Chapter 5 Flashcards
Syntax
component of mental grammar that deals with constructing phrasal expressions out of smaller expressions. Subfield of linguistics that studies how expressions can combine to form larger expressions
principle of compositionality
the fact that the meaning of a sentence depends on the meanings of the expressions it contains and on the way they are syntactically combined
linguistic expressions
piece of language that has a certain form, a certain meaning and, most relevantly, has some syntactic properties
grammaticality judgement
instance where a native speaker of some language decides whether some string of words corresponds to a syntactically well-formed or grammatical phrasal expression in their language
grammatical
describes a sentence that is in accordance with the descriptive grammar rules of some language, especially syntactic rules
subject
the expression (usually noun phrase) that occurs to the left of a verb phrase
object
the expression that occurs to the right of the verb phrase
syntactic properties
properties of linguistic expressions that dictate how they can syntactically combine with other expressions, namely, word order and co-occurrence properties
word order
linear order in which words can occur in some phrasal expression; also, the set of syntactic properties of expressions that dictates how they can be ordered with respect to other expressions
co-occurrence
set of syntactic properties that determines which expressions may or have to co-occur with some other expressions in a sentence
argument
linguistic expression that must occur in a sentence if some other expression occurs in that sentence as well. If occurrence of x requires occurrence of y then y is an argument of x
adjunct
linguistic expression whose occurrence in a sentence is optional
agreement
the phenomenon by which certain expressions in a sentence must be inflectionally marked for the same person, number, gender, etc
syntactic constituent
group of linguistic expressions that function as a syntactic unit within some larger expression; the smaller expressions out of which some larger phrasal expression was constructed in accordance with the phrase structure rules
cleft
A kind of sentence in which some constituent is displaced to the left
conjuncts
an argument of a coordinating conjunction such as and or or
syntactic categories
group of expressions that have very similar syntactic properties. All expressions that belong to the same syntactic category have more or less the same syntactic distribution.
syntactic distribution
refers to the set of environments in which an expression can occur.
sentence
syntactic category that consists of all phrasal expressions that can grammatically occur in Sally thinks that _____
noun phrases
the name of a syntactic category that consists of proper names, pronouns, and all other expressions with the same syntactic distribution
determiners
expressions such as the, a, this , all, etc. Consists of those expressions that when combined with an expression of category noun to their right result in a n expression of category noun phrase
nouns
syntactically, consists of expressions that can combine with determiners to their left, the resulting expression being of category noun phrase
adjectives
expressions that can be noun adjuncts or occur in between a determiner and a noun
verb phrase
the name of a syntactic category that consists of all expressions which if combined with a noun phrase to their left result in a sentence
intransitive verbs
name for the set of lexical expressions whose syntactic category is verb phrase, require no complement
distransitive verbs
verb that needs two noun phrase complements
sentential complement verbs
syntactic category that consists of those expressions that if combined with a sentence to their right result in a verb phrase; a verb that needs a sentence as its complement
adverb
verb phrase adjuncts such as quickly, well, furiously, etc.
VP adjuncts
kind of adjunct that combines with an expression of syntactic category verb phrase with the resulting expression also being of category verb phrase
N adjuncts
kind of adjunct that combines with an expression of syntactic category noun with the resulting expression being of category noun phrase
prepositional phrase
the name of a syntactic category that consists of those expressions that contain a preposition and a noun phrase
lexical entries
representation of a lexical expression and its linguistic properties within a descriptive grammar of some language
phrase structure rules
a recipe for syntactically combining expressions of certain syntactic categories, part of descriptive grammar
phrase structure tree
visual representation of how phrases are constructed within a descriptive grammar given the lexicon and the phrase structure rules
ambiguity
phenomenon by which a single linguistic form can be the form of more than one distinct linguistic expression
lexical ambiguity
phenomenon where a single word is the form of two or more distinct linguistic expressions that differ in meaning or syntactic properties
structural ambiguity
the phenomenon where a single string of words is the form of more than one distinct phrasal expression or word. Arises because the expressions can combine differently syntactically, resulting in distinct phrases that happen to have the same form
lexicon
mental repository of linguistic information about words and other lexical expressions, including their form, meaning, morphological and syntactic properties
preposition
lexical and syntactic category that consists of expressions such as of, in , for, with, etc.
ungrammatical
not in accordance with the descriptive grammar rules of some language, especially syntactic rules
