scholarly journals Separating surface order and syntactic relations in a dependency grammar

Author(s):  
Norbert Bröker
2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 355-380
Author(s):  
Rafaël Poiret ◽  
Haitao Liu

ABSTRACTBased on two syntactically annotated corpora, and within the theoretical tradition of dependency grammar, the current study investigates the quantitative differences and similarities between written and spoken French. Our findings support the assumption that spoken and written French are two realizations of one language that do not differ in the syntactic categories, but in the frequency of these categories, and also in their organization in sentence. The subjects in spoken French are mostly pronouns, whereas in written French the subjects are mostly nouns and pronouns. Spoken and written French share many syntactic relations, but with different frequencies. For instance, dislocations are more diverse and frequent in spoken French. Spoken French and written French differ in the word order of vocative nominal phrases. Finally, written French is slightly more difficult to process than spoken French.


2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (5) ◽  
pp. 116-121
Author(s):  
A. I. Nevorotin ◽  
I. V. Awsiewitsch ◽  
I. M. Sukhanov

This article is the continuation of analysis and discussion from the book by Professor AI Nevorotin "Matrix phraseological collection: a manual for writing a scientific article in English". The Matrix phraseological collection is a kind of catalog of text samples. The samples were from articles selected from the leading English-language scientific journals and were systematized in such away that when writing an article in English, a Russian researchers are able easy to find examples suitable for his/her own work. Furthermore, the selected samples can be transformed accordingly saving the semantic and syntactic relations between the elements and, finally, be inserted into the text. The second part of this work is devoted to the detailed analysis of the English scientific literature and also the section "Legality of the provisions of the problem".


2021 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 231-263
Author(s):  
Timothy Osborne

Abstract The so-called ‘Big Mess Construction’ (BMC) frustrates standard assumptions about the structure of nominal groups. The normal position of an attributive adjective is after the determiner and before the noun, but in the BMC, the adjective precedes the determiner, e.g. that strange a sound, so big a scandal, too lame an excuse. Previous accounts of the BMC are couched in ‘Phrase Structure Grammar’ (PSG) and view the noun or the determiner (or the preposition of) as the root/head of the BMC phrase. In contrast, the current approach, which is couched in a ‘Dependency Grammar’ (DG) model, argues that the adjective is in fact the root/head of the phrase. A number of insights point to the adjective as the root/head, the most important of which is the optional appearance of the preposition of, e.g. that strange of a sound, so big of a scandal, too lame of an excuse.


Author(s):  
Yosef Grodzinsky

AbstractThe prospects of a cognitive neuroscience of syntax are considered with respect to functional neuroanatomy of two seemingly independent systems: Working Memory and syntactic representation and processing. It is proposed that these two systems are more closely related than previously supposed. In particular, it is claimed that a sentence with anaphoric dependencies involves several Working Memories, each entrusted with a different linguistic function. Components of Working Memory reside in the Left Inferior Frontal Gyrus, which is associated with Broca’s region. When lesioned, this area manifests comprehension disruptions in the ability to analyze intra-sentential dependencies, suggesting that Working Memory spans over syntactic computations. The unification of considerations regarding Working Memory with a purely syntactic approach to Broca’s regions leads to the conclusion that mechanisms that compute transformations—and no other syntactic relations—reside in this area.


2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-74
Author(s):  
Igor Mel’čuk

Abstract A morphemic phraseme is a phraseme (= a constrained combination of linguistic signs) composed of morphemes that are part of the same wordform. Like a lexemic phraseme, a morphemic phraseme has a segmental signifier. All logically possible types of morphemic phrasemes are presented and illustrated: morphemic idioms, collocations, nominemes and clichés. Formally, these can be phraseologized complex stems, phraseologized complex affixes and phraseologized wordforms. A syntactic phraseme is a phraseme that includes at least two minimal syntactic subtrees and whose signifier is non-segmental (it involves prosody or an operation). All syntactic phrasemes are idioms. A syntactic idiom must be distinguished from 1) phrases described by means of semantically loaded surface-syntactic relations; 2) phrases consisting of a lexical unit taken together with its actants; 3) lexemic phrasemes consisting of “light-weight” words, such as Rus. ˹nu i˺ [X]! lit. ‘Well and [X]’ = ‘What an amazing X!’, and 4) lexemic phrasemes with syntactic pecularities. The notion of fictitious lexeme, necessary for designating some syntactic idioms (those that are expressed only by prosody), is introduced. An illustrative list of 29 Russian syntactic idioms is presented, as well as the lexical entries for several Russian syntactic idioms.


Proglas ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anton Getsov ◽  
◽  
◽  

The paper is part of a series of publications that set out to examine various aspects in the analysis of appositive constructions. The purpose of this particular study is to reveal the multidimensional, diverse, and complex interaction between three types of syntactic relations – attributive, predicative, and appositive. The study offers a critical review of various theories on the status of the grammatical relation between the components of non-detached (close) appositive constructions. The main argument of this paper is that determining this status, on the one hand, is a function of the morphological and semantic characteristics of the components of the construction, while, on the other hand, it determines their syntactic status.


Author(s):  
Timothy Osborne

AbstractThis paper considers the NP vs. DP debate from the perspective of dependency grammar (DG). The message is delivered that given DG assumptions about sentence structure, the traditional NP-analysis of nominal groups is preferable over the DP-analysis. The debate is also considered from the perspective of phrase structure grammar (PSG). While many of the issues discussed here do not directly support NP over DP given PSG assumptions, some do. More importantly, one has to accept the widespread presence of null determiner heads for the DP analysis to be plausible on PSG assumptions. The argument developed at length here is that the traditional NP-analysis of nominal groups is both more accurate and simpler than the DP-analysis, in part because it does not rely on the frequent occurrence of null determiners.


2013 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Groß ◽  
Timothy Osborne

AbstractThe paper claims that a marriage of the Dependency Grammar (DG) understanding of word and sentence structure with the axioms of Construction Grammar is possible and desirable. The catena unit – the validity of which has been established in syntax – is extended to morphosyntax. In syntax, a word catena is defined as a word or a combination of words that is continuous with respect to dominance. This definition is extended to morphosyntax, where a morph catena is defined analogously as a morph or a combination of morphs that is continuous with respect to dominance. The validity and utility of the catena concept for construction grammars is demonstrated in a particular area, namely regarding the functional meanings expressed by periphrastic verb chains (e.g. modality, aspect, and voice). The morph combinations (= the constructs) that express these functional meanings form morph catenae.


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