Transformational Grammarp.33 - p.43

JackOctober 30th, 2012

Table of Contents• Language and Grammar

• Deep and Surface structure

• Transformational Rules

• Issues in Grammatical Theory

• The Centrality of Syntax

• Is Language Innate?

Language and Grammar

• From a linguistic perspective, a grammar is a description of a person’s linguistic knowledge.

Language and Grammar

• Definition of Language :– A language can be defined as an infinite set

of well-formed sentences.

• Grammar:– A formal device with a finite set of rules that

generates the sentences in the language.

Language and Grammar

• Evaluation of Grammars:– Chomsky (1972) has suggested three criteria:

• First, observational adequacy

• Second, descriptive adequacy

• Third, explanatory adequacy

Deep and Surface structure

• Deep structure:– the underlying structure of a sentence that

conveys the meaning of a sentence

• Surface structure:– the superficial arrangement of constituents

and reflects the order in which the words are pronounced

Deep and Surface structure

• Three arguments for usefulness of distinction:

– First, deep-structure ambiguity

– Second, underlying structure

– Third, active vs. passive

Transformational Rules

• Transformational rules (transformations):– applied to the deep structure and the

intermediate structures, ultimately generating the surface structure of the sentence

Transformational Rules

• Examples:

– First, particle-movement transformation• blocked with pronoun

– Second, passive transformation

Issues in Grammatical Theory

• Psychological Reality of Grammar

– Belief:• Structure and rules of transformational grammar

were psychologically real.

– Assumption:• Surface structure was the starting point for

comprehension and the deep structure was the ending point.

Issues in Grammatical Theory

• Derivational Theory of Complexity (DTC):

– The distance between surface and deep structure would be an accurate index of the psychological complexity.

Issues in Grammatical Theory

• Early studies:– Negative were more difficult to comprehend.

• Later Studies:– Affirmative were more difficult to comprehend.

＊ No intuition and experiment has revealed the relationship of possessing difficulty, so some assumptions guiding DTC are faulty.

Issues in Grammatical Theory

• Recent grammatical theory:

– Using the leaving trace of passive voice

– Proved that passive voice are more difficult or slow to understand comparing to active sentence.

– Zurif and Swinney (1994) suggest that traces have psychological reality.

The Centrality of Syntax

• Chomsky (1995)– syntactic structure is the heart of our linguistic

knowledge.

It’s controversial.

The Centrality of Syntax

• Two alternative approaches:– Bresnan (1978)

• lexical functional grammar/psychologically realistic grammar

• Greater emphasis on individual lexical items

• Storing syntactic information in the lexical entry simplifies the process of comprehending sentences.

The Centrality of Syntax

• Two alternative approaches:– Jackendoff (2002)

• Grammars have multiple sets of function rules and a complete account of grammar requires attention to the interfaces between different systems.

• These systems operates in parallel.

• It might be easier to understand the evolution of language.

Evolution of Language

• The relationship between grammar and evolution:– Hauser, Chomsky, and Fitch (2002):

• FLB (faculty of language in the broad sense)– memory– cognitive skills– intentional behaviors between humans

• FLN (faculty of language in the narrow sense)– the capacity of recursion– mapping meanings onto sound

Evolution of Language

• Criticize:– Pinker and Jackendoff (2005):

• There are many aspects of grammar that are not recursive, such as morphology.

Is Language Innate?

• Nativists assert that children are born with some linguistic knowledge.

Are there any

evidence?

Is Language Innate?

• Evidence:

– Without presenting consistent linguistic model, they have the capacity to invent some aspects of language.

– Deaf children invented hands gestures that are similar to ASL (American Sign Language)

Is Language Innate?

• Parameter:– a grammatical feature that can be set to any

of several values.

• example: null-subject parameter» English is a subject language» Italian is a null subject language

Is Language Innate?

• Parameter-setting theorists– Chomsky (1981) ; Hyams (1986)

• Children are born with parameters and values.

• the importance of experience

• shows a tidy solution of how innate processes interact with a child’s language experience.