Contrastive Grammar for Translators 2 PDF

lOMoARcPSD|41499384 Poznámky na zápočet Contrastivive grammar for translators 2 (Univerzita Palackého v Olomuci) Scan to open on Studocu Studocu is not sponsored or endorsed by any college or university...

lOMoARcPSD|41499384 Poznámky na zápočet Contrastivive grammar for translators 2 (Univerzita Palackého v Olomuci) Scan to open on Studocu Studocu is not sponsored or endorsed by any college or university Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 1 Syntax – the study of the principles governing how words can be assembled into sentences Morphology – deals with the internal form (parts) of words Sentences – structured  words are grouped into constituents - 3 aspects of sentence structure: - the linear order of words - the categorization of words into parts of speech - the grouping of words into structural constituents of the sentence 2 types of questions about a phrase: - What is its internal structure? - How does it function grammatically within a sentence? - it stars from the bottom of a tree and works itself up, individual words make up smaller constituents, smaller phrases make up larger ones The big brown dog ran away quickly. Words, word classes and phrases - words are categorized into parts of speech which are also called word classes: noun, determiner, adjective, verb, preposition, adverb, conjunction, interjection - words are grouped into phrases  every phrase has its head - a phrase that behaves as a single unit with a single function is called a constituent - types of phrases:  noun phrase (the library, the receptionist, the very noisy visitor)  adjective phrase (very noisy)  adverb phrase (very …; continually ….)  prepositional phrase (in the library)  verb phrase (continually insulted the receptionist in the library) The structure of a phrase - consists of a head, alone or accompanied by one or more dependents (the) - its category depends on that of the head - the head – the element that assigns a category to a larger unit - if standing alone, could perform the syntactic function of the whole construction - it may govern the agreement of grammatical categories Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - takes the inflection or governs the agreement in the phrase Grammatical functions vs categories “Some people complained about it” - subject is a function – a relation concept  “some people” is the subject, we are describing relation between it and “complained,” or between it and the whole clause - noun phrase is a category – a class of expressions which are grammatically alike - a class of noun phrases includes and indefinitely large set of expressions Nouns and noun phrases NP – can have various functions in a clause or sentence, notably those of subject, object or complement - distinctive properties of prototypical noun phrases:  function: - in clause structure: SUBJECT A student helped us. OBJECT They elected a student. PREDICATIVE COMPLEMENT She is a student.  subject complement - in pp structure: COMPLEMENT We were talking (to a student).  form - a typical NP consists of a noun serving as head word and possibly various accompanying dependents - distinctive properties of prototypical nouns:  inflection – nouns typically inflect for number (singular or plural) and case (plain or genitive) SG PL PLAIN CASE student students GENITIVE student´s students´  function – nouns can normally fill the head position in phrases with any of the four functions (subject, object, predicative complement, complement)  dependents – various kinds that occur exclusively or almost exclusively with nouns as head: o certain determinatives – the door; a year; every book; which paper o pre-head adjectives – young children; a big dog; recent events o relative clauses – the guy who fainted; the book i´m reading - the determiner - an obligatory kind of dependent found only in NP structure with certain types of singular noun as head – a function word that determines/specifies, how the reference of a noun phrase is to be understood - precedes all other words in a noun phrase (this old table you bought; some people; what a strange sight)  central determiners: Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384  articles (a, an, the)  demonstrative pronouns (that, these, …)  possessive pronouns (my, your, …)  interrogative pronouns (what, which, whose)  indefinite pronouns (some/any/no, every/each/either/neither)  pre-determiners  all/those/both/half quantifiers  double/twice/three times/one third  such/what  post-determiners  cardinal numbers (one, two)  ordinal numbers (first, second)  closed-class quantifiers (a few, a little, a lot)  - there can be maximum one of each determiner in this order only: pre-determiner – central modifier – post-determiner all the three boys  *the all three boys - modifiers – optional elements that add specification to the meaning of the head - pre-modifiers – preceding the head - properties that are inherent in the head of the noun phrase, visually observable, and objectively recognizable or assessable, will tend to be placed nearer to the head and be preceded by modifiers concerned with what is a matter of opinion of the observer  a subjective/objective polarity - size – age – shape – color – origin – material - noun - post-modifiers – following the head - adjectives in this place: a) after indefinite pronouns anyone intelligent can do it; I want to try something larger b) fixed phrases the person opposite – all of us, me included institutional expressions: the president elect, devil incarnate, … c) adjectives ending in – able/-ible can be in postposition if preceded by a superlative, only, last, next, … d) difference in meaning (involved, concerned, responsible, present, proper) Adjectives as head of noun phrases  abstract ideas  singular examples – the deceased, firs-born, four-year-old  the unemployed, the poor, the chronically sick and disabled – the antonyms of these adjectives are also likely to occur, though most particularly when they are associated by contrast with the above-listed more basic fact  nationality nouns – the adjectives are restricted to words ending in –ish, -sh, -ch, -ese  plural forms Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 2 - two cases of nouns: a) the unmarked common case (boy in singular, boys in plural) b) the marked genitive (boy´s in the singular, boys´ in the plural) - the genitive of regular nouns is realized in speech only in the singular  it takes the forms /iz/, /z/, /s/, following the rules for the –s inflection of nouns and verbs - in writing, the inflection of regular nouns is realized:  in the singular by apostrophe + s (boy´s)  and in the regular plural by the apostrophe following the plural (boys´) – zero genitive  it adds nothing to regular plural noun in speech and only apostrophe in writing - zero genitive with singular nouns – used to avoid repetitive or awkward combinations of sounds: a) with Greek names of more than one syllable which end in –s Euripides´ plays, Socrates´ wife, Xerxes´s army b) with many other names ending in /z/  the pronunciation of the genitive is most commonly /iz/ and the spelling is an apostrophe only Burns´ poem, Dickens´ novels, Jones´ car - the group genitive – the 's ending is not a case ending in the sense that languages like Latin, Russian, and German have - its function is similar to that of a preposition, only it comes after the noun phrase - GROUP GENITIVE (or 'embedded genitive') - the genitive ending is attached to a post- modifier someone else´s car; my son-in-law´s house, the Museum of Modern Art´s director Nouns that have the genitive form in English: 1. noun classes that are highest on the gender scale: - it´s used to show possession/ownership  the Saxon genitive – only in English - only with nouns highest on the gender scale - uses apostrophe s with the head noun (the boy´s) and adds the dependent noun (bike)  personal names (George Washington´s statue)  personal nouns (the boy´s bike; the woman´s hat)  animal nouns (the horse´s tail, the dog´s collar)  collective nouns – organized individuals denoting authoritative and other organizational bodies (the government´s economic plans; the nation´s resources; the committee´s decision) 2. certain kinds of inanimate objects:  geographical names – nouns that have the closest to the people of the country are most likely to be acceptable in the genitive Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - Europe´s future, China´s development, Harvard´s Department of Linguistics  temporal nouns – the decade´s events, this year´s sales, yesterday´s paper, today´s world - nouns related to time The choice between the of-construction and the genitive construction - in many cases there is a regular correspondence between an of-phrase and the genitive the ship´s funnel vs the funnel of the ship - the lexical factor that influences the choice: - the of-construction is not normally required with nouns higher on the gender scale (personal nouns, personal names, animal nouns, collective nouns, nouns with personal characteristics)  the Saxon genitive in practice Ann´s car vs *the car of Ann the lady´s car vs *the car of the lady the dog´s collar vs *the collar of the dog - the of-construction is normally required with inanimate objects the roof of this house vs *this house´s roof - there is a group of inanimate objects that allow the genitive – geographical nouns, nouns denoting time and place China´s population vs the population of China the world´s economy vs the economy of the world last year´s profit vs the profit for last year The function of the genitive - the construction with genitive or possessive pronoun with determinative function will have definite reference (Susan´s son  her son; *a Susan´s son) The post-genitive – double genitive - an “of” construction combined with a genitive to produce a construction known as the post- genitive  the independent genitive acts as prepositional complement following “of” Jim´s friend – a friend of Jim´s -when it must be used:  *That old car of Jo is falling apart.  That old car of Jo´s is falling apart. - the post genitive in second sentence is the only option if the head of the noun phrase is inanimate and there is another determiner  you cannot say *a car of Susan, but only a car of Susan´s - when it can be used:  a friend of Jim – a friend of Jim´s  a son of Peter – a son of Peter´s - the head is human, which is why it is OK - in the post-genitive is okay if the post-modifier is definite (typically a name) and human The independent genitive Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - the head of the superordinate noun phrase in a genitive construction may be omitted if the context makes its identity clear My car is faster than John´s. Hers was the prettiest dress. His memory is like an elephant´s. The local genitive  for normal residences (We´ll meet at Bill´s. She is staying at my aunt´s. She is staying at Johnsons´.)  for institutions such as public buildings (Let´s have dinner at Tiffany´s. St Paul´s. St James´s)  the genitive is usually a saint´s name  for places where business is conducted (at the dentist´s, the barber´s, the butcher´s) - the ´s is often dropped The genitive in English – the Saxon genitive – a phrasal case alternating with the position of the central determiner The genitive in Czech – adjectival noun - must be animate (mostly even human), singular and marked by masculine or feminine gender Genitive meanings: a) possessive genitive b) subjective genitive c) objective genitive d) genitive of origin e) descriptive genitive f) genitive of measures g) genitive of attribute h) partitive genitive the baby´s blue eyes the baby has (blue) eyes the earth´s surface the earth has a (rough) surface 3 Adjectives - class of words which define more precisely the reference of a noun or pronoun - can occur before noun – premodifying a noun phrase /after the verb - complement - comparative (better); superlative (the best) - most common ones form pairs which contrast in terms of meaning: good – bad, wide – narrow, useful - useless - many derived from other words and are easily recognizable by their suffixes - most common adjective suffixes: -al, -ous, -ic, -y, -ful, -les - characteristics:  they can freely occur in attributive function – they can pre-modify a noun, appearing between the determiner and the head of a noun phrase  they can freely occur in predicative function – they can function as subject complement  they can be pre-modified by the intensifier very Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384  they can take comparative and superlative forms – the comparison may be by means of inflections (-er and –est), or by the addition of the pre-modifiers more and most inflectional  clever – cleverer - the cleverest periphrastic  clever – more clever – the most clever  monosyllabic adjectives normally form their comparison by inflection “real, right, wrong” – take only periphrastic form  disyllabic can also take inflections – they have the alternative of a periphrastic form - disyllabic adj that can most readily take inflected forms are those ending in an unstressed vowel (-y, -ow, -le) - for adjectives ending in –ly, comparison with periphrasis is common (friendly, likely, lonely) -y, can occur with inflectional forms as well as with periphrastic forms (quiet, common, solid, …)  trisyllabic or longer – only periphrastic form; exceptions are adjectives with the negative un- prefix (unhappy, untidy, …) - suppletive forms – the form goes to a different stem (good – better – best) - usage of the definite article with the superlative (the):  if the superlative is used attributively, the definite article is required  if the adjective is not attributive, the is optional  with the indefinite or zero article, most is always interpreted as an intensifier Adverbs - the most obvious adverbs are those derived from adjectives by adding -ly - words that modify verbs, adjectives, other adverbs - time, place, manner, degree - closed class of function words (now, where, so, too, just, …) - open class of derived words (-ly  quickly, saliently, …)  relation to adjectives: - the most obvious adverbs – derived from the adjectives by adding –ly  addition of –ly sometimes forms adjectives, not adverbs - most participle adjectives ending in –ed don´t have an adverb form and so we use a prepositional phrase instead: They rose to greet me in a subdued manner. (not subduedly) He faced the court in a dignified fashion. or we use a preposition and a related noun if there is one: She looked at me in amazement. (not amazedly) He was overwhelmed with confusion. (not confusedly) - prototypical members of the adverb category enter into the system of grade, though the –er and –est suffixes are incompatible with the –ly suffix  for the most part comparatives and superlatives are formed by means of more and most  function – distinguishes adverbs from adjectives - mostly function as modifiers of verbs, adjectives, other adverbs Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - intensification of: gradable adjectives – adverbs of degree such as very or extremely can be used - much, greatly, considerably, rather, little non-gradable adjectives - we can use adverbs which emphasize their extreme or absolute sense, such as absolutely, completely Adjunct - an element which is part of a clause or sentence in which it modifies the verb - another term for adverbial - generally optional parts of the sentence Adverbial - adds extra meaning - most peripheral of the clause elements (subject, verb phrase, object, complement, adverbial) - normally optional – can be omitted without changing the meaning - can consist of and adverb phrase (She left very suddenly), prepositional phrase (at midnight; through the window), noun phrase (last night; the week before last), or of an adverbial clause (as soon as she could) ADJECTIVES AND ADVERBS ENDING IN –LY  IDENTICAL IN FORM early train finished early a likely story most likely to succeed a monthly visit she visited him monthly ADJECTIVES AND ADVERBS  TWO FORMS – DIFFERENCE IN MEANING She arrived late in the a昀琀ernoon. I haven’t seen her lately. She works hard. She hardly ever works. Stay close together He watched her closely. The plane 昀氀ew high above. They were praised highly. live deep in the woods deeply in love The door was wide open. He seems to be widely known her - some adverbs have two forms, one ending in –ly and the other not. we can sometimes use either of the two forms of the adverb without changing the meaning, although the form ending in –ly is grammatically correct and more usual in a formal style - comparison to a higher degree – is expressed by the inflected forms in –er and –est or their periphrastic equivalents with more and most - positive (absolute) – comparative – superlative - monosyllabic adjectives normally form their comparison by inflection - many disyllabic adjectives can also take inflections, though they have the alternative of a periphrastic form 4 – English auxiliaries and modals Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 Auxiliary verbs –subclass of verbs whose members are used to mark tense, aspect, mood, voice,  often marked by inflection - tend to convey meanings which elsewhere are expressed by inflection of the verb a) modal – 9 core verbs: could, can, should, shall, may, might, will, would, must b) non-modal – do, be, have – they have grammatical function - auxiliary verbs behave differently from lexical verbs in a number of ways, the most important syntactic ways involve the “NICE” properties of auxiliaries:  N egation  I nversion  C oda  E mphasis Modal verbs – their status is in some degree intermediate between auxiliaries and main verbs - central modals: can, may, shall, must, will/could, might, should, would - marginal modals: dare, need, ought to, used to – are not used that often - modal verbs behave differently than lexical verbs in a number of ways, the most important being subject-auxiliary inversion and negation - from semantic point of view, modal verbs behave differently from the other verbs Modality deals with two contrasts: 1. factual vs non-factual She talked to him. She has talked to him. She may have talked to him. 2. assertion vs non-assertion She must leave today. She leaves today. - we distinguish three kinds of meanings of modal verbs: a) epistemic – expresses human knowledge/judgement – possibility, probility, logical necessity, opinion (should, may) b) deontic – expresses human action – permitting people to do something – permission, obligation to do something (must) c) dynamic – expresses ability (can) - how do deontic and epistemic types of modality differ: Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384  negation: deontic: You may not (cannot) leave yet. = it is not possible for you to leave epistemic: She may not notice it. = it is possible she will not notice it  questions: She may/might/must be the one you mean. Can she be the one you mean?  may/must in the epistemic sense do not appear in questions  past tense: deontic: I thought I could see her yesterday, but I had to work late at the office.  semi- modal used because of the abnormal past time reference of the modals epistemic: She may/must have seen him. - differences between modal auxiliaries and other verbs:  they don´t have nonfinite forms (*to can, *canning, *canned)  they don´t have –s forms (*she cans speak English)  abnormal time reference of past forms (You could leave tomorrow.) – four of the modal auxiliaries (can, may, will, shall) have preterit forms (could, might, would, should) o past time in indirect speech – the past tense modals are used quite regularly as past tense equivalents of their present tense forms in indirect speech construction (You can/may do as you wish.  She said we could/might do as we wished.) o past time in other constructions – could and would act as the past time equivalents of can and will - might and should do not act as the past time equivalents of may and shall o tentativeness or politeness: could, might, would:  tentative permission – Could I see your driving license? I wonder if I might borrow some coffee?  tentative volition – Would you lend me a dollar? I´d be grateful if someone would hold the door open.  tentative possibility – in expressing a tentative option: There could be something wrong with the light switch. Of course, I might be wrong. - in polite directives and requests - one thing making modal auxiliaries similar to lexical verbs is that they carry meaning CAN, COULD, BE ABLE TO - if you can do something, it means nothing prevents the situation from happening but it is not certain if it will happen a) possibility (it is possible for even …) Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 b) ability (are you able to …); ability in the past/future: could is the past form of can only with the meaning of general ability, not with specific achievements c) permission (are we allowed …?) MAY, MIGHT, CAN, COULD a) possibility – they can express the possibility of a situation occurring, but it is equally possible that the situation will not occur - can expresses that something is not unusual possibility – in formal English, may/might is sometimes used in the same possibility sense as can/could I think he might have broken his left leg.  it is possible something happened You could have killed yourself.  it was possible – possibility in the past - unrealized b) permission – may is more formal than can, as a permission auxiliary MUST, HAVE TO, HAVE GOT TO a) logical necessity b) strong obligation – the speaker is advocating a certain form of behavior, thus must, unlike have to, typically suggests that the speaker is exercising his authority - are interchangeable SHALL, SHOULD, OUGHT TO a) tentative inference b) weak obligation - with the perfect aspect, should and ought to typically have the implication that the recommendation has not been carried out - shall is substitute for the future use of will in formal style - it is also used for making offers and suggestions - archaic WILL, WOULD a) prediction b) willingness - will can be used in an epistemic meaning with the past tense Modal verbs connected with the idea of permission, obligation and volition: 1) must is used when there is a strong obligation in the mind of the speaker or person being talked about 2) have to is used when the obligation comes from an external authority or someone else 3) is used to talk about rights/responsibilities/obligations which are not strong 4) expresses the idea that someone disapproves of something or it is strictly forbidden 5) expresses the idea that there is no law or requirement to make you do something 5 – verb complementation CANONICAL CLAUSE STRUCTURE Canonical clause Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - it has two main constituents: subject + the predicate predicate – everything that is not the subject - can consist of a single verb, but the verb cannot stand on its own – predicate is not the same thing as a verb - in the canonical clause:  the subject precedes the predicate (declarative clause)  the subject typically takes the form of a noun phrase, and the predicate is a verb phrase  the verb precedes the object  the object typically takes the form of a noun phrase The subject - is obligatory in English and not obligatory in Czech a) syntactic properties – the subject is distinguished from other elements in the clause structure by the combination of a number of syntactic properties  basic position - before verb, in English  case – for some noun phrases, there is a inflectional distinction of case that separates subjects from most non-subjects; it´s typical for NPs consisting of pronouns like I/me, he/him, she/her, we/us, they/them  verb agreement – all verbs other than the modal auxiliaries agree with the subject in the present tense b) semantic properties – in canonical clauses that describe an action, the subject of the clause normally corresponds semantically to the performer of the action  the agent - the subject can be associated with a range of roles, depending on the kind of situation described and whether the clause is active or passive the patient  being affected by something - the verb is the most important element in determining what the rest of the clause is like - a large percentage of verbs in English allow or require an object  transitivity The object - syntactic properties of the object:  object is obligatory with some verbs  its basic position is right after the verb  it typically corresponds to the subject of an associated passive clause  it can normally take the form of a pronoun - transitivity – the number of objects in the clause - transitive verbs – need object - intransitive verbs – do not need object a) pure intransitive verb – no object at all - appear, die, fall, happen, … b) verbs which can also be transitive with the same meaning – no change in the subject-verb relationship - they have understood object “He smokes (a pipe).” “I am reading (a book).” Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - in some cases the intransitive verb acquires a more specific meaning, so that a particular kind of object is understood “John drinks (heavily).”  drinks alcohol - objects that follow transitive verbs can be called complements (noun phrase, verb, adverb, propositional phrase) - direct/indirect object a) semantic roles:  the direct object is characteristically associated with the semantic role of the patient  the indirect object is characteristically associated with the semantic role of recipient b) syntax of the direct and indirect object: John will give Mary a book.  when two object co-occur in canonical clause, the indirect object precedes the direct object - different construction with a prepositional phrase: John will give the book to Mary.  the book is the direct object to Mary is the prepositional object John will give Mary a book. John will give a book to Mary.  the difference is related to functional sentence perspective: old vs new information/topic focus/theme – rheme The structure of phrases - head alone/with dependents (complements and modifiers) - complements - are related more closely to the head than modifiers - obligatory in the clearest cases - umbrella term (can include an object) - object complement – “I met a friend of yours.” - predicative complement – “She was a friend of yours.” - modifiers - are optional – you can have more than one - umbrella term (includes attributes, adjuncts, adverbials - ditransitive verb – takes two objects in its verb pattern - “I should have lent you my keys.” – “you” is the indirect object, “my keys” is the direct object “Max gave Mary a photo.” – “Mary” is indirect object/complement, “a photo” is direct object Complement clause – acts as the complement of a word (verb/adj/noun) - that-clause, wh-clause, ing-clause, infinitive clause “I´d like to carry on”  the infinitive clause “to carry on” is the complement of the verb “like” Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 Non-finite clause – clause which contains a non-finite verb, i. e. a verb which does not involve variation for number, person and tense;  infinitive clauses  -ing clauses  -ed clauses - they have elements as subject, verb, object, adverbial - the object is usually omitted - non-finite verb – does not involve variation for past tense and present tense - 3 forms:  the infinitive, with or without “to” (bare infinitive if without “to”) – to be, to eat, to live  the –ing form (present participle/gerund) – being, eating, living  the –ed form (past participle – been, eaten, lived Verbs used in monotransitive function require a complement, which may be a noun phrase, but also a dependent finite clause, or a non-finite clause. - the infinitive - gives a sense of mere potentiality - denotes the imaginative (unreal) - something projected (into the future) - ing – denotes the factual - something actually done - actual performance of the action itself  some classes of verbs take both constructions:  emotive verbs  aspectual verbs of beginning, continuing and ending - all of them can appear with the –ing form 1. initial part 2. continuing 3. final part  retrospective verbs – remember, regret - the infinitive construction indicates that the action or event takes place after, and as a result of, the mental process (I remembered to fill out the form) - the participle construction refers to a preceding event coming to mind at the time indicated by the main verb (I remembered filling out the form)  infinitives and – ing forms in the complementation of perception verbs - what are perception verbs? - non-finite verb forms such as –ing and bare infinitive can be used after them - bare infinitive is used when talking about the process - -ing form is used when talking about accomplishments  complementation of the verb “suggest” Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - suggest often presents problems - it is never followed by an infinitive in the active voice (only in passive) - while the infinitival participle to never follows the verb suggest, the preposition to must be used to introduce the recipient; the verb suggest is never used with an indirect object: Can´t you suggest them something? Can´t you suggest something to them? 6 Non-canonical clauses differ from the canonical ones on one or more dimensions, mainly:  clause type – declarative – statements  the subject is present and generally precedes the verb - the default clause type – all canonical clauses belong to it - it lacks the special syntactic properties of the other clause types - interrogative - questions – yes/no interrogatives – polar  the operator is placed in front of the subject - wh-interrogatives  the interrogative wh-element is positioned initially - imperatives - directives - no clear grammatical subject - verb has the base form - “Give me a digital watch for my birthday.” - exclamatives - exclamations – initial phrase introduced by what or how, usually with subject-verb order - “What a fine watch he received for his birthday!”  polarity – positive - negative  information packaging – speakers have many syntactic choices in presenting information to their addresses, which may also be non-canonical - statements – to convey information - questions – to seek information - echo question/declarative question – used to express surprise - directives – to instruct somebody to do something - exclamations – for expressing the extent to which the speaker is impressed by something Clausal negation It is raining. It isn´t raining.  differ in polarity. - a positive clause/clause with positive polarity - a negative clause/clause with negative polarity Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - positive polarity items: some, something, always, already, too - negative polarity items: any, at all, ever, yet, either  in terms of meaning they aren´t negative, but they appear in negative clauses or questions - negation is marked by words (not, no, never) or by affixes within a word (-n´t, un-, non-) - polarity – the grammatical system in which positive and negative contrast - semantically – a simple pair of positive and negative clauses are related in such a way that they cannot both be true/false; one has got to be true - tag – consists of an auxiliary verb + personal pronoun subject - its polarity is the reverse of that of the clause to which it is attached - positive clause + negative tag: “They have read my book, haven´t they?” - negative clause + positive tag: “They haven´t read my book, have they?” - two types of clausal negation:  verbal clausal negation: o We didn´t find any mistakes. o There isn´t anyone here. o He doesn´t ever apologise.  non-verbal clausal negation: o We found no mistakes. o There is no one here. o He never apologises. Subclausal negation/local negation - negative elements don´t have the effect to make the clause negative - subclausal negation: “He was unkind, wasn´t he?” - clausal negation: “He wasn´t kind, was he?” - two types:  lexical – lexically expressed by means of negative affixes: o prefixes: dis-, in-, non-, un- o suffixes: -less  phrasal Negators - in standard English, negative clausal polarity is marked by a single negator “He didn´t say anything. He said nothing at all.” - in czech, there is a negative concord – there is only one negator which triggers negative concord (negative agreement) on polarity sensitive items (Neřekl nikomu nic.) - there can be more than one negation in both Czech and English – clausal and subclausal negation can combine  “Their behavior was certainly not immoral.” “Jejich chování nebylo nemorální.” - in English and Czech, subclausal negation can combine with clausal negation, resulting in a hesitantly positive interpretation Polarity-sensitive items Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - any, anybody, anyone, never, much, yet, … - occur readily in clauses of one polarity but not of the other. “I have some objections to make.” “*I don´t have some objections to make.” “*I have any objections to make.” “I don´t have any objections to make.” - they are not negative; they just appear in negative context/non-assertive context – context when we don´t present a situation as a fact, but question it, deny it. “Did you see anybody?” “Will it ever end?” Words negative in meaning but not in form - seldom, rarely, scarcely, hardly, barely, little, few  they are followed by nonassertive forms  sentences in which they appear require a positive tag question: “They hardly have any friends, do they?” “Hardly anyone wants the job 7 The distinction between Czech and English word order should be viewed as a distinction in the prevailing roles or functions that the word order plays in the language system The main principles of word order: 1. grammatical principle - the position of each sentence element within the sentence is determined by its grammatical function  subjective before predicate in English 2. functional sentence perspective/information structure - the sentence is oriented towards an element which conveys the information that contributes most to the development of communication - sentence elements of the given utterance are organized in conformity with the information structuring principles Functions of word order:  in English – it has grammatical function  suggests what is subject, object, …  in Czech – it expresses functional sentence perspective  it signals the information load in terms of what is old information and what is new Information structuring - speakers have many syntactic choices in presenting information to their addresses - is regulated by a number of principles: Given-before-New  speakers, in composing their message, will tend to place given information (the info known in the previous situation) before new information Principle of End Weight  heavy constituents, in the sense of units containing many words, tend to be placed at the end of the message - the elements carrying communicative dynamism can be divided into:  theme/topic/given  rheme/focus/new Peter (theme/topic/given) married a strong woman (rheme/focus/new). Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 The methods applied by English for FSP include:  stress  articles and demonstratives  word/constituent order – double object construction  specific syntactic structures – passivization - existential construction (there-construction) Voice - the terms differ as to how the syntactic functions are aligned with semantic roles - passive and active – based on the semantic role of the subject in clauses expressing actions - the category of voice expresses relation between syntactic and semantic structure of the sentence - in the verb phrase, the difference between the two voice categories is that the passive adds a form of the auxiliary “be” followed by the past participle (-ed) of the main verb - process of passivization: a) take the object and make it subject b) make the verb passive (be + -en) c) if required, express agent as a by-phrase Passives of ditransitive verbs - if there are two different active voice sentences, there will be two passive ones: John gave the book to Mary. The book was given to Mary. John gave Mary a book. Mary was given a book. - the noun phrase immediately following the verb can become the subject of the passive sentence Passivisation can have two different and opposing functions: 1. long passive – making the agent prominent by placing him at the end “John wrote a book.” “The book was written by John. (not by Peter).”  the subject of the passive can represent old information (the book) 2. short passive – getting rid of the agent - occurs when the agent is irrelevant/unknown - the agent is left out as redundant Agent is:  general – It is believed… Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - It can´t be explained…  author – As has been stated before… - this was studied in detail…  hidden – the team was beaten… - the house was searched  none – the city is situated - the two forms are distributed equally  these short passives are more frequent; they enable us to leave out something that would be obligatory in the active (a main clause subject) - the passive is generally more commonly used in informative than in imaginative writing, and is notably more frequent in the objective, impersonal style of scientific articles and news reporting - primarily, only transitive verbs – verbs that need an object or objects – have passive forms - the subject of a passive may correspond to an object of a preposition rather than of the verb - prepositional verbs (verbal idioms consisting of a lexical verb followed by a preposition, such as “look at”) can often occur in the passive, but not so freely as in the active “The dean was called on.”  prepositional passive – its preposition is in post-verbal position, stranded Voice constraints – the active (transitive) and passive sentences are not in systematic correspondence:  active only – middle verbs (a kind of transitive verbs) do not occur at least in some senses in the passive  object constraints – co-reference between a subject and a noun phrase object blocks the passive correspondence - occurs with:  reflexive pronouns  reciprocal pronouns  possessive pronouns when co-referential to the subject  meaning constraints – a difference of preferred interpretation only, arises from the fact that is subject position, a generic phrase tends to be interpreted universally, while in object or agent position, this universal meaning disappears “Excessive drinking causes high blood pressure.” “High blood pressure is caused by excessive drinking.” 8 simple sentence = canonical clause – the most basic syntactically - syntactically independent - consists of one clause only Composite sentence - multiple sentence/sentence complex - two types of relations:  subordination – subordinate clauses characteristically function as a dependent within a larger clause, and very often they differ in their internal structure from main clauses Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 “She is ill.” - main “I know that she is ill.” – subordinate/non-canonical  coordination – one clause may be coordinated with another; the relation usually being marked by means of a coordinator such as “and” or “or” - canonical clauses are non-coordinate “That´s Bill.” “I´m blind.” “That´s Bill or I´m blind.” Conjunction – refers to words that have a conjoining or linking role in grammar to two rather different classes of words a) coordinating conjunctions – coordinators - and, or, but, nor  used to link two or more units of the same status b) subordinating conjunctions – subordinators - if, when, because, …  placed at the beginning of a subordinate clause to link it into the main clause Subordinate clauses often differ in their internal structure from main clauses. “Sue is the best candidate.” “I agree that Sue is the best candidate.” Classification of subordinate clauses according to their structure:  finite clause – a clause whose verb element is finite (takes, took, can work, has worked, is writing, was written, …)  nonfinite clause – a clause whose verb element is nonfinite (to work, having worked, taken, …) a) infinitive clauses (This is the best way to serve dressed crab.) b) –ing clauses (They have an odd way of serving dressed crab.) c) – ed clauses (The dressed crab served in this restaurant is excellent.) - normally subordinate clauses, the subject is usually omitted - non-finite verb – does not involve variation for past tense and present tense Classification of subordinate clauses according to their function:  nominal clauses – take on functions associated with noun phrases (subject/object in the main clause) (What you do) does not concern me.  subject Everyone knows (that mercury is a metal).  object - punctuation – comma never separates the reported clause from the reporting clause - tenses – no restrictions on the use of will in nominal clauses - word order – no inversion in indirect questions  adverbial clauses – take the function of adverbials She suddenly left (when the police entered the building).  relative clauses – take an adjectival function as modifiers in a noun phrase I´ve talked to the people (who live there). The computer (which they bought) was very powerful. - are post-modifiers in a noun phrase - the relative pronoun/adverb – relativizer – points back to the head of the noun phrase, which is usually referred to as the antecedent  restrictive (defining) relative clauses – bring information that is crucial to identify the referent of the head noun (antecendent) Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 - if the relative clause is omitted, the meaning of the sentence would be completely different – RELATIVE CLAUSES CANNOT BE LEFT OUT - it is not separated by commas - all relative pronouns (who/whom/whose, which, that), depending on the antecedent, can be used - if they function as the object, they can be omitted  non-restrictive (non-defining) relative clauses – bring only additional information – info that is not necessary to identify the referent of the head noun (antecedent) - if the relative clause is omitted, the meaning of the sentence does not change - the relative clause is often separated by commas - only wh-pronouns can be used – “that” is not used - the relative pronoun must be used, even if it functions as an object in relative clause Indirect condition “She is far too considerate, if I may say so.” – conditional clause is a conventional expression of politeness; it makes the speaker´s utterance seemingly dependent on the permission of the speaker “I met your girlfriend Caroline last night, if Caroline is your fiend.” – the conditional clause expresses uncertainty about the extralinguistic knowledge required for a correct interpretation of the utterance. The uncertainty may be the speaker´s or the hearer´s Direct condition - the truth of the proposition in the main clause is a consequence of the fulfillment of the condition in the conditional clause “If you put the baby down, she´ll scream” antecedent consequent Real/open conditional – the situation is or was true, or may have been or may become true - we use a present tense to talk about the future, the present or unchanging relationships, and past tenses to talk about the past Unreal/hypothetical conditional – the situation is imaginary or untrue Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])  lOMoARcPSD|41499384 Conditional subordinators: if, unless, so long as, assuming (that), given (that), in case, in the event that, on condition (that), provided (that), providing (that), supposing (that) Reported speech - structure – the main clause + the reported clause (direct/indirect speech) in objection position - reporting clause accompanies both direct and indirect reports of somebody´s speech or thought – it specifies the speaker/thinker, the addressee, the type of act - types – direct speech – the reporting clause introducing direct speech may be placed in initial, medial or final position – “He said, ´I have a violent head pain. ´” - indirect speech – “He said that he had a violent head pain.” Downloaded by Jan Mat?jka ([email protected])