1Week 4a. The DP andthe geometry of treesCAS LX 522Syntax IPreviously, in LX522…n Sentences are made of constituents, themselvespossibly made of constituents, etc.n [The kid [who [dropped [the cookie]]]] [ate [it]]n Any account of syntactic knowledge will need toprovide this kind of hierarchical structure.n Overall idea: The syntactic system we have inour head builds trees, such that all and only thetrees that the system can build are grammatical.n To the extent that grammatical and ungrammaticalsentences are distinguished in terms of thehierarchical structure, it must be part of the system.Minimalismn As we try to determine what the properties ofthis grammatical system are, we should assumeas little as we can get away with.n Any language-like system that is going to createhierarchical structure is going to need somethingthat takes two (or more, but let’s say that “two issimpler than any other number”) things andputs them together into something eligible forfurther combinations.n So, the machine that builds the trees has at leastthe operation Merge.X¢-theoryn A phrase is a syntacticobject formed bycombining (merging) twosyntactic objects, with theproperties inherited fromone of them (the head ofthe phrase).n A word is a syntacticobject.specifiercomplementXYP X¢XPheadZPintermediateprojectionmaximalprojectionminimalprojectionX¢-theoryn In the ’70s and ’80s, these ideas went by thename “X¢-theory”.n Every XP has exactly one:n head (a lexical item)n complement (another XP)n specifier (another XP)n for any X (N, V, A, P, I, etc.)specifiercomplementXYP X¢XPheadZPintermediateprojectionmaximalprojectionminimalprojectionRadford and the X(P)n To forestall confusion: lunch is both a minimalprojection and a maximal projection. It functionsas a phrase, an XP, but it has nothing in it but ahead, an X.n Since you need to write something, Radfordgenerally opts to write X for these X/XPs.eat lunchV NPVP2Radford and the X(P)n In this class, and on my overheads, I will usually writeX/XP as XP. You should do the same, but you should beaware that Radford does it differently.n In general, this will depend on whether the properties weare focusing on are those of phrases (XPs) or heads (Xs).In these ambiguous cases, it will almostinvariably turn out thatthey act like phraseswith respect to what weare focusing on.eat lunchV NPVPRadford and the X(P)n Another similar comment pertains to the statusof IP below. It is an IP. It is not an I¢. It’s true thatit will be an I¢ after we combine Pat with the IP,but it isn’t yet. Cf. Radford p. 120.Pateat lunchIV NPN IPwillVPX, X¢, XPn In English, the head and the complement alwaysseem to come in that order: head-complement.n at lunch (P NP = PP)n eat lunch (V NP = VP)n will eat lunch (I VP = IP)n But here, languages differ.English is a head-first (orhead-initial) language.at lunchP NPPPX, X¢, XPn In Japanese, the head follows the complement.Japanese is head-final.n ringo-o tabeta (NP V = VP)apple aten toshokan de (NP P = PP)library atn This seems to be aparameter thatdistinguishes languages(the head parameter)toshokan deNP PPPX, X¢, XPn Whether the specifier comes before X¢ or after isindependent of whether the head comes beforethe complement.n Specifiers are overwhelmingly initial, although afew languages may be best analyzed as havingfinal specifiers (sometimes).n E.g., Japanese, which ishead-final, neverthelesshas initial specifiers.Ringo-garingo-o tabe-INP I¢IPtaVPNarrowing in: NP?n Traditionally, a phrase like the students iscalled a noun phrase and written as NP.n What does this imply about the structure?n What category is students?n What category is the?n Which one is the head?n Where is the other one?3Narrowing in: NP?n There are a couple of problems with this.n There’s the headedness problemn The syntactic object that combines with the head isthe complement, not the specifier.n (Note: There is a way out of this, we’ll see it later)n Supposing that the is a whole DP is suspicious,because it can never bemodified by anything.Modifiability is a signatureproperty of phrases.studentsDPNPtheN?DP!n If the students is not an NP, it must be a DP.n It’s head-initial, like English should be.n The NP can of course be modified (happy students).n There are several reasons to think that thestudents is a DP and not an NP, even better thanthese two, which we’ll see indue course (…at the appropriatejuncture, in the fullness of time).studentsDDPtheNP!DPn Consider the genitive (possessive) ’s in English:n John’s hatn The student’s sandwichn The man from Australia’s bookn The man on the hill by the tree’s binocularsn Notice that the ’s attaches to the whole possessorphrase—in the last two examples, it isn’t even attachedto the head noun (it’s the man’s book and binoculars,not Australia’s or the tree’s, after all).n This is not a noun suffix. It seems more like a littleword that signals possession, standing between thepossessor and the possessee. (Recall, it’s a clitic).DPn It seems to be impossible to have both a ’s and adeterminer.n *The building’s the roofn Cf. The roof of the buildingn *The tiger’s the eyen Determiners like the and the possession marker ’sseem to be in complementary distribution—if oneappears, the other cannot.n You may recall a similar pattern from a couple ofweeks ago. What was the explanation for the *s?n The big fluffy pink rabbit *The that rabbitn *The my rabbit *Every my rabbitPossessorsn This suggests a structure like this forpossession phrases:n The possessor DP is in the specifier ofDP. And of course, this can be ascomplex a DP as we like, e.g., the veryhungry linguistics student by the treewith the purple flowers over there.n The possessed NP is thecomplement of D.D’sD¢DPbookNPDPDstudentNPtheRecursionn Another noteworthy aspect of thepossessor phrase is its recursive property.n The possessor is a DP in the specifier ofDP. That means that the DP possessorcould have a possessor too…n The student’s father’s bookn The student’s mother’s brother’s roommate4X-bar theory: DPn The student’smother’sbrother’sroommateDD¢DProommateNPDPDstudentNPtheDD¢brotherNPDPD’sD¢motherNPDP’s’sX-bar theory: DPn What do we do with apparently simple “NPs” likeJohn or students (e.g., Students in the class complainedbitterly)? Are these NPs or DPs?n Well, there are two options…n One: They are NPs.n Pro: Just as they appear.n Con: Subjects, objects, etc. can