Chapter 7 Grammar

 

Def: 

• Grammar: the analysis of the structure of phrases and sentences

1 English Grammar 

English, like other languages, has a set of guidelines for how words fit together to create meaning. These guidelines, called grammar, describe how to build correct phrases and sentences (grammatical sequences) and avoid nonsensical combinations (ungrammatical sequences). By understanding grammar, we ensure everyone using English can communicate clearly.

2 Traditional Grammar

English grammar uses words like "article," "adjective," and "noun" to sort words. These words actually come from how people figured out old languages like Latin. They just used the same labels for English

The Parts of Speech

Def: 

• Nouns: a word such as boy, bicycle, or freedom used to describe a person, thing, or idea. We begin proper nouns with a capital letter (Cathy, Latin, Rome) 

• Article: a word such as a, an or the used with a noun

• Adjective: a word such as happy or strange used with a noun to provide more information

• Verb: a word such as go, drown or know used to describe an action, event or state

• Adverb: a word such as slowly or really used with a verb or adjective to provide more information 

• Prepositions: a word such as in or with used with a noun phrase

• Pronoun: a word such as it or them used in place of a noun phrase

• Conjunction: a word such as and or because used to make connections between words, phrases and sentences

Agreement

Def: The grammatical connection between two parts of a sentence, as in the connection between a subject (Cathy) and the form of a verb (loves chocolate)

 

Agreement based on: 

• Number: the grammatical category of nouns as singular or plural

• Person: the grammatical category distinguishing first person (involving the speaker, me), second person (involving the hearer, you) and third person (involving any others, she, them)

• Form of verb(tense): the grammatical category distinguishing forms of the verb as present tense and past tense 

• Active voice: the form of the verb used to say what the subject does (e.g. He stole it)

• Passive voice: the form of the verb used to say what happens to the subject (e.g. The car was stolen) 

• Gender: a term used in three ways:

(1) a biological distinction between male and female, also called natural gender;

(2) a distinction between classes of nouns as masculine, feminine (or neuter), also called grammatical gender;

(3) a distinction between the social roles of men and women, also called social gender

Grammatical Gender

Def:  A grammatical category designating the class of a noun as masculine or feminine (or neuter), in contrast to other types of gender

Nouns are classified according to their gender class and articles and adjectives have different forms to “agree with” the nouns’ gender

E.g: 

• Spanish has two grammatical genders, masculine and feminine, as in the expressions el sol (“the sun”) and la luna (“the moon”)

• German uses three genders, masculine der Mond (“the moon”), feminine die Sonne (“the sun”) and neuter das Feuer (“the fire”)

Traditional Analysis

In the past, grammar books explained English verbs using charts, similar to how they explained Latin verbs

3 The Prescriptive Approach

Def: An approach to grammar that has rules for the proper use of the language, traditionally based on Latin grammar, in contrast to the descriptive approach. This view of grammar as a set of rules for the proper use of a language is still found

today

4 The Descriptive Approach

An approach to grammar that is based on a description of the structures actually used in a language, not what should be used, in contrast to the prescriptive approach

Structural Analysis

Def: The investigation of the distribution of grammatical forms in a language

E.g: test-frame for category nouns

 

However, many forms do not fit those test-frames 

E.g: Cathy, someone, the dog, these require different test-frame

Constituent Analysis

A grammatical analysis of how small constituents (or components) go together to form larger constituents in sentences

E.g: 

The old woman, a large snake, Brazil (noun phrases), from Brazil (a prepositional phrase) and brought (a verb)

Using a diagram we can determine the types of forms that can be substituted for each other at different levels of constituent structure

5 Subjects and Objects

Def: 

• Subject: the grammatical function of the noun phrase typically used before the verb to refer to who or what performs the action of the verb (e.g. The boy stole it)

• Object: the grammatical function of the noun phrase after the verb that typically undergoes the action of the verb (e.g. The boy stole the book)

• adjunct: A part of a sentence, typically an adverb or a prepositional phrase, that provides additional information about where, when or how

English uses position in the sentence to indicate grammatical function, with the subject as the first noun phrase before the verb and the object as the noun phrase after the verb, The other phrase at the end is an adjunct, often a prepositional phrase

There are some ways to distinguish between subject and objects

6 Word Order

Def: the linear order of constituents in a sentence (e.g.Subject–Verb–Object), used in language typology to identify different types of languages

English likes words in a certain order: 

Noun Phrase–Verb–Noun Phrase (or NP V NP).But other languages are different! Japanese puts the verb last, while Scottish Gaelic goes verb, noun, noun.  Malagasy even flips it to verb, noun, then another noun!

Language Typology

The identification of a language as one of a specific type is often based on word order such as SVO or SOV. The four main types are shown in the table above. The other two (OSV, OVS) have been documented in a small number of languages in South America

Why Study Grammar?

English has strict rules for word order, but other languages don't. This can cause problems for people learning a second language because the order might be different. By understanding these differences, we can improve language teaching material

 

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