Analysing Syntax 1

Lesson 8B

Sentences

Sentences, like the morphology of individual words, can be analysed using trees to illustrate their phrase structure

In order to be able to analyse a sentence you need to understand the main grammatical categories

Grammatical categories Nouns (N)

dog, cat, apple, park etc. Determiners (Det.)

a, the, this, that etc. Verbs (V)

walk, come, go Adjectives (A)

big, black, hairy etc. Adverbs (Adv)

quickly, slowly etc. Pronouns (PRO)

he, she etc. Prepositions (P)

in, on, under, over etc.

Categories and trees

Words have to be attached to their

grammatical category

dog the walks hairy park quickly in the

N Det V A Adv PN Det

Putting words in order

words combine to form phrases

phrases combine to form sentences

What kind of phrases are there?

Types of phrase

Noun phrase Verb phrase Prepositional phrase Adverb phrase Adjective Phrase

Phrases Each sentence contains

a subject and a predicate

the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

Syntactically these correspond to:

a noun phrase and a verb phrase

the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

The top of the tree So the tree for any sentence (S) should start

like this:

This means that every sentence is made up of a noun phrase and a verb phrase

S

VPNP

The bottom of the tree What we need to do is to connect:

the structure

at the top

of the tree

TO

the words of

the sentence

at the bottom

of the tree

the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

S

VPNP

Det A N V Adv P Det N

Connecting top and bottom

You need to start at the bottom of the tree and build more phrases on to the categories. These phrases could be:

Noun phrases Adverb phrases Prepositional phrases Adjective phrases

What about? The dog ?

The park?

Noun phrase (NP)

A name is a noun and it attaches to a noun phrase

Romeo

NP

N

A simple noun phrase (NP)

Determiner (Det.) + Noun (N) = Noun Phrase (NP)

the dog the park

Det

NP

N

NP

Det. N

Prepositional Phrase (PP)

Preposition + NP = Prepositional Phrase (PP)

in + =

the park in the park

NP

Det N

P PP

P NP

Det N

Adverb Phrase (Adv.P) When there is just one adverb, it

attaches to an Adverb Phrase (Adv.P)

quickly

Adv

Adv.P

Adjective Phrase (AP) A single adjective attaches to an

Adjective Phrase (AP)

hairy

A

AP

More on adjectives Adjectives are often found in sentences

as modifiers of nouns:

the hairy dog

modifier of noun

In this case they form part of a more complex noun phrase …

More complex noun phrases

… and they are analysed like this:

the hairy dog

Det

NP

NA

AP

Inserting the phrases

The subject NPis easy to insert……………….……………… but the VP is more difficult

the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

S

VPNP

Det A N V Adv P Det N

AP

First you attach the Verb

the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

S

VPNP

Det A N V Adv P Det N

AP

Then you attach the AdvP

the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

S

VPNP

Det A N V Adv P Det N

AP AdvP

Then you attach the PP

the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

S

VPNP

Det A N V Adv P Det N

AP AdvP NP

PP

What a complete tree looks like

a sentence

divides into a noun phrase ……………….. and a verb phrase

these attach to

phrases or

and categories categories

attach to words the hairy dog walks quickly in the park

S

VPNP

Det A N V Adv P Det N

AP AdvP NP

PP

How to analyse the syntactic structure of a simple sentence

It’s a bit like decorating a Christmas tree:

Write S NP + VP at the top Write the words of the sentence at the bottom Write the categories above the words Where necessary put the categories into phrase

structures (NP, Adv,P, AP, PP) Attach the phrase structures to the main NP and

VP

Ambiguous sentencesThese sentences look the same but they

have a different meaning

The man hit the intruder with a stick The man hit the intruder with a wooden leg

They should have a different syntactic

structure. Where is the difference going to be

Disambiguating

With a wooden leg and with a stick are

both prepositional expressions

BUT …… with a wooden leg is about the intruder

so it is attached to the noun with a stick is about how he hit the

intruder so it is attached to the verb

Different structure

hit the intruder with a wooden leg

attached to NP

hit the intruder with a wooden leg

D N P D A N

PP

NP

NP

AP

NP

VP

V

hit the intruder with a stick

attached to VP

hit the intruder with a stick

D N P D N

NP

PPNP

VP

V

Juliet loves Romeo

Romeo loves Juliet

N N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

He loves carrots

He loves carrots

PRO N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

The lamb followed Mary

The lamb followed Mary

Det N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

N

The cat killed the mouse

The cat killed the mouse

Det N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

N Det

Jack killed the giant

Jack killed the giant

N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

N Det

She solved the mystery

She solved the mystery

N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

PRO Det

Beavers build dams

Beavers build dams

N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

N

Beavers build dams

Beavers build dams

N

NP

V

NP

S

VP

N