Parts of Speech (Lexical Categories)

Parts of Speech n Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives, Prepositions, Adverbs (etc.) n The building blocks of sentences n The [ N sun] shines too brightly in Tucson n *[ V Will glow] shines too brightly in Tucson n Also called: Lexical Categories, Syntactic Categories.

Classic Definitions of P.O.S n Noun: n Person, place, or thing n Verb: n Action, occurrence or state of being n Adjective: n modifier that expresses quality, quantity or extent.

Classic Definitions of P.O.S n Adverb: n modifier that expresses manner, quality, place, time, degree, number, cause, opposition, affirmation or denial n Preposition: n modifier that indicates location or origin.

Problems with the semantic def. n Not so clear cut: n The assassination of the president… n Sincerity is an important quality n Tucson is where New Yorkers flee for the winter n Multiple parts of speech? n Gabrielle’s father is an axe-murderer n Anteaters father attractive offspring n ?Wendy’s father country is Iceland

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana. (first flies is a verb, second one is a noun. First like is a comparative conjunction, second like is a verb. )

Problems with the semantic def. n Cross-linguistic Problems – Irish Gaelic: a)D’ith Seán Pst’eat.3sng John “John ate” b)’S-dochtúir-é Seán Pres-doctor-3sng John “John is a doctor” (lit. John doctors)

Problems with the semantic def. n Cross-linguistic Problems – Kwamera: a)Iak-imiki Kuri u 1sg.dislike dog this “I don’t like this dog” b)ianpin iak-am-óuihi ihi when 1s-prog-small still “when I was still small”

Problems with the semantic def. n Cross-linguistic Problems – Warlpiri: a)Wita-rlu ka maliki wajilipinyi Small-subj aux dog chase.present “The small one is chasing the dog”

Problems with the semantic def. n The yinkish dripner blorked quastofically into the nindin with the pidibs. n yinkish -adj n dripner -noun n blorked -verb n quastofically -adverb n nindin -noun n pidibs -noun

Distributional definitions n We determine the P.O.S of a word by the affixes that are attached to it and by the syntactic context (where in the sentence) it appears in. n The definition of P.O.S is distributional n Because they are distributional, POS definitions are language specific.

Two kinds of distribution n Morphological distribution (affixes --prefixes, suffixes etc.-- that appear on the word) n Syntactic distribution (position relative to nearby words.)

English P.O.S distributionally ( English ) n Nouns n take case, number and gender endings n -ness, -ment, -ing, -er, etc. derivational affixes n appear after [ the _____ ] n can be subject/object of sentence n Modified by Adjectives n [_____ is a pain in the neck]

English P.O.S distributionally ( English ) n Verbs n take -ify, -ing, re- derivational affixes n takes -s, -ed, -en, -ing, inflectional affixes (can be inflected for tense, mood, aspect) n appear after auxiliaries [ will ______ ] n [Please _______!] n follows subject and precedes object n can be negated

English P.O.S distributionally ( English ) n Adjectives n take -er, -est, -ate, -ity, -ish, -some affixes n appear between ‘the’ & noun [ the _____ book ] n can follow ‘very’ [very _______] n can appear in [John is __________] n Adverbs n take -ly affix n appear before adjectives and verbs n [very ______] n can appear at very beginning or end of sentence

Distinguish Adverbs from Adjectives? n Adverbs: take -ly, and modify any category but nouns n Adjectives: modify nouns, no -ly. n But they are in complementary distribution: – part of the same category? n Also both take the same modifiers (eg. ‘very’) n We’ll be agnostic on this point and abbr. both Adv & Adjs as “A”, but the jury is still out on this one.

Cross-Linguistic Variation in POS n Each language has its own set of distributional criteria. n Not all languages have the same sets of parts of speech as English. Some may have less (eg. They may not distinguish verbs from adjectives) or they may have more!

Open vs. Closed P.O.S n Open POS: F allow neologisms (new words) F express content F N, V, Adj, Adv n Closed POS: F don’t allow new additions F express function F Prepositions, conjunctions, modals, auxiliaries, determiners (articles) pronouns, among others.

Some closed class POS Prepositions (P): to, from, under, over, with, by, up, etc. Conjunctions (Conj): and, or, either … or, Determiners/deitics/quantifiers/numerals (D): this, that, the, a, my, your, our his, her, their, each, every, some, one, two three etc. Complementizers (C): that, which, for, if Auxiliaries/Modals/Tense (T): will, have, can, should, is, must, would Negators (D) or (N): no, not, n’t, never, no-one. THIS LIST IS NOT EXHAUSTIVE!!

Summary: POS n Building blocks of sentences n Classic definitions are meaning-based. n don’t work well: unclear cases, ambiguous POS, cross- linguistic problems, knowledge of POS without knowledge of meaning n Linguistic definitions are distributionally based: n morphological distribution (affixes) n syntactic distribution (nearby words) n Open vs. Closed classes