Grammar

Chapter 3 – The grammar of English

Definitions of grammar

• a set of rules which allow the production of well formed sentences and utterances • educated native speakers intuitively follow the rules of grammar • foreign learners study grammar in an explicit way in textbooks • non-native speakers may develop new rules which deviate from standard rules

examples

• *I never did nothing to upset her.

(rule: multiple negation is not permitted in English). The correct sentence is:

I never did

anything

to upset her

) • *She came yesterday, isn’t it ?

(rule: the tag question must contain an auxiliary in accordance with the type of verb used in the main clause). The correct sentence is:

She came yesterday, didn’t she

?

Descriptive vs Theoretical grammar

• Descriptive grammar describes how a language works, drawing on a long tradition of grammatical studies, using both traditional and new terminology (e.g. subject, embedding) • Theoretical grammars are new analytical models developed by linguists to describe a language (e.g. Systemic-functional Grammar). • ‘metalanguage’

Morphology and Syntax

• Morphology : the area of grammar dealing with the internal structure of words • Morphology can be divided into derivational inflectional and • Syntax : the area of grammar dealing with the way in which words combine to form larger units such as phrases, clauses and sentences.

The Units of Grammar

• A hierarchy of units (rank scale) Top down  text sentence clause phrase word morpheme Bottom up 

Morpheme : the smallest linguistic unit of meaning and grammatical function e.g. un -less and glad -s Word : linguistic unit preceded and followed by spaces in the written language

A golden sun filled the air with light, and the green sea lapped the sand

(15 words) Phrase : a linguistic unit made up of a word or a group of words

A golden sun

(Noun Phrase= sintagma nominale )

Clause : a linguistic unit made up of one or more phrases, containing at least a verb phrase e.g.

A golden sun

(NP)

filled

(VP)

the air

(NP) Sentence : the largest linguistic unit made up of one or more clauses e.g.

A golden sun filled the air with light, and the green sea lapped the sand John told me that he would like to move to Paris

Text : a sequence of sentences which is coherent and cohesive

Word

• a word is a linguistic unit which in the written form has a space on either side (orthographic criterion) but: weekend, week-end, week end brother-in-law (cognato) identity card

Word : a linguistic unit which, in the spoken form, is surrounded by pauses and has only one main stress identity card [  ] blackbird, black bird but: Mary’s and, have, from (unstressed in the spoken form)

Other criteria of wordhood

• Internal stability: Elephant, elephant s but brother-in-law, brother s -in-law • A word expresses a single concept: but the (function word), dry, get (polysemy)

Lexeme, word-form

• LIST v. list, lists, listing, listed • LIST n. list, lists (lexeme) (word-forms) (lexeme) (word-forms) • TEACH teach, teaches, taught, teaching (lexeme) (word-form)

Lexeme : a unit of vocabulary which includes different variant form, called word-forms • Lexicography : entry (voce), headword (lemma) walk n. walk v. lexeme 1 lexeme 2 bank n. bank n. lexeme 1 lexeme 2 (passeggiata) (passeggiare) (money) (river)

HOW MANY ‘WORDS’ ARE THERE IN THIS SENTENCE?

I asked him to list all his books, but instead of listing them all, he listed only the relevant ones and his favourite book 24 or 16?

Word / word-forms / lexemes List / listing / listed = 3 word forms of the lexeme TO LIST Book / books = 2 word forms of the lexeme BOOK He / him / his = three word forms of the lexeme HE (24 word-forms, 16 lexemes)

Word classes (parts of speech)

• 9 major word classes: nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives, adverbs, conjunctions, prepositions, determiners, pronouns, auxiliary verbs • inserts or interjections (Wow, Hey), wh words, numerals • some word-forms may belong to more than one class (e.g. round n. adj. v. prep.

MULTIPLE CLASS MEMBERSHIP • the same word form may belong to more than one word class e.g.

fast (Adj), fast (Adv), fast (N) park (N), to park (V) can (N), can (Aux) • only the co-text, i.e. the surroundings of the word, allows the reader/listener to understand the difference • word stress helps disambiguation e.g. rebel (n.) [  ], rebel (v.) [  ]

Divide the following words into 2 groups: pig, autumn, me, explain, they, which, sing, suddenly, from, today, biology, and, truth, could, the, extraordinary, since, hot, announce, in

• pig, autumn, explain, sing, suddenly, today, biology, truth, extraordinary, hot, announce • me, they, which, from, and, could, the, since, in

Open and closed classes

• open-class words words  lexical words  content 4 classes: nouns, (lexical) verbs, adjectives, adverbs • closed-class words function words  grammatical words  5 classes: conjunctions, prepositions, determiners, pronouns, auxiliary verbs

open-class words

• length: (generally) polysyllabic • origin: (generally) Latin, Greek, French, Germanic origin • frequency: less frequent

closed-class words

• length: (generally) monosyllabic or disyllabic • origin: (generally) Germanic origin • frequency: more frequent

Nouns (N)

• Nouns are lexical words which refer to concrete objects or entities e.g. house (common, concrete, countable), Mary , London (proper), love (common, abstract), sugar (common, concrete, uncountable) • they may take the ’s genitive case (

genitivo sassone)

Verbs (V)

• open class denoting actions or states • lexical /main / full verbs e.g. I like English He walked to school • auxiliary verbs (or auxiliaries) are added to lexical verbs for various purposes e.g. I could go faster. (modality) John is going nowhere. (aspect) Do you go to school? (question) I do love him! (emphasis)

Lexical Verbs (V)

• dynamic: referring to physical processes

=

allow the progressive form

e.g. to play, to walk, to drink

• stative / state : referring to states and conditions = do not allow the progressive form

e.g. to know, to love, to believe

Adjectives (Adj)

• Adjectives are lexical words which describe qualities and properties of things, people, etc.

e.g. happy, blue, wonderful gradable (very happy) - ungradable (dead, married) • attributive function, before a noun e.g.

the extraordinary boy

• predicative function, after copular verbs (to be, to seem, to appear) e.g.

John is tall

• some adjectives are only used in either attributive or predicative function e.g.

the child is afraid

(predicative) e.g.

*the afraid child the main task

(attributive)

*the task is main

Adverbs (Adv)

• Adverbs are lexical words which carry out several functions: - express degree ( very, really, totally ) - circumstance adverbs provide information about the circumstances of an event or state, i.e.,

how

,

when

, and

where

( yesterday, now ) - disjuncts allow the speaker to comment on the whole utterance ( probably, unfortunately ) - Linking adverbs or conjuncts: connect one sentence or part of a sentence to another Fortunately, today outside the dog has eaten his food very quietly She wasn’t free to go to New York at Christmas and besides she couldn’t afford it.

Prepositions (Prep)

• show the relationship between two items • are typically followed by a noun phrase with which they form a Prepositional Phrase (PP) e.g. the dog ran under the table [the table]=NP [under [the table] ]=PP • simple: single word e.g. under, over, at, on • complex: more than one word according to, on behalf of, with regard to

Determiners (Det)

Function words used before a noun to indicate definiteness or indefiniteness, quantity, possession, etc.

e.g.

all these sugary cookies filled with jam and cream

The main subclasses are : • articles (indefinite and definite):

a, an

,

the

• demonstrative:

this

,

that

,

these

,

those

• possessive:

my, your, his, her, their, our, its etc.

• quantifiers:

all

,

few

,

many

,

several

,

some

,

every

,

each

,

any, etc.

• cardinal numbers:

one

,

two

,

fifty

, etc.

• ordinal numbers:

first

,

second

,

third

, etc.

Pronouns (Pron)

closed class of words which replace words avoiding repetitions e.g. Michelle was offered an exciting new job and she decided to take it Main subclasses : • personal pronouns e.g. They love football (subject) She loves them • possessive pronouns (object) e.g. This book is mine • Demonstrative pronouns e.g. This is my friend Tom • reflexive pronouns e.g. She hurt herself • interrogative pronouns e.g. Whose car is this?

• relative pronouns e.g. This is the car which/that I want to buy

Auxiliaries (Aux)

A closed class of verbs which accompany lexical verbs Two subclasses: • primary auxiliaries

have, be, do e.g. Liz is looking has studied a lot for a job, Do you speak English? She

• modal auxiliaries (modality)

can, could, shall, should, will, would, may, might, must, e.g. I must go now! Would you like a cup of coffee?

Wh-words

A frequently used expression to refer to function words beginning with wh  adverbs (interrogative, relative, exclamative)

e.g. When did you call her?

 pronouns (interrogative, relative, exclamative)

e.g. Whose car is that?

 determiners (interrogative, relative, exclamative)

e.g. Which book did you choose?

Numerals

• cardinal, e.g.

one, two, three, etc.

• ordinal, e.g.

first, second, third, etc.

• numerals may function as nouns e.g

.

The Magnificent Seven