1Week 4. q Theory and the BigPictureCAS LX 522Syntax IThe forest vs. the treesn Let’s take a moment to look at what we’vedone and lay out where we’re going.n The underlying goal is to lay out a model ofthis subconscious knowledge of sentencestructure that we have; a system whichpredicts what speakers find grammaticaland ungrammatical.The forest vs. the treesn All we have from the outset is data andintuition as to how the system works; welook at the data, we draw generalizations,we formulate hypotheses, and we look atmore data to see how the predictions ofour hypotheses fared.The forest vs. the treesn We started out looking at sentences to see whatmakes a sentence?n Looks like sentences need a subject, kind ofcentered around a noun, and a predicate,usually kind of centered around a verb.n The subject part can have other stuff, not just thenoun (adjectives, etc.), and the verb part canhave other stuff, not just the verb (adverbs, etc.).n So, we laid out some hypotheses as to what thesubject and the predicate could contain.The forest vs. the treesn We noticed that the things which can be subjects(we called then “noun phrases” because of theintuitive centrality of the noun) can also be objectsof verbs or of prepositions, we noticed where theadjectives and prepositional phrases seem to beable occur with respect to the noun and so forth.n Looking deeper, with the idea of constituency inmind, we continued to revise our hypotheses untilwe came up with rules for the noun phrase andthe verb phrase and the other components of thesentence that seemed to share a lot of commonproperties.The forest vs. the treesn The fact that pretty much any kind ofphrase that we looked at seemed to haveroughly the same properties suggested afurther, bigger hypothesis about howLanguage works:n X-bar theory: The hierarchical structure ofsentences is constructed (only) of phrasesthat conform to the X-bar template.2The forest vs. the treesn Along the way, we discovered that if we assumeX-bar theory is right, we probably had mis-named the phrase which can be the subject of asentence or an object of the verb; based on theevidence from possessor phrases, wedetermined that what we thought was a “nounphrase”, headed by a noun, was actually a“determiner phrase” headed by a determiner(and containing a noun phrase headed by anoun).The forest vs. the treesn In general, this is how we’ll progress; weconsider some part of the data, form hypothesesbased on the generalizations we see, and thenlook for data that we don’t account for.n Right now, we have the basic tools we need todiagram the structures of sentences (categories,X-bar theory), but that’s by no means the end ofthe story…The forest vs. the treesn There are several large areas we need to address.First of all, simply drawing a tree that conformsto X-bar theory doesn’t guarantee that we’regoing to have a grammatical sentence.n Theta theory and subcategorization are themajor components of our final theory whichhelp make sure that our structures are legitimate.These are going to be our main topics today.The forest vs. the treesn Another major component of syntax ismovement, which has many complexproperties.n In general, the idea is that sentences likethesen John will leave.n Will John leave?n Are related in a meaningful way.The forest vs. the treesn The underlying view of the grammaticalsystem has us starting with something like:n John will leaven …in either case, and if you are trying toform a yes-no question, you willadditionally move will from where you seeit above to where you see it below:n Will John — leave?The forest vs. the treesn That means that there are two levels involved in thegeneration of a sentence (where we our system issupposed to, in the end, generate all and only thegrammatical sentences of a language).n There’s the first level (John will leave), which issometimes called the Deep Structure or D-Structureor DS representation of the sentence.n Then, there’s a second level, after any movementhas happened (Will John leave?), and this is whatwe pronounce. This is sometimes called the SurfaceStructure or S-Structure or SS representation.3The forest vs. the treesn In fact, there’s even a third level; it’s a levelconceptually after the one we pronounce.n Consider:n Everyone bought something.n …I don’t remember what that thing was,though.n …but they all bought different things.The forest vs. the treesn Everyone bought somethingn For every person x:for something y:x bought y.n For some thing y:for every person x:x bought y.n These are renditions of the two meaningsin a “logical form”; they differ in whethereveryone or someone comes first.The forest vs. the treesn The idea is that after S-Structure there can be moremovement to yield the Logical Form (or LF).n There are two possibilities for Everyone boughtsomething. It’s ambiguous, like I saw the man on thehill with the binoculars.n We might say that one one meaning(every…some…) no movement occurs, but on theother meaning (some…every…) something movesover everyone.n something everyone bought —The Y modeln This overall view of grammar has thisshape (something like an inverted Y)DSSSLFPFMeaning is readoff of Logical FormD-Structure is theunderlying formPhonetic Form isthe pronunciationOvert movementCovert movementPhonology/MorphologyS-Structure is the surfaceform (modulo phon/morph)The Y modeln We haven’t been making distinctions, but we havegenerally been considering sentences that did notcontain any (obvious) overt movement. Basically, wehave been characterizing SS/DS.DSSSLFPFMeaning is readoff of Logical FormD-Structure is theunderlying formPhonetic Form isthe pronunciationOvert movementCovert movementPhonology/MorphologyS-Structure is the surfaceform (modulo phon/morph)The Y modeln Given this, we can only say that X-bar theoryapplies to SS/DS. However, we will make anadditional assumption: Movement is structurepreserving.DSSSLFPFX-bar theoryOvert movementCovert movementPhonology/Morphology4The Y modeln By movement is structure preserving, we mean thatmovement will never change an X-bar compliantstructure into an X-bar noncompliant structure. X-bartheory constrains DS and all representations created bymovement (SS, LF).DSSSLFPFX-bar theoryOvert movementCovert movementPhonology/MorphologyThe Y modeln Theta theory and subcategorization willconstrain additional aspects of DS (for example,the requirement that hit has a DP object).DSSSLFPFX-bar
View Full Document
![Nom from finite T no case from nonfinite T (T [inf], M to)](https://media.gradebuddy.com/documents/386389/7a3e15e0-7507-4825-a32d-f3e6fb67d2eb.png)
Unlocking...