Academic literature on the topic 'Complex nominal phrases'

The article deals with the processes that complicate the simple phrase on the basis of word-formation laws. Cases of the formation of components of complex phrases are shown by formation methods. There are presentation about the formation of complex word combinations by methods of contamination and conversion in the Uzbek literary language. Of these, nominal complex phrases are more often used; adjectives, numbers, pronouns and modal words are less common. The given examples are substantiated scientifically and theoretically. Key words: main, dependent word, derivation, contamination, conversion, nominal complex phrases, methods of complication, descriptive, attributive

Abstract We focused in this paper on the “behaviour” of the noun, centre in a nominal phrase, in the presence or absence of different determiners: articles (definite, indefinite), demonstrative adjectives, possessive adjectives, indefinite adjectives, negative adjectives. We deal with more or less complex structures including compulsory or optional rules of nominal definite/indefinite determination or no determination.

AbstractIn Vedic Sanskrit, masculine a-stem nominals exhibit two different forms of the nom/voc.pl, a short form (ending in ‑ās) and a long form (ending in ‑āsas). In this article, we will argue that the scope of this variation is not a single nominal but the entire noun phrase. This means that whereas the short form may occur several times in a noun phrase, the long form is either absent or occurs only once. From a functional point of view, complex noun phrases containing one long form are equivalent to simple noun phrases consisting of one long form. In contrast, complex noun phrases containing only short forms are equivalent to simple noun phrases consisting of one short form. The presence or absence of the long form marks the presence or absence of a certain linguistic feature, the exact nature of which still has to be determined. We will argue that in those cases in which two long forms occur in relative proximity to each other, they either have to, or at least can be interpreted as being part of two distinct noun phrases. In order to do so, we will apply morphological, semantic, syntactic as well as stylistic and metrical criteria.

In English, the position of the AP in the nominal phrase is determined by its form: only structurally simpler phrases are said to be licit in prenominal position, more complex ones have to follow the noun. Recent studies have reported an increasing use of nominal premodifiers in English, so the question arises whether this trend affects only simpler phrases or whether a new structural option emerges – complex APs in prenominal position. Drawing on data from COHA, this article investigates which types of AP occur prenominally. The data show that certain types of complex APs are gaining ground in the prenominal position. Most of these can be analyzed as complex words rather than complex phrases and hence do not indicate major syntactic changes in the English NP. However, some of the attestations, such as easy-predicates with a to-infinitival clause, are complex phrases. It is argued that it is the dependency relation between their rightmost element, a lexical verb, and the noun they modify which makes them occur in prenominal position.

Abstract This work investigates the syntax of nominal modification involving the linker a in Siwkolan Amis, one of the dialects of Amis, an Austronesian language spoken in Taiwan. Based on the two observed types of NP-ellipsis patterns and the formal licensing condition, I argue that Amis displays two types of modification. Modifiers in direct modification are functional heads projecting extended functional projections of NP, whereas those in indirect modification are modifier phrases base-generated at [Spec, ModP]. This distinction adds weight to J. Wu’s (2003) view that relative clauses and description-denoting modifiers marked by -ay are clausal modifiers that have a full-fledged CP structure from a cartographic perspective. Furthermore, I argue that a projects the Modifier Phrase (ModP) and is a modificatory clitic endowed with a [+mod] feature that attaches to a head element moving from a lower head position to form a morphological word. Very much in line with Philip (2012), the proposed analysis suggests that a is endowed with an interpretative profile in marking a modification relation between an extended functional projection (a modifier phrase) and a dependent word (a modified noun) in the nominal domain. Issues involved in dealing with the structure of Amis complex noun phrases are discussed.

This article aims at discussing verb-noun compounds with a locative prefix in the nominal part of the compounds in Cinyanja. The singular and plural forms of the compounds have been presented to show that the complex forms are nouns. With regard to the internal structure, the compounds show that they have a phrasal structure. Since verb-noun compounds in this study resemble the structure of synthetic compounds in English, the analysis of these words followed the syntactic approach. The results show that internally, the compounds with a locative have a verb phrase internal structure, and follow the verb-argument word order. In the syntactic context, it is shown that the compounds with the phrasal internal structure function as determiner phrases because they can appear in the subject and object positions in simple sentences and relative clauses. Further, the entire compound word can be modified by adjectives, and be coordinated with simple nouns, which suggests that the compounds with a locative are indeed determiner phrases. Finally, with the application of the lexical integrity hypothesis, the results reveal that the compounds with the locative in the nominal part are genuine compounds because they adhere to the lexical integrity principle.

AbstractThe goal of this paper is to address the syntax of certain oblique nominals in Blackfoot (Algonquian) that are introduced by a set of verbal prefixes called linkers. In the literature, an oblique nominal introduced by a verbal affix always shows certain properties of objects, e.g., agreement. This type of affix is analyzed as forming a complex verb with the main verb via head movement, and the oblique nominal is treated as an object of the complex verb. However, this paper demonstrates that oblique nominals introduced by linkers in Blackfoot do not show certain object properties even though the linker looks like it forms a complex verb. Building on the lack of object properties, linker phrases are proposed to be adjuncts. As proposed for adjuncts generally (e.g., Stephanov, Arthur. 2001. Late adjunction and minimalist phrase structure. Syntax 4(2). 94–125), this paper proposes a late merge analysis for linker phrases. Within an Agree-based model (Chomsky, Noam. 2000. Minimalist inquiries: The framework. In Roger Martin, David Michaels & Juan Uriagereka (eds.), Step by step: Essays on minimalist syntax in honor of Howard Lasnik, 89–155. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001. Derivation by phase. In Michael Kenstowicz (ed.), Ken Hale: A life in language, 1–52. Cambridge: The MIT Press) where the derivation proceeds by phases (Chomsky 2008), a linker phrase, as an adjunct, lacks the relevant features to participate in the derivation via Agree, and thus it merges late at the end of a given phasal derivation such as vP. When spell out applies, the linker linearizes with a [V-v] complex in the base position, i.e., vP, giving its surface appearance as a verbal affix. Under this view, a linker does not lead to formation of a complex verb as it does not undergo head movement to the verb, unlike applicative affixes, consistent with the absence of object properties.

The nominal clause and noun phrases in Albanian and English are in an oppositional relationship. This study makes descriptions of syntactic structure using constituent analysis between the two languages. The question that now emerges is what kind of language is implied by this type of description. Tufte (1971, p.41) rightly noted that “Noun phrases are any and all structures headed by a noun, or by a pronoun, or any other word or structure that stands in for a noun. Thus, even an entire clause may function as a noun phrase”. Furthermore, the fact that phraseological categories coexist or are "projections" of specific word-level categories demonstrates that categories are complex entities. This was originally emphasized in Harris (1951) and was expanded upon by Muysken (1985) and Chomsky (1970).

<p>Given the importance of disciplinary specificity in terms of the potential differences in the functionality of nominalizations in scientific textbooks and the dearth of studies of this type, the current study explores the extent to which nominalization is realized across two disciplines. To this aim, eight academic textbooks from Physics and Applied Linguistics are analyzed to identify the nominal patterns and expressions and their related types. Findings indicate that, despite the similarity of the first three most prevalent patterns in the sample textbooks, the distribution of these patterns marks disciplinary distinctions. That is, Physics academic writers tend to (a) use a more complex, lexically dense style of writing and package more information into compound nominal phrases by deploying a pattern where nominals are followed by strings of prepositional phrases in comparison to writers in Applied Linguistics; and (b) express particularity using nominals preceded by classifiers more frequently than Applied Linguistics writers. Writers in Applied Linguistics, on the other hand, are found to manifest a greater tendency toward conveying generality by using a pattern where nominals are realized with few pre/post modifiers.</p>

Complex collocations are a type of collocation whose syntactic structure is more complex than that of simple collocations. Thus, they are binary standardized or frequent phrases whose components show a lexical restriction relationship. The complex character of its structure means that one of its components, the collocative, is not a lexical unit, but rather a fixed phrase. Most of them are adverbial, either in the case of verbal predicates (llover a cántaros) or adjectival predicates (loco de atar), although they can also — in less frequent cases — be adjectival, as when combined with a noun (dinero en efectivo), or also nominal, in combination with a verb (hacer un corte de mangas).

L’obbiettivo principale di questo lavoro è quello di contribuire al dibattito sullo status del meccanismo di Accordo (Agree, Chomsky 2001) ed il suo ruolo nella piena interpretazione della frase a livello di interfaccia semantica (Manzini & Savoia, 2007, 2011). C’è disaccordo nella linguistica teorica (ed anche nella psicolinguistica) se il fenomeno di accordo sia un meccanismo computazionale sintattico o semantico, oppure se sia legato strettamente ai requisiti dell’apparato articolo-fonatorio, ovvero l’interfaccia senso-motoria (la pronuncia). La nostra contribuzione a tale dibattito è quella di vedere come il meccanismo sintattico di accordo possa rendere conto di due tipologie di dati: costruzioni con forme di accordo non canonico reperibili nei linguaggi naturali, e dati psicolinguistici sul processamento dell’accordo, includendo anche dati provenienti dall’acquisizione della prima lingua L1, della seconda lingua L2 e dati sulla comprensione linguistica (disambiguazione, riconoscimento di errori). Le due domande principali a cui si cerca di dare una risposta sono le seguenti:1) sono le configurazioni di accordo non canonico dovute a un problema nel meccanismo computazione di accordo o sono spiegabili facendo riferimento all’interpretazione semantica che viene attribuita agli elementi lessicali inseriti nella frase? 2) Ci sono tratti di accordo (persona genere e numero) che hanno un ruolo prominente rispetto agli altri nel meccanismo di accordo? Le risposta alla prima domanda sarà che il meccanismo computazionale di accordo è quello basico descritto da Chomsky (2001), le peculiarità nelle configurazioni di accordo non canonico sono dovute ai requisiti a livello di interfaccia semantica degli elementi lessicali inseriti nella computazione sintattica. Le risposta alla seconda domanda sarà che mentre genere e numero non implicano ina differenziazione o una prominenza dell’uno sull’altro sia a livello teorico che nei dati naturalistici provenienti dalla psicolinguistica e dall’acquisizione della prima (L1) e della seconda (L2) lingua, il tratto di persona ha un ruolo chiave per poter comprendere sia i dati naturalistici sia la distribuzione di alcuni pattern di accordo tra le lingue del mondo. Queste risposte generali si basano sull’analisi di un corpus eterogeneo di dati e su considerazioni che vengono proposti nei 6 capitoli in cui è divisa la tesi. Nel primo capitolo sono introdotti i concetti base sull’accordo sintattico, semantico e nozionale che verranno utilizzati durante tutta la trattazione. Vengono anche introdotte le differenti teorie sul diverso peso che i tratti di accordo hanno nella computazione dell’accordo. Nel secondo capitolo vengono analizzate delle particolari costruzioni aspettuali diffuse nelle varietà del Sud Italia che sono composte da un ausiliare + un verbo lessicale: sia l’ausiliare che il verbo presentano delle forme di flessione finita (i.e. Io sto a faccio). Si propone che queste costruzioni mostrino una doppia flessione per soddisfare i requisiti di interfaccia semantica per l’attribuzione /realizzazione di diversi valori aspettuali (nei casi descritti si tratterà di aspetto progressivo). Nel terzo capitolo sono trattate delle costruzioni pseudo partitive che presentano pattern variabili di accordo: ad esempio la frase “un centinaio di senatori si è dimesso /si sono dimessi”. Dopo una descrizione delle variazioni cross-linguistiche, viene proposta un’analisi in cui l’indefinitezza del sintagma nominale che introduce il sintagma nominale complesso (“un centinaio) e la relazione espressa dalla preposizione (di), interagiscono per fornire diversi tipi di output livello di interfaccia semantica . Nel quarto capitolo sono presentati dati sull’acquisizione dell’Italiano (L1 e L2) in cui viene analizzata la distribuzione di soggetti nulli/espressi. L’analisi verte soprattutto nel verificare se gli split di persona(1 e seconda persona vs 3 persona) e di definitezza sono presenti nei dati naturalistici. Il risultato dimostra che entrambi i tipi di split sono presenti e sono strettamente legati agli elementi lessicali che sono introdotti nella costruzione sintattica della frase. Nel quinto capitolo viene proposta una rassegna di dati psicolinguistico sulla rilevanza dei diversi tratti di accordo. Nella prima parte vengono analizzati i tratti di genere e numero: i dati psicolinguistici e diverse considerazioni teoriche porteranno a concludere che genere e numero sostanzialmente non comportano differenze rilevanti sia a livello cognitivo generale, sia nel processamento linguistico che a livello teorico. Nella seconda parte viene analizzato il tratto di persona: tramite la presentazione di diversi studi psicolinguistici (includendo uno studio neurofisiologico sulla reazione neurale agli split di persona) e dati tipologici verrà confermata il ruolo centrale del tratto di persona in quanto fa riferimento alla disambiguazione referenziale tra i referenti discorsivi (1a e 2a persona) i referenti dell’evento linguistico (3a persona). Nel sesto capitolo vengono presentate delle conclusioni generali sui dati esposti in tutto il manoscritto.

The point of departure of this book is the fundamental observation that actual conversations tend to consist of loosely connected, compact, and meaningful chunks built on a noun phrase, rather than fully fledged sentences. Therefore, after the treatment of elementary matters such as the Turkish alphabet and pronunciation in part I, the main points of part II are the structure of noun phrases and their function in nominal, existential, and verbal sentences, while part III presents their adjuncts and modifiers. The verbal system is extensively discussed in part IV, and in part V on sentence structure the grammatical phenomena presented so far are wrapped up. The first five parts of the book, taken together, provide for all-round operational knowledge of Turkish on a basic level. Part VI deals with the ways in which complex words are constructed, and constitutes a bridge to the advanced matter treated in parts VII and VIII. These latter parts deal with advanced topics such as relative clauses, subordination, embedded clauses, clausal complements, and the finer points of the verbal system. An important advantage of this book is its revealing new content: the section on syllable structure explains how loanwords adapt to Turkish; other topics include: the use of pronouns in invectives; verbal objects classified in terms of case marking; extensive treatment of the optative (highly relevant in day-to-day conversation); recursion and lexicalization in compounds; stacking of passives; the Başı-Bozuk and Focus-Locus constructions; relativization on possessive, dative, locative, and ablative objects, instrumentals and adverbial adjuncts; pseudo-relative clauses; typology of clausal complements; periphrastic constructions and double negation.

Abstract Investigations into phonological differences between nouns and verbs focus almost exclusively on the lexical (word) level, showing that underlying contrasts are more numerous and stable (“faithful”) on nouns (Smith 1998, 1999). This raises the question of whether these (or other) alleged differences in word-level phonology generalize to the nominal vs. verbal phrase. The Bantu family provides an ideal testing ground for such an investigation. Based on Bantu, I show that nouns are more likely to undergo modification at the phrase level than verbs, thereby obeying less “faithfulness” to the input than verbs. Nominal phrases also show more distinct outputs and complex idiosyncrasies than their verbal counterparts. After establishing that there are distinct asymmetric properties in the phrasal phonology of nominal vs. verbal constituents in Bantu, the chapter raises the question of what causes these asymmetries and whether they are general or pertain only to Bantu and other African languages.

Chapter 3 focuses on -men in Mandarin, a morpheme that has been analyzed as a plural marker and/or a collective marker and has been used to argue for the existence of DP projections in Mandarin. It defends the view that -men is a plural marker but argues against the analysis of placing -men in the D position. By treating -men as a plural morpheme, the Mandarin fact may seem to argue against the proposed uniform D-less structure of numeral containing phrases in Chapter 2. However, this chapter argues that the Mandarin fact does not force us to change the proposed structure in Chapter 2. Specifically, it proposes an analysis of -men as an associative plural marker. The analysis of -men further argues for the lack of DP in Mandarin.

Wood’s ‘Prepositional prefixing and allosemy in nominalizations’ discusses how Icelandic prepositional prefixing supports three main points. First, Wood shows that prepositions play a dual role in constructing verb meaning—while they may have meaning of their own, they may also condition a special meaning for verbal roots. Second, the patterns of prefixation in Icelandic support the claim that DNs, even in the Complex Event Nominal (CEN) reading, can be built by combining heads together directly, without any phrasal material below the nP level. This is in contrast to what Wood calls the ‘Phrasal Layering’ analysis, where what is nominalized is a full verb phrase, perhaps with a VoiceP or other extended vP layers. Third, Wood shows that adjunction and complementation define distinct domains for the conditioning of idiosyncratic meaning, and both are available for the syntactic assembly of words and phrases.<141>

In her chapter ‘Nominalizing verbal passives: PROs and cons’, Borer argues that nominalization, and by extension many other morphological processes, must be syntactic. Borer focuses on so-called short argument structure nominals (SASNs), i.e. ASNs which are missing an overt logical (external) subject, and which do not obligatorily take a by-phrase. Borer provides evidence that SASNs embed a passive structure, with the latter showing most of the syntactic properties of clausal verbal passive, including the promotion of the internal argument. Nominalization is thus an operation which can combine a passivized verbal extended projection with a higher nominal head. Long ASNs, in turn, are nominalizations which bring together a nominalizer with an active Verbal Extended Projection, ExP[V], complete with all its arguments, including the external. ASNs (de-verbal/de-adjectival), according to Borer, therefore must contain a verbal/adjectival ExP, and the argument array in ASNs is that which is associated with the embedded ExP[V] and ExP[A] respectively, and not with the noun. This in turn means that the operation Nominalization, which brings together a verbal/adjectival stem with a nominalizing affix, must be allowed to apply to the output of syntactic operations which involve complex syntactic phrases, including passive and movement.

German is noteworthy for allowing agentive vPs to front, albeit under very specific conditions. This chapter examines the prosodic requirements for such phrases to front, comparing them with those for fronted lexical VPs as well as with the prosody of unfronted vPs/VPs. The results of a production study are shown, and it is determined that the prosodic condition is identical to the “hat contour” that is more widely, but optionally, used in the language for other contrastive topics, so-called I(ntonation)-topics. This investigation of vP/VP I-topics, which are typically more complex than DP/PP I-topics, sheds light on previously-unknown aspects, such as the fact that the characteristic L*+H (low rising) intonation of the hat contour generally falls on the rightmost nominal in the I-topic. The range of variation in the realization of hat contours is discussed, as well as the key intonational differences between I-topicalization and what we call regular (focus) fronting.

Separable complex verbs (SCVs) are a subtype of multi-word expressions: phrasal predicates with a verbal head, and particles, adjectives, or nouns as non-heads. They behave as lexical units, but cannot be analysed as verbal compounds. They are analysed as verb phrases with a non-projecting complement, and they can also behave as syntactic compounds, with syntactic incorporation of the preverb. The subtype of SCVs with a Noun as complement is called quasi-incorporation. Nominalizations of separable complex verbs are nominals compounds consisting of a preverb and a deverbal nominalization. This implies a systematic paradigmatic relationship between phrasal constructions (SCVs) and morphological constructions (the corresponding nominalization compounds).

Study of the periphrastic causative in Tłı̨chǫ has its origins in community-based research supporting a literacy manual and dictionary database. It is shown that the causative verb ats’ele ‘cause, let, do to’ takes two complements: the causee and a second expression of varying complexity that indicates the caused process or result. At its most complex, the second complement can be a clause which bears an adverbializing suffix and expresses the caused situation. Ats’ele selects a TypeP, which is independent of the higher verb in aspect, tense, and polarity. This leads to a broader range of interpretations of the relationship between causing and caused situations than is found in languages where the caused situation is expressed as a verb phrase. The complementizer used in the causative construction contrasts with a nominalizer in the language, in that it forms an adverbial clause. The facts thus provide a novel instance of non-nominal complementation.

Maithili (Indo-Aryan; India; Nepal) has a complex agreement system in which many terms and non-terms, including subjects, objects, obliques, extra-clausal ‘deictic referents’, and, crucially, possessors within any of these can potentially control agreement on the verb. Agreement is partly determined by grammatical function and argument structure, but in many instances the functional prominence of the agreement controller—determined by focus and referential features, including respect—overrides syntactic prominence. This is particularly clear when possessors internal to an argument or adjunct can control agreement, even though viable alternatives appear to be available. The functional prominence of the internal possessor also appears to have a syntactic correlate: the possessor that controls agreement may be in a more prominent position within the phrase headed by the possessed nominal, and this is what enables it to participate in clause-level syntactic processes.

This paper aims to analyse values of meanings of proper names which have the role to convey the intimate connection between the human soul and the Divinity, as this intimacy is configured in the poetry by Traian Dorz, a less studied contemporary Romanian writer, the author of thousands of lines of mystical poetry and of several volumes of memoires and religious mediations. Thus, in an important number of literary creations inspired by biblical truths and verses, nouns like Mire (‘groom’), Soţ (‘husband’), Frate (‘brother’), Prieten (‘friend’), Dor (‘longing’) etc. are integrated in original lyrical definitions or phrases which substitute the name of God. From the viewpoint of Christianity, these nominal phrases point out the human being’s aspiration towards the ecstatic state, as the human being is described during its mystical ascension, until the true, complete and everlasting unification with its Creator.