Lgcs 10: Intro Ling. Lecture Notes Monday, May 5th, 2014.
(iii) Transformations (in the following order)
1. Final Class Grammar!!! Our grammar now has three components:
V-to-T Movement
Raise V to T, if T does not dominate a free morpheme.
Condition: Only applies to Vcop.
(i)
A lexicon, which lists every word, along with its pronunciation, meaning,
and word category.
(ii) A set of PS Rules, which arrange words into sentences.
Start symbol is S for declaratives, CP for interrogatives.
The output of the PS Rules is called Deep Structure (DS).
(iii) A set of ordered transformations, which take DS as input, and which
move, delete, or insert nodes.
The output of the transformations is called Surface Structure (SS).
Each component looks as follows:
(i) Lexicon
N:
kittens, squirrels, guys
V t:
like, love, devour, destroy, …
Va:
seem, look, …
Vd2: serve, give, …
Vcop: be
A:
nice, happy, brave…
P:
in, near, of, on, …
Deg: very, pretty, quite, …
D:
the, a, those, these, some, your, …
T:
will, have, be, can, might, should, …
Conj: and, or
Pron:
V i:
Vd:
Vc:
she/her, he/him, they/them…
smile, cry, yawn, …
put, serve, give, …
think, know…
Adv:
often, quickly, wisely, …
PAdv: just, right, …
C:
that, whether, if, …
Neg:
not
(ii) PS Rules
S → NP T VP
NP → {(D) AP* N (PP) | NP PP | Pron}
VP → {Vi | Vt NP | Va AP | Vd NP PP | Vd2 NP NP | Vc CP | Vcop {AP | NP | PP} |
Vp PP | AdvP VP | VP AdvP | VP PP | Neg VP}
PP → {P (NP) | PAdv PP}
AP → {A | Deg AP}
AdvP → {Adv | Deg AdvP}
CP → C S
XP → XP Conj XP
Heads are obligatory elements of a phrase. The head of a phrase determines the type
and number of complements in a phrase (e.g., Vt requires an NP complement.)
Complements occur as required by a head; they are always sister to a head.
T-to-C Movement
Raise T to Cq, if Cq does not dominate a free morpheme.
VP Ellipsis (Optional)
Delete a VP that is identical to a preceding VP in the context.
Tense Hopping
Lower T to V, if T does not dominate a free morpheme.
Condition: Cannot cross Neg.
Do-Support
Insert the dummy auxiliary do to bear bound (stranded) tense morphology.
2. V-to-T Movement Summary. Across languages, tense morphology, whether
bound or free, is generated in T. When a tense morpheme is free, e.g., will or have,
nothing happens. When a tense morpheme is bound, e.g., [PRES], [PAST], a number
of ensure that the bound morpheme combines with a verb stem:
In French:
V-to-T Movement for all verbs.
In English:
V-to-T Movement for Vcop; otherwise Tense Hopping,
otherwise, Do-Support.
Our evidence for positing V-to-T Movement comes from sentences in which T does
not dominate a free morpheme. In such sentences, we find the following word
orders:
(a) V Adv Object;
(b) V Neg Object;
(c) V precedes the subject in yes/no questions, if the language uses
T-to-C Movement to form yes/no questions.
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3. Yes/No-Questions Summary. We arrived at the following generalization for the
formation of questions across languages: Yes/No-questions are CPs headed by a Cq,
where Cq must be occupied by a free morpheme at surface structure. To achieve this,
in some languages, Cq is occupied by a lexical complementizer, while in other
languages, T moves into Cq by a rule of T-to-C Movement. In both cases, a free
morpheme must appear in Cq.
4. Updated Summary of Cross-Linguistic Comparisons
Headedness refers to the order of heads and complements in a language. Languages
tend to be head-initial or head-final (but are sometimes mixed).
Head Movement refers to transformations that move one head to another (e.g.,
V-to-T Movement, T-to-C Movement.)
Ellipsis refers to transformations that delete nodes (e.g., VP Ellipsis).
Yes/No-Questions. Yes-No questions are generated as CPs headed by Cq, where Cq
must be occupied at surface structure by either (i) a Cq from the lexicon, as in
Japanese and Hebrew, or (ii) T-to-C Movement, as in English and French.
5. Pidgins and Creoles
When speakers of mutually unintelligible languages come into contact and need to
communicate, a pidgin language can develop. Pidgins are rudimentary, limited
languages: they have a small vocabulary, and a simplified grammar.
Pidgins usually arise in a situation that involves at least three languages, one of
which is dominant. The dominant language usually contributes most of the
vocabulary; this is called the superstrate language. The other languages are called
substrate languages, and can provide the phonology of the pidgin.
Pidgins do not have native speakers; rather, speakers of a pidgin maintain their
native language but use the pidgin to communicate with other groups.
Over time, a pidgin can develop into a creole, a full-fledged language with native
speakers. This is believed to result when the children of speakers of a pidgin develop
it into a complete language.
When a pidgin becomes a creole, its vocabulary and grammatical system expand
dramatically.
Creoles are examples of language genesis.
Comparison of languages considered so far:
French:
Headedness:
V-to-T Movement:
Yes/No Questions:
VP Ellipsis:
Hebrew:
Headedness:
V-to-T Movement:
Yes/No Questions:
VP Ellipsis:
Japanese:
Headedness:
Yes/No Questions:
English:
Headedness:
V-to-T Movement:
Yes/No Questions:
VP Ellipsis:
Head-initial
Yes
T-to-C Movement
No
(1) Comparison of creoles (From Bickerton 1985, “Creole Languages”)
Hawaiian
Haitian creole
Sranan
creole
base: he walked
he walk
li maché
a waka
anterior: he had walked
he bin walk
li té maché
a ben waka
irreal: he will/would
he go walk
l’av(a) maché
a sa waka
walk
nonpunctual: he is/was
he stay walk
l’ap maché
a sa waka
walking
he would have walked
he was/had been walking
he will/would be walking
he would have been
walking
he bin go walk
he bin stay walk
he go stay walk
he bin go stay
walk
li t’av(a) maché
li t’ap maché
l’av ap maché
li t’av ap maché
a ben sa waka
a ben e waka
a sa e waka
a ben sa e waka
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6. Non-Configurationality (adapted—at times word-for-word—from Baker 2001)
English and French are said to be configurational in the sense that subjects and
objects consistently occur in certain positions within a tree, and verb and object form
a constituent to the exclusion of the subject.
Non-configurational languages do tend to have rich morphological case and
agreement systems, suggesting at least that there are two types of typologically
distinct languages: non-configurational, which rely on morphology to express
syntactic relations, and configurational, which rely on phrase structure.
Not all languages are configurational in this sense.
Nonetheless, many researchers argued that even non-configurational languages have
hierarchical structure, based on certain familiar English-like asymmetries between
subject and object.
For example, in the Australian language Warlpiri, any order of subject, verb, and
object is possible, as long as the auxiliary occurs in the second position in the clause
(data from Hale 1983):
For example, in English, an object may be anaphoric to a subject, but not vice versa:
(2)
(3)
Ngarrka-ngu
ka
man-ERG
PRS.IPF
‘The man is spearing the kangaroo.’
wawirri
kangaroo
panti-rni
spear-PST
Wawirri
Panti-rni
Ngarrka-ngu
Panti-rni
Wawirri
panti-rni
ngarrka-ngku
panti-rni
warirri
ngarrka-ngku
ngarrka-ngku
warirri
warirri
ngarrka-ngku
panti-rni
ka
ka
ka
ka
ka
Subjects and objects appear to have the same syntactic distribution, and there is no
evidence that the verb and object form a constituent to the exclusion of the subject.
Given facts like these, flat structures have been proposed in which subject and object
are not distinguished by phrase structure configurations.
Any language in which it is difficult or inappropriate to use phrase structure to
distinguish grammatical functions like e.g. subject and object could be called nonconfigurational.
The class of languages that have been called nonconfigurational includes most
Australian languages (Dyirbal, Nunggubuyu, Jiwarli, Jingulu); various American
Indian languages (Salish, Uto-Aztecan, Iroquoian, Algonquian,
Klamath/Sahaptin/Nez Perce); certain South American languages (Quechua);
various New Guinean languages; South Asian languages such as Malayalam;
Hungarian, Japanese, perhaps even German).
(4)
a. The two old men are looking at themselves.
b. *Themselves are looking at the two old men.
Similar facts hold for Warlpiri (Hale 1983):
(5)
a. Purlka-jarra-rlu
ka-pala-nyanu
old.man-Dual-Erg Pres-3DualS-Reflex
‘The two old men are looking at themselves.’
paka-rni.
see-NonPast
b. *Purlka-jarra
ka-nyanu-palangu
old.man-Dual
Pres-Reflex-3DualO
‘Themselves are looking at the two old men.’
nya-nyi.
see-NonPast
…the question of how to fit non-configurational languages into linguistic theory is
relevant to some of the deepest issues of linguistics—including the questions of how
much variation Universal Grammar allows and what are its proper primitives
(phrase structure, grammatical functions, or something else?) (Baker 2001, p. 8)
References
Baker, M. 2001. The Natures of Nonconfigurationality. In Baltin, M. and C. Collins,
Eds., The Handbook of Contemporary Syntactic Theory. Blackwell.
Legate, J. 2002. Walpiri: Theoretical Implications. MIT PhD dissertation.
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7. French vs. Haitian Creole
The following sentences illustrate negation in French. Is the position of pas 'not' in
French as expected?
(13) tonga
taorian’
ny
mpamboly
arrived
after
the farmer
‘The old teacher arrived after the farmer.’
(6)
(14) namono
ny
akoho
tamin’ ny antsy
killed
the chicken
with
the knife
‘The woman killed the chicken with the knife.’
Nous
avons
pas
we
have
not
‘We have not seen John.’
vu
seen
Jean.
John
(French)
(7)
Nous
voyons pas
Jean.
we
see
not
John
‘We don’t see Jean.’
Consider now Haitian Creole, one of Haiti’s two official languages (along with
French.)
(8)
Bouki
déjà
konnen
Bouki
already knows
‘Bouki aready knows Boukinet.’
Boukinèt
Boukinèt
(Haitian Creole)
(9)
Bouki
pa
konnen
Bouki
not
knows
‘Bouki doesn’t know Boukinèt.’
Boukinèt
Boukinèt
(Data from Carnie 2006)
ny mpampianatra antitra
the teacher
old
ny
the
vehivavy
woman
(15) nanaseho
sari
n’ Noro ny lehilahy ny reni
n’ ny zaza
showed
picture of Noro the man
the mother of the child
‘The mother of the child showed the man a picture of Noro.’
(i)
Provide PS Rules for S, NP, AP, VP, and PP in Malagasy.
You may leave out T in your S rule, since there is no evidence for this position
in these data.
(ii) Is Malagasy head-initial or head-final?
(iii) Provide the trees for the sentences above, given your rules.
(iv) How does Malagasy differ from English?
9. More practice with English
Provide derivations for each of the following, given our final class grammar:
Does Haitian Creole have V-to-T Movement? How can you tell? Derive (9).
8. Practice with PS rules in another language
Malagasy is an Austronesian language spoken throughout Madagascar. Based on the
following data, answer (i)-(iv) below.
(10) namangy
anay
ny
visited
us
the
‘The children visited us.’
ankizy
children
(11) mihinana
ahitra
eat
grass
‘The cow eats grass.’
omby
cow
ny
the
(12) matory
ny
mpamboly
sleep
the
farmer
‘The farmer(s) is/are sleeping.’
(16)
(17)
(18)
(19)
(20)
(21)
(22)
(23)
(24)
Are you never at home on Fridays?
We asked if we could put some things on your bed quietly.
Does it look okay?
Have you seen Kimiko?
Do you often see Kimiko?
Do you?
(Meaning: Do you often see Kimiko?)
Is she?
(Meaning: Is she Kimiko?)
They talked to Kimiko on Friday.
We did not.
(Meaning: We did not talk to Kimiko on Friday.)
Revise the PS rules so that they account for the following sentence, and then provide
a tree for the sentence, given your revision.
(25)
(26)
Whether it will rain again is uncertain.
That you are well-prepared seems likely.
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