Reflection

Syntax is the part of grammar that concerns itself with the structure of sentences. Thus, studying English syntax is studying about its grammar so that this first chapter mainly focuses on Grammar and its types.
Firstly, the term of grammar itself can be ambiguous. In a narrow sense, the term grammar may be construed as being similar to the term of syntax. That is talking about grammar, we can think about structure of sentences. However, there are also some other definitions of grammar: “A grammar of a language is a coherent system of rules and principles that are at the basis of the grammatical sentences of a language.”(Haegeman); “Grammar deals with language forms and meanings and the ways they are interconnected”(Jacobs) and “A grammar of a language is a model of the linguistic competence of the fluent native speaker of the language.”(Radfrord). Secondly, grammar can be viewed differently depending on the perspective one is taking. These ways of viewing grammar have led to the ways that grammar has been categorized as types of grammar. There are three types of grammar: mental grammar, descriptive grammar and prescriptive grammar. Specifically, mental grammar refers to native speakers’ linguistic competence in using the rules and principles to produce and understand their language. Otherwise, descriptive grammar provides visible analogs to the invisible mental grammars of native speakers. Besides, prescriptive grammar states rules for what is considered the best or most correct usage. It is based on the grammarian’s views of what is best.
From the first chapter, definitions of syntax and grammar concern with structure of sentences in. So, what is sentence structure? This problem will be interpreted in chapter “Sentences structure”. It is divided into 3 parts: the units of syntactic analysis, constituent structure and some properties of sentence structure. First of all, that’s constituent structure. A constituent is a part of some unit higher in the hierarchy. More specifically, complementary to the concept of constituent is that of construction. Constructions are made up of units lower in the hierarchy. The sentence is the largest unit of syntax and the word the smallest. By contrast, the words are not syntactic constructions because they are the minimal units of syntax, and the sentence is not a constituent. Accordingly, there are three ways that represent the constituents in a sentence: labeled brackets, phrase structure and tree diagram. Moreover, there are some properties of sentence structure such as linearity, hierarchy, and categoriality. Linearity is word order in a sentence. All of the words in a sentence cannot be uttered at a same time; they are produced in a time sequence. Hierarchy is that different ways of grouping words may result in different meanings. And categoriality is that words have different distributions based on their categories.
In English, some verbs don’t take a noun phrase, but others require a noun phrase to follow. So what is the role of the verb in a sentence? The verb plays a significant part in most English sentences: it determines the meaning of a sentence. The verb and its noun phrase make up not only a syntactic unit but also a semantic unit. According, every verb has its argument structure – required noun phrase, and the participants minimally involved in the activity or state expressed by verb called the predicate. The predicate determines the number of arguments, the status of arguments, and the forms of arguments. However, verbs are not the only grammatical category that can function as predicates. Actually, there is a semantic relationship between the predicate and its arguments. The predicate can assign semantic roles to its arguments. The specific roles that arguments semantically receive from predicates are now to as thematic roles. The thematic roles which are generally distinguished in current linguistic descriptions: agent, patient, theme, experiencer, goal, benefactive, source, instrument, locative. Thematic roles show a partial correlation with grammatical relationship.
In syntax, subcategorization refers the occurrence or non – occurrence of the internal arguments. Another thing, subcategorization is used to show the tight bond between the head and its complement. And grammatical relations in a phrase consist of a head, complements, adjuncts, and specifiers. The complements are used to denote any constituent whose presence is required by another element, a predicate or head and are obligatory. A constituent just adds some meaning having to do with time, place, manner, etc, that is called an adjunct, which is optional phrase.
There is internal hierarchy between the constituents of a verb. That’s, all VP – internal constituents can not be treated on an equal footing. As a result, substitution affects constituent. Therefore, the flat layered structure can not represent internal structure, but the layered structure can do so. Lastly, X-bar is the part of grammar that regulates the structure of phrases.
After studying English syntax, I have something in my mind. Syntax brings me many benefits and necessary knowledge of English linguistics. First of all, I found it a very great chance to have this subject in my studying project. This is a really useful and interesting subject, which helps me a great deal in studying and mastering English, my favorite subject of all time. Due