Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T15:40:19.419Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Semantic structure1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Thomas H. Peterson
Thomas H. Peterson
Affiliation:
California State University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In generative–transformational theories of language, semantics has always played handmaiden to syntax. For example, the extended standard theory (EST) has as its core a component of base phrase structure rules and a lexicon which supplies lexical items for the deep syntactic trees generated by the base rules; ‘semantic representations’ are created from these lexicalized P-markers at various stages of their syntactic derivation from deep to surface structure (Jackendoif, 1972: 4 ff.). Similarly, the semantic representations of a rival theory, generative semantics (GS), are taken from deep pre-lexical syntactic P-markers generated by base PS rules (McCawley, 1971). Both of these models reflect the historical roots of generative–transformational grammar, for at its inception, this theory provided only a model of syntax with no description of semantic structure (Chomsky, 1957). So it is natural, though not necessary, that linguists working in this tradition would construct their semantic models as outgrowths of the original syntactic core.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Linguistics , Volume 19 , Issue 1 , March 1983 , pp. 79 - 114
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1983

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Allerton, D. J. (1978). Generating indirect objects in English. JL 14. 21–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aronoff, M. (1976). Word formation in generative grammar. LIn Monograph One. Cambridge: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1957). Syntactic structures. The Hague: Mouton.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1965). Aspects of the theory of syntax. Cambridge: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Fillmore, C. J. (1968). The case for case. In Bach, E. & Harms, R. T. (eds), Universals in linguistic theory, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1–88.Google Scholar
Fillmore, C. J. (1971). Some problems for case grammar. Unpublished paper from Ohio State University Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences.Google Scholar
Fodor, F. A., Bever, T. G. & Garrett, M. F. (1974). The psychology of language: An introduction to psycholinguistics and generative grammar. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Jackendoff, R. S. (1972). Semantic interpretation in generative grammar. Cambridge: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Jackendoff, R. (1975). Morphological and semantic regularities in the lexicon. Lg 51. 639–671.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. (1970). Irregularity in syntax. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar
Lyons, J. (1968). Introduction to theoretical linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCawley, J. D. (1968). Concerning the base component of a transformational grammar. FL 4. 243–269.Google Scholar
McCawley, J. D. (1971). Prelexical syntax. GURT No 24, Georgetown University.Google Scholar
Meisel, J. M. & Pam, M. D. (eds) (1979). Linear order and generative theory. Current Issues in Linguistic Theory Series, Vol. 7. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peterson, T. H. (1977). On constraining grammars through proper generalization: A revision of the generative-transformational theory of syntax. TL 4. 75–127. Reprinted as Peterson (1979 a).Google Scholar
Peterson, T. H. (1979 a). Constraining grammars through proper generalization: Multiple order grammar. In Meisel, & Pam, (1979): 93–163. Reprinted from Peterson (1977).Google Scholar
Peterson, T. H. (1979b). Multiple order grammar and the movement of NP. In Meisel, & Pam, (1979): 165–186.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peterson, T. H. (1980). The law of time conversion: An algebraic property of time adverbs. TL 7. 111–119.Google Scholar
Stockwell, R., Schachter, P. & Partee, B. (1973). The major syntactic structures of English. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar