English Syntax
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MODULE 1
Sentence structure: Constituents
Instructor: Lam Hoang Phuc
1.1. Structure
▪ Syntax: the study of the structure of phrases and
sentences.
▪ A thing is said to be complex (i.e. have structure) when:
a) it is divisible into parts (its constituents),
b) there are different kinds of parts (different categories
of constituents),
c) the constituents are arranged in a certain way,
d) and each constituent has a specifiable function in the
structure of the thing as a whole.
▪ The constituents of a complex thing are themselves
complex, i.e. the parts themselves consist of parts, which
may in turn consist of further parts.
This complex thing is said to have a hierarchical structure.
1.1. Structure
▪ We can construct endless possibilities of word-sequences
from a collection of words. Clearly, not all the word
sequences would be acceptable. When a sequence of
words fails to constitute a good expression, it is described
as being ungrammatical.
▪ Ultimately, a full syntactic description of any language
consists in explaining why some strings of words of the
language are well-formed expressions and others not.
▪ In dealing with syntactic structure, we will be doing three
things:
a) analysing linguistic expressions into their constituents.
b) identifying the categories of those constituents.
c) determining their functions.
1.1. Structure
▪ Immediate constituents: each of the constituents of
a syntactic unit at the next level down in the hierarchy.
▪ Words are not immediate constituents of a sentence, but
belong with other words to form groups – phrases. It is
phrases that function as immediate constituents of a
sentence.
While sentences certainly contain words, they don’t
consist of words. They consist of phrases.
1.2. Establishing constituents
▪ There are different ways of demonstrating that a given
sequence of words is a phrase:
1. Omission
o If a sequence of words can be omitted from a sentence
leaving another good sentence, that’s a good indication
that the sequence is a phrase functioning as a
constituent in the structure of the sentence. However,
not all phrases are omissible.
E.g. in The very talkative gentleman next to me lit a
cigar.
very talkative can be omitted without making the
sentence ungrammatical, so it is a phrase.
1.2. Establishing constituents
2. Replacement by a single word
o If you can replace a sequence of words in a sentence
with a single word without changing the overall
structure of the sentence, then that sequence
functions as a constituent of the sentence and is
therefore a phrase.
E.g. in Old Sam sunbathed beside a stream.
beside a stream can be replaced by a single word like here
or there without making the sentence ungrammatical, so
it is a phrase.
1.2. Establishing constituents
3. The question test
o Answers to ‘WH’ questions (that is, questions that
contain one of the question words who, which, what,
why, where, when, whose, and how) are phrases.
E.g. beside a stream is a possible answer to the question
Where did old Sam sunbathe?, so it is a phrase.
1.2. Establishing constituents
4. Movement
o the movement of a sequence of words in forming a
construction indicates that the sequence is a phrase.
E.g. in Old Sam sunbathed beside a stream.
beside a stream can move to the front of the sentence,
forming Beside a stream, old Sam sunbathed.; since the
new sentence is also grammatical, beside a stream must
be a phrase.
1.2. Establishing constituents
5. The sense test
o Phrases form not only syntactic units (constituents in
the structural form of sentences) but also semantic
units. In other words, they form identifiable parts of
the meaning of sentences; they form coherent units of
sense.
o E.g. in Old Sam sunbathed beside a stream.
beside a stream has a meaning that is identifiable, so it is
a phrase.
1.3. ‘Phrase’ and ‘constituent’
▪ A word sequence is considered a phrase if it can be a
constituent of a sentence. However, this does not mean
that word-sequence is a constituent of every sentence in
which it appears.
E.g. old Sam is a constituent of
Old Sam sunbathed beside a stream.
but not a constituent of
Though he was old Sam did regular press-ups.
▪ Our understanding of particular word-sequences is matter
of how we structure them in our mind. That’s why we
need to construct physical (graphic) phrase markers (tree
diagrams) to represent these abstract mental structures.
1.3. ‘Phrase’ and ‘constituent’
▪ Example of phrase markers:
beside a stream that had dried up
▪ Any point in a phrase marker that could branch and bear
a label is called a ‘node’. In the phrase marker above
there are two nodes, labelled ‘PHRASE-a’ and ‘PHRASE-b’.
1.3. ‘Phrase’ and ‘constituent’
▪ A node is said to dominate everything that appears below
it and joined to it by a line. Thus the node labelled
‘PHRASE-a’ dominates all the following elements: beside,
PHRASE-b, a, stream, that, had, dried, and up.
1.3. ‘Phrase’ and ‘constituent’
▪ A node is said to immediately dominate another element
when there are no intervening nodes. Thus PHRASE-a
immediately dominates just beside and PHRASE-b.
PHRASE-a dominates stream but it does not immediately
dominate it, because the node labelled ‘PHRASE-b’
intervenes.
1.3. ‘Phrase’ and ‘constituent’
▪ In a phrase marker, a sequence of elements is
represented as a constituent if there is a node that
dominates all those elements and no others. The
sequence a + stream + that + had + dried + up is
represented as a constituent because the elements can all
be traced back to a single node that does not dominate
1.3. ‘Phrase’ and ‘constituent’
▪ Some sentences are structurally ambiguous, i.e. having
more than one interpretation.
E.g. the sentence
Heseltine asked how old Sam was.
has two intepretations:
a) old belongs with how to form the phrase how old; so
the question that could have been asked by Heseltine
is How old is Sam?
b) old and Sam go together, forming a constituent; so the
question that could have been asked by Heseltine is
How is old Sam?
REFERENCES
Burton-Roberts, N. (2016). Analysing sentences: An
introduction to English syntax (4th ed.). Oxfordshire:
Routledge.