The structure of noun phrase and verb phrase in english Trinh Ngoc Thanh

In particular, the research work in this book combines an interdisciplinary combination of grammatical, syntactic, and semantic aspects into the investigation of noun and verb phrase str

TRINH NGOC THANH

THE STRUCTURE OF NOUN PHRASE AND VERB PHRASE

IN ENGLISH

TRINH NGOC THANH, PhD

THE STRUCTURE OF NOUN PHRASE AND VERB PHRASE

IN ENGLISH

VNU-HCM PRESS - 2020

It has been acknowledged that nouns and verbs are two major parts of speech (Lyons, 1968) as they are universal features in languages (Robin, 1952) and furthermore, these two categories, mostly by nouns, embed semantic information of sentences (Algeo, 1995) Coming from these claims, the writing of this book continues to investigate nouns and verbs at both the internal and external dimensions of phrase structure In particular, the research work in this book combines an interdisciplinary combination of grammatical, syntactic, and semantic aspects into the investigation of noun and verb phrase structure in English Another focus

of this book is the presentation of the underlying theories in the system of noun phrase and verb phrase structure in English language

In response to the above stated aims, the main research question

of this book is that: To what extent does an interdisciplinary review in

linguistics contribute to our knowledge about the structure of noun phrase and verb phrase in English? To answer this research question, the author

employs the reviewing of recent linguistic research through which relevant linguistic terms and critical issues are covered in a selective scope Further than that, the author also selects explanations in combination with examples for the purpose of illustrating key linguistic theories in the interdisciplinary field of grammar, syntax, and semantics

The main chapters of the book are structured as follows Chapter 1: Syntactic Structure defines syntactic structure from both linear and hierarchical perspectives and then provides readers with a review of movement and selection as two key syntactic theories within the scope

of this book The major approach of this chapter is to highlight concepts which are considered as the essence in reviewing noun phrase and verb phrase structure in the following chapters

Chapter 2: Noun Phrase Structure firstly deals with the noun phrase structure from the organization of constituency tests in order to reveal the

notion of headedness and the extent to which headedness considerably determines obligatory constituency in two maxims: dependency and

independency in function The next section of this chapter further analyzes

the notion of headedness from the combination of structural and semantic

evaluations The author chooses three case studies of binominal structure, the adjective noun phrase, and recursive principles of X-bar levels so as to crack out the distributional issues of NP structure at the internal and external dimensions The last section of Chapter 2 further presents the acquisition

of determiner phrase and structural ambiguity in relative clauses so as to link the areas of grammar acquisition and semantic interpretation with the specific context of teaching implication for L2 learners

The purpose of Chapter 3: Verb Phrase Structure is to present

the reconsideration of semanticity in verb phrase structure of English

This chapter firstly presents a theoretical review on types of information for the argument-taking in verb construction and subsequently

reviews the system of tense-aspect-mood and types in complex verb

construction The selective types of verb construction in Chapter 3 include (1) verb-preposition construction, (2) double objects verb construction, (3) gerundive nominals, and (4) infinitives

Algeo, J (1995) Having a Look at the Expanded Predicate In B Aarts

and C Meyer (Eds.), The Verb in Contemporary English: Theory and

Description (p 203-217) UK: Cambridge University Press

Lyons, J (1968) Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics UK: Cambridge

University Press

Robins, R (1952) Noun and Verb in Universal Grammar Language, 28(3),

289-298

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER I: SYNTACTIC STRUCTURE

1.1 THE LINEAR PERSPECTIVE: A GENERATIVE CONSTRUCTION 13

1.2 THE HIERARCHICAL PERSPECTIVE: A MORPHOLOGICAL-SYN- TACTIC CONSTRUCTION .15

1.3 THE HIERARCHICAL PERSPECTIVE: A PARTIAL CONSTRUCTION 16

1.4 COMPONENTS OF SYNTACTIC STRUCTURE 18

REFERENCES 20

CHAPTER 2: NOUN PHRASE STRUCTURE 2.1 HEADEDNESS: SELECTION & OBLIGATION 22

2.1.1 SELECTION FOR HEADEDNESS IN NP 22

2.1.2 THE OBLIGATORY CONSTITUENCY IN NP: INDEPENDENCY IN FUNCTION 25

Replacement test .26

Extension Test 27

2.1.3 THE OBLIGATORY CONSTITUENCY IN NP: DEPENDENCY IN STRUCTURE 29

Movement Test: Wh- Word Question 29

Movement Test: Passive Voice and It-Cleft Test 31

2.2 HEADEDNESS: THE PRINCIPLE OF DISTRIBUTION 35

2.2.1 BINOMINAL STRUCTURE 35

Binominal Structure [NP1+of+NP2] 35

Binominal Structure [NP Head - NP Mod] 37

2.2.2 THE ADJECTIVE NOUN PHRASE 38

2.2.3 RECURSIVE PRINCIPLES OF NOUN PHRASE AT X-BAR LEVELS 42

2.3 CASE STUDIES .45

2.3.1 THE ACQUISITION OF DETERMINER PHRASE 45

2.3.2 STRUCTURAL AMBIGUITY IN RELATIVE CLAUSE 47

2.4 DISCUSSION QUESTIONS 48

REFERENCES 49

CHAPTER 3: VERB PHRASE STRUCTURE 3.1 SEMANTICITY: TYPES OF INFORMATION 53

3.1.1 S-SELECTION AND C-SELECTION 53

3.1.2 LINKING PROBLEMS 54

1st scenario: Proposition and the corresponding syntactic category 54

2nd scenario: Grammatical relations of semantic roles 55

3.2 SEMANTICITY: THE SYSTEM OF TENSE-ASPECT-MOOD 57

3.2.1 TENSE .57

Present tense 58

Past tense 59

Present perfect tense 60

Future tense 60

3.2.2 ASPECT AND MOOD 60

Aspect and aspectual coercion 60

Aspectual coercion by time-span adverbials 62

Aspectual coercion by time-point adverbials 63

Mood and modality 64

3.3 COMPLEX VERB CONSTRUCTIONS 65

3.3.1 VERB-PREPOSITION CONSTRUCTION 65

Maximal projection 65

Case-theoretical implication 66

3.3.2 DOUBLE OBJECTS VERB CONSTRUCTIONS 67

3.3.3 GERUNDIVE NOMINALS 68

3.3.4 INFINITIVES 70

3.4 DISCUSSION QUESTION 71

REFERENCES 71

CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION REFERENCES .73

LIST OF COMMON ABBREVIATIONS

c-selection Categorical Restriction

s-selection Selectional Restriction

X’ X-bar

Chapter I:

SYNTACTIC STRUCTURE

This chapter firstly aims to define syntactic structure from linear

and hierarchical perspectives and subsequently reviews key terms in syntax This chapter serves as a review of key aspects to be covered within the scope of noun phrase and verb phrase structure in English

1.1 THE LINEAR PERSPECTIVE: A GENERATIVE CONSTRUCTION

The root of syntactic structure can be referred from the definition

of syntax as “the branch of grammar dealing with the ways in which words, with or without appropriate inflections, are arranged to show connections of meaning within a sentence” (Matthews, 1982, p.1) This definition reflects the view of syntactic structure as the intersection between morphology and syntax and to be constructed by the mechanisms of word combination According to Carnie (2008),

the simplest form of word combination is the linear concatenation

in which the representation of combining words corresponds with the order of word from left to right and this combination can be conducted with or without the semantic consideration

Consider the possible word combination of four single words: Nemo + ate + Dory’s + seaweed:

(1a) Nemo ate Dory’s seaweed

(1b) Dory’s seaweed ate Nemo

(1c) Dory ate Nemo’s seaweed

(1d) Seaweed ate Dory’s Nemo

In analyzing the syntactic structure in the word combination of Nemo + ate + Dory’s + seaweed, we can firstly integrate one of the leading

ideas in generative theory, that is, “syntax is a projection of the lexicon”

(Babby, 2009, p 11) into our evaluation The view of projecting the lexicon

holds the importance of understanding the predicate- argument structure:

in other words, it is the headedness of verb which considerably determines

the interaction among words in a straight line From the lexical entry of verb, it could be further argued that possible word combinations of (1) can

be firstly traced to the semantic consideration from the lexical entry of eat

as this verb requires two nouns: one doing the action of eating and the other being eaten (Carnie, 2008) Applying the semantic consideration into the four word combinations, the case of (1b) and (1d) denote an awkward sense of meaning because an inanimate thing like the seaweed

is unable to perform the action of eating an animate thing like the fish naming Nemo or Dory

The second consideration of analyzing syntactic structure is

given to the word order of main elements in a sentence In English, for instance, the order of Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) is commonly

identified as thus four possible word combinations of (1) corresponds

to the grammaticality of a sentence as the word order indirectly supplies the morphosyntactic features which are acceptable in the

given syntactic positions (Julien, 2002) Following this explanation,

it can be seen that the word combination of 1(a,b,c,d) strictly follows

the principle that a noun phrase (NP) can function as subject (S) and object (O) while a verb phrase (VP) itself denotes its function in the

verb position of the SVO structure.

The third consideration of analyzing syntactic structure is the

position of head and complement as another variation of word order

Radford (2004) explained that the head word in the head-complement relationship defines the natural construction of the whole phase while Burton-Robert (2016) further extended the head-complement order,

stating that the mutual dependency between head and complement occurs

“when a head demands a further expression, that further (obligatory)

expression is said to complement the head” (p.36) When applying the

head-complement relationship into the analysis of 1 (a,b,c,d), the head

verb eat requires a noun phrase as its complements in the meaning

generation of eating something

1.2 THE HIERARCHICAL PERSPECTIVE:

A MORPHOLOGICAL-SYNTACTIC CONSTRUCTION

In the hierarchical perspective, the underlying principle of syntactic structure firstly relies on the assumption that phrases are structured in a morphological-syntactic hierarchy, given that there is a

specific typology of word order and a reference to the generalizations

of functional and grammatical functions (Valin, 2004) The syntactic

structure of NP is organized in the hierarchical frame of

Pre-determiner+ Determiner +Pre-modifiers+ Head Noun+ Post-modifier

(Burton-Roberts, 2016) and further details on the syntactic hierarchy of NP are as follows:

morphological-Determiners are grammatical words relating to definiteness and

indefiniteness or information about quantity and proportion Determiners include articles (a, an, the), demonstratives (this, that, these, those), quantifiers (some, any, no, each, every, either, neither), and possessives

(my, your, its, her, his, our, their) Meanwhile, pre-determiners precede

determiners and may intensify the plausibility or generality of the phrase

meaning (e.g all students versus all the lovers)

While head noun is at the center and possesses the headedness

of the whole NP, pre-modifiers are groups of words preceding the head

noun and giving extra-information about the head noun Pre-modifiers

can be in the form of adjective phrases (AP), or quantifying adjectives (e.g much, many, few, little) and numerals (one, two, three, first, second,

third) According to Kim (2019), in English NP, the order of NP

pre-modifiers may follow the frame of demonstratives> numerals > adjectives (e.g those two blue cars); furthermore, on the case of AP as pre-modifiers, the multiple positions of adjectives (Adjs) is in the following order: quality Adj> size Adj > shape Adj > color Adj

Post-modifiers are groups of words following the head noun on

the right side and more often prepositional phrases (PP) function as

post-modifiers of NPs in English language According to Burton-Roberts (2016), the extension of post-modifiers on the right side shows an evidence

of NPs embedding a regular right-branching structure (e.g a journey  a

journey to the new village  a journey to the new village on the top of the mountain)

1.3 THE HIERARCHICAL PERSPECTIVE: A PARTIAL CONSTRUCTION

Another principle of hierarchical perspective is related to the assumption that phrases are structured in a partial hierarchy, given that there

is an existence of internal arguments and external arguments (Williams,

1981) According to Babby (2009), the case of VP is one specific stance to

illustrate the assumption of partial hierarchy

First, the internal argument of VPs follows the mechanism of

the projection principle where the syntactic structure of VP follows the

subcategorization of elements required by the head verb (Valin, 2004)

According to Burton-Roberts (2016), the subcategorization of elements

in VP structure follows the complementation of head verbs in six

sub-categories as follows:

1 Transitive verb: the complement for this group of verb is NP

and more often functions as the direct object of the head V (e.g dread, make, spot, throw, inspect)

2 Intransitive verb: this group of verb does not require

complement in its structure (e.g sleep, die, laugh, sigh)

3 Ditransitive verb: this group of verb needs the combination

of two NPs in its complementation The corresponding grammatical functions of these two NPs are indirect object and direct object (e.g give, send, buy)

4 Intensive verb: this group of verb is more often known as

linking verb in grammar books (e.g be, become, seem, appear, look, taste, feel, smell, sound) The complement of intensive verb (including APs, NPs, and PPs) is termed as subject-predicative since its complements specify the attribution of the things or people in the subject

5 Complex transitive verb: this group of verb takes two

complements in its verb structure including direct object and an object-predicative The object-predicative specifies the attribution of the direct object and in the form of either APs, NPs, or PPs (e.g.: find + NP (direct object) + AP (object-predicative); make + NP (direct object) + NP(object-predicative), put + NP (direct object) + PP (object-predicative)

6 Prepositional verbs: this group of verbs requires prepositional

complement in the form of PP (P+NP) (e.g glance at NP, reply

to NP, refer to NP, listen to NP)

Meanwhile, in the syntactic structure of VP, the external argument

of VPs can be linked with through an adjunct-argument which is realized

in the form of prepositional phrase (PP) or adverbial phrase (AdvP) Both forms of PP and AdvP construct the adjunction structure which is optional

and is used to “express a wide range of ideas including manner, means, purpose, reason, place, and time (including duration and frequency)” (Burton-Robers, 2016, p 86) In terms of syntactic representation using

X-bar (X’) levels in tree diagram, the complementation and adjunction of

VP can be distinguished from the position of nodes: VP complementation

stands close to head verb at one level while VP adjunction stands at an external level of head verbs and VP complements

Figure 1: Adjunct and Complement in VP structure

The illustration for X-bar levels for VP complementation and

adjunction in Figure 1 describes the sisterhood relationship In VP structure, a syntactic category is labeled as adjunct when it is a daughter of

one V-bar level and sister of another V-bar level Meanwhile, a syntactic category is labeled as complement when it is a daughter of one V-bar level and a sister of head verb

1.4 COMPONENTS OF SYNTACTIC STRUCTURE

In syntactic structure, constituent is a basic element indicating

the extent to which a single word or a group of words can stand alone

as an independent unit in the sentence environment Constituent links with the hierarchical perspective of syntactic structure in the sense that constituent corresponds to the grammatical judgment (Carnie, 2008) and when constituents are structured in terms of independent units in a

sentence, these units form constituent structure or the phrase structure

of a sentence (Valin, 2004) The constituent structure of a sentence can be

presented using the method of labeled bracketing and can be tested using specific constituency tests Further details on the constituent presentation

and constituency tests are discussed in Chapter 2: Noun Phrase Structure

in this book

The concept of agreement in the syntactic structure of English

language is normally linked with the issue of subject and verb agreement

At the core of the sentence, subject is the head noun embedded with

common features such as number (singular, plural), gender (masculine, feminine), person (first, second, third person), and count or non-count (+

count) (Carnie, 2008) For instance, in English language, the simplest way

to notice agreement is from the morphological change with reference to the

verb tense: for instance, the suffixes –s and -es as the singular marking for

verb in the simple present tense for third person subject) Other instances

of agreement including binominal structure and adjective NP in English are also presented in the next chapter

In a similar concern as number or gender marking, the feature of

animacy refers to the feature of human or non-human (+ human) in NPs

and the semantic effect of being animate in NPs on the agreement with VPs and other elements in a sentence According to Becker (2014), the feature of being animate is a cross-linguistic feature in several languages

and is considerably identified with related aspects such as the transitive

structures for the subject and case system of NPs (refer to the work of case grammar by Fillmore, 1977) Moreover, the semantic effect was

also found in semantic roles (or thematic roles), the concept of which

denotes the interrelation between syntactic and semantic considerations

in the subject-predicate position The concepts of animacy and semantic

roles will be further investigated in Chapter 3: Verb Phrase Structure in

this book

The examination of English phrase structure in this book also

introduces movement and selection as two major syntactic theories within the scope of reviewing Movement refers to the movement to a position of

a higher node in the representation of tree diagram and this can take place

in the particular case of head-movement relations (i.e the movement from

one head to another head) or the general movement principle of filler-gap

dependencies (i.e the movement between the filler and the gap) (Carnie,

2008) This book particularly focuses on movement test and NP-movement

in Chapter 2 so as to illustrate the movement of head noun in a constituent

structure and related notions such as N-movement

The syntactic theory of selection refers to an operation of selecting features in the head-complement relationship following a setting of the

subcategorization frame and normally encountered in the selectional restrictions of head verbs and their NP arguments For instance, there are

animacy restrictions found from in NP-selection for certain verbs (think, believe, know); NP-selection for double objects verb construction (give, lend), and NP-selection for passive sentences in English language (Becker, 2014) The concept of selection is briefly introduced in Chapter 2 and in the coverage of s-selection and c-selection theories in Chapter 3

REFERENCES

Babby, L H (2009) The Syntax of Argument Structure UK: Cambridge

University Press

Becker, M (2014) The Acquisition of Syntactic Structure: Animacy and

Thematic Alignment UK: Cambridge University Press.

Burton-Roberts, N (2016) Analysing Sentences: An Introduction to

English Syntax UK: Pearson Education

Carnie, A (2008) Constituent Structure UK: Oxford University Press.

Fillmore, C J (1977) The Case for Case Reopened In Peter C and Jerrold

S (Eds.), Syntax and Semantics: Grammatical Relations (pp 59–82)

New York: Academic Press

Kim, M J (2019) The Syntax and Semantics of Noun Modifiers and the

Theory of Universal Grammar Switzerland: Springer International

Publishing

Matthews, P (1982) Syntax UK: Cambridge University Press.

Radford, A (2004).English Syntax: An Introduction UK: Cambridge

University Press

Valin, R D V (2004) An Introduction to Syntax UK: Cambridge

University Press

Williams, E (1981) On the Notions “Lexically Related” and “Head of a

Word” Linguistic Inquiry, 12, 245–74.

Chapter 2:

NOUN PHRASE STRUCTURE

This chapter reviews key theories, characteristics, and elements of noun phrase structure It deals with relevant syntactic theories, examples and case studies on the specific case of English noun phrase (NP)

In particular, the first part of this chapter examines the key notion of

headedness in English NP, and to be followed by distributional issues for

NP headedness The combination of explanations with examples and case studies aims to demonstrate the link between syntactic argument and syntactic representation on internal and external structure of NP The follow-up section deals with teaching implications for second language learners whose may have encountered problems with grammar acquisition and semantic interpretation

2.1 HEADEDNESS: SELECTION & OBLIGATION

2.1.1 SELECTION FOR HEADEDNESS IN NP

The notion of headedness in NP traditionally comes from the view that it is obligatory for the inclusion of noun in the combination

of words constituting NP structure (Aarts, 2001) The function of head

in such an instance links with its common denotation of determining the central idea or concept in the subject of a sentence, and the word category of noun particularly contributes to the form of head in NP (Burton-Roberts, 2016) The word category of noun in the head-modifier distinction can be viewed under the organization that one element is more important than the others to refer to a thing or a person (Jespersen, 1924); and thus, the designation of NP involves the semantic and syntactic characterization of the head noun (Givon, 2001) while the modifier of noun-in the form of other strings of words-

is viewed as subordinates to the head in the internal structure of NP (Jespersen, 1924).

In relation to the semantic entity of NP, the classification for word category of noun normally follows the notional definition which characterizes the semantic features of people, animals, or things; in some other way, the notional definition is also extended into the abstract concepts, emotional values, and sensual conceptions (Aarts, 2001) Nevertheless, the categorization of noun in relation to the notional definition in return may fail to establish the functional connection of NP being the subject of

a sentence-an exemplary obligatory function of NP in the appearance of form at the structural level In other word, the denotation of head noun (head N) in the sentence subject position may not convey “who or what is engaged in carrying out in the action specified by the verb” (Aarts, 2001, p.9) Consider the following examples:

(1) Colorless green ideas sleep furiously

(Fromkin et al., 2017, p 147)(2) The baby sleeps

Theories of c-selection (i.e the selection of syntactic categories) and s-selection (the selection of semantic categories) can be applied in determining the headedness of NP on the assumption that the selection

of head N is dependent on the obligatory selection of its corresponding type of verb (Fromkin et al., 2017) C-selection originates as a part

of Chomsky’s (1965) theory of subcategorization where it was argued that the selection of NP as the complement for the verb follows the arrangement of syntactic structure designating the position of NP In the

system of intransitive verb sleep in English language, the NP following

after the main verb (main V) does not require a c-selection argument However, the c-selection of NP in the position of sentence subject is obligatory to indicate who or what performing the action Therefore, both sentences (1) and (2) correspond to the c-selection with which

the following NPs are identified as participants of sleeping: colorless

green ideas and the baby

Grimshaw (1979) proposed the theory of s-selection in the theoretical ground that the verb selects NP as complement that corresponds with the selective type of semantic feature on the assumption that theta-roles are projected at the lowest level of clause

structure (Ramchand, 2008) Although the intransitive verb sleep in

(1) does not require s-selection of NP in the structure of [ _+(NP)], the s-selection argument can be expanded into the situation-participant selection (Zhang, 2016) where the classification other lexical items in the subject is dependent on the semantic category of the verb (Fromkin

et al., 2017) In the expanded context for evaluating of semantic

entity of (1), the head N ideas cannot carry out the action of sleeping

because the head N itself represents a notional definition of abstract concept Instead, the s-selection for sleeping requires the head N in the subject to have semantic features of human as the participant This

reason explains why head N baby in (2) maintains the characterization

of headedness in NP because both the c-selection and s-selection are appropriate to describe the action of sleeping in the main V

On the evaluation of the modifier in (1), the head-modifier

distinction of NP colorless green ideas is also awkward in the composition

of having both without color (colorless) and being colored (green) in the

formation of modifier for the head N ideas (Fromkin et al., 2017) If the

selection restriction is applied to (1) with the modified s-selection on head

N leaves corresponding to the entity of being dark green and the modified c-selection for leaves by the main V rustle, the result of this modification

categories and semantic categories in the evaluation of headedness in

NP The theories of s-selection and c-selection help us to determine the selection for headedness in NP on the semantic interpretation of syntactic dependencies between the head N in the sentence subject and its main V In other words, the two arguments in the head N of NP and the main V connect with each other in the following mechanism of dependency:

A dependency is a binary function which takes as arguments two sets of properties and gives as result a more restricted set The two sets correspond to the denotations of the two words related by the dependency (Gamallo Otero, 2008)

2.1.2 THE OBLIGATORY CONSTITUENCY IN NP: INDEPENDENCY

IN FUNCTION

From an independent characterization, NP constituency can be defined in three principles First, the independency implies that NP can stand alone as a unit in which the syntactic categories themselves refer to the entity of being commonly generalized as the subject of the sentence or in the other case being the direct object of the verb Second, the independency also refers to the notion of NP being analyzed separately from other parts of the sentence; and therefore, it is assumed that the syntactic entity of NP can be tested by using the replacement mechanism of other similar references And third, the independent characterization of NP constituent structure can be considered stable when a similar internal NP structure can be internally replicated, the result of which is the extension mechanism of NP constituency in the independent development of similar grammatical function on the external environment Drawn on these principles, the following section

demonstrates constituent analysis using replacement test and extension

test as two main methods to prove the independent characterization of

NP constituency

Replacement test

Consider the following set of three examples:

(4) [NP The child] found [NP a puppy]

(5) [NP The professor] wrote [NP a book]

(6) [NP That runner] won [NP the race]

(Fromkin et al., 2017, p 81)

Replacing NP by personal pronouns

The first set of example demonstrates that in each sentence (4), (5), and (6) NP functions both as sentence subject and direct object of main V

In terms of generalization, NPs in position of sentence subject denote the characteristic of people performing the action of the main V Regardless of the gender, NP replacement for sentence subject by third singular person pronouns can be applied as follows:

(4’) He/she found [NP a puppy]

(5’) He/she wrote [NP a book]

(6’) He/she won [NP the race]

Since the direct object of the main V refers to the notion of things, the second replacement test can be applied with the third singular pronoun of

it The results are as in (4”), (5”), and (6”):

(4”) [NP The child] found it

(5”) [NP The professor] wrote it

(6”) [NP That runner] won it

If NP replacement tests for sentence subject and direct object are applied

at the same time, this action will produce the sentence pattern as follows:

Replacing NP by another similar NP structure

If an NP is a constituent structure, it can be replaced by another similar NP structure which has the same semantic and syntactic entities In the same denotation of people, three sentence subjects in (4), (5), and (6) can be interchanged with each other for making new sentences as follows:

(4”’) The professor found a puppy

(5”’) That runner wrote a book

(6”’) The child won the race.

Extension Test

Coordinated NPs

Meanwhile, in the case of extension test, coordination method is used in the main principle to replicate a similar NP structure or a similar

sentence structure The term extension denotes an expansion from a single

NP into a collective NP (in a minimum number of two NPs); and in the implementation of coordination method for the sentence subject function, the constituency testing for (4), (5), and (6) results in the coordination of two NPs as in (7) and (8):

(7) [NP The child and the professor] found a puppy

(8) [NP The professor and the athlete] wrote a book

The maximum number of three NPs for the subject function can be coordinated in (6) and thus results in the following outcome:

(9) [NP The child, the professor, and the athlete] won the race

If the replication of coordinated NP for the subject function in (9) is based

on the denotation of people who win the race, the replication for NP for the direct object position is selective according to the main V The theory

of s-selection is applied in the replication of NPs for direct object position

in (4) where the main V found will select the coordination of two NPs: a

puppy and a book as in sentence (10):

(10) The child found [NP a puppy and a book]

Coordinated NP structure

A limitation of coordinating two or more NPs for constituent analysis is that the semantic representation of the collective NP may allow certain types of lexical choice into the grouping of animals or things The following examples include animals or things as NPs functioning subject

of the sentence:

(11) [NP The hedgehog] ate [NP the cream cake]

(12) [NP A rat] bit [NP my toe]

(13) [NP This shoe] hurts [NP me]

In (11) and (12), the sentence subjects denote animals as those performing the action of eating the cream cake and biting my toe Meanwhile, sentence (13) describes the emotional experience of hurting caused by this shoe If the replication of NPs in these instances is applied, the s-selection to construct coordinated NPs is limited in the sense that the semantic category of animals or things should have similar features as NPs in the subjects of original sentences For example, the collective noun for (11) should include a similar type of animal which can eat cream cake while the collective noun for (13) should be a similar type of object which can cause the emotional experience of hurting

The notion of being independent in function can be applied to resolve the aforementioned difficulty for constituent analysis: a newly coordinated

NP structure extends the sentential environment and denotes a similar type

of subject for the designated action The new replicated of NP structure is considered constituent due to the reason that a new NP in the coordinated structure can stand alone as a unit in terms of its structure and can function independently as a subject in the extended sentence Therefore, new

constituent structures for (11), (12), and (13) can be constructed using coordination method as such:

(11’) [NP The hedgehog] ate the cream cake, and [NP the dog] ate the cream cake

(12’) [NP A rat] bit my toe, and [NP a hamster] bit my toe

(13’) [NP This shoe] hurts me, and [NP that shoe] hurts me

2.1.3 THE OBLIGATORY CONSTITUENCY IN NP: DEPENDENCY IN STRUCTURE

Meanwhile, the dependent perspective of analyzing NP constituency can be described in three following principles First, the constituency of NP

is analyzed dependently with the sentential environment, which means that the judgment whether the construction of NP is in a constituent structure is integrated in movement with other parts of the sentence-rather than the way

in which NP is independently realized on its own grammatical function Second, the constituency testing of NP follows the assumption that an NP in its own constituent structure can be dependently moved to other positions, and thus, the dependent testing of NP constituency results in the appearance

of external grammatical categories after the sentence transformation And third, the consideration to the emphatic dimension is also a criterion in

NP movement, considering the fact that the constituent structure can be moved into other sentence position according to the emphatic function which NP denotes Three common methods of movement test are chosen

in this section to illustrate constituent analysis based on the dependency in

structure, namely Wh-word question, passive voice, and it-cleft sentence

Movement Test: Wh-Word Question

According to Fromkin et al (2017), this first type of movement test is a basic type of linguistic test where the main consideration of standing alone as a unit is tested in the following hypothesis: if a set of words can be used to answer a Wh-word question, it is a constituent The

first principle behind the forming of question to test the characteristic of

a constituent follows a type of descriptive method known as structural analysis which is dependently integrated with the test-frames that can

be used to fill up empty slots in the formation of sentences (Yule, 2016) The second principle of Wh-word question test is the transformation from declarative to interrogative sentence structure; and as a result, this

movement results in the appearance of three extra-features: Wh-word at

the beginning of the question structure, auxiliary word, and the main V appears right after the auxiliary (Aarts, 2001) Finally, the set of words

which can be in its proper form to answer the Wh-question is normally

considered to have the constituent structure Consider the following test frames:

(14a) I heard a yesterday

(14b) I heard yesterday

(15a) The makes a lot of noise

(15b) makes a lot of noise

On the first step, the empty slots of test-frames are filled with

Wh-question word what:

(14a) I heard a what yesterday.

(14b) I heard what yesterday

(15a) The what makes a lot of noise.

(15b) What makes a lot of noise.

The second step determines which test-frame can be applied with Wh-word question test for constituent analysis Among the four test-frames, the Wh-question word test can be firstly applied for constituent analysis in (14b)

On the third step of constituent evaluation, the result of the interrogative structure will be as in (14c):

(14c) Wh-word question: What did you hear yesterday?

Possible answer : A lot of noise

Apart from the aforementioned possible answer, the test-frame in (14b) allows other cases of constituents as long as the semantic representation

of the fulfilled NP into the empty slot involves the s-selection of sound

On the test-frames of (14a) and (15a), Wh-word question test will prove that these empty slots are not constituents because the dependency in NP should include both the combination of determiners (i.e a, the) and the head N in its internal structure

The constituency testing for the empty slot in (15b) can be also tested with Wh-word question test Note that NP position as sentence subject will not result in the appearance of auxiliary verb as in (15c):

(15c) Wh-word question: What makes a lot of noise?

Possible answer: The fan

For the case of present continuous tense, the test-frame in (16) involves the appearance of auxiliary in predicate of the sentence The transformation from declarative to interrogative structure takes place

as follows:

(16) is making a lot of noise

Wh-word question: What is making a lot of noise?

Possible answer: The fan

Movement Test: Passive Voice and It-Cleft Test

The second type of movement test follows an NP-movement

in the change of sentence structure from active to passive form In the mechanism of NP-movement, the passive voice test can be applied to analyze the constituency of the examined NP in the manner that NP-movement corresponds to the following principles The first principle

is the change in function of direct object in active sentence to be the

subject in passive sentence and this functional change is normally encountered in the groups of transitive and di-transitive verbs (Aarts, 2001) The second principle is the change in verb argument in the lexical-approach to passive sentence structure, the result of which is the optional integration of the NP-subject in the passive transformation (Carnie, 2008) The third principle is that the structure of passive sentence denotes a correlation between the given-new distinction and the topic-focus orientation where the movement of word orders accounts for “a strong tendency for topical information to be given and for focal information to be new” (Keizer, 2007, p 268).

It-cleft structure- the third type of movement test- syntactically represents a sentence transformation into a restrictive relative clause: in the most basic form, constituent analysis using it-cleft clause under the

governance of restrictive relative clause tends to be signified by

Wh-word or that In the application of it-cleft test, the constituent analysis

denotes the focus-ground orientation of the examined NP in the frame

of information structure into the division of three parts: the frame (It

+ copula be), the part of informational orientation (the focus) and the other part of relevant background information of the orientated focus (the ground) (Santorini & Kroch, 2007)

Overall, both passive voice and if-cleft tests are able to prove the examined NPs to be constituents if the following conditions are met:

Topicalization

If we can topicalize a string of elements whose principal element is an X (where X stands for N, A, P or V) then that string is an XP (i.e a phrase headed by X)

Movement

If we can move a particular string of words in a sentence from one position to another, then it behaves as a constituent

(Aarts, 2001, p 194-196)

To illustrate the implementation of passive voice and it-cleft tests for constituent analysis, examples from (17) to (19) below are selected for the purpose of examining whether the following bracketed NPs are constituents

in terms of their structure The particular case of examination is transitive verb which only requires one NP in the position of direct object:

(17) Henry bought [NP a bright yellow jumper] yesterday (Calude, 2008, p 11)(18) His girlfriend bought [ NP this computer]

(Aarts, 2001, p 194-196)(19) That silly fool broke [NP the teapot]

the optional integration of Henry, his girlfriend, and that silly fool as the

original NPs functioning as sentence subjects in the passive transformation

Meanwhile, the third principle identifies that a bright yellow jumper, this

computer, and the teapot as constituents because the movement condition

is met and the new information is also constructed from the focus which is formerly functioned as direct object from (17) to (19)

Meanwhile, applying it-cleft test to (17) and (18) produces a new set

of sentences as follows:

(17’’) It was [NP a bright yellow jumper] (that/which) Henry

bought

(18’’) (?) It was [NP this computer] (that/which) his girl bought.

A key argument for the cleft structure in (17”) and (18”) is identified in the distinction between the referential status and no referential role of the

movement of the ground Considering the movement of a bright yellow

jumper and this computer in the constituent analysis, the application

it-cleft structure in (18”) can be paraphrased in a more logical way The main reason for this paraphrased cleft-structure is due to the value of indefinite

this being implied with the function of referencing whereas the value of

indefinite a being indexed with the function of type-identifying (Herdberg,

2000) The replacement of this for it in the frame and the extra-appearance

of a in (18’’’) supports the above claim:

(18”’) This was a computer (that/which) his girl bought.

Another note in the application of it-cleft test for the purpose of

constituent analysis is the obligatory integration of that/which in the

formation of restrictive relative clause Consider it-cleft movement of (19)

in the following transformation:

(19”a) (!) It was [NP the teapot] (that) that silly fool broke.

(19”b) (?) It was [NP the teapot] that that silly fool broke.

The omission or extra-addition of that in (19”a) infers the consideration

to the evaluation of [NP the teapot] as a constituent The principle of topicalization of it-cleft test identified in (19”b) is not applied successfully

as the movement of cleft-structure leads to the syntactic ambiguity for

the focus-ground orientation on the topicalization of [NP the teapot] In

other words, it is ambiguous in (19’’b) for the role of that being either the determiner for silly fool or the indicator of restrictive relative clause

Therefore, the application of it-cleft test in (19) for proving [NP the teapot]

as having constituent structure should include the addition of which to

avoid the problem of syntactic ambiguity:

(19”c) It was [NP the teapot] which [NP that silly fool] broke

2.2 HEADEDNESS: THE PRINCIPLE OF DISTRIBUTION

The earlier section on the selection of headedness for NP has mentioned semantic and syntactic entities as the standards for the combination of head N and its modifier This section firstly discusses the issue of NP headedness with the account of distributing the semantic and syntactic entities following the notion of agreement in NP In particular, the notion of agreement in NP is firstly reviewed with two case studies of binominal structure and the adjective noun phrase in the system of English language The second focus of this section is reserved for a discussion on the distribution of externality on the construction of NP headedness The third case study reviews recursive principles of NP under the theoretical consideration of X-bar theory which divides the syntactic representation of phrase structure at three levels: phrase level (NP), intermediate level (N’), and head level (N) In this section, theoretical explanations are combined with specific examples to analyze the concept of NP headedness from structural and semantic evaluations

2.2.1 BINOMINAL STRUCTURE

Binominal Structure [NP 1 +of+NP 2 ]

Keizer (2007) explained the notion of agreement in an identification

of factors determining subject-verb agreement One of the key aspects mentioned by Keizer is the number agreement where more often the singular

or plural marking of NP determines the construction of its relevant verb form In the simplest way to characterize the number agreement, the marking

of singular or plural case for English NPs generally involves the binominal construction of NPs in the following syntax [NP1+of+NP2] where the NP headedness on the first NP independently determines the morphological change of the relevant verb form However, the task of determining the singular or plural marking for NP headedness in [NP1+of+NP2] to some extent depends on the extension of relevant sentence environment

Consider the following pairs on number agreement in the binominal structure of [NP1+of+NP2] for the singular or plural marking of copula be

in simple past tense:

(20a) [NP1 Three reviews] of the book were received.

(20b) [NP1 A review] of three books was received.

(21a) [NP1 The herd] of large African elephants was larger

than [ ProN I] thought.

(21b) [NP1 The herd] of large African elephants was/were

stampeding toward [ ProN us].

(22a) [NP1 Two bottles] of wine were spilling.

(22b) [NP1 A lot] of wine was spilling.

On selection of simple past tense of be in past tense in the above

pairs of sentences, the mechanism of number agreement can be generated

in the given hypothesis:

[Agreement] may be anaphoric, as when a pronoun agrees with its antecedent, or it may involve a relation between a head and its dependent, as when a verb agrees with its subject or object

(Kroeger, 2005, p 112) Applying Kroeger’s hypothesis into the analysis of number agreement among the three pairs, observation on the position of NP1 clearly in determining the match of to be-verb form in past tense with the corresponding

the singular and plural marking of the head N review in 20 (a, b) due to

the distinction in quantity between three (20a) and one (20b- in place of

the article a) The subject-verb agreement for 22 (a, b) considerably relies

on the s-selection identified from the concrete and abstract expressions of

quantity between two bottles (22a) and a lot (22b)

The subject-verb agreement in 21 (a, b) places a further consideration the anaphoric agreement with the pronoun in the extended sentence environment It can be argued that the collective NP in 21 (a)

agrees with the singular past tense form of be as the [ProN I] infers that the semantic inference of [NP The herd] is rather from derived from a

personal experience with large African elephants Meanwhile, be verb

agreement in 21 (b) can select both the singular and plural marking because the appearance of [ProN us] is likely to indicate either a whole

group experience (were) with the elephants or a reported event by an individual of the group (was)

Binominal Structure [NP Head - NP Mod ]

In the second case of Keizer’s (2007) analysis, the notion of agreement is examined through the binominal structure of close appositions formed by head-modifier (mod) combination At the internal level, close appositions are classified into four underlying structures:

In correspondence with each underlying structure, the particular

case of the poet Burns is analyzed with reference to arguments of previous

scholars (Keizer, 2007) On the first type of structure [NP Head + NP Mod],

it is the second NP that is considered the restrictive element to define the

meaning of the first NP (Lee, 1952) and in a reverse position of [NP Mod+ NP Head], the application of replacement-by-zero-test proposes that the

omission of the first NP (i.e the poet) does not considerably affect the pragmatic aspect of referencing other because the second NP (i.e Burns)

is argued to be the head of the binominal structure (Haugen, 1953)

Similar to the concern of two NPs being two constituents, it is inconclusive on the third type to determine which between the two NPs

to be the central element in answer to the question of headedness in close apposition structure (Sopher, 1971); and in response to this inclusiveness identified in the former structures, the transformational account of binominal construction suggests the treatment of [ Det [N Mod + N Head]] as

a constituent structure where the first NP involves the adjectival function for the proper noun in the second NP (Burton-Roberts, 1975)

Overall, specific cases of past tense of be in agreement with the

syntax [NP1+of+NP2] and the combination of head-modifier in close appositions from Keizer (2007) propose that the issue of NP agreement can be judged on the criteria of grammaticality and modification in binominal structures On the ground of NP headedness, the main argument

of the structural perspective on NP agreement is settled upon the concern

of determining which between the two NPs determines the appropriate c-selection for verbs and c-selection for modifiers

2.2.2 THE ADJECTIVE NOUN PHRASE

Similar to the emphasis of structural perspective on the ground of NP headedness, this case study draws on Günther (2018) to review the case of nominal construction from the syntactic group of adjective which denotes the internal structure of [Determiner (Det) + Adjective (Adj)] with the semantic features of [+human] or [+abstract] In Günther (2018)’s study, the contrastive perspective links the comparison between English and German language on the nominal construction of [the + adj] in support for the argument that the Adjs are not under the nominalization process to function as NPs; rather than that, they remain silent as modifiers of silent head Ns