Ling 320 Test 4

lol

Syntax

arrangement of words to create a sentence with meaning

Syntactic categories

groups of words/phrases with the same grammatical features

Lexical Categories

content words (usually open-class, can make new ones)

• ex: nouns, noun phrases, verbs, verb phrases, adjectives, etc.

Functional categories

function words (usually closed-class, can’t make new ones)

• ex: prepositions, prepositional phrases, determiners, etc.

Syntactic operations

rule processes that may move or combine words/phrases to create meaningful ones

Merge

takes 2 words/phrases and combines them to a new single constituent

Move

moves a constituent from one spot to another to create new meaning (such as a question)

inversion

Inverts subject + verb to ver+ subject to give emphasis, show formality, or give questions

wh movement

moving a question word to the front of a sentence

grammatical relations

different structural roles NP’s have and show how they interact with a verb

subject

the do-er, agent

direct object

what the action happens to, patient

indirect object

the recipient/goal

adjunct

something added but is optional to a sentence, like adverbs

thematic roles

describe what is happening in the sentence rather than the syntactic rules

transitive verb/clause

action verb requires an object to receive and complete the sentence

• ex: she read a book

intransitive verb/clause

doesn’t require a direct object

• ex: wait, go, stop, etc.

ditransitive verb/clause

a verb that takes 2 objects, an indirect and a direct object

• ex: he brought me coffee

active voice

subject does the verb

• ex: my sister ate a sandwich

passive voice

focuses on the recipient

• ex: the sandwich was eaten by my sister