Topic 5: Syntax of Mother Tongue: Verb Phrase Preposition Phrase

TOPIC 5: SYNTAX OF MOTHER TONGUE
I. The Syntactic Features of Mother Tongue
Mother Tongue
This refers to person’s native language – that is, a language learned from birth.
This is also called as first language, dominant language, home language and native
tongue (although these terms are not necessarily synonymous).
Syntax
Syntax, in a broader perspective of linguistics, is the study of how words are
ordered in human language; what rules are necessary to describe a particular language;
and how can these rules differ across languages.
Syntax is concerned with the set of rules and principles in a language, which
relate to how words and phrases are arranged to create well-formed sentences (OED,
2015).
sentence
verb phrase preposition phrase
noun phrase
verb preposition noun
A. Syntactic Features of Mother Tongue
Constituency and Tree Diagrams

- A sentence consists not of words but as constituents.
Example:
1. Nakakita si Harry ug iring.
What is it made up of?
It is made up of sounds like /i/, /r/, /n/ and /g/ in the word ‘iring’, or made up of
words like ‘Nakakita’ and ‘Harry’.
2. Ganahan si Cris kang Marta.

sentence
V NP N
Ganahan Si Cris kang Marta
Linear Word Order

- The words in a sentence must occur in a particular sequence if the sentence
is to convey the desired meaning.
Example:
1. Gisulyapan ni Dodong si Nene
If we rearrange the words in this sentence, we either come up with nonsense, as
in (2):
(2) Si Nene ni Dodong gisulyapan.
Or with a sentence whose meaning is distinctly different from that of (1):
(1) Gisulyapan ni Nene si Dodong.
We put simply that ordering of the words in sentences determines, in part,
whether a sentence is grammatical or not, and what the sentence means.
Hierarchical Structure
- The individual words in a sentence are organized into natural, semantically
coherent groupings, the largest grouping of all being the sentence itself.
These groupings within a sentence are called constituents of that sentence.
The relationship between constituents in a sentence form the constituent
structure of the sentence.
Example:
1. Daghang pamilya ang nangaon sa mga nindot nga restawran.
We can easily distinguish a number of meaningful groups of words in this
sentence: Daghang pamilya ang nangaon sa mga nindot nga restawran; for instance,
clearly have meanings of their own, and each makes a coherent contribution to the
meaning of the sentence as a whole. With these reasons, they are constituents of this
sentence.
On the other hand, some groups of words in sentence (1) do not naturally form
meaningful units; daghang pamilya ang and nangaon sa mga, for example don’t clearly
have meaning of their own. Thus, these groups of words aren’t constituents of the
sentence.
II. The Transformational - Generative Grammar Model
Transformational - Generative Grammar by Zellig S. Harris

In linguistics, Transformational Generative Grammar (TGG) is the part of the
theory of generative grammar, especially of natural native languages. Transformational
Generative Grammar is also known as Transformational Grammar, which is a system of
language analysis. It shows the relationship among the various elements of a sentence
and among the possible sentences and the process of rules which are transformations
of sentences to express semantics with the help of surface structures and deep
structures.
Surface and Deep Structures
When it comes to Syntax, Noam Chomsky, as a famous linguist is known for
proposing that beneath every sentence in the mind of a speaker is an invisible,
inaudible deep structure, the interface to the mental lexicon. The deep structures are
converted by transformational rules into a surface structure that corresponds more
closely to what is pronounced and heard. The rationale is that certain constructions, if
they were listed in the mind as surface structures, would have to be multiplied in a
thousand of variations that would have been learned one by one, whereas if the
constructions were listed as deep structures, they would be simple, few in number, and
economically learned. (Steven Pinker, Words and Rules. Basic Books, 1999.
Aspects Model or Standard Theory by Noam Chomsky (as presented in his
book Syntactic Structures)
In the years where the Transformational - Generative Grammar was formulated,
it has gone through countless transformations and numerous changes as to how
grammar provides a way in understanding language. Chomsky has rejected the
interpretation and eliminated many of the transformational rules in the previous
versions of grammar and replaced them with broader rules. According to him, the
grammar of a language is a statement of what a person has to know in order to
recognize and utterance as grammatical, but not a hypothesis of the process involved in
either producing or understanding a language. Although several features of the newer
version (Aspects Model or Standard Theory) differ, at a deeper level, they still share the
same syntactic feature (Caroll, 2008).
Aspects Model or Standard Theory and Four Main Components
A. The Base Components

- Produces or generates basic syntactic structures called Deep Structures.
B. Transformational Component
- Transforms of Changes the basic structures into sentences called Surface
Structures.
C. Phonological Component
- Gives sentences a phonetic representation so that they may be pronounced
properly or perfectly.
D. Semantic Components
- Deals with the meaning of sentences.
The relationship of the four main components is as shown in the simplified diagram
below:
Semantic Base
Component Component
Transformational
Component
Semantic
Interpretation
Phonological
Component
References:
https://www.slideshare.net/mobile/LanzManipor
/syntax-5161096
https://www.thoughtco.com/mother-tongue-language
www.eresearchjournal.com
all-about-linguistics.group.shef.ac.uk
GROUP MEMBERS
Sinsuat, Norhaya
Suazo, Kaye Mae
Subong, April Grace
Tagac, Khristal
Talisic, Shaira
Tionson, Cleo
Tordillo, Mary Sheresh
Verano, Melvilane

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What are the main components of Transformational-Generative Grammar?

What are the differences between surface structure and deep structure?

TOPIC 5: SYNTAX OF MOTHER TONGUE

I. The Syntactic Features of Mother Tongue

verb phrase preposition phrase

verb preposition noun

A. Syntactic Features of Mother Tongue

Constituency and Tree Diagrams

2. Ganahan si Cris kang Marta.

Ganahan Si Cris kang Marta

Linear Word Order

II. The Transformational - Generative Grammar Model

Transformational - Generative Grammar by Zellig S. Harris

Aspects Model or Standard Theory and Four Main Components

A. The Base Components

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