Constituent Structure of the Sentence Syntactic Processes 1

Constituent Structure of the Sentence. Syntactic Processes. 1. The traditional scheme of sentence parsing. 2. The main sentence parts: the subject and the predicate, their types. 3. The secondary sentence parts: attribute, object, adverbial modifier. 4. The structural scheme of the sentence. The elementary sentence. 5. Syntactic processes.

2. The Subject • The subject is one of the two main parts of the sentence. • It denotes the thing whose action or characteristic is expressed by the predicate. • It may be expressed by different parts of speech.

Grammatical Types of the Subject

The Predicate • The predicate denotes the action or property of the thing expressed by the subject. • It can be expressed in numerous ways.

Sentences for Analysis • • • John runs quickly. Did you have a sleep? Nick, dishonest! Jack started training out at a health farm. As we continued to laugh his surprise gave way to annoyance. Alfredo used to talk to me about it. May I ask you a question? He is said to be looking for a new job. I felt sore for a minute.

3. The Secondary Sentence Parts The Object • 1. Objects are divided into direct, indirect and prepositional. • 2. Objects are grouped into prepositional and nonprepositional. • • 3. Prof. Pocheptsov singles out the following types of objects: Object object (дополнение объекта) e. g. He saw me. He looked at me. Addressee object (дополнение адресата) e. g. He gave her money. He wrote to me. Subject object (дополнение субъекта) e. g. He was exhausted by her outburst.

The Adverbial Modifier • It is a secondary part of the sentence modifying a part of the sentence serving to characterise an action or a property as to its quality or intensity, or to indicate the way an action is done, the time, place, cause, purpose, or condition, with which the action or the manifestation of the quality is connected.

According to their meaning, adverbial modifiers are subdivided into adverbial modifiers of: place and degree; description; comparison condition; direction; manner; purpose; consequence; exception. time; attending cause; concession frequency; circumstances;

The Attribute • Attribute is a dependent element of a nominative phrase that denotes an attributive quality of an object expressed by a noun. • It is a secondary part of the sentence modifying a part of the sentence expressed by a noun, a pronoun, a cardinal numeral, and any substantivised word, and characterizing the thing named by these words as to its quality or property.

The Apposition • Apposition has been often regarded as a special kind of attribute, and sometimes as a secondary part of a sentence distinct from an attribute. • Apposition is a word or phrase referring to a part of the sentence expressed by a noun, and explaining and specifying its meaning by giving it another name.

4. Structural Schemes of the Sentence. The Elementary Sentence • The structural scheme of the sentence is a sentence structure minimal by its composition and simplest by grammatical and semantic structure. • A construction built according to a structural scheme and realizing all of its components is called an elementary sentence.

Prof. Pocheptsov lists some structural schemes for verbal sentences and examples of corresponding elementary sentences: • Subject – predicate expressed by a verb of non-directed action (Active Voice). • Subject – predicate expressed by a verb of nonprepositional-object directivity (Active Voice)– direct object. • Subject – predicate expressed by a verb requiring two non-prepositional objects: object of addressee and object of patient (Active voice) – non-prepositional object of addressee – non-prepositional object of patient.

• Subject – predicate expressed by a verb of spatial directivity (Active Voice) – adverbial modifier of place. • Subject – predicate expressed by a verb of temporal directivity (Active Voice) – adverbial modifier of time. • Subject – predicate expressed by a verb of non-prepositional object directivity (Passive Voice).

Immediate Constituents Scheme

Variants of IC-Scheme

Variants of IC-Scheme

5. Syntactic Processes • Expansion / Extension (расширение) consists in adding of some syntactic units to another unit. • The added elements have the same syntactic status as the expanded element. • The simplest type of expansion is repetition of some element in a syntagmatic chain. • e. g. Good, good boy. I walked and walked

• Addition (аддиция) takes place when each element of expansion relates to others as both semantically and syntactically independent unit. (e. g. She cried bitterly and with despair. ) • Specification (спецификация) can be observed when one syntactic unit semantically develops the other, makes it more specific. (e. g. I’ll give you a call tomorrow, after 5 p. m. )

• Complication is a syntactic process that consists in transforming the structure of a syntactic unit from simple to complex. • The complicacy of structure presupposes a mutual syntactic dependence of the unit’s constituents. • e. g. She cried. She began to cry.

• Complication of the predicate. The following three types of complication are singled out according to the morphological appurtenance of the complicating element: • active-verbal complication (e. g. I have to go); • passive-verbal complication (e. g. He is expected to come); • adjectival complication (e. g. He is unlikely to come).

• Complication of the object. Complication of the direct object is possible after verbs of certain semantics. • It consists in adding an infinitive, a participle, an adjective, or a prepositional group to a noun or a pronoun performing the function of the object. • The object and the complicating element stand in the relations of secondary predication. • e. g. I found him attractive. She considered me a fool.

• Contamination has a restricted usage. It can be applied only to the predicate. • The result of contamination is the so-called double, or contaminated, predicate. • e. g. The sun shone glaring and dazzling.

Development (развертывание) is a modification of one element by another element which depends on the former. • Syntactic groups that appear in the result of development are of endocentric character, their syntactic behavior is that of the central element before it was modified e. g. • N → AN: flower – beautiful flower; • V → VAdv: walked – walked slowly; • A → Adv. A: beautiful – strikingly beautiful.

• Adjunction (присоединение) is similar to development. It consists in modifying words as syntactic elements with particles (e. g. only for you, just in case, even at such a great sum). • Inclusion (включение) consists in inserting modal words and similar elements into a sentence. (e. g. Apparently, this is the only way out. A true friend, indeed. ) • Isolation is a syntactic process aimed at accentuating some sentence member or sentence member group. (e. g. I used to. At home. )

• Substitution (замещение) is a use of words with generalized structural meaning instead of words and constructions with specific meaning which were mentioned earlier. • e. g. Do you want me to open the window? – Yes, please do. • Representation (репрезентация) consists in using a part of some syntactic unit representing the whole unit. • e. g. Could you help me? – I will be happy to.

• Ellipsis (опущение) takes place when a structurally needed element of the construction is not explicitly used but only implied. The omitted element can be restored from the context. • e. g. It seems so strange! – It is!