Principles of Syntactic Analysis

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Principles of Syntactic Analysis
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Identifying constituent boundariesthe adverbial
test
All the students may pass their exams
Naturally all the students may pass their
exams
All naturally the students may pass their exams
All the naturally students may pass their exams
All the students naturally may pass their
exams
All the students may naturally pass their
exams
All the students may pass naturally their exams
All the students may pass their naturally exams
All the students may pass their exams
naturally
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Identifying constituents
Naturally of course
Sentence adverbial
Naturally in a natural way
Manner adverbial
Naturally all the students may pass their
exams
All the students naturally may pass their
exams
All the students may naturally pass their
exams
All the students may pass their exams
naturally
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Identifying constituentsthe substitution
deletion tests
All the students may pass their exams
The students may pass their exams
All students may pass their exams
Students may pass their exams
All may pass their exams
The may pass their exams
They may pass their exams
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Identifying constituentsthe substitution
deletion tests
They may pass their exams
They may their exams
They may
They pass their exams
They pass
They do
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Identifying constituentsmovement tests
All the students may pass their exams
Mayall the students pass their exams
Pass their exams is what all the students
may
Their exams is what all the students may
pass
The students may all pass their exams
Pass their all the students may exams
Only constituents at some level of analysis may
move!
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All constituents identified
All the students may pass
theirexams
All
the
students
may
pass
their
exams
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Naming constituents lexical and phrasal
categories
Lexical categories
Phrasal categories
N(oun)
NP
- Pro(noun)
Nom
- Proper (name)
V(erb)
VP
Phrasal categories are said to be projections
from lexical categories
- Main Lexical
- Aux(iliary) Modal
A(djective)
AP
Adv(erb)
AdvP
D(eterminative)
DP
P(reposition)
PP
Subordinator
CL(ause)
Clausal and sentential categories
Coordinator
Interjection
S(entence)
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Naming constituents
S DP D All NP D the N students
VP Aux may VP V pass NP D theirN
exams
This is a socalled labelled bracketing It is
difficult to read, therefore
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S
DP
VP
VP
Aux
D
NP
V
NP
may
D
N
All
D
N
pass
the
students
their
exams
All
the
students
exams
may
pass
their

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Naming constituents
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Assigning syntactic functions to constituents
S
Subject
Predicate
DP
VP
Head
Operator
Complement
Complement
VP
Aux
D
NP
Det
Head
Predicator
Object
V
NP
may
D
N
All
Det
Head
pass
D
N
the
students
their
exams
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Adverbial positions
S
DP
VP
VP
Aux
D
NP
V
NP
may
D
N
All
pass
D
N
the
students
their
exams
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Adverbial positions
S
DP
VP
VP
Aux
D
NP
V
NP
may
D
N
All
pass
D
N
the
students
their
exams
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Phrasal vs. clausal constituentsthe notion of
recursion
Adverbial
Subject
Predicate
Predicator
Object
S AdvP Naturally NP the students VP may
pass NP their exams
S CL Because they have studied diligently NP
the students VP may pass NP their
exams
S CL That they have studied diligently VP
pleases NP me
SNP The students VP claim CL that they
have studied diligently
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Non-finite clausal constituents
Adverbial
Subject
Predicate
Predicator
Object
S CL Having studied diligently NP the
students VP may pass NP their exams
S CL To study diligently VP pleases NP the
students
SNP The professor VP wants CL the students
to study diligently
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Det
Head
Predicator
Complement
Operator
Complement