Rosta, Andrew; (1997) English syntax and Word Grammar theory. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

Making some fundamental innovations in Word Grammar theory, the thesis explores the nature of syntax (focusing on English) in the areas of (I) relationships between word order and surface constituency, and grammatical relations, (II) the syntax-morphology interface. (I) Dependency and surface phrase structure ('skeletal trees') get defined; mediating between them is s-dependency, essentially a relation of linear precedence but also crucially involved in (among much else) determining extractability and landing sites for extraction, and defining subordination (demonstrated on prepositional passives). A range of constructions where phrases are in some sense 'many-headed' are examined. A relation 'Proxy' is motivated for: relative and interrogative pronouns; that clauses; extraposition; cognate objects. WG's traditional constituency-based analysis of coordination is refined but ultimately rejected and instead a highly detailed dependency-based analysis is provided for all/most varieties: standard, complex, gapping, appended, asyndetic. Partially coordination-like constructions studied include: pied piping; other conjunctions than AND/BUT/OR (e.g. than, as, like, instead of, so, though, nor); 'subjunctions' (e.g. negators (not, other than); subjunct adverbials (e.g. even, only, sort of); all but, more/less than; some prepositions (e.g. over thirty went; Romance partitives; these type of dogs; 'binominal'/'helluva' constructions (that peach of a film))). (II) Issues of what words, syntax and morphology are are discussed in the light of an argument that a sequence of more than one word can be enounced simultaneously (e.g. French DE+LE=du), a fusion-like phenomenon dubbed 'coenunciation'. Morphological-phonological entities are syntactic words' symptoms, not their components. Solving persistent problems or yielding drastic simplifications, coenunciation analyses are applied to: Romance and German articled prepositions; articles; contracted auxiliaries; clitics; right node raising; interrogatives clauses; underlying demoted subjects of passives and mediopassives/middles; gerunds; possessive/genitive 's; -ly adverbs; depictives (eat meat {raw naked/*naked raw}); deictics (e.g. today); possessive determiners/pronouns; numerics (e.g. twice, second, half); comparatives; superlatives; morphosyntactic forms of verbs; and gallimaufries of lexeme-specific examples.

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