Note to the instructor
Note to the student
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations used in examples
Tables and figures
1 What is syntax?
章节导读
1.1 Some concepts and misconceptions
1.1.1 What is the study of syntax about?
1.1.2 Language change
1.2 Use of linguistic examples
1.2.1 Why not just use examples from English?
1.2.2 How to read linguistic examples
1.3 Why do languages have syntax?
1.3.1 Word order
1.3.2 Promotion and demotion processes
1.3.3 All languages have structure
Further reading
Exercises
Notes
2 Words belong to different classes
章节导读
2.1 Identifying word classes
2.1.1 How can we tell that words belong to different classes?
2.1.2 Starting to identify nouns, adjectives and verbs
2.1.3 An illustration: How do speakers of a language identify word classes?
2.2 Verbs
2.2.1 An introduction to verb classes
2.2.2 Verbs and their grammatical categories
2.3 Nouns
2.3.1 Semantic roles for noun phrases
2.3.2 Syntactic roles for noun phrases
2.3.3 Nouns and their grammatical categories
2.3.4 Nouns,definiteness and determiners
2.4 Adjectives
2.4.1 Positions and functions of adjectives
2.4.2 Adjectives and intensifiers
2.4.3 Adjectives and their grammatical categories
2.4.4 Are adjectives essential?
2.5 Adverbs
2.5.1 Adverbs and adjectives
2.5.2 The adjunct function
2.6 Prepositions
2.6.1 Identifying prepositions in English
2.6.2 Postpositions
2.6.3 Grammatical categories for adpositions
2.7 Conclusion
Further reading
Exercises
3 Looking inside sentences
章节导读
3.1 Finiteness and auxiliaries
3.1.1 Independent clauses
3.1.2 Finiteness
3.1.3 Main verbs and verbal auxiliaries
3.1.4 Ways to express the grammatical categories for verbs
3.1.5 Non-finite verbs
3.1.6 Co-ordination of clauses
3.1.7 Summary
3.2 Introduction to subordination
3.2.1 Complement clauses
3.2.2 Adjunct or adverbial clauses
3.2.3 Identifying subordinate clauses
3.2.4 Special properties of root clauses
3.2.5 Some cross-linguistic variation in subordination
3.2.6 Summary: Properties of subordinate clauses and root clauses
3.3 Major cross-linguistic variations
3.3.1 The co-ordination strategy
3.3.2 Nominalization
3.3.3 Serial verbs
3.3.4 Summary
Further reading
Exercises
4 Heads and their dependents
章节导读
4.1 Heads and their dependents
4.1.1 What is a head?
4.1.2 The influence of heads on their dependents
4.1.3 Summary: The properties of heads
4.1.4 More about dependents: Adjuncts and complements
4.1.5 More about verb classes: Verbs and their complements
4.1.6 Other heads and their complements
4.1.7 Summary: The main properties of complements vs adjuncts
4.1.8 Is the noun phrase really a determiner phrase?
4.1.9 Phrases within phrases
4.2 Where does the head occur in a phrase? Head-initial and head-final languages
4.2.1 Head-initial languages
4.2.2 Head-final languages
4.2.3 An exercise on head-initial and head-final constructions
4.3 Head-marking and dependent-marking languages
4.3.1 Definitions and illustrations: Syntactic relationships between heads and dependents
4.3.2 Head adposition and its NP object
4.3.3 The clause: A head verb and the arguments of the verb
4.3.4 Head noun and dependent possessor NP
4.3.5 Head noun and dependent AP
4.3.6 An exercise on head-marking and dependent-marking
4.3.7 Some typological distinctions between languages
4.3.8 Summary
Further reading
Exercises
5 How do we identity constituents?
章节导读
5.1 Discovering the structure of sentences
5.1.1 Evidence of structure in sentences
5.1.2 Some syntactic tests for constituent structu