GIU Summary - Study Guide PDF

GIU, Summery of Tutorials and Lectures Session 1: Topic 1: Definitions of Grammar: 1. Grammar as a system that organises language 2. Grammar as a book of rules written about this system 3. Grammar as a branch of linguistics (closely linked with phon...

GIU, Summery of Tutorials and Lectures Session 1: Topic 1: Definitions of Grammar: 1. Grammar as a system that organises language 2. Grammar as a book of rules written about this system 3. Grammar as a branch of linguistics (closely linked with phonology and lexicon) Grammar is closely linked with other linguistic domains Idioms: kick the bucket, spill the beans, a piece of cake,... Phonology-grammar o use (n.) vs. use (v.), live (v.) vs. live (adj.) o different stress pattern: artist vs artistic o plural -s differently realised phonetically (cats, dogs, buses) Branches of grammar: Syntax is the study of sentence structure. Morphology is the study of the shape and structure of words. She + is + singing + loudly. → Syntax: studies how words are combined to create sentences he is sing-ing loud-ly. →Morphology: studies how morphemes are combined to create words. Morphology: Morphology studies morphemes Morphemes are the smallest units of meaning in language Inflectional morphology “a morphological change in verbs, nouns and some other verb classes, that expresses a grammatical meaning such as number or tense” (Biber, Conread & Leech 2002) Word class does NOT change Easy way to tell: no separate dictionary entry e.g. eat – ate – eaten Derivational morphology “the process by which one word is derived from another” (Biber, Conrad & Leech 2002) New word is created by adding an affix (e.g. –ly, -ful, -ise/-ize) Word class can change, but does not necessarily have to! Easy way to tell: separate entry in the dictionary e.g. photo – photography – photographer. Example: They were running down the street when they saw a woman run in the opposite direction. running → verb (ing- form) run → verb (infinitive) Two different forms of the same verb, thus: inflectional morphology. Example: She is an experienced swimmer and thus, she can swim very well. swimmer → noun swim → verb Two different words (two separate dictionary entries!) and thus: derivational morphology. Collocations and colligations: Collocations are combinations of words which frequently cooccur Words with a statistical tendency to go together “I did my homework.” “I made my bed.” → *“I made my homework.” and *“I did my bed.” do not work, because even though “do” and “make” express something similar, they do not occur with the same words! The colligation is a subtype of the collocation Words co-occurring with a grammatical feature (verb form, preposition, etc.) “She wanted to run to the store.” (wanted + to run, infinitive) Prescriptive and descriptive grammar: Prescriptive Prescribing fixed grammar rules  Telling people how to use language Descriptive Describing how language is actually used Making no value judgement What is “wrong” in these sentences from a prescriptive perspective? He wanted to quietly leave the room. → split infinitive Should be something like: “He wanted to leave the room quietly.” What are you waiting for? → stranded preposition Could be something like: “For what are you waiting?” (Although in this case, both sound a little wrong.) Me and my sister are going to Berlin. → oblique form (wrong case!) Should be something like: “My sister and I are going to Berlin.” Summary: Grammar can be defined in multiple ways Usually comprised of syntax and morphology (further divided into inflectional and derivational) Collocations are words that tend to co-occur, colligations a subtype Prescriptive and descriptive are different approaches to grammar Form and meaning: One meaning can be expressed through many different forms “You must complete the StEOP before taking the Grammar in Use exam.” “You have to complete the StEOP before taking the Grammar in Use exam.” “You are required to complete the StEOP before taking the Grammar in Use exam.” → the concept of obligation can be expressed in multiple ways One form can express many different meanings “You must be joking.” “You must hand in your assignment tomorrow.” → “must” means something different in those two sentences; in the first one, it refers to a logical conclusion, saying that the person had to be joking and the second one refers to an obligation Grammaticalization: refers to the process whereby lexical words become function words (e.g. “going to”). Lexical or content words, in this case, refer to those words which have a lexical meaning while function words are those which express a grammatical function. In the case of “going to”, the literal movement gradually turned into the figurative future. The study of grammar: Introspection (“How would I say it?”) Elicitation (“How would you say it?”) Corpora (“How do people, in general, say it?”)  Session 2: Topic 2 Units of grammar: Sentences: usually beginning with a capitalised letter and ending with a period / full stop; made up of one or multiple clauses →Clauses: basically any construction containing a lexical verb →Phrases: words grouped around a head, e.g. a noun phrase →Words: combinations of morphemes, marked by spaces between them →Morphemes: smallest unit of meaning in language, dealt with in morphology Constituents: definition A constituent is a word or a string of words which syntactically behaves as a unit in a larger construction, i.e. a building block of language. Immediate constituents are constituents which immediately make up a construction. How do we identify the constituents of a sentence? →constituency tests! constituency tests: Substitution Movement Sentence fragment (Coordination) (Insertion) … Substitution →Replacing a string of words with a single word (e.g. a pronoun) - He loves his new mattress. - He loves it. Movement →Moving a string of words to another position in the sentence (e.g. making a passive sentence) - He loves his new mattress. - His new mattress is loved by him. Sentence fragment →Checking if a string of words can be used to answer a question - He loves his new mattress. - What does he love? His new mattress. Constituents can also exist within other constituents, this is then called nesting (nested phrase). My friend drinks orange soda. representing constituency structure: 1. Bracketing Charles [eats the pizza]. 2. Underlining Charles eats the pizza. 3. Tree Diagrams Bracketing [The captain] [eats [the pie]]. Underlining Tree diagrams  A different way of representing them: Exercise: Identifying and analysing the grammatical structure of a sentence is called parsing. Syntactic categories: Summary: Sentences can be comprised of one or multiple clauses Clauses must contain a verb Constituents are words or strings of words which syntactically behave as a unit Ambiguities: Young boys and girls love the adventure playground. The boy hit his brother with a stick. → Syntactic / structural ambiguities; i.e. constructions that are not entirely clear and may have more than one meaning; can be represented with several different tree diagrams Syntactic class & syntactic function: Terry loves yoghurt. Syntactic class: noun Syntactic function: direct object Syntactic category/ Word class/ Part of speech (POS) → different names for the same thing; all syntactic classes! open & closed: Open classes also called lexical / content words new words can be added with no problem “I googled that.” “He tweeted about it.” Closed classes fixed in the membership, i.e. hard (almost impossible) to add items classification How do we know to which class a word belongs? Syntactic criteria (i.e. grammatical behaviour) Morphological criteria (i.e. what a word looks like, inflectional and derivational morphology) Semantic criteria (i.e. what a word means)  Session 3 Topic 3 Subjects Semantic: Usually referring to actor / agent (‘doer’ of an action) or topic Syntactic: Usually left-most constituent Typically a NP (as short as possible → light subject constraint) Inversion in interrogatives (He is nice. Is he nice?) The predicate consists of: Predicator She showed the women kindness. Complements complements There are two (main) types of complementation: Direct objects: entity affected by the action / process of a verb → the patient. I saw a great film. Indirect objects: entity receiving something → the recipient / beneficiary She gave him her hand. Things to remember about direct and indirect objects: They cannot be an AdjP (e.g. *They told nice a story.) Indirect object (Oi) precedes direct object (Od) (e.g. He sent her a book.; *He sent a book her.) Oi can often be paraphrased by a PP (e.g. I sent a book to her.) Can be made into a passive sentence (e.g. A book was sent to her. / She was sent a book.) subject and object complements Subject complement: property or attribute of the subject; follows a copular verb (be, feel, look, appear, seem, smell, taste). My brother is a successful businessman. This dish smells absolutely repulsive. Object complement: property or attribute of the object; requires a direct object in the sentence! He considered his ally intelligent. The woman called him mad. What kind of complement (Od, Oi, SC, OC)? subject complements There are two types of subject complements: Attributive Identifying My brother is an amazing person. → just a description; therefore attributive My brother is the guy in the green shorts. → singles out my brother from a group of people; therefore identifying With identifying SC, the two NP (i.e. subject and complement) can be switched. Summary Syntactic class determines what a word is, syntactic function determines what a word does There are open and closed syntactic classes Subject and predicate are syntactic functions Direct object, indirect objects, subject complements and object complements are types of complementation Optional elements: adjuncts: Adjuncts express circumstantial meanings (e.g. time, place, manner). They are often optional and moveable. Obligatory adjuncts: The candy is in the hall. (Locative complements!) They live in a haunted house. He was looking for you. (PP-complements of prepositional verbs!) Complementation patterns: Transitivity is a property of verbs which describes how many objects or complements a verb can take. There are five different complementation patterns you need to know for this course: Intransitive Monotransitive Ditransitive Copulative Complex-transitive Intransitive →no objects or complements Examples: He disappeared. I flinched. The door creaked. The zombies ran. Monotransitive →Just one object (Od) - She carries a pumpkin. - Brendon drank some punch. -They saw a big mummy. Ditransitive →Two objects (Oi and Od) - He gave her a good scare. -She showed them the basement. -They told us a scary story. Copulative →Always with a SC (copular verb!) -He felt scared. - The party is wild. -The graveyard brownies taste amazing. Complex-transitive →Always with an OC and an Od -He called the vampire a bad influence. -The novel made her terrified of zombies. - The werewolf considered the bat a friend. Complementation patterns: exercise  Session 4: Topic 4 Nouns: → Semantic, morphological and syntactic criteria Subclasses: Common nouns: - Have plural and singular - Count & mass nouns Proper nouns: - Capitalised - Places and people Pronouns: - Eight different subtypes pronouns Types of pronouns: Personal: I, we, you, he, she, it, me, us, him, them, … Relative: who, what, … Possessive: strong (mine, theirs, yours, …) and weak (my, your, our, …) Indefinite: some, any, … Reflexive: herself, yourself, myself, … Reciprocal: each other, one another, …  Demonstrative: this/these, that /those Interrogative: who, what, where, … Nouns: common nouns Invariably singular - Concepts, ideas - E.g. ignorance, information, advice Invariably plural - E.g. clothes, trousers Count nouns - Countable - Usually things, objects; separate items; concrete - E.g. apple, t-shirt Mass nouns - Non-countable - Usually substances, concepts - E.g. rice, dust Count / mass uses of the same nouns – determine the use of the noun: Collective nouns: 1. The team has won its first game. 2. The team have won their first game. →Variety (1. is more AE, while 2. is more BE) →Meaning → 1. focus on totality, not individuals → 2. focus on members as individuals Noun phrases: definition Type of phrase determined by the head Head: - Most important element - Indicates what is being described Example: his red football boots → boots is the head, therefore this is a NP NPs contain a noun as a head Can be expanded by adding elements before or after the head - Vampires love candy. - Vampires love Halloween candy. - Vampires love sweet Halloween candy. - Vampires love the sweet Halloween candy that I keep in a jar by my front door. Noun phrases: structure Summary: Adjuncts are elements of a sentence which can be optional but don’t have to be Transitivity is a property which refers to a verb’s tendency to take objects Nouns can be separated into common nouns, proper nouns and pronouns Noun phrases are phrases with a noun as the head Noun phrases consist of pre-head dependents (determiners, modifiers), the head, and post-head dependents (complements, modifiers and peripheral dependents) Noun phrases: post-head dependents Complement: Restricted number of heads it can refer to ‘controlled by the head’ (tight semantic bond with head) Semi-obligatory Examples: - This is an example of a complement. - The course on literature was interesting. - The head of the department is nice. Modifier Not bound to a certain type of noun (many different heads possible) No tight semantic bond with head Optional Examples: - The students at the prom sipped their punch. - The book on the desk is Kat’s. - The man in the convertible was blocking the way. Peripheral dependent: Usually an apposition or a non-restrictive relative clause Usually longer attachments to the phrase; set off by commas Optional Examples: - The guy in my English class, Joey, is very mean. - My sister, who loves books, does not like Joey. - He went to the concert, which took place in the Skunk bar. Relative clauses A relative clause is… a whole finite clause part of a NP a post-head dependent introduced by a relative pronoun (not a subordinator!) The blond girl, who is yelling at her fellow students, is called Katarina. Relative elements: Relative pronouns: who, whom, whose, which, that, etc. →replace people or things Relative adverbs: when, where, why, etc. →replace adverbials of time, place, reason, etc. Relative elements have a syntactic function within the relative clause Usually subject, object, adjunct etc. Relative clauses: (non-)restrictive: - You have just taken the book which I wanted. How many books? → multiple books - You have just taken the book, which I wanted. How many books? → one book Relative clauses: reduced relative clauses Relative clauses can be reduced by turning it into a non-finite clause by adding –ed or – ing to the verb. Examples: - Most people who showed showing up to the party were not invited. - Who is that guy who is talking to your sister? - I know the guy who was punched by Bianca. Relative clauses: sentential rel. clauses A sentential relative clause is a clause that relates to a whole sentence. Examples: - The school was empty, which was unusual for this hour. - In 1999, Heath Ledger played the part of Patrick Verona in this film, which has catapulted him to fame. Summary - Noun phrases consist of pre-head dependents (determiners, modifiers), the head, and post-head dependents (complements, modifiers and peripheral dependents) - Complements and modifiers are sometimes hard to distinguish from each other, but in general, complements have a very close relationship with the head - Relative clauses are finite clauses introduced by relative elements (either pronouns or adverbs)  Session 5: Topic 5 Situation types: parameters Three parameters: Duration: length of time an event lasts (does it last long or is it over immediately?) - Durative or punctual Dynamic: Is it an event (dynamic situation; do we put effort into it) or a state? - Dynamic or stative Inherent endpoint (i.e. telicity): Is there some kind of ‘goal’ or endpoint? - Conclusive or non-conclusive Situation types, Four situation types: State: durative; stative; does not have an inherent endpoint Activity: durative; dynamic; does not have an inherent endpoint Accomplishment: durative; dynamic; has an inherent endpoint Achievement: punctual; dynamic; has an inherent endpoint A major distinction exists between stative (state) verbs and dynamic (event) verbs → every situation type that starts with an “A” is dynamic! Verb phrase: structure Verb phrase: auxiliaries What can be expressed by auxiliaries? Tense Aspect Voice Modality Aspect …gives information about whether the speaker is talking about a situation as a whole or just “the middle” of a situation. English has two aspects: the perfect and the progressive Perfect : viewed from the outside, in retrospect Aspect: progressive viewed from the inside, in progress stative / state verbs: She sits on the floor. She is sitting on the floor. → compresses the time of an action event / dynamic verbs He eats a piece of cake. He is eating a piece of cake. → stretches the time of an action Three effects of the progressive aspect: - Duration → time lengthened - Limited duration → time shortened - Not necessarily complet Summary There are four different situation types (state, activity, accomplishment, achievement) The verb phrase consists of pre-head dependents (modal and auxiliary verbs), the head (verb) and post-head dependents (complements) There is a fixed order for auxiliary verbs (modal, perfect, progressive, passive) Aspect gives information about an action; establishes whether a speaker is talking about a whole action or just the middle of a situation Aspect: progressive Verbs which cannot be used in the progressive:  Session 6: Topic 6: Right or wrong? 1. Lexical verbs express different situation types. 2. Auxiliary verbs can function as the head of the verb phrase. 3. The order of auxiliary verbs is perfect aux., modal aux., progressive aux., and passive aux. 4. English has two aspects: the perfect and the progressive. 5. With the progressive the beginning and end of a situation are out of focus. 6. Activities and states combine most naturally with the progressive as a temporal frame. 7. An achievement in the progressive indicates a series of events rather than a single event. Time and tense:  Tense = grammatical expression of time; realised by verb inflection  Past and present (non-past)  Time = a semantic category  Past, present, future Past tense: effect →Always used to express distance 1. Temporal distance: “They talked about grammar yesterday.” Distance between present and past situations  2. Social distance: “I wanted to ask you if you could lend me a hand?” Distance between two people to be polite and save face 3. Hypothetical distance: “If I had a garden, I would get a dog.” Distance between reality and hypothetical situation Past tense: historic present = use of the simple present to refer to something in the past, usually in chronological order. No distancing effect → expresses immediacy and relevance! Example: “So, yesterday I walk home and see that creepy guy on the corner. He says to me “Hey, I think I know you”, and I’m like, “No, I don’t think so…” → Tense and time do not necessarily have to match! Past tense: present perfect, Three uses of the present perfect: State or habit-up-to-the-present → Began in the past and is still going on Jess has lived here for three months. Indefinite past → Happened at some point in the past, details of the situation are not important, Nick has been to New York before. Resultative past → Results of the past carry over into the present, Winston has passed his driving test. Past tense: past perfect = refers to a situation anterior to something that happened in the past Winston had already left when we arrived. She used the phone her friend had given her. Summary There are four types of verbs incompatible with the progressive aspect (verbs of inert cognition, verbs of inert perception, state verbs of ‘having’ and ‘being’, verbs of attitude). There is a distinction between tense and time (time being a semantic concept and tense the realisation of this concept). Future references There is no future tense, but we have future reference through various means. Future references: “Will” Will + infinitive (future simple) Internal factors: speaker as the source Spontaneous decisions: “This turkey looks terrible. I’ll get Schmidt to make it next year.” Promises: “I won’t forget that it’s my turn to clean the kitchen tomorrow.” Willingness: “Can I borrow your copy of “Dirty Dancing”? Sure, I’ll bring it tomorrow.” External factors: something else is the source Prediction: “Jess will teach a class tomorrow.” Will + progressive (future progressive) Ongoing state / activity: This time next week, we will be exploring New York. Matter-of-fact / matter-of-course: We will be talking about this tomorrow. Politeness: When will you be paying me back the money? Future reference: “Going to” Be going to + infinitive Internal factors: speaker as the source Intention: I am going to talk to Nick. External factors: something else as the source Prediction: It looks like Coach is going to lose this game of True American. Future references: other ways Other ways of referring to the future: Present progressive (for an arrangement): I’m having friends over tonight. Present simple (timetables, fixed events): My plane leaves at three. Be to (formal): She is to meet her new boss. Be about to (informal): He’s about to have dinner. Past in the future (future perfect): By this time next year, you will have finished your studies.  Future in the past: I was going to talk to him. Future reference in subordinate clauses: She is going to be so happy when she passes her exam.  Session 7: Topic 7: Modality: Definition →a semantic concept →a speaker’s attitude towards the factual content of what is expressed by the main verb / sentence You may talk to the detective. Main verb / sentence: You talk to the detective. → Modal verb may expresses the speaker’s attitude, feelings about talking to the detective, i.e., that the speaker allows it. Modal sentences are sentences which do not represent situations as facts but as possible, probable, necessary, etc. Expressed by different linguistic forms, e.g. Modal auxiliary verbs - They could be a model for possible underground life on other planets. - One must consider it possible that it is comparable to all the livening mass... -... where similar subterranean microbes could exist Stance adjuncts (adverbials) - Live bacteria have apparently lived off energy from the Earth’s core... - Unfortunately, we cannot do anything about it. - In actual fact only a fraction of this number actually occurs. Stance subordinate clauses (+ main clause verbs, adjectives, nouns) - The subterranean bacteria seem not to have relied on the Sun’s energy.. - One must consider it possible that it is comparable to all the livening mass...  - It is to be expected that there are very major life-forms down there. Types of modals: central (core) Typical features:  Not inflected in the third person  Followed by bare infinitive (not to-infinitive)  Negated by the addition of n’t or not  Invert with subject to form a question  Some have no past form a. He could sing well when he was young (= past) b. I could help you (= today, tomorrow), if you like Core modals: One single word Can have function of politeness and remoteness Marginal modals More than one word Also called semi-modals Periphrastic (i.e. consisting of multiple words) Characteristics of core modals marginal modals: = those that can sometimes behave as an auxiliary or as a lexical verb Example of need: …as a lexical verb Do you need a lift? → do-support of a question He needs a new car. → third person –s You don’t need to give me anything. → negation with do instead of direct; to instead of bare infinitive …as an auxiliary verb You needn’t worry about the exam. → direct negation Need I take a jacket? → subject-auxiliary inversion for the question Types of modality Epistemic modality: Deductions by the speaker Possibility, necessity, probability, prediction, etc. Deontic / root modality: Requirements from the speaker Permission, obligation, willingness / volition, etc. Subject-oriented modality (dynamic modality): Less frequent Involves some attribute of the subject-referent, i.e. describing the subject Example: Sean can race much faster than Takashi. Explain the ambiguity in terms of modality! Try to give some context for each example. Hedging = “reducing the strength of claims to avoid overstating a case.” The results could indicate an increase in... It seems that... / It is possible that... There is some evidence to support... Other ways of presenting events as non-facts: Mandative Subjunctive - a. They demand that she return the library books immediately. - b. The suggestion that she come back to work was not met with enthusiasm. Conditional clauses - I’d love it, if you came. = Hypothetical - If you had come, you would have met my friend. = Counterfactual Interaction between speaker and hearer: Clause types Summary Modality describes a speaker’s attitude towards something. It is usually expressed through modal verbs, which can be separated into core and peripheral modals. There are two types of modality, deontic (or root) modality and epistemic modality. There are four clause types: declarative, exclamative, interrogative and imperative.  Session 8: Topic 8 Adjectives: properties Semantic - Qualities - Properties - Attributes Morphological - Inflectional: degrees of comparison (absolute, comparative, superlative) - Derivational: -less, -ful, -al, -ous; adverb formation by adding –ly Syntactic - 3 uses of adjectives (attributive, predicative, postpositive) Adjectives: uses Attributive - Comes before the noun, modifies a NP head - E.g. the bad husband; the remote bar; the funny prime minister Predicative - Comes after copular verb - E.g. The husband is bad.; The bar is remote; The prime minister is funny. Postpositive - Comes after the noun - E.g. the attorney general; the president elect Adjectives: terminology What does periphrastic mean? →Using multiple words rather than inflection →In adjectives, used for comparison, e.g. more / most interesting Adjectives: comparison Can be either inflectional or periphrastic Inflectional for adjectives with one syllable Periphrastic for adjectives with three or more syllables Mixed for adjectives with two syllables Adjectives: gradience Gradience expresses how adjective-like an adjective is. Five criteria: - predicative use - attributive use - gradable (very, quite, etc.) - comparative / superlative are possible - adverb formation (usually with the suffix –ly) Adjective phrase: structure Adverbs: properties Semantic - Manner, place, direction, time - Beautifully, loudly (manner); there, outside (place); away, through (direction); now, - tomorrow (time) Morphological - Typical suffix –ly Syntactic - 3 uses of adverbs (circumstantial, degree, sentence) Adverbs: uses Circumstantial - Describing the circumstances of a situation Degree - Introducing a gradient to another word or phrase; always comes before another phrase (e.g. verb phrase, adjective, etc.) Sentence - Modifying the entire sentence Adverb phrase: structure Prepositional phrase Structure of the prepositional phrase: preposition + complement (typically a NP) - The wedding video is in the box. - The actors are on the movie set. - He goes to the jewellery store. Different types of complements: as inferior (adj); from under the bridge (PP) Prepositional phrases are exocentric. The head does not function in the same way as the whole phrase A preposition is not a prepositional phrase. As opposed to endocentric phrases (head functions in the same way as the whole phrase; e.g. a noun is also a noun phrase) Phrasal verb: verb + particle take off, take up, put down, come apart, … Preposition vs. subordinators Summary There are three different types of adjective usage: predicative, attributive and postpositive. Gradience is a concept which describes how “adjective-like” an adjective is. There are three different types of adverb usage: circumstantial, degree or sentence. Prepositional phrases are exocentric and always require a complement.  Session 9: Topic 9: Sentence types Finite and non-finite subordinate clauses Finite clause →Marked for tense I believe that he is in the air vents. Four classes: Noun clause Adverbial clause Relative clause Comparative clause Infinite →Not marked for tense Infinitive, I want to hide in there. -ing clause, I love travelling in airplanes.. -ed clause, Not having seen the film, I can’t really say anything about it.  1. noun clauses a) That-clause - I think that Hans is in the office. Direct object - That Holly wants to get divorced is a shame. Subject - My suggestion is that you don’t jump off the roof using a fire hose as a bungee cord. Subject-complement - She is not particularly happy that John is here. Post-head dependent b) Wh-clause - I saw what they did. Direct object - What the policeman said is wrong. Subject - The question is why Hans did what he did. Subject-complement - John had no idea where Karl was. Post-head dependent  2. adverbial clauses Introduced by subordinator (because, although, if, etc.) Give additional information (i.e. function as adjuncts) Some key types of adverbial clauses: Time: When you are ready, we will leave. Place: Wherever the men are, John will find them. Reason: They went to Nakatomi Plaza because they were invited to a Christmas party. Purpose: He failed to learn German so that he could play the role. Condition: If you study hard, you will pass the exam. Concession: Although it was hard, they all passed the exam. adverbial clauses: Conditional clauses: Two clauses:  Subordinate clause:  Condition, protasis, antecedent  Main clause:  Consequence, apodosis, consequent Real conditionals: - Factual (generally true) - Predictive (likely) Unreal conditionals: - Hypothetical (unlikely) - Counterfactual (impossible)  3. relative clauses - A relative clause is typically finite. - A relative clause is part of a NP. - → relative pronouns and relative adverbs! - A non-restrictive relative clause is separated from the rest of the NP by commas. - You can omit the relative element in restrictive relative clauses.  4. comparative clauses Introduced by than or as: - She was faster than she had thought. - The ventilation shaft is as wide as he had hoped. - His wife is smarter than him. - She was faster than she had thought. - The ventilation shaft is as wide as he had hoped. Than and as → subordinators! Finite clauses: exercise Summary - In subordinate clauses, there is a major distinction between finite and nonfinite clauses. - Finite clauses can be either noun clauses, adverbial clauses, relative clauses or comparative clauses.  Session 10: Topic 10: Finite and non-finite subordinate clauses - Finite clause →Marked for tense I believe that he is in the air vents. - Four classes: Noun clause Adverbial clause Relative clause Comparative clause - infinite clause →Not marked for tense Infinitive I want to hide in there. (to-infinitive, bare infinitive) -ing clause I love travelling in airplanes. (present participle clause) -ed clause Not having watched the film, I can’t really say anything about it. (past participle clause) What is a dangling non-finite clause? - While walking across the street, a car hit her. - Walking down High Street, the buildings were beautiful. → The implied subject of the non-finite clause should be the same as the subject of the main clause. → Other names: dangling modifiers, dangling participles, non-related modifiers / participles. Non-finite clauses: infinitive or –ing? Some verbs allow both (e.g. forget, remember, regret, etc.) →Often causing a difference in meaning! 1. John stopped to watch the cat jump over the fence. → John was doing something else (e.g. walking) and stopped doing that to watch the cat 2. John stopped watching the cat jump over the fence. → John was watching the cat but stopped watching to do something else Non-finite clauses: catenative verbs = verbs that require another verb (usually in the form of a non-finite subordinate clause) afterwards (creating a chain of verbs) = verbs taking a non-finite complement - I want to read this book. - He can help you study for the test. - She enjoys attempting to help him study for the test.  Session 11: Topic 11: Word order: SVOCA, What is the standard (unmarked) word order in English? - Subject - Verb - Object - Complement(s) - Adjunct(s) also called the canonical word order → things can be shifted around for emphasis! Word order: adjuncts Position of adjuncts is quite flexible! End of sentence: The girls were fighting with each other angrily. Beginning of sentence: Angrily, the girls were fighting with each other Before lexical verb: The girls were angrily fighting with each other. Information packaging: terminology Cohesion: = establishing (formal) links between sentences - Textual level - Text-internal - Formal links between sentences (e.g. pronouns, coordinators, etc.) Coherence: - Meaning level  - Text-external - Logical connections between ideas end-focus = “tendency for ‘focal’ constituents to appear towards the end of the clause” (Collins & Hollo 2010) - Focal information = new information - Focus is placed at the end of an utterance - New information comes after already given information (given-before-new principle) end-weight “tendency […] for long and complex constituents of the clause to occur at or towards the end of a sentence” (Collins & Hollo 2010) Avoidance of long subjects! → light subject constraint How can we give these sentences more end-weight? theme-rheme - Similar to given-before new - Topic (theme) is started first, then a comment follows - In a newspaper article about actors of the early 2000s: Another well-known actress of this era is Lindsay Lohan. - In a newspaper article about Lindsay Lohan: Lindsay Lohan is a rather well-known actress of the early 2000s.  - Thematic progression, i.e. how we move from one topic to the next Through: Using the comment of one sentence as the topic of the next: Tina Fey wrote many successful movie scripts. The most successful script is probably Mean Girls Keeping the same topic over several sentences: Cady Heron is the protagonist of this film. She is a sweet, naïve girl who goes to school for the first time in her life after being home-schooled. The passive Active voice Canonical (unmarked) word order - Cady broke the crown. Passive voice Marked word order Agent and patient are switched! - The crown was broken by Cady. Frequent uses of the passive: 1. Academic writing 2. Newspaper articles → reasons?  3. more impersonal (formal and detached) 4. Patient affected by an action is emphasised 5. Focus on the product / result, not producer (especially in academic writing) The passive: five types 1. ‘short’ passive Agent omitted (i.e. the by-phrase) → agent unimportant or not known - The school administration’s move was criticised vocally. → Short passive; agent not important or not known 2. ‘long’ passive Agent is given → end-weight / given-before new - The exhibition was opened by Janice’s friend. → Long passive, end- focus / given-before new; theme-rheme? 3. Passive in ditransitive clause Direct object or indirect object in subject position - The customer was paid $500 as compensation. 4. Prepositional passive PP-complement becomes the subject; preposition at the end - I don’t think this house has been lived in. → Prepositional passive; foregrounding the house  5. ‘get’ passive Informal; implies increased responsibility; foregrounding dynamic process - She got herself grounded this week. → get passive; implies her responsibility, negative connotated Summary Non-finite clauses are those which contain a non-tensed verb (i.e. infinitive or –ing form). The fixed word order in English is SVOCA (subject – verb – object – complement – adjunct). Different forms of information packaging are end-focus, end-weight and theme- rheme. There are five different types of passive for different situations (short passive, long passive, ‘get’ passive, prepositional passive, passive in ditransitive clauses).  A brief recap of the last sessions: Terminology: syntactic classes Terminology: verbs Terminology: valency Terminology: miscellaneous Generic reference → used to refer to all things of a kind, members of a group, etc. e.g. “Masks are compulsory in public spaces now.” as opposed to specific reference, i.e. “She was wearing a mask.” Verbs: situation types Three parameters: Duration: length of time an event lasts (does it last long or is it over immediately?) Dynamic: Is it an event (dynamic situation; do we put effort into it) or a state? Inherent endpoint (i.e. telicity): Is there some kind of ‘goal’ or endpoint? Verbs: situation types Four situation types: State Activity Accomplishment Achievement State: durative; stative; does not have an inherent endpoint Activity: durative; dynamic; does not have an inherent endpoint Accomplishment: durative; dynamic; has an inherent endpoint Achievement: punctual; dynamic; has an inherent endpoint the verb phrase: What is the extended verb phrase? - The teacher writes a report. - She buys a book. - My parents went to Seattle. Verb phrase: structure Verb phrase: auxiliary order Verbs: progressive Three effects of the progressive aspect: Duration → time lengthened Limited duration → time shortened Not necessarily complete Verbs which cannot be used in the progressive: Adjectives: gradience Clauses: finite subordinate clauses Four classes: Noun clause Adverbial clause Relative clause Comparative clause Clauses: noun clauses - Types of noun clauses: That-clause Wh-clause - Possible roles within sentences: Direct object Subject Subject- complement Post-head dependent Clauses: adverbial clauses Key types: Time Place Reason Purpose Condition Concession Types of conditionals: Real conditionals Factual Predictive Unreal conditionals Hypothetical Counterfactual Clauses: relative clauses Types: Restrictive Non-restrictive Sentential Reduced Clauses: comparative clauses Introduced by than or as Must contain a verb! Clauses: the matrix clause = clause with an embedded subordinate clause - The superordinate clause is the main clause - The subordinate clause is a finite / non-finite clause  Clauses: non-finite clauses Clauses: complementation Catenative verbs require non-finite clauses →complements in the form of more verb phrases - She suggested studying before the exam. - I asked her, but she said she didn’t mind doing the presentation. - I planned to tell her this afternoon. Obligatory adjunct Locative and temporal complements Examples: A little glass box was lying under the table. The cat is sleeping on the sofa. PP-complements of prepositional verbs Needed to complete verb phrase Examples: I’ve been looking for my cat for an hour. I try to abide by the rules. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)