Week 3: Phrase Structure

constituent

general term for the grouping of words into larger units, can explain why 2 strings of words have different meanings

phrase

specific term for a syntactic constituent (NP, VP, PP, AdjP)

substitution test

substitute pro-form of syntactic phrase for constituent, if ungrammatical = not a constituent, if grammatical = constituent

noun: sub pronouns, verbs: sub do so/did so, prepositions: sub there/here/then

clefting

move a string of words into “It was _____ that/who [rest of sentence]”, if ungrammatical = not a constituent, if grammatical = a constituent

fragment test

make questions that can be answered by constituents - the way it is worded in the question has to be the answer to a question

coordination test

if 2 strings can be coordinated (connected by a conjunction and/or/but), then they are both constituents and of the same category

lexical ambiguity

2 meanings caused by words with more than one meaning

Talia lives by the bank (river bank and money bank)

structural ambiguity

one sentence having 2 meanings due to tree structures