UNIVERSITIY OF BIHAĆ

PEDAGOGICAL FACULTY

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Syntactic characterisation of clause elements

Seminar paper
Contents
Contents.................................................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION-SYNTAX ........................................................................................3
CLAUSE ELEMENTS ................................................................................................4
Subject ............................................................................................................... 4
Verb ....................................................................................................................6
Object ................................................................................................................. 7
The Direct Object.............................................................................................8
The Indirect Object...........................................................................................9
Complement......................................................................................................10
Adverbials.........................................................................................................10
CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................... 11
REFERENCES: ......................................................................................................13

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INTRODUCTION-SYNTAX

Syntax is the study of the part of the human linguistic system that determines how
sentences are put together out of words. Syntactic rules in a grammar account for the
grammaticality of sentences, and the ordering of words and morphemes.

Syntax involves our knowledge of structural ambiguity our knowledge that sentences
may be paraphrases of each other our knowledge of the grammatical function of each part of a
sentence, that is, of the grammatical relations. It is also concerned with speakers' ability to
produce and understand an infinite set of possible sentences.

“We know that the grammars that are in fact constructed vary only slightly among
speakers of the same language, despite wide variations not only in intelligence but also in the
conditions under which language is acquired.” (Chomsky 1972, p.79)

The sentence is regarded the highest-ranking unit of grammar, and therefore the
purpose of a grammatical description is to define, making use of whatever descriptive
apparatus that may be necessary (rules, categories, etc).

The word syntax is used in linguistics with two meanings. First, it refers to a branch of
linguistics (or grammar), which studies the regular patterns of communicative units, their
structure and function. Second, syntax is the whole of linguistic phenomena that are involved
in the building and use of communicative units. In modern syntax, albeit schematically, two
main approaches may be distinguished:
traditional syntax and structural (or structuralistic) syntax.

Syntax, put simply, is the grammatical arrangement of each element of a sentence. It’s
main concern is ensuring the coherence of your subject, verb and object, as well as the
relationships that tie them together. Involving a logical sequence, it’s the framework from
which you build sentences correctly.

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Each word we use in our language has a meaning. When we string words together to
form a sentence, the goal is for the complete statement to relay a specific message.

CLAUSE ELEMENTS

Linguists have problems in agreeing how to define the word sentence. For this web page,
sentence will be taken to mean:

'a sequence of words whose first word starts with a capital letter and whose last word is
followed by an end punctuation mark (period/full stop or question mark or exclamamtion
mark)'.

The basic parts of a sentence fall into two categories: the subject and the predicate. Know
them well, because you can’t have a sentence without them. There are five main clause
elements in English language. We have subject, verb, object, adverbial and complement.

Subject

The subject, like the verb, is a central constituent in the clause. And as a central element, it
'governs' many of the grammatical choices to be made within the clause. The subject
determines agreement between itself and the verb and governs the person, number, case, and
gender, where relevant, of several other constituents within the clause. Traditional grammar
books and school grammars often define the subject along semantic lines: they refer to the
subject as "what the sentence is about" or as "the topic of the sentence" or as the "actor
performing the action described by the verb. From the perspective of grammar, however, such
definitions are misleading, since those older definitions blend and conflate different ideas that
are best understood if kept apart. As we will see soon in the section on METAFUNCTION,
the subject is a distinct entity, related to, but separate from, notions like 'theme' or 'topic' or
'actor.'

Grammatical subjects usually share a number of properties that serve to identify them within a
clause. These are form, position, agreement, pronouns, and voice.

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Form. The subject is usually a noun phrase or clause.

That guy (S) is the one.

What I don't know (S) can hurt me.

Position. The subject is usually positioned before the verb in the indicative mood, after the
auxiliary in the interrogative mood, and absent — but implied — in the imperative mood.

Sandy (S) fell asleep. [indicative mood]

Did I (S) win? [interrogative mood]

Go home! [imperative mood]

• The subject is a noun or noun phrase, pronoun or subordinate clause.

o The dog was sick. Fred felt funny. (noun)
o Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun. (noun phrase)
o I am happy. They are jealous. (pronoun.)
o What she said is untrue. (subordinate clause)
• In this kind of analysis a series of noun phrases is a single clause element.
• Pronouns used as subject are in the subject case (I, she, they not me, her, them)
• The subject controls singular-plural verb agreement (You go; she goes) and agreement
of reflexive pronoun objects (I injured myself; they amused themselves)
• A subject is usually present in a clause, but it may be omitted in non-standard
(especially spoken) structures (Drinks like a fish. Gets here when?) or imperatives
(Listen to this).

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Verb

The function of verb is the least ambiguous in English since only one category (the verb
phrase) fills this function. Nonetheless, the verb is recognizable by a combination of formal
and functional properties. These are form, position, agreement, tense, modality, aspect, and
voice.

Form. The verb is composed of a main verb with or without auxiliaries.

Frank reads (V) quickly.

Frank must have been reading (V) quickly.

Position. The verb usually occurs after the subject in the indicative mood, around the subject
in the interrogative mood, and at the beginning of the clause in the imperative mood.

Sandy fell (V) asleep. [indicative mood]

Did I win (V)? [interrogative mood]

Go (V) home! [imperative mood]

Agreement. The verb corresponds in number (singular or plural) with the subject in finite
clauses.

Liz (S) works (V) hard. [singular, third person]

Emily and Liz (S) work (V) hard. [plural]

Tense. The verb of a finite clause is marked for tense (present or past).

Mike likes (V) Nintendo. [present]

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Mike liked (V) Nintendo. [past]

Modality. The verb can be marked as predicating something other than simple fact (modal).

Paul might do (V) it. [modal]

Paul ought to do (V) it. [semi-modal]

Aspect. The verb can be marked as completing or continuing the process indicated by the
main verb (perfect and/or progressive).

Paul has done (V) it. [perfect]

Paul is doing (V) it. [progressive]

Paul has been doing (V) it for a long time. [perfect and progressive]

Voice. The verb is marked for voice (active or passive).

Emily likes (V) Liz. [active voice]

Liz is liked (V) by Emily. [passive voice]

Verb the central and obligatory element. A clause must contain at least one verb phrase,
which may be a single verb:

Jesus wept. They are drowning.

The cow jumped over the moon.

The choice of verb will largely determine what other elements are in the clause.

The verb usually has a subject. A transitive verb is one which takes a direct object. (Strictly
this is a tautology since transitive = “taking a direct object”)

Object

These usually follow the verb. They may be direct or indirect.

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 o Direct object: Fred bit his thumb. The chimpanzees groomed each other.
o Indirect object: Jane gave the gorilla a kiss. Jane gave a kiss to the gorilla.
(Note that here there is also a direct object = a kiss)

Just as with subjects, they may be nouns, noun phrases, pronouns or subordinate clauses.

Just as subjects are, pronouns are in the appropriate (object) case (me, her, them).

As above, reflexive pronoun objects agree with their subjects (They amused themselves).

But unlike subject, the object has no effect on agreement of verb.

The Direct Object

The direct object is identifiable by its formal and functional properties. These are form,
position, pronouns, and voice.

Form. The direct object usually has the form of a noun phrase or clause.

The cat chased the mouse (DO).

I know that she will be here soon (DO).

Position. Direct objects usually occur after the subject and verb, as in the examples above.

Pronouns. If the subject and the object of a clause refer to the same entity, then the object
will be in the form of a reflexive pronoun. The reflexive pronoun will agree with the subject
in number, person, and gender, where relevant.

You (S) should see yourself (DO).

We (S) rewarded ourselves (DO) with a treat.

All other pronouns assuming object function will take the objective form.

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I like her (DO).

She likes me (DO).

Voice. There is also a systematic relationship between the object of an active voice clause and
the subject of a passive voice clause. The object of the active voice clause corresponds to the
subject in the passive voice equivalent.

Emily likes Liz (DO). [active voice]

Liz (S) is liked by Emily [passive voice]

The Indirect Object

The indirect object is identifiable by all of the criteria of the direct object with a few
unique characteristics of its own in form and position.

Form. Although both objects usually occur either as noun phrases or as clauses in form, the
indirect object is restricted to the relative clause form.

I sent whoever wants it (IO) copies of a receipt.

Position. The indirect object can occur only when the direct object is also represented in the
clause. (Here we use the asterisk [*] to represent ungrammatical forms in a language.)

We gave her (IO) everything (DO).

*We gave her (IO).

The indirect object also occurs only between the verb and the direct object.

We gave (V) her (IO) everything (DO).

*We gave (V) everything (DO) her (IO).

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Moreover, only the indirect object can be paraphrased by a prepositional phrase functioning
as an adverbial, beginning with either to or for. The choice of the preposition is governed by
the main verb of the clause.

We gave her (IO) everything (DO).

We gave everything (DO) to her (A).

Finally, the indirect object can be omitted without affecting the semantic relationships of the
remaining constituents of the clause.

We (S) gave (V) her (IO) everything (DO).

Complement

Complement (verb) means “go with”. (Do not confuse with compliment). In clause syntax,
the complement is anything which adds to the meaning of the subject (subject complement) or
object (object complement).

Subject complement usually follows the verb. The most common verb for a subject
complement is the verb to be, but some other verb may be substituted where the meaning of
be is expressed. These are called copular (= linking) verbs or simply copulas. In the examples
complements are in red type, copular verbs underlined:

She is a doctor. That smells heavenly.

The students are feeling dazed and confused.

Object complement usually follows the direct object: Sunshine makes me very happy. The
voters elected Clinton president of the USA.

Adverbials

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These clause elements add to or complete the meaning of the verb element. They may be
single adverbs. But they also include nouns, noun or verb phrases and subordinate clauses:

They ran quickly. He went home twice nightly.

We walked on the playground.

My friend phoned me this morning.

I was happy when I saw her again.

Adverbials may appear in several positions in the clause, but are most common at the end:
Often I dream. I often dream. I dream often.

Adverbials may perform different functions:

Adding information: I walked quietly.

Linking clauses: The bus was full. However, Fred found a seat.

Adding a comment on what is expressed: Quite frankly we disapprove of violence.

Some verbs (like put) must have an adverbial to complete their meaning: Please put the gun
down. The path runs around the field.

CONCLUSION

All human languages use sentences as minimal units of propositional expression, but the
forms sentences can take in any language are infinitely varied. The study of sentence structure
exposes the way in which human creativity is constrained by structure.

Chomsky (1965) observed that the creativity we observe in sentence construction raises an
interesting problem for language acquisition. Do children learn how to create sentences?
One hypothesis would be that children learn a language by simply imitating the sentences that

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other speakers produce. Imitation does not explain children’s ability to produce new
sentences, or accept sentences that they have never heard other speakers produce.
A second hypothesis would be that children produce new sentences by combining words
together in novel ways. Random generation would predict that children would also produce
lots of unacceptable sentences before they learn the correct structure for sentences.
A third hypothesis is that children produce new sentences based on analogy with the
sentences they hear other speakers produce. Analogy predicts children would also produce
false analogies,
e.g., *Are the girls who ____ good are getting cake? from Are the girls getting cake?
The solution to the acquisition problem lies in recognizing sentence structure and role it plays
in organizing words.

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REFERENCES:

• Aarts,Bas.2001. English Syntax and Argumentation.2nd edition.Palgrave

• Croitoru, Elena.2002. The English Sentence Structure. Galati.Ed. fundatiei „Dunarea
de Jos”
• Chomsky, Noam. 1957. Syntactic Structures. The Hague/Paris: Mouton

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