PHRASE STRUCTURE II - X-BAR THEORY
Intermediate levels of structure in phrases
1. Intermediate levels in nPs
Bill can’t [talk to Mary about her behaviour] but Betty can [talk to Mary about her behaviour].
John could [talk to Mary about her behaviour] but Betty was not be able to [talk to Mary about hbehaviour].
repeated words can be deleted:
Bill
can’t [talk
to Mary about her behaviour]
but Betty can [talk
to Mary
about
her behaviour].
repeated words can be replaced by a pro-form:
John can’t [talk to Mary about her behaviour] but Betty can do so.
However, in some cases dletion or replacement is not possible:
*
Bill can’t talk
to Mary about
her
behaviour but Betty can talk
to Mary about
her boyfriend .
* John can’t talk to Mary about her behaviour but Betty can do so her
language.
VP
V PP PP
talk
P NP. P NP
to about
N D N
Mary her behaviour
“to Mary about” is not a “complete syntactic unit (constituent) ”
The
deleted or replaced words must form a „complete constituent”
Consider the conjoined NPs:
I like [this teacher of English] and not [that teacher of English ]
I like [this teacher of English] and not that one.
Since “teacher of English” in “this teacher of English” can be replaced by “one” , it forms a “complete syntactic unit (constituent)”, which does not contain the determiner “this”. If so, the correct phrase structure of “this teacher of English” should be as in b ) and not as in a):
a) NP.
PP
D N
this teacher of English
“one” replaces ”N + PP” (non-constituent)
b) NP.
D N’
t
his
PP
N
teacher of English
„one” replaces N’ (a constituent)
The structure in A) where all modifiers in a phrase are sisters of the head word (and of each other) will be called “ a flat structure” of a phrase
The structure in B ) with one or more intermediate (X’) levels, where modifiers are attached at different levels and consequently are not sisters to each other (have different “mothers”) will be called “X-bar or X-prime structure” of a phrase.
Different types of modifiers (modifier functions):
1) SPECIFIER ( D or NP’s) - a daughter of NP , a left sister to N’
2) COMPLEMENT ( [ of+NP ] ) - a daughter of N’, a right sister to N
The position (function) of attributive APs
…….[ the tall [ teacher of English ] ] but not the small one
NP N’
…….this [ tall teacher of English ] but not that one
N’
Both “teacher of English” and “tall teacher of English” are replaceable with “one”, hence both are N’ s and the correct X-bar structure of “this tall teacher of English” is:
NP
D
t
his
N’
AP
N’
PP
A N
tall teacher
of English
The AP “tall” in the NP is neither a specifier (not a daughter of NP) nor a complement (not a sister to N).
The AP is a sister of N’ and a daughter of another N’ . Such modifiers have the function
of an ADJUNCT
specifier – adjunct – head – complement - adjunct
that clever student of physics who is tall
some close friends of John from Paris
John’s great interest/ivolvement in politics before the war
Napoleon’s sudden attack at Russia in 1812