Understanding English Grammar: Morphology, Units, and Word Classes, Appunti di Inglese

Scarica Understanding English Grammar: Morphology, Units, and Word Classes e più Appunti in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! 3 )THE GRAMMAR OF ENGLISH 1- Definition of grammar: Grammar refers to a set of rues which allow the production of well formed sentences or utterances. Native speakers of a language intuitively follow these rules , while foreign learners study grammar through pedagogical textbooks and grammar books. The rules of grammar are subject to change depending on social , stylistic geographical variation in the use of the English language. There is an important distinction between • Descriptive Grammar: describes how the language works using both traditional and new terminology. • Theoretical Grammar: is based on analytical models elaborated by linguists which introduce new metalanguage ( terms and concepts proper to these new theories). The areas of grammar which traditionally represents its main core are: • Morphology : the study of the internal structure of words . it can be divided into derivational and inflectional morphology. • Syntax: the study of the way in which words combine to form longer units such as phrases , clauses and sentences. A central feature of syntax is word order. 1.1 The units of Grammar: Speakers of a language do not communicate through individual isolated words , but through larger “chunks” of language which are meaningful and are created according to specific combinatory rules. Each unit of grammar combines with other elements form a larger unit. Grammatical units can be ordered according to a rank scale and can be analyzed: This is the bottom-up list: 1. MORPHEME: the smallest linguistic unit of meaning or grammatical function. Ex: “un” and “happy” are morphemes which can combine to form the word “unhappy”. 2. WORD: the linguistic unit phonologically preceded and followed by pauses , orthographically preceded and followed by spaces or punctuation marks , and carrying a single meaning. Ex: “unhappy” 3. PHRASE: is a linguistic unit made up of a word or group of words. it can be: - noun phrase NP Ex. The boy - verb phrase VP Ex. Has given - adjective phrase AdjP Ex. extremely interesting - adverb phrase AdvP Ex. very fast - prepositional phrase PP Ex. in front of the cinema 4. CLAUSE: linguistic unit which is made up of one or more phrases and which typically contains at least one Verb Phrase. A main clause is semantically independent and can stand alone. Ex. Run!, John sang. 5.SENTENCE: the largest linguistic unit which can consist of one or more clauses. More complex sentences contain more than one clause. Ex. John told me that he would like to move to Paris. 
 6.TEXT: it is a written or spoken stretch of language , a sequence of sentences which is coherent and cohesive. Novels, articles, letters, lectures are texts. 1.2 Word, word-form and lexeme: The term “word” can be defined in different ways using different criteria : A) Orthographic word: a linguistic unit preceded and followed by spaces or punctuation marks. This definition may pose some problems in the case of hyphens or apostrophes, or different spelling words or compounds which have a unified referent. Ex.the word “brother in law” refers to one single person. but should it be consider one or more words? we should say that the compound consists of three orthographic words , but it is listed in the dictionary as a single noun. B) Phonological word: a linguistic unit surrounded by pauses and having only a main stress. However, according to this definition, function words such as articles and prepositions, which tend to be unstressed, could not be considered as words. Ex. compounds such “ice cream” “ice cube” which consist of two orthographic words could be considered as one word since they normally have one main stress. C) Criterion of Internal Integrity: A word is an indivisible unit which cannot be interrupted by inserting other material in it. around the cage and the Ex. Elephants is correct, but elephant it's not. BUT Brother-in-law, brotherS-in-law. D Criterion of Meaning: A word is a linguistic unit that express a single meaning. However, there are strings of words that can refer to one concept. Ex. “The man who came to the office this morning”. There are also linguistic items such as the, to, by, and, which do not really carry referential meaning to a specific content-concept but which are nevertheless considered as words. An important sense of the the “word” refers to the words we find in the dictionaries. They are called lexemes and they are a group of related forms which share the same meaning and belong to the same word class. Ex: The lexeme TEACH is realized by the word-forms teach, teaches, teacher, teaching, taught. In lexicography the technical terms used to refer to the abstract dictionary unit are “entry”, “headword” and “lemma”. A Dictionary Entry is an independent lexical unit which is listed in a dictionary in alphabetical order. It consists of the headword, the main word selected as representative of the lexical unit, in other words, the citation form of a word. The canonical form is also called Lemma. Ex. Italian verbs are in the infinitive form. A word-form can be defined as the physical realization of the lexeme, its concrete expression in speech or writing. 1.3 Words Classes Words are traditionally grouped in different categories called word classes or parts of speech according to their meaning or position in a sentence. Open Classes can admit new members as new words are often created. They are called also lexical or content words as they are the main carriers of meaning in a text. • Nouns: Lexical words which commonly refers to concrete object or entries or abstract notions and things, states or quality. They can be common nouns (divided in countable and uncountable) or proper nouns. • Lexical Verbs: Words which express actions, events, states, processes and show their relationship between the participants in what is referred to the verb. • Adjectives: Lexical words which describe qualities and properties of things or people, and state of affairs. They can be gradable (large, larger) or non-gradable (dead; alive) • Adverbs: lexical words which can carry out several functions: circumstance adverbs give information about the circumstances (yesterday, tomorrow, there, well, soon...), linking