Syntax 1 Wiki

Syntax 1

Welcome and Prospect

This course gives a systematic introduction to the scientific study of English syntax. We will ask what enables people to understand sentences they have never heard before and to decide reliably whether some string of words they hear is grammatical English or not. To this end, we will precisely define the notion ”grammar” and show that it is people’s knowledge of the grammar of English that underlies the abilities mentioned above. In the process of defining ”grammar” we will learn about a number of technical tools of modern syntactic theory: types and type hierarchies, feature structures, constraints, and syntactic schemata.

Prerequisites:

• The course Introduction to Linguistics.
• For BA ES students: This course can only be taken to fulfill the requirements of BAES 3.4 Vertiefungsmodul 1
• For BA students: this course cannot be taken with a Modulprüfung.

Readings

We will read several chapters from the following book:

Ginzburg, Jonathan and Ivan Sag (2000). Interrogative Investigations: The Form, Meaning and Use of English Interrogatives. Stanford: CSLI.

Online Grammars

To help you visualize the abstract syntactic structures, we will work with online grammars. These are available permanently. Here are the links to the grammars:

Online Grammar for Chapter 2: HPSG Background

OLAT

The OLAT course for CBA-2 is at Constraint-based Syntax 2 on OLAT.

Course and Module Requirements

Constraint-based Syntax 2 is Seminar A in the Core module Constraint-based Grammar (LING-CORE-CON). Seminar B is Constraint-based Semantics. The Modulhandbuch specifies the following requirements for the module:

1. Module Assessment

Seminar paper of about 15-20 standard pages (6,000-8,000 words, max. 4 weeks to complete / full time) or a 30-minute oral examination relating to seminar A or B. At the beginning of the seminar, the lecturer in charge will determine the possible forms of examinations.

2. Performance record

Oral presentation or written work (5 pages) for the seminar which is not the subject of the module examination.

Week 1

Table of Contents:

1. Words

1.1. Major parts of speech

2.1. Minor parts of speech

2 Phrases