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Syntactic structure in familiar and exotic languages Richard Hudson Krakow, October 2009 1 Plan 1. 2. 3. 4. Understanding syntactic structure Showing syntactic structure Teaching syntactic structure Using syntactic structure 2 verb preposition 1. Understanding syntactic structure • For example: Time flies like an arrow and fruit flies like a banana. Groucho Marx • The sentence-parts have: – different word classes. noun verb – but also different relations among words. • i.e. different syntactic structures 3 How to analyse syntactic structures? • Two theoretical traditions: – the old European tradition – the young American tradition • Poland contributed to the old tradition – Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz invented Categorial Grammar (1935) • But the young tradition dominates theory. 4 The old tradition • How old? • At least 1,000 years – in 8th century Arabic grammar from Basra and Kufa • Part of a much longer tradition of grammatical analysis – starting in Babylonia 5 About 2,000 BC 6 Babylonia earliest written language, out of fashion new, semitic, in fashion Akkadian Babylon Sumerian 7 Becoming literate in Babylon 8 Verb conjugations (Sumerian and Akkadian) 9 NB!!! 4000 years ago!!! We – you – they (in that order) Sumerian Akkadian English menden-ee ni:nu-mi we menzen-ee attunu-mi you emene-ee unu-mi they 10 Syntactic structure: old tradition • Among the units, words are basic. – but also some word-combinations: • clauses and prepositional phrases • Syntactic relations: – relate words directly to one another. – are classified: • subject • object, etc. 11 The new tradition • Invented in 1933 in USA – by Leonard Bloomfield • Called ‘Immediate Constituent Analysis’ – then ‘Phrase structure grammar’ • Assumed by all leading theories – Chomsky: Minimalism – Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar, etc. 12 Syntactic structure: new tradition • Units: – most units are ‘phrases’ – word groups – words have no special status • Relations: two primitive relations: – order: A before B – part-whole: A is part of B – but sometimes combined with ‘subject’ etc. 13 For example … fruit flies like a banana. • old tradition: the word flies is subject of the word like • • new tradition: the phrase fruit flies is the first part of the phrase fruit flies like a banana no direct link between flies and like 14 Who cares? • Linguists care. • So they’ve formalised these traditions: – old = dependency grammar (no phrases) – new = phrase structure grammar (no classified relations) • Psychologists care too: – how do our minds handle syntax? 15 Claim: Our minds use dependency grammar • We recognise abstract classified relations in other areas – e.g. social relations: brother, cousin, colleague, friend, … • So why not in syntax? – e.g. fruit modifies flies, which is subject of like • But then phrase structure is redundant. 16 2. Showing syntactic structure • Complex structures need a notation. – geography has maps – music has musical notation – mathematics has formulae, graphs, etc. • Syntax needs a notation. – first introduced in 19th century – for teaching grammar in school 17 Standard notation for phrase structure OK before VP S VP OK after D agreement PP NP NP N V P D N Time flies like an arrow. 18 A notation for dependency structure adjunct complement subject s a c c Time flies like an N V P D arrow. N 19 The joke s a c c Time flies like an N V P D a and fruit N s flies N arrow N o c like a banana. V D N 20 3. Teaching syntactic structure Dependencies are relevant to: • meaning • agreement • selection • optionality • word order 21 Teaching meaning LIKE and PLEASE are synonyms, but … feeler Him liking it stimulus him s He it s o liked it. It o pleased him. 22 agreement Teaching agreement s a c c Time flies like an N V P D a and fruit N s flies N arrow N o c like a banana. V D N 23 Teaching selection s RELY selects ON He He c c relies on p s CAN selects an infinitive selection can extra dependency selects a genitive predicative swim. s o SZUKAĆ her. Szukam prezentu. I seek present. infinitive genitive 24 Teaching optionality • Some verbs demand an object, others allow one: He took it obligatory object He ate it optional object • Absent objects usually have indefinite meaning: *He made a sandwich and ate. He ate. = He ate something. • This is English. What about other languages? 25 Japanese o mo keeki-wa yaki-mashita-ka already cake-topic make- did - ? Have you baked a/the cake? o hai, yes yaki-mashita make-did • Most dependents are optional • When absent, they are definite 26 Why use dependencies? agreement Relations are abstract, not just word order: • ‘subject’, not ‘the noun before the verb’ s – The man who we think knows the answer selection • ‘complement’, not c‘the noun after the verb’ – The man on whom she relies • ‘dependent’, not ‘nearby word’ 27 Teaching word order • All word-order rules use dependencies. • Many languages have very general rules. • Dependents take their position from the head: – – – – free order: no restrictions head-final: head follows all dependents head-initial: head precedes all dependents head-medial: head follows some dependents and precedes others. 28 Free order s o o Jan kocha Marię s Marię kocha Jan Polish o s Jan Marię s kocha o kocha Marię o Jan s s Marię kocha kocha Jan o Marię Jan 29 Head-final or -initial Japanese s shinbun-ga teburu-no ue-ni newspaper-subj table-’s top-on desu is Welsh Mi roddes i lyfr da i dad Eleri - gave I book good to father Eleri I gave a good book to Eleri’s father. 30 Head-medial English We dread cold weather just before Christmas. • Every dependent is either a pre-dependent or a post-dependent. • Every major word class allows both. •Why? 31 4. Using syntactic structure • Speakers use syntactic structure to combine words. • Hearers use it to combine meanings. • Therefore, we must hold words in memory until their dependencies are complete. • This places a load on memory. • No problem if dependencies are short. 32 Dependency distance • = A 9word’s dependency distance is the dd number of words that separate it from its ‘parent’. dd = 1 That Cracow is a very beautiful city by any standards is clear. It is clear that Cracow is a very beautiful city by any standards. 33 Some figures • Human minds are the same everywhere – so we expect similar dd figures in all languages. • Conversation: – English: 0.4 (mean dd) – Japanese: 0.4 – German: 0.9 ! • Chinese news: 1.89 !! – head-initial: 3.3 !!! • Are these figures correct and typical? – If so, what do they tell us? 34 Conclusions • Syntactic structure is important when teaching languages or learning them. • Dependency structure is better than phrase structure. • Structural analysis allows important generalisations. • Syntactic structure needs diagrams. 35 Dziękuję • This slide-show is available at www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/dick/talks/cracow.ppt • The theory is called Word Grammar www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/dick/wg.htm 36