Lecture 5
Lecture 5
In Clause Structure:
Subject: The NP can function as the subject of a sentence. Example: "A student helped us."
Object: It can also act as the direct object of a verb. Example: "They elected a student."
Predicative Complement: In some cases, it serves as a predicative complement, describing the
subject. Example: "She is a student."
Complement: Within prepositional phrases, NPs can serve as complements. Example: "We were
talking to a student."
Inflection: Nouns often inflect for number (singular or plural) and case (plain or genitive).
Examples:
Singular, Plain Case (Nominative Case): "student"
Singular, Genitive: "student's"
Plural, Plain Case (Nominative Case): "students"
Plural, Genitive: "students'"
Dependents: Nouns can have various kinds of dependents, including determinatives, which
occur exclusively or almost exclusively with nouns as heads.
Examples: "the door," "every book," "young children," "a big dog," "recent events," "the guy who
fainted," "the book I'm reading."
DEPENDENTS
In the structure of noun phrases (NPs), there are three main types of dependents:
1. Determiners: Determiners are a type of dependent found only in NP structure. They are
obligatory elements in NPs with certain types of singular nouns as heads. Determiners
include words like articles (definite and indefinite), demonstratives, possessive
pronouns, and quantifiers. They specify and identify the noun they precede, indicating
whether it is definite, indefinite, specific, general, etc. For example, in the phrase "the
cat," "the" is a determiner specifying a specific cat. Other examples of determiners: the
news, a pear, some cheese, two new films, no reason, etc.
2. Complements: Complements in noun phrases are dependents that provide additional
information about the head noun. They are elements that have to be licensed or
permitted by the head noun, similar to how complements in clause structure have to be
licensed by the head verb. Complements are necessary for the sentence's grammatical
structure and meaning. For instance, in the phrase "the loss of blood," "of blood" is a
complement specifying the type of loss. Or, as in “She expressed her opinion on the
matter,” where “on the matter is a complement” indicating the topic of her opinion.
3. Modifiers: Modifiers are the default type of dependent in noun phrases and lack the
special features of determiners and complements. There is no limit to the number of
modifiers that can occur in an NP. Modifiers provide additional descriptive information
about the head noun, enhancing its meaning. They can include adjectives, relative
clauses, prepositional phrases, and other descriptive elements. For example, in the
phrase "a beautiful sunny day," both "beautiful" and "sunny" are modifiers describing
the day, or, in the phrase "a young woman from Boston who complained," both "from
Boston" and "who complained" are modifiers.
NOMINALS
The structure of noun phrases (NPs) involves the introduction of a concept known as "nominals."
These nominals serve as intermediary units situated between the noun phrase and the noun itself.
This arrangement is analogous to the presence of a verb phrase between a clause and a verb. To
illustrate, in phrases like "the guy who fainted" or "a young woman," the initial distinction occurs
between the determiner and the remaining elements, and these segments, such as "guy who fainted"
and "young woman," function as nominals. In these cases, the noun takes on the role of the
nominal's head rather than directly heading the NP. However, for simplicity, this general concept
often references NPs with various types of nouns as their heads.
In the structure of noun phrases (NPs), dependents can be categorized as internal or external based
on whether they appear inside or outside the head nominal. Complements and determiners are
always internal and external, respectively. The modifiers mentioned earlier are typically internal,
but there are also external modifiers. For instance, in the examples provided below, the underlined
words represent the dependents, and the head nominals are enclosed in brackets:
SUBCLASSES OF NOUNS
There are three primary subclasses of nouns: pronouns, proper nouns, and common nouns.
Pronouns include words like I, me, my, mine, myself, you, he, she, it, who, and what (all pronouns
in the nominative case that respond to the queries "who?" or "what?") . They are distinct from other
nouns in their inability to combine with determiners (e.g., the me, a myself). Personal pronouns also
show inflectional contrasts between nominative and accusative forms (e.g., he vs him).
Proper nouns function as the heads of noun phrases, denoting specific names assigned to individual
people, places, festivals, etc. They can also occur derivatively in various types of noun phrases (e.g.,
Let's listen to some Beethoven).
"Derivatively" means in a way that is derived or obtained from something else, often
through modification or adaptation. The phrase "Let's listen to some Beethoven" employs a
metonymy. Here, "Beethoven" functions as a metonym for the music composed by Ludwig
van Beethoven. So, the statement implies listening to the musical creations of Beethoven.
The determiner "some" adds a sense of generality, suggesting that the speaker and listener
will listen to a selection of Beethoven's music without specifying particular pieces or
compositions.
Common nouns constitute the default subclass, lacking the unique properties of pronouns and
proper nouns. Examples include cat, day, furniture, window, fact, truth, perseverance, etc.
Number is the term used to describe the system that distinguishes singular and plural forms in
language. In the context of nouns, it refers to the contrast between singular and plural forms. For
instance, in English, nouns typically have both singular and plural forms, such as cat (singular) and
cats (plural).
Nouns with Fixed Number
There are nouns in English that always exist in either singular or plural form:
Singular-Only Nouns: Some nouns only have a singular form and do not have a plural
counterpart. Examples include crockery, dross, footwear, harm, indebtedness, nonsense, etc.
Plural-Only Nouns: Conversely, there are nouns that only exist in plural form and lack a
singular counterpart. Examples include alms, auspices, belongings, clothes, genitals, scissors,
vermin, etc.
In summary, the choice between countable and non-countable interpretations often depends on
grammatical and lexical factors within a given context.
SUBJECT-VERB AGREEMENT
Subject-verb agreement in English is primarily determined by the number of the subject, which can
be singular or plural. When the subject is singular, the verb takes a singular form, and when the
subject is plural, the verb takes a plural form. For example, in the sentence "Their dog eats a lot," the
singular subject "dog" corresponds with the singular verb "eats," whereas in "Their dogs eat a lot,"
the plural subject "dogs" matches with the plural verb "eat."
This agreement rule generally applies to verbs in the present tense, except for modal auxiliaries. In
the past tense, only the verb "be" shows agreement; other past tense verbs like "ate" remain the same
regardless of the subject. However, there are nuances to this rule. For instance, expressions denoting
measures like "ten days" or "twenty dollars" are plural in form but can conceptualize a single abstract
entity, leading to singular verb agreement. For example, “Ten days is a long time to be on your
own,” – singular agreement despite the plural form due to the singular conceptualization of time.
Similarly, quantificational nouns like "a lot of" can have singular heads in certain contexts, causing
the verb to agree with the embedded plural noun phrase. For example, “A lot of people were
present at the event,” – plural agreement because of the embedded plural noun "people". Collective
nouns, such as "committee" or "team," can take either singular or plural verbs, with the choice
reflecting whether the focus is on the individuals in the group or the group as a whole. Additionally,
certain determiners like "any," "no," "either," and "neither" can lead to either singular or plural verb
agreement, depending on the context and formality. Singular agreement is more common with
"either" and "neither," while both singular and plural agreements are accepted with "any" and "no."
In summary, subject-verb agreement in English is influenced by both number and context, with
specific rules and exceptions for various situations, measures, quantifications, collective nouns, and
determiners.
The terminology related to "determiner" and "determinative" has undergone changes across
different linguistic frameworks. In the Cambridge Grammar of the English Language by
Huddleston and Pullum, "determinative" refers to words like articles and quantifiers, while
"determiner" is the grammatical function these words serve. However, in older grammars
like Quirk et al.'s Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language , these terms were used
in the opposite manner, with "determiner" denoting the lexical category and "determinative"
indicating the grammatical function. This discrepancy highlights the need to be aware of
specific usages within different linguistic contexts. Similarly to Huddleston and Pullum , in
our terminology, we employ "determiner" to denote the grammatical function and
"determinative" for the lexical category. This distinction is made based on the suffixes used:
"-er" in "determiner" aligns with the suffix in the functional term "modifier," whereas "-ive"
in "determinative" corresponds to the suffix in the categorical term "adjective." This
differentiation helps clarify the roles and categories within linguistic analysis.
In noun phrases (NPs), the determiner position can be occupied by two main types of expressions.
Most commonly, it is filled by a determinative, and some of these can have their own modifiers,
forming a determinative phrase (DP). Additionally, the determiner can take the form of a genitive
NP.
Determinatives and DPs have various forms, such as definite articles (like "the") and indefinite
articles (like "a" or "an"). These markers serve to indicate whether the NP is definite or indefinite.
Definite NPs are those where the head (the main noun) is sufficient in the context to identify the
referent, while indefinite NPs do not provide unique identification.
Definite Article: The definite article, like "the," is used when the head of the NP is considered
unique or sufficiently identifiable in the context. For instance, "The President of France" indicates a
specific person identifiable from the context, while "The key" implies a particular key relevant to the
ongoing conversation.
Indefinite Article: The indefinite article, such as "a" or "an," does not imply uniqueness. For
example, "A cabinet minister" suggests any one of a number of ministers without specifying a
particular one. Similarly, "I'll give you a key" indicates any key without unique identification.
Articles with Plural NPs: The definite and indefinite articles apply to plural NPs as well, indicating
either specific groups or general sets. For instance, "The Presidents of France and Italy" refers to a
unique set of two people, while "The keys" implies a specific bunch of keys, contextually
identifiable.
Definite and Indefinite Determiners: Determiners like "the," "this," "that," "a," "each," and "every"
mark NPs as definite or indefinite. Additionally, quantificational determinatives like "all," "both,"
"some," and "many" can indicate indefiniteness based on quantity.
It is essential to note that while determinatives primarily function as determiners in NP structures,
they can also serve as modifiers in other contexts, depending on the sentence structure. For
example:
Furthermore, certain quantificational determinatives can have their own dependents, forming
determinative phrases (DPs). These DPs consist of modifiers preceding the head determinative, such
as in "Not many people turned up," where "Not many" forms a DP modifying the head noun
"people."
IV. Complements
One noticeable distinction between nouns and verbs lies in the fact that nouns do not take objects.
When nouns are morphologically related to transitive verbs, such as "criticism" related to "criticise,"
the complement of the noun that aligns with the object of the verb appears in the form of a
prepositional phrase (PP). For instance:
Verbs + Objects: 1. I criticised her decision. 2. He abandoned his ship. 3. Sandy married Pat.
Nouns + PP Complements: 1. my criticism of her decision 2. his abandonment of his ship 3. Sandy's
marriage to Pat
Typically, the preposition "of" is used, as seen in the first and second examples. However, with
certain nouns, other prepositions are employed, as in the third example.
Complements within noun phrase (NP) structure are primarily limited to PPs and subordinate
clauses.
PP Complements: Dependents in the form of PPs qualify as complements when they are
authorized by the head noun. The clearest cases exhibit one or more of these characteristics:
Correspondence with Object or Subject in a Related Clause Structure: For object case, as
illustrated previously, and subject correspondence, as shown below:
o The warriors returned. 2. The premier attacked.
o The return of the warriors 2. An attack by the premier
This type of PP complement can combine with one corresponding to the object in a clause,
as in the removal of the files by the secretary, similar to "The secretary removed the files."
Choice of Preposition Specified by Head Noun: Many nouns accept complements headed by
a specific preposition, as in "belief in God" or "familiarity with the data."
Obligatory PP Complements: PPs are necessary because the noun wouldn't make sense
without them. For example, "the advent of the steam engine" or "a dearth of new ideas"
almost always occur with a PP headed by "of."
V. Modifiers
Internal modifiers within noun phrases (NPs) can greatly enhance their descriptive power. These
modifiers can occur before or after the head of the NP, creating a more nuanced and detailed
meaning.
Pre-head Modifiers: Pre-head modifiers occur before the head noun in the NP and include:
Adjectives (AdjPs): These can stand alone or come with their own dependents. For example:
a long letter, some very irate customers.
Determinatives (DPs): These appear after a determiner and can have their own dependents,
such as another two candidates, an exceptional one hundred people
Nominals: These are nouns, either alone or with internal dependents, functioning as
modifiers. For instance: a brick wall, high octane petrol, a United States warship.
Verb Phrases (VPs): These modifiers can be either gerund-participles or past participles. For
example: the condemned man, a recently discovered fossil.
Post-head Modifiers: Post-head modifiers come after the head noun and include:
Prepositional Phrases (PPs): These provide additional information about the noun. For
example: the tree by the gate, food for the baby.
Adjective Phrases (AdjPs): These can contain their own dependents and are usually found
after the head noun. For instance: people fond of animals, the ones most likely to succeed.
Appositive NPs: These are noun phrases set off by commas, which can stand alone instead of
the entire NP. For example: the opera 'Carmen', my wife Lucy.
Finite Clauses: These are relative clauses that function as post-head modifiers, providing
more details about the noun.
Non-finite Clauses: These clauses can be infinitival, gerund-participial, or past-participial,
offering further description of the noun.
Combinations of Modifiers: Noun phrases can accommodate multiple modifiers, enhancing their
specificity. For example:
In English grammar, there exists a construction called the fused-head construction, where the head
of a noun phrase (NP) is combined with a dependent element, such as a determiner or an internal
modifier, within a single word. This results in a single word serving as both the determiner and the
head of the NP. There are three main subtypes of fused-head construction: simple, partitive, and
special.
1. Simple Fused-Head: In this type, a single word functions as both the determiner and the head of
the NP. For example, in the sentence "Pat doesn't seem to have any," the word "any" serves as both
the determiner and the head.
2. Partitive Fused-Head: The partitive subtype denotes a part rather than the whole. Partitive fused-
heads can be further categorized into explicit and implicit partitives. In explicit partitives, the fused
head is followed by a partitive prepositional phrase (PP), like “ Some of his remarks were quite
flattering.” The partitive structure denotes a subset of "his remarks," but we can't replace it with
"some remarks of his remarks." In implicit partitives, the of complement is understood rather than
expressed overtly. For instance, in "both are out of focus," "both" is understood as "both of them."
3. Special Fused-Head: Special fused heads have unique interpretations that are not directly
retrievable from the context. For example, in the phrase "many would disagree," "many" is
understood as "many people," but the specific reference to "people" is not present in the surrounding
text.
Fused Determiner-Heads: Various determiners can occur in this construction, except for the
articles "the" and "a," along with "every" and "what." The determiner "what" has two forms:
one functioning as a determiner, and the other as a pronoun. The pronoun "what" is non-
personal and is replaced by "who" for human beings. The determinative "no" appears in the
fused determiner-head construction as "none."
Fused Modifier-Heads: Modifiers can also fuse with the head of an NP, as seen in examples
like "the blue" (referring to "the blue shirt") and "the youngest of their children." However,
not all modifiers can fuse as readily as determiners can. Modifiers that can fuse include
determinatives used after a determiner, superlatives, comparatives, ordinal numeral words,
and certain semantic categories of adjectives (e.g., color adjectives and nationality adjectives
not functioning as count nouns).
Compound Forms: Certain determiners like "every," "some," "any," and "no" have formed
compound words with nouns like "body," "one," and "thing," resulting in words like
"everybody," "someone," and "nothing." These compound forms are morphologically distinct,
and adjectival modifiers follow the head instead of appearing in the usual pre-head position.
For instance, "somebody famous" is a fused compound form, whereas "famous person" is not.
Pronouns form a unique subgroup of nouns that are distinguished by their syntactical inability to
take determiners as dependents. Unlike common nouns and proper nouns, pronouns cannot be
modified with determiners such as "this" or "the." Instead, pronouns are typically used as the head of
noun phrases (NPs) in various grammatical roles, including the subject, object, predicative
complement, and complement of a preposition. It is essential to note that pronouns belong to the
noun category, rather than being an entirely separate category of words.
There are several distinct types of pronouns, as illustrated in the following examples:
Personal Pronouns: These are pronouns that are used to refer to specific people or things. For
example: "I like them."
Reciprocal Pronouns: These pronouns indicate an action or feeling is reciprocated between two or
more entities. For instance, "They dislike each other."
Interrogative Pronouns: These pronouns are used to ask questions. For instance, "Who saw them
leave?"
Relative Pronouns: These pronouns are used to introduce relative clauses and relate them to the
main clause. For example, "the guy who helped us."
Reflexive Pronouns: These pronouns refer back to the subject of the sentence, showing that the
action is done to itself. For instance, "Your sister underestimates herself."
In this section, we will focus on personal pronouns, specifically their deictic and anaphoric uses.
Deictic pronouns are used to refer to specific people or things based on the context of the utterance.
For example, "She likes him." Anaphoric pronouns derive their meaning from previous expressions
in the text, such as "Liz said she was unavailable."
Personal pronouns come in three different persons: the 1st person (referring to the speaker), the
2nd person (referring to the addressee or audience), and the 3rd person (referring to entities not
including the speaker or addressee). Within the 3rd person singular, there is further distinction
based on gender: "he" for males, "she" for females, and "it" for inanimate objects or when gender is
unspecified.
The use of "they" as a singular pronoun is becoming more widely accepted for unspecified gender.
In contrast, the use of "he" as a gender-neutral pronoun is less common today.
The personal pronouns also exhibit various inflectional forms: nominative, accusative, genitive, and
the plain form. The choice between nominative and accusative forms primarily depends on
syntactic function, with the nominative form used for the subject of a clause and the accusative
form used for objects of verbs and prepositions. For example, "She and I went to the store"
(nominative) vs. "He met us at the mall" (accusative).
Genitive case, which applies to personal pronouns, has both dependent and independent forms.
The dependent form is typically used in noun phrases to indicate possession, such as "my key,"
while the independent form functions as the head of the noun phrase, as in "This is mine."
Reciprocal pronouns, such as "each other" and "one another," are used to indicate mutual actions
between two or more entities. These pronouns do not show person agreement with their
antecedent and can have genitive forms, such as "each other's."
VIII. Genitive Case
The genitive case, marked in writing by - 's or the apostrophe alone, is a grammatical construction in
English that signifies a range of relationships, not limited to possession. It is a grammatical case that
has evolved in English, and while it is less elaborate than cases in some other languages, it plays a
crucial role in conveying meaning and structure within sentences.
Possessive pronouns in English serve the same function as the genitive case. They indicate
possession or association between one noun and another noun, just like the genitive case does in
many other languages. In English, possessive pronouns replace genitive nouns to show ownership or
relationship and can function in sentences similarly to the genitive case.
The primary function of the genitive case is to mark a dependent within the structure of an NP.
Here are a few illustrative examples:
[The teacher's car] was stolen. (The genitive dependent is "teacher's," indicating possession)
They phoned [my mother]. ("My" serves as the genitive, denoting the possessive relationship)
In these examples, the genitive dependent is part of the NP, often taking the form of 's at the end of
the word, such as "teacher's." Sometimes, it can also include a post-head dependent, as seen in
"Secretary of State's son."
Genitive NPs have a dual function, serving as both determiners and complements. This construction
is equivalent to using a definite determiner and a post-head complement separately. For instance:
the patient's condition (Genitive NP, serving as both determiner and complement)
the condition of the patient (Separate determiner and complement)
In these examples, the single genitive dependent does the work of the two dependents in the
separate determiner and complement constructions.
While the term 'possessive' is often used interchangeably with 'genitive,' it is essential to recognize
that genitive NPs represent relationships beyond possession and can convey various semantic
relationships. Examples like "her father," "her birth," or "her anger" do not necessarily imply
possession. The genitive case can convey semantic relationships such as association, origin, and part-
whole relationships. For example, "the book's cover" (association), "John's hometown" (origin), "the
leg of the table" (part-whole).The oblique genitive appears as a complement to "of" in post-head
dependents. For example, "a casual remark of Kim's."
Subjective Genitive: It appears in formal style as the subject of a gerund-participial clause that
functions as a complement (of a verb), as in: She didn't approve of his being given a second chance.
Fused Head Genitive: The genitive can fuse with the head, as in: They accepted Kim's proposal but
not Pat 's. (understood as "Pat's proposal").
Oblique Genitive: It functions as a complement to "of" in a post-head dependent, for example: A
casual remark of Kim's (indicated as indefinite) vs. Kim's casual remark (marked as definite).
Predicative Genitive: It acts as a complement of verbs like "be" and "become," indicating possession,
for instance: Everything in this room is Mary's.
Attributive Genitive: It serves as an internal modifier in NP structure, such as: They've just moved
to an old people's home. (indicating ownership)
In summary, the genitive case in English is a versatile construction that goes beyond mere
possession. It serves multiple functions, including determiners, predicatives, and oblique
complements, adding depth and nuance to the language.