Lecture 11 syntax

Syntax is a part of grammar, which deals with laws governing combination of words into word-groups, sentences or sentence-groups .Word-groups may be distinguished into syntagmatic jng of notional words alone, synatgmatic grouping of notional words with functional words, and syntagmatic groupings of functional words alone. Phrase is a group of words that together have a particular meaning, especially when they express the meaning well in a few words.

Sentence. There are more than 100 definitions of a sentence.There are only some of them 1. Any coherent connection of words having an informative destination is effected within the framework of the sentence. 2. A written English sentence is a group of words that says something in a fixed structure of grammar and punctuation. 3. A group of words usually containing a subject and a verb, expresses a complete idea or asks a question, and that, when written begins with a capital letter and ends with a full-stop [28,1298], Nowadays the scholars start distinguishing between a sentence and an utterance, as they cannot explain the nature of the so-called one-member sentences "Night!" and elliptical sentences: "Where are you going? -Home". Sentence-group: Sentences in continual speech are not used in isolation; they are interconnected both semantically-topically and syntactically.

Text: The word 'test1' is used in linguistics to refer to any passage, spoken or written, of whatever length, that does form a unified whole.

The boundary between morphology and syntax seems obvious enough as we usually can clearly distinguish between a word and a phrase. E.g.: What a ghastly disappointment for you (H.E. Bates)," Disappointment." is obviously a word, long as it is, whereas "to get rid of in the sentence " I've been trying to get rid of her for ages" (H.E. Bates), short as it is, is a phrase. Bui sometimes it to be difficult to see the difference. Cf:

1. 'Has been telling " ("Oh, I suppose she's been telling you that I am a selfish brute" (J.Cary)) consists of three words and seems to fall under Syntax, but it's also a form of the word "tell" and thus it would seem to fall under Morphology,

2. "And what happened next?" (A. Christie). The word " happened can be considered from two different viewpoints: on the one hand, we can consider it in its surroundings in the sentence, namely in its connection with the word "what", which denotes the doer of the action, with the word "next", which denotes the time of the action. So the word would fall under Syntax. On the other hand, we can confide " happened" as a part of a system including also the forms "happen happens, happening", so, the word would fall tinder Morphology.

3. Sometimes it is difficult to say to what part of speech the won belongs, if it is not put into a sentence, for example: "Plain". A. "I' am a plain man, M. Poirot», said Sir Joseph Hoggin. (A. Christie) 'Plain" is an adjective. B. Plain - noun- The grassy plain gave way to an extensive swamp. C. Plain - adverb - It's just plain crazy to spend al your pay as soon as you get if.

Performing their semantic functions, words in an utterance form various syntagmatic connections with one another.

Syntagmatic relations are immediate linear relations between units in a segmental sequence, e.g.: "I gave Albert Thompson some money, I took him to Whitechapel and wrote down the directions m his journey to my house" (V.S.Pritchett)

1.Predicative relation

2.Objective relations- gave Albert Thompson, gave money, took him

3.Attribute relations- Some money, his journey, my house

4. Adverbial relation.-Took to Whitechapel.