Week 2 Flashcards
The main variants of sentence types and examples
- Declarative: “King Charles opened his speech in French.”
- Interrogative: “Which policies should the government abandon?”
- Imperative: “Watch out for snowball-firing robots!”
- Exclamative: “How observant of you!”
Sentence types can be defined by…
- Their structure (syntax)
- Their use (pragmatic) - ‘speech acts’
Speech acts
An action performed with words in (interpersonal) communication.
Sentence type
A grammatical form paired with a conversational use to express a speech act.
Declarative (example and use)
Example:
“It’s very cold today.”
“I don’t like pizza.”
Use:
Asserting, claiming (statement).
Interrogative (examples and use)
Example:
“How smart is she?”
“Is she smart?”
Use:
Inquiring, questioning (question).
Imperative (examples and use)
Example:
“Go home!”
“Don’t eat too much!”
Use:
Directing, ordering, requesting (directive).
Exclamative (examples and use)
Example:
“What a big house this is!”
“How sweet of you!”
Use:
Expressing surprise (positive) (exclamation).
Characteristics/syntax of the sentence types
-
Declarative
• Subject-predicate (SVO) order
Charles opened his speech in French. -
Interrogative
• Yes/no: Can they make a comeback?
• WH: Which policies should the government abandon? -
Imperative
• Lack an overt subject
Ø Watch out for snowball-firing robots! -
Exclamative
• Initial constituents with what or how
What nonsense this is!
How observant of you!
Illocutionary force
Speech acts have illocutionary force (what the utterance of a sentence does). For example, the (standard) illocutionary force of a question is asking for information.
How are there potential mismatches between syntax (sentence meaning) and pragmatics (speaker meaning)?
“I hear you’re making a film.”
Syntax: declarative
Pragmatics: question
“Why don’t you just go home?”
Syntax: interrogative
Pragmatics: directive
Syntax
Structure/form, sentence meaning
Pragmatics
Use/function, speaker meaning
Subject-auxiliary inversion (SAI)
It changes the meaning of a sentence from declarative to interrogative.
- The government should abandon harmful policies (declarative).
- Should the government abandon harmful policies? (Yes/no-interrogative).
- Which policies should the government abandon? (WH-interrogative)
How to change the meaning of a sentence from declarative to interrogative?
Apply subject-auxiliary inversion.
“The government should abandon harmful policies” (declarative) to “Which policies should the government abandon?” (WH-interrogative).
What are two ways to trigger syntactic movement?
Some items perform two syntactic roles simultaneously (it’s called a double function).
Passivisation
“Bob stole my idea.”
“My idea was stolen by Bob.”
Yes/no-question formation
“The boy will laugh.”
“Will the boy laugh?”
What positions do auxiliaries move to in questions?
“The boy will • laugh.”
When auxiliaries switch places with the subject, they move to a structural position that precedes the subject in the sentence.
Movement leaves a gap (•) in the original position of the moved constituent.
“Will the boy laugh?”
Types of yes/no-questions
Neutral questions
1. Does John like pancakes?
2. Have you eaten your lunch yet?
Biased questions
1. John likes pancakes, doesn’t he? (positive bias)
2. John doesn’t like pancakes, does he? (negative bias)
Alternative questions
1. Are you baking a cake or is something burning?
2. Would you like coffee or tea?
WH-movement (or WH-fronting)
I wonder who Susie saw yesterday.
Who did Susie see • yesterday?”
Pied-piping
The process of WH-moving a phrase containing more material than just a WH-word.
Who did John go swimming with yesterday?
Which person did John go swimming with yesterday?
How is WH-movement restricted in English?
Only one WH-phrase can undergo WH-movement per clause.
A language with no WH-movement
Chinese
Languages with more than one WH-movement
Bulgarian
Languages with WH-movement
English
Does WH-movement and auxiliary-inversion take place in main questions with WH-subjects?
Yes, the movement doesn’t change the word order.
Someone has eaten the cake; who has eaten the cake?
WH-clauses
Clauses that contain at least one WH-word (who, what, where, how, why).
Variations of WH-clauses
- Echo WH-question
John went swimming with who yesterday? - Main WH-question
Who did John go swimming with yesterday? - Subordinate WH-question
I wonder who John went swimming with. - Restrictive relative clause
The man who John swims with is here. - Non-restrictive relative clause
Paul, who John swims with is here.
Alll uses for sentence types
- Asserting, claiming
- Inquiring, questioning
- Directing, ordering, requesting
- Expressing surprise
Passivisation of “Bob stole my idea.”
[NP: My idea] was stolen • by Bob.
Mixed language
French
