Syntax Vocabulary

Question 1

syntax

Answer 1

the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed sentences in a language

Question 2

grammar

Answer 2

the system and structure of a language (syntax is a part of this)

Question 3

constituents

Answer 3

a word or a group of words that function as a single unit within a hierarchical structure

Question 4

phrases

Answer 4

a group of words that act together as a grammatical unit

Question 5

pronominalization

Answer 5

the substitute of a constituent by a pronoun

Question 6

pro-form

Answer 6

a type of function word or expression that stands in for another word, phrase, clause, or sentence where the meaning is recoverable from the context

Question 7

wh-pronoun

Answer 7

who, whose, whom, which, what, that

Question 8

movement

Answer 8

the means by which some theories of syntax address discontinuities

Question 9

coordination test

Answer 9

one of the traditional diagnostic tests for constituent structure

Question 10

gapping

Answer 10

a type of ellipsis that occurs in the non-initial conjuncts of coordinate structures

Question 11

sentence-fragment test

Answer 11

a test showing that a string of words that can be a sentence fragment must be a constituent

Question 12

structural ambiguity

Answer 12

the potential of multiple interpretations for a piece of written or spoken language because of the way words or phrases are organized

Question 13

head

Answer 13

in linguistics, the head or nucleus of a phrase is the word that determines the syntactic category of that phrase

Question 14

noun phrases

Answer 14

a noun plus optional determinants, adjective phrases, and prepositional phrases

Question 15

prepositional phrases

Answer 15

begins with a preposition and ends with a noun

Question 16

adjective phrases

Answer 16

phrase the head of which is an adjective

Question 17

verb phrases

Answer 17

a syntactic unit consisting of an auxiliary (helping) verb preceding the main verb

Question 18

adverb phrases

Answer 18

a multi-word expression operating adverbially: its syntactic function is to modify other expressions, including verbs, adjectives, adverbs, adverbials, and sentences

Question 19

projections

Answer 19

the categorical representation of the lexical structure that must be at every syntactic level

Question 20

parts-of-speech

Answer 20

a category of words that have similar grammatical properties

Question 21

determiners

Answer 21

a word, phrase, or affix that occurs together with a noun or noun phrase and serves to express the reference of that noun or a noun phrase in the context

Question 22

phrase-structure rules

Answer 22

a type of rewrite rule used to describe a given language’s syntax

Question 23

subordinate clauses

Answer 23

A clause containing a subject and verb that begins with a subordinate conjunction or a relative pronoun

Question 24

clause

Answer 24

a syntactic construction containing a subject and predicate and forming part of a sentence or constituting a whole simple sentence

Question 25

sentence

Answer 25

a set of words that is complete in itself, typically containing a subject and predicate, conveying a statement, question, exclamation, or command, and consisting of a main clause and sometimes one or more subordinate clauses

Question 26

main clause

Answer 26

a clause that can form a complete sentence standing alone

Question 27

predicate

Answer 27

the part of a sentence or clause containing a verb and stating something about the subject

Question 28

subject-verb agreement

Answer 28

the rule stating that if a subject is singular, its verb must also be singular; if a subject is plural, its verb must also be plural

Question 29

case

Answer 29

any of the inflected forms of a noun, adjective, or pronoun that express the semantic relation of the word to other words in the sentence

Question 30

transitive

Answer 30

a verb that accepts one or more objects

Question 31

intransitive

Answer 31

a verb that does not take an object

Question 32

ditransitive

Answer 32

takes both a direct object and an indirect object

Question 33

direct object

Answer 33

the noun or a noun phrase that’s receiving the action of the verb

Question 34

indirect object

Answer 34

the optional recipient of a verb in a sentence

Question 35

adverbial (or adjunct)

Answer 35

constituents that provide information about the circumstances of the action denoted by the verb and its subjects and object(s)

Question 36

complement

Answer 36

a word, phrase, or clause that is necessary to complete the meaning of a given expression

Question 37

predicative complements

Answer 37

completes the meaning of a sentence by giving information about a noun

Question 38

matrix clause

Answer 38

a clause that contains a subordinate clause

Question 39

subject

Answer 39

the something or someone that the sentence is about

Question 40

semantics

Answer 40

how one’s lexicon, grammatical structure, tone, and other elements of a sentence coalesce to communicate its meaning