Syntactic Processes

Question 1

classification of Arguments (2)

Answer 1

1. grammatical relation to the verb
2. semantic role in the event

Question 2

What is a Grammatical Relation (4)

Answer 2

1. subject
2. direct object
3. Indirect object
4. Oblique object

Question 3

Semantic Roles (8)

Answer 3

1. Agent
2. Patient
3. Instrument
4. Experiencer
5. Theme
6. Location
7. Recipient
8. Beneficiary

Question 4

what is a semantic role?

Answer 4

characterizations of the way an event participates in an event

Question 5

what is an Agent:

Answer 5

participation that willfully initiates interaction (animate)

ex: STEVE gave Sue a gift
ex: STEVE broke a mirror

Question 6

what is a Patient

Answer 6

Participation that is affected by an action and undergoes a change of state (dies, or wounded)

ex: the FLY dies
ex: Steve broke the MIRROR

Question 7

what is an Experiencer:

Answer 7

participant that perceives something, receives some sensation or reacts to some event (animate). 5 senses/perception

ex: Steve SAW the train
ex: Steve HEARD a noise

Question 8

what is a Theme:

Answer 8

participant that undergoes some motion or process, but doesn’t change state (no modification to the object) usually the D.object

ex: Steve saw THE TRAIN
ex: Steve put THE WALLET on the table

Question 9

What is a Recipient:

Answer 9

Participant that received some transferred object: animate (usually)

ex: Steve gave SUE a gift
ex: SUE received a gift
ex:

Question 10

what is a Beneficiary:

Answer 10

Participant that benefits from an event (animate)

ex: I cooked SUE dinner
ex: I cooked dinner for SUE
**Look for the preposition “FOR”

Question 11

what is an instrument:

Answer 11

participant that us used to carry out the action (inanimate)

ex: the FLY SWATTER hit the fly
ex: Steve hit the fly with the FLY SWATTER

Question 12

What is Location:

Answer 12

spatial location that a participant occupies, moves to, or moves from

ex: Steve is AT HIS OFFICE
ex: Steve came FROM HIS OFFICE

Question 13

Grammatical process (3)

Answer 13

1. Voice (full, agentless, impersonal, antipassive)
2. causatives
3. Applicatives

Question 14

Subject Relation is assigned to

Answer 14

the argument expressing the most important Semantic role (agent)

Question 15

The Direct object Relation is assigned to

Answer 15

the argument expressing the next most important semantic role (patient)

Question 16

Tendency of subjects and Direct objects

Answer 16

Subjects = Agents
Direct Objects = Patients

Question 17

Voice

Answer 17

grammatical process that changes the diathesis of the verb by moving the grammatical relations and semantic roles

Question 18

Voice options (4)

Answer 18

1. Full Passive
2. Agentless Passive
3. Impersonal Passive
4. Antipassive

Question 19

Full Passive voice: expression

Answer 19

• Analytically (aux + participle)
• Morphologically (morpheme on the lexical verb)

Question 20

Full Passive voice: syntax effects

Answer 20

S –> optional OblObj
O –> S
Transitive –> Intransitive

Question 21

Syntactic Properties of a Full Passive Voice

Answer 21

• demotes the subject to an optional oblique object
  -promotes the direct object to a subject.

ex: the hunter killed the bear
–> the bear was killed by the hunter

Question 22

What are the Pragmatic Properties of Full Passive?

Answer 22

It makes the agent less prominent by demoting it or omitting it

Question 23

How is agentless Passive expressed?

Answer 23

• morphologically (morpheme on lexical verb)

Question 24

Agentless passive: Syntactic effects

Answer 24

the Subject is suppressed

Question 25

Agentless Passive: pragmatic effects

Answer 25

the participant introduced by the Subject (the agents) isn't mentioned. ex: the man was seen --> (who saw the man??)

Question 26

How is Impersonal Passive expressed analytically

Answer 26

Analytically: aux+verb pattern

Question 27

How is Impersonal Passive expressed Syntactically

Answer 27

-demotes the subject of the active to an optional oblique object inserts a "dummy" subject (non lexical Subject equivalent to the English pronominal "it"

Question 28

Example of Impersonal Passive

Answer 28

It is said that this is a ground-breaking study

Question 29

How is Antipassive expressed morphologically? (English doesn't have this)

Answer 29

- antipassive morpheme on the lexical verb - demotes Direct object to oblique object (may be deleted) promotes and A argument to an S argument - Patient become lower in individuation

Question 30

Antipassive Syntactic effects (3)

Answer 30

1. Demotes direct object of the active voice to oblique object 2. applies to a transitive clause 3. turns transitive clause into an intransitive clause

Question 31

What languages is Passive more common?

Answer 31

Nominative-Accusative languages

Question 32

What languages is Antipassive more common?

Answer 32

Ergative-Absoloutive languages

Question 33

What is a Grammatical Pivots

Answer 33

- links NP together across different clauses

Question 34

Grammatical Pivots in accusative languages

Answer 34

-Accusative languages have Subject Pivot (S=A) can be deleted in the second clause

Question 35

What do causatives do?

Answer 35

add a new participant that is realized as a subject and has the semantic role of a causer. Adds new clause and possible predicate --> ex: I had them studying ex: I forced them to...

Question 36

What do Applicatives do?

Answer 36

add new participant that is realized as an object can influence semantic roles

Question 37

what is a CAUSER

Answer 37

agent that does or initiates something. because of their actions, the causee performs the action described by the verb