DESCRIÇÃO E ANÁLISE MORFOSSINTÁTICA DO INGLÊS Prof John Corbett USP-CAPES International Fellow

Today’s session Course introduction How do we classify sentence constituents? Meaning Form Function

Course introduction Course topics: Basic introduction to syntax Word structure (morphology) Grammatical systems Grammar teaching for EFL/ESL

Provisional schedule of classes 1. Form, function & meaning 2. Parts of speech 3. Phrase structure 4. Embedded phrases 5. Clauses 6. Embedded clauses & sentence types 7. Word structure 8. Allomorphs 9. Number, gender, & person 10. Case, degree & definiteness 11. Tense, aspect, & finiteness 12. Mood, modality & voice 13. Teaching grammar deductively 14. Teaching grammar inductively 15. Course review

assessment Most assessment done via moodle 4 of the weekly quizzes (ungraded) 40% 1 Graded test 20% 1 Group video project 20% 1 Individual reflective essay 20% Total 100%

Basic reading ANDERSON, W.; CORBETT, J. Exploring English with Online Corpora. 2nd edn. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. BRINTON, L.; BRINTON, D. The Linguistic Structure of Modern English. Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2010. Thornbury, S. How to Teach Grammar. Harlow: Longman, 1999.

Help!? Personal details Name John Corbett Email jcorbett@usp.br Office location AUCANI building, Level 3, Room 10 Office hours To be arranged (and publicised on moodle) Any questions?

An Introduction to Sentence Structure Q: What is grammar?

An Introduction to Sentence Structure Q: What is grammar? A: The classification of sentence constituents (parts of speech) and an account of how they combine. Classification = paradigmatic relations Combination = syntagmatic relations

Classification according to Meaning Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby.

Meaning Different kinds of thing in the world: Fiona/me/baby arms Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby. Different kinds of thing in the world: Fiona/me/baby arms

Meaning Different kinds of action: pick rock Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby. Different kinds of action: pick rock

Meaning Different kinds of location? up in Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby. Different kinds of location? up in Something to do with comparison? like

Meaning Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby. Something to do with identification? her arms a baby

Meaning Something to do with addition? and Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby. Something to do with addition? and

Form Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby. Some items have only one form: up, and, a Some items have two forms, singular and plural: arm/arms; baby/babies Some items have multiple forms: have, has, had, having, etc

Form A regular verb: forms of ‘to pick’ Regular Infinitive: (to) pick Present: pick, picks Past or Preterite: picked Perfect (have/has/had) picked 2 basic forms: pick(s) + picked

Form A very irregular verb: forms of ‘to be’ Irregular Infinitive: (to) be Present: am, are, is, ’s Past or Preterite: was/were Perfect (have/has/had) been Many different forms, resulting from the merger of two historically different verbs, Old English waeron and beon.

Function Questions about function: What kind of words go together? Fiona has picked me up in her arms and is rocking me like a baby. Which words function as modifiers, and which as headwords in the phrases?

Function: ‘The Tarzan Test’ Identifying Modifiers and Headwords: A big, grey cat was prowling near the wood shed. Which words can you delete and still communicate the basic idea? CAT-PROWLING-NEAR-SHED Headwords A-BIG-WAS-NEAR-THE-WOOD Modifiers

Prepositions Prepositions precede noun phrases: The angry leopards sprang into the forest. up the tree. across the stream. over the rock through the wood. under the blanket etc. Substitution test

Question… Ok, so we can use meaning, form and function to classify parts of speech. So, how would you classify the word ‘baby’?

Some problems … a) I use Johnson’s baby powder. b) It keeps my skin baby soft. c) Baby yourself with Johnson’s.

Some problems … a) I use Johnson’s baby powder. Nouns can modify other nouns - baby + powder b) It keeps my skin baby soft. Nouns can modify adjectives - baby + soft c) Baby yourself with Johnson’s. Nouns can turn into verbs - I baby you, she babied him, etc.

Testing grammatical models In the last 30 years, linguists have been collecting large quantities of electronic text, which are searchable. Among the best of these is the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA). http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/

Playing with concordances Go to http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/ Click on ‘KWIC’ (key word in context) Type in your search item, eg ‘my’ or ‘bouncing’ or ‘highly’… If you want, choose a section (eg ‘Spoken’, ‘Academic’…) or choose the whole corpus

Using coca: basic kwic search

Checking results… Scroll down the page and look at the concordance results. The results show you the keyword (‘highly’) in its context. The COCA KWIC search colour codes parts of speech. What do you notice about the colours of the words following ‘highly’?

Things to notice highly addictive highly ambiguous highly amused ‘Highly’ tends to be found in contexts such as: highly addictive highly ambiguous highly amused highly analytical highly appropriate highly autobiographical

Things to notice In other words… highly + adjective

Things to notice We can say that ‘highly’… Is a word ending in –ly (form) It usually modifies an adjective (function) It has an intensifying meaning. Conclusion: ‘highly’ is an intensifying adverb.

Searching for other intensifying adverbs

[adverb] + addictive Notice the number of modifiers that end in –ly.

Summary Grammar is the study of the constituents (‘bits’) that make up sentences. Breaking sentences down into their constituent parts is called ‘parsing’. ‘Parsing’ breaks sentences into: Clauses (Subject, Predicator, Object, etc) Phrases (Noun Phrase, Verb Phrase, etc) Words (Noun, Verb, Adjective, Preposition, etc) Morphemes (Prefix, Root/Stem, Suffix/Inflexion)

Summary The criteria that we use to identify grammatical constituents are: Meaning (eg does the constituent express a thing, an action, a place etc?) Form (what does the constituent look like, eg does it have a particular kind of ending?) Function (what other constituents does the target constituent ‘go with’?)

Check out this week’s grammar quiz on moodle! Postscript Check out this week’s grammar quiz on moodle! See you next week!