomorrow)

2/ a) &hey decided yesterday to go tomorrow)

b) &hey decided tomorrow to go yesterday)

4/ a) 1esterday+ they decided to go tomorrow)

b) &omorrow+ they decided to go yesterday)6/ &hey decided to go yesterday yesterday)

9/ Fow long didn,t &om wait8

+ercise 1.2

A. &he following expressions are structurally ambiguous) #or each reading >

interpretation/+ provide a paraphrase that is itself unambiguous)

./ a) chocolate ca'e icing

b) clever boys and girlsc) Gohn will answer the question precisely at noon)

d) 7atch the man from across the street)

e) &hey should decide if they will come tomorrow)

3. Provide a tree diagram for each reading) &o do so+ download the &rees program as

well as the tree-drawing grammar tool) In the &rees program+ open the grammar tool

with the file menu item B(hoose "rammar)B &hen select the file menu item B%ew)B &his

will call up an empty wor'space on the right and a window containing syntactic

categories on the upper left) (lic' on a syntactic category+ and a copy will appear in the

window on the lower left) (lic' on this copy and drag it into the wor'space) 1ou can

build trees using any of the premade structures in the grammar tool+ adding or deleting

nodes as needed) #or the purposes of this exercise+ all that is relevant is the structure of

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the trees that you build that is+ the way the nodes are grouped+ not the way they are

labeled/) &herefore+ you can simply label all nonterminal nodes > nodes other than

words/ with a dummy symbol li'e ,V,)

+ercise 1.4

A. Fow many elements does an expression need to contain to be three-ways

ambiguous8

3. If an expression contains four elements+ how many ways ambiguous can it be in

principle8

Pro"lem 1.1

Are syntactic structure and recursion equally basic properties of human language8

$xplain in a brief paragraph)

Pro"lem 1.

(an you come up with a sentence or other expression/ that is structurally ambiguous

more than two ways8 Paraphrase the distinct readings+ and draw a tree for each reading)

#eel free to use the tree-drawing grammar tool see $xercise .); for instructions/)

Pro"lem 1./

0ownload the grammar tool in which grammar ) In the &rees program+ open it with the

file menu item B(hoose "rammar)B &hen select the file menu item B%ew)B &his will call

up an empty wor'space on the right and a window containing a lexicon of one-letter

expressions on the upper left) (lic' on one of the expressions) A copy of the expression

will appear in the lexical items window on the lower left) (lic' on this copy and drag it

into the wor'space) 1ou can build complex expressions out of simpler ones by dragging

them on top of each other or onto other nodes that appear in the course of a derivation)

*efore beginning a derivation+ you must select a grammar ". or "2/ in the Bchoose-

grammarB menu above the wor'space) &he grammar tool requires you to produce the

first combination by dragging one Roman letter onto the "ree' phi) Play with the tool to

see what happens next) 5nce you are able to construct complex expressions+ briefly

answer the following questions) &here is no need to submit the trees you construct)

• 7hat is the difference between ". and "28

• If presented with substrings generated by ". and "2 containing only Roman

letters i)e)+ if the phi were somehow invisible/+ is it possible to tell which

grammar has generated the string8

Pro"lem 1.0

&he grammars of $arly Modern $nglish .9CC-.


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ha'espeare,s plays and the Authori:ed Oersion of the *ible also 'nown as the ing

Games *ible/)

Available at:

Documents

Introduction to Generative Grammar