I.

Introduction

- Sentence. String of words that begins in a capital letter and ends in a full
stop.
- Constituent. String of one or more words that syntactically and
semantically (meaning-wise) behave as units.
- Syntactic argumentation. Giving motivated reasons for adopting certain
structures and rejecting others.

II. Function

- Subject.
o The constituent that tell us not only who performs the action
denoted by the verb (who is the Agent - Agent role) but also who
or what the sentence is about. They answer the questions “who or
what carried out the action denoted by the verb?” “Who or what
the sentence is about?”
o Subjects can precede dynamic or stative Predicates:
 Nonreferential it / Dummy it / Weather it  It is used in
expressions that tell us about the weather.
≠ referential it  refers to a concrete object in the real
world.
 Existential there  it is used in propositions that have to
do with existence.
≠ locative there  which pecifieas a location.
 Nonreferential it and existential there are said to be
meaningless because all they seem to be doing in the
sentences in which they occur is fill the Subject slot.
o Subjects are usually noun phrases.
o Subjects are usually the first noun phrase we come across.
o Subjects are obligatory (except in imperative clauses)
o Subject determine the form of the verb: there’s an agreement.
Agreement is only visible through the ending -s on the verbs for
third person singular Subjects. In the rest of the cases we have
verbs in their base form.
o Subjects change position in yes-no questions: the verb is in the
initial slot and the Subject is in the second slot.
o Subjects can be identified by adding a tag question. The pronoun
of the tag question identifies the Subject.

- Predicate.
o Specifies what the Subject of the sentence is engaged in doing.
o The Predicate is everything in the sentence except the Subject.

- Predicator.
o Verbs function as Predicators. They specify the main action, event
or process denoted by the verb. They are in the business of
predicating something.
- Direct Object. (DO)
o Direct Objects are the constituents that refer to entities that
typically undergo the activity or process denoted by the verb.
o They have a Patient role.
o They are often noun phrases.
o Their usual position is after the main verb
o They have a strong relationship with the verb that precedes them.
These verbs that require a DO to complement its meaning is a
transitive verb. (Intransitive verbs do not need a following
constituent to complete their meaning)
o In some sentences, the DO is understood or implicit.
o If we turn an active sentence into a passive sentence, the DO of
the active sentence becomes the Subject of the passive sentence.
The Subject in the active sentence ends in a by-phrase. A form of
the verb be appears.
o They function as Complement to the verbs.

- Indirect Object (IO)

o They have a Goal/Receiver or Beneficiary role.
o They are related to ditransitive verbs: they take a DO and IO.
o They are usually noun phrases
o They cannot occur without a following DO
o IOs always precede Dos
o They can become the Subjects of passive sentences. Subjects of
the active sentence end up in a by-phrase and DO stay in place.
IOs end up in to-phrases if the DO becomes the Subject.

- Adjuncts
o They tell us about the how, when, where or why of the situation
expressed by the sentences. We can test to see if a sentence
contains an Adjunct by asking how?, when?, where? or why?.
o They are always optional and they express peripheral information
o They can be stacked, which means that more than one of them
can appear in a sentences.
o They are mobile.

III. Form: Words, Word Classes and Phrases.

- Words can be grouped into word classes (parts of speech – these are
notions of form as opposed to the functional notions) and how they form
phrases. Noun – determinative – adjective – verb – preposition – adverb
– conjunction – interjection.
- Nouns, determinatives and pronouns.
o Nouns. They are defined as words that denote people, animals,
things or places (notional definition)
 o They also include words that denote abstract ideas or concepts,
emotional states, bodily sensations, etc.
o Another approach is a formal (their shape) and distributional
(where they can occur and how they behave in sentences) criteria.
o Nouns can have similar suffixes: -ance, -hood, -tion, -ness, -ship.
The plural and genitive endings also are typical of nouns.
o They can be preceded by determinatives: the, a, this/these,
that/those, no, few, little, many, much, each, every, either, neither,
any, some, certain, a few, several, various, enough, all, both:
which specify more precisely the meaning of the nouns they
precede.
o They can be preceded by adjectives, that qualify the nouns they
precede.
o Common nouns are ordinary, everyday nouns. Some of them can
be counted (countable nouns), but other as a rule cannot
(uncountable nouns). Proper nouns are names of people, places
and objects, they do not normally take a preceding determinative
nor a plural ending.
o Noun phrases. Is a string of words whose central element is a
noun. Its central element is its Head.
o Pronouns. They are words that function as noun substitutes.
 General personal pronouns: I/me, you, she/her, he/him,
it, we/us, they/them. The first is the nominative form used in
Subject position and the second one is the accusative form
used in DO/IO position or after prepositions.
 Possessive personal pronouns: my/mine, your/yours,
her/hers, his/his, our/ours, their/theirs. The first is the
dependant pronoun that functions as Specifier, the second
is the independent form which occur elsewhere.
 Reflexive personal pronouns: myself, yourself, herself,
himself, itself, ourselves, themselves.
 Reciprocal personal pronouns: each other, one another
 Demonstrative pronouns: this/these, that/those. They
occur independently and the dependant forms occur before
nouns as determinatives and function as Specifiers.
 Relative Pronouns: that, who, which.
 Interrogative or wh-pronouns: what, which. They occur
independently and the dependant forms occur before
nouns as interrogative determinatives and function as
Specifiers.
 Indefinite pronouns: another, few, less, little, many, more,
most, much, either, neither, each, etc. They occur
independently and the dependant forms occur before
nouns as determinatives and function as Specifiers.

- Adjectives.
o These are words that can modify nouns.
 o They can sometimes be identified through certain formal
characteristics: suffixes -ful, -less, -ive; prefix un-.
o Most adjective possess gradability, they can be preceded by
words such as very, extremely, less, which indicate the extent to
which adjective applies to the word it combines with.
o They take comparative and superlative endings. The comparative
form indicates the greater extent the adjective applies. The
superlative form indicate the maximal extent.
o Distributional characteristic: they can occupy attributive position
(when it precedes a noun) or predicative position (after a copula or
linking verb: appear, be, become, feel, look, remain, seem, smell,
sound)
o Adjective function as the Heads of adjective phrases.

- Verbs.
o They are action words
o They have inflections (-s and -ed) that mark the verb for present
and past tense. The -s ending also marks the third person singular
ending of the present tense. Other form is the base form.
o Can be classified in finite (verbs that carry tense) and non-finite
(verbs that do not carry tense // to-infinitive (to is the infinitival
particle) – bare infinitive – present participle (-ing ending) – past
participle (-ed ending))
o We have main verbs (or lexical verbs) that stand on their own in a
sentences.
o We have auxiliary verbs that cannot occur independently and
function as helping verbs, they add more specific meaning to it,
specifies from what point of view we should view the meaning
expressed by the main verb.
 Modal auxiliaries: can, could, may, might, must, ought to,
shall, should, will, would. They mean, ability, permission,
possibility, obligation, necessity, intention, prediction and
they express situations that do not obtain at the present
moment, but will, could, must or should obtain in the future.
They are always finite (they carry tense)
 Aspectual auxiliaries: be, have. They refer to the way the
meaning expressed by the main verb is viewed in time:
progressive aspect (ongoing process) and perfect aspect
(current relevance).
Be and have can function as auxiliaries or main verbs.
 Passive auxiliary: be. It is followed by the past participle
form of the main verb.
 Dummy auxiliary: do. It doesn’t have meaning by itself.
 Used for do-support to form the negative counterpart
of a sentence that does not contain an auxiliary verb.
 And also to form the interrogative version of
sentences that do not contain an auxiliary verb.
 Also, it is used in contexts where auxiliaries get
stranded. Code
  Emphatic contexts.

- Prepositions.
o They don’t have typical endings. They tend to be short, often
consisting of two or three letters.
o They often combine with noun phrases to form prepositional
phrases. The noun phrases function as prepositional
Complement.
o They denote a relationship of some sort between two entities.

- Adverbs.
o They modify verbs, adjectives or other adverbs
o The ending -ly is a typical adverb ending. Other endings are
-wards, -wise, -ways.
o Circumstantial adverbs: can specify a variety of different types of
circumstantial information as frequency and manner. They include
interrogative adverbs like why, when and how.
o Degree adverbs: specify the degree to which the adjective they
modify applies.
o Stance adverbs: either they have a lining function or they modify
whole sentences.
o They function as Heads of adverb phrases.

- Conjunctions.
o They have a linking function.
o Coordinating conjunctions: and, or, but. They link unites of
equal syntactic status. The conjoined NP behaves the same ways
as non-conjoined NPs. Adversative (but), Cumulative (and),
Disjunctive (or)
o Subordinating conjunctions: that, if, whether, for, because,
although, when. They introduce subordinate clauses, they link
units of unequal syntactic status. Complementizer and
“adjunctisers”.

- Interjections.
o These are expressions of emotion, physical state, agreement,
disagreement and such like.
o They are not really part of sentences in which they occur, but
literally thrown in.

IV. More on Form: Clauses and Sentences

- Main clauses – subordinate clauses – matrix clauses (a clause that

contains a subordinate clause within it)
- We can speak of finite (contain a tensed verb) and non-finite (do not
contained a finite verb) clauses. And these clauses can have or not a
Subject of their own.
 - Verbless clauses, they lack an overt verb, but can be said to contain an
implicit verb be.
- Clause types:
o Declarative clauses: are the most straightforward clause type.
They usually display an unmarked order of the functional
categories: Subject + Predicator + IO + DO. Used to make
statements.
o Interrogative clauses: There are two types:
 yes/no interrogatives: which they elicit either “yes” or “no”
as answers – display inversion of Subject with an auxiliary
verb.
 open interrogatives/wh-interrogatives: which can potentially
elicit an infinite range of answers – they start off with the
wh-words
 alternative interrogatives: the possible answers to such
interrogatives are given in the way the question is asked
 rhetorical question: situations in which interrogatives are
not used to ask a question, but to have the import of
directives.
o Imperative clauses: are normally interpreted as directives, as
someone telling someone else to (not) do something. They usually
do not contain Subjects and their verb is in the base form.
o Exclamative clauses: are formed with an initial wh-word. Wh-word
usually functions as a modifying element inside a phrase.
- Pragmatics is the study of the meaning of linguistic expressions in
context. According to this, some clauses have a typical use, but there no
one-to-one relationship between the clause types and their uses.
o Declaratives make statements
o Interrogatives ask questions
o Imperatives issue directives
o Exclamatives utter exclamations

V. The Function – Form Interface

A particular function (Subject, DO, IO, Adjunct) may be performed by different

forms (word clauses: nouns, adjectives, verb – phrases: NP, AP, VP – clauses:
matrix, subordinate)
- Subject: Noun phrases – Prepositional phrases (tend to be locative
phrases or phrases specifying a timespan) – Finite clauses – Non-finite
clauses (with or without Subject of their own and introduced or not by a
wh-word)
- Predicates are verb phrases, and Predicators are always main verbs.
- Direct Object: Noun phrases – Prepositional phrases (tend to be
locative phrases or phrases specifying a timespan) – Finite clauses –
Non-finite clauses (with or without Subject of their own and introduced or
not by a wh-word)
- Indirect Object: Noun phrases – Wh-clauses (she told whoever wanted
to hear it his story.
 - Adjuncts: Adverb phrases – Prepositional phrases – noun phrases –
Finite clause – Non-finite clauses (with or without Subject of their own)

VI. Tense, Aspect and Mood.

There are only two tenses: present tense and past tense

- Present tense. Most verbs the base form for all persons except for the
third person singular (attachment of bound inflectional morpheme -s).
Some of the uses are:
o State / Typical behaviour. Conveys that a situation has held and
will continue to hold indefinitely. (my kids love chocolate)
o Historic Present. events in the past, to make them more relevant
to the moment of speaking.
o Instantaneous use.in news or sports to describe events as they
are happening.
o Timeless use. describe situations that are not located in real time,
but are unchanging “truths”

- Past tense. Attachment of -ed to regular verbs, irregular have their

special forms. Mainly used to refer to past situations. Uses:
o Modal past tense. is used to refer to situations that are in some
way unlikely to come about
o Politeness use. Is often used in situations when we make
requests, but are worried that we are inconveniencing the
addressee. (Could you help me this weekend?)
o Reported speech. When we convey the speech of others

- Referring to future time.

o We use present tense to talk about the future (in situations when
we see the future being scheduled): present futurate.
o We can use the past tense to refer to future time, viewed from a
moment in the past: past futurate.
o Using modals verbs such as will and shall.
o Present progressive futurate: modal will + progressive be +
present participial. Used when the event that is being referred to is
contingent on some other event.

Aspectuality and aspect.

- Progressive aspect.
o Construction: is made up of a form of the auxiliary be + present
participle form of main verb.
o Encodes an ongoing situation wither in the present or the past.
o Can occur in finite and non-finite forms (with other auxiliaries)
 o Uses of the progressive:
 Express an ongoing activitiy in the present or past.
 With state verbs, indicates that the state referred is only
temporary.
 Degree of irritation on the part of the speaker.

- Perfect aspect.
o Construction: form of the perfect auxiliary have + past participle
form of main verb.
o Used to express anteriority, refer situations in the past.
o Present perfect. Expresses current relevance. Cannot combine
with adjuncts that are incompatible with the current relevance
meaning.
Other uses:
- Used to report on events that took place in the past, but
have relevance at the present moment (accompanied by
adjuncts that indicate recency.
- Continuative perfect: indicate that a situation began in
the past, extends to the present moment and potentially
beyond.
- Habits
- Present perfect of result: indicates the outcome of a
situation.
- Experiential present perfect: that a situation occurred at
least on one occasion in a period of time beginning in
the past and leading up to the present.
o Past perfect.

Modality and mood.

Types of modality:
- Epistemic modality. Concerned with the knowledge we have as
language users and the conclusions we draw on the basis of that
knowledge.
- Deontic modality. Concerned with an action imposed by an authority
(speaker imposing an obligation on someone)
- Dynamic modality. Typically Subject-oriented. Notion is attributed to the
referent of the subject of the sentence.

Core modals: can, cannot, will, won’t, may, must, mustn’t, shall, shan’t –
would, wouldn’t, could, couldn’t, should, shouldn’t, might, mightn’t. (past tense
counterpart)

- Modals are always followed by a verb in the shape of a bare infinitive.

- Do not have a third person singular present tense forms
- nor do they have non-finite forms.
- They are always tensed
 - Past tense forms are used to express anteriority or unrelated meaning.
Meanings by core modals:
- ability: can, could
- conclusion/necessity: can, could, must
- intention/volition: will, would, shall
- obligation: must, should
- permission: can, could, may, might
- possibility: can, could, may, might
- futurity/prediction: will would, shall.