Practical Grammar 8

Complement Clauses

Exercise 8.1 (based on section 5.1 of the textbook)

• Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/.
• Open your latest grammar or start with a copy of Grammar5-Ex 7.3.
• Add the words in the following sentences:

(1) Oscar thinks that Sarah likes musicals
(2) Oscar enquires whether Sarah likes musicals

Implement the following:

1. that and whether belong to the part of speech C (= complementizer).
2. Complementizers head CPs.
3. CPs take two daughers: a C and an IP. The two daughters are co-heads of the CP.
4. You need to add a new VP rule which allows a VP to consist of a V and a CP. The CP bears the GF COMP.

• Make any further changes that are necessary to obtain exactly the f-structure (10) on p. 101 for (1). For sentence (2), you should obtain an f-structure which is identical to that of sentence (1), with the exception that the CLTYPE of (2) should be INTER.

Check what your grammar predicts for the following examples:

(3) *Oscar thinks whether Sarah likes musicals
(4) *Oscar enquires that Sarah likes musicals

If your grammar licenses these examples, then add information to it that makes it impossible to derive a well formed f-structure for them.

Hint: think about the function of each of the complementizers!

Homework

For next week, read pages 102-113 in the textbook.

  Main page  Week 2  Week 3   Week 4   Week 5  Week 6   Week 7  Week 8  Week 8b  Help