Constituent Structure
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Description
This book explores the empirical and theoretical aspects of constituent structure in natural language syntax. It surveys a wide variety of functionalist and formalist theoretical approaches, from dependency grammars and Relational Grammar to Lexical Functional Grammar, Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar, and Minimalism. It describes the traditional tests for constituency and the formal means for representing them in phrase structure grammars, extended phrase structure grammars, X-bar theory, and set theoretic bare phrase structure. In doing so it provides a clear, thorough, and rigorous axiomatic description of the structural properties of constituent trees.Andrew Carnie considers the central controversies on constituent structure. Is it, for example, a primitive notion or should it be derived from relational or semantic form? Do sentences have a single constituency or multiple constituencies? Does constituency operate on single or multiple dimensions? And what exactly is the categorial content of constituent structure representations? He identifies points of commonality as well as important theoretical differences among the various approaches to constituency, and critically examines the strengths and limitations of competing frameworks.
This is an ideal introduction for graduate students and advanced undergraduates. It is also a valuable reference for theoretical linguists of all persuasions in departments of linguistics, cognitive science, computational science, and related fields.
Features
- Addresses issues at the heart of contemporary syntactic theory
- Compares the approaches of different theories and frameworks
- Clearly and engagingly written for graduates and advanced undergraduates
Reviews
"This book is an excellent survey of phrase structure in generative grammar. Carnie traces the arguments and the data that have been used in the history of Chomskyan grammars in particular, but also GPSG and HPSG are discussed to a large extent. The presentation is clear and easy to follow, and interesting at that. Meticulously Carnie works his way through the arguments that lie behind the changes in phrase structure theory that have taken place in the past, but he also discusses the very latest improvements such as 'bare phrase structure' and 'label free' syntax. All in all, I think this book is very well written and interesting and it definitely deserves a place on every syntactician's bookshelf." --Linguist List
About the Author(s)
Andrew Carnie is Associate Professor of Lingusitics at the University of Arizona. His 1995 dissertation proposed that the traditional distinction between phrases and words is derived and falls out from the interfaces of the syntax with the morphological and semantic components. His publications include the successful textbook Syntax: A Generative Introduction (Blackwell, 2002) and, as co-editor, The Syntax of VSO Languages (OUP, 2002), Formal Approaches to Function (Benjamins, 2003), and Verb First (Benjamins, 2005), as well as articles in theoretical syntax in such journals as Syntax, Journal of Celtic Linguistics, Studia Linguistica, Journal of Linguistics, and Canadian Journal of Linguistics. He is currently working on Irish Nouns: A Guide for Students, Teachers and Researchers (OUP) and Sentence Structure: A course book (CUP).
