Phrases as the basic element of syntax
In the passive version of the sentence (3) The shaft was brushed against his shoulder by a passing cab the unit the shaft serves as subject, and the unit the passing cab is the object of the preposition by. The constituent composed of a noun and an article is called a noun phrase [NP], e.g. by the teacher; NPs can be very complex. Here is a list of some examples of NP:
the girl beautiful weather
this boy those sunny days
a dog stupid question
that large bicycle nice try
women the Pacific Ocean
elderly men brilliant student
David this year
Queensland judgment day
They water rat
What structure do noun phrases have in English? Based on the noun phrases listed above (there are more complicated ones), a noun phrase seems to consist of a determinative followed by a noun, or a determinative followed by an adjective followed by a noun, or just a noun, or an adjective followed by a noun.
We can represent these structures using what are called phrase structure rules, like:
NP → Detv N
This rule says that a noun phrase (NP) “goes to” (arrow) a determinative (Detv) followed by a noun (N). We could thus separately list the rules that we would need to cover all the structures:
NP → Detv N
NP → Detv Adj N
NP → N
NP → Adj N
In fact, there’s a simpler way to write all of these different forms with a single rule. There is a convention in writing phrase structure rules so that if something is in parentheses, it can either be there or not. So we could rewrite our rules just as:
NP → (Detv) (Adj) N
This rule says that a noun phrase consists of a noun, possibly preceded by a determinative.
The preposition by and the NP following it in the sentence also form a constituent in this sentence (by a passing cab); it is called a prepositional phrase [PP].
Some examples of the PP are:
to the shops in a weak
after the party next to the bus stop
into the large kitchen nearby
near those very large buildings under the tree
A preposition doesn’t have to be followed by anything, so we can have a preposition phrase that consists of just a preposition (John went outside ) . So a preposition phrase consists at least of a preposition, possibly with a noun phrase following it. We could write this as:
PP → P (NP)
The verb plus the NP following it form a unit as well, as shown by a sentence like A cab rolled out of blackness, and into blackness disappeared[59]. The constituent composed of a verb plus following NP is called a verb phrase [VP]. As with NPs, VPs can be quite complex. In our discourse, we have various different verb phrase structures, like the ones we can see in the following sentences.
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So our verb phrase can have just a verb, or a verb followed by a PP, or a verb followed by an NP, or a verb followed by an NP and a PP, or a verb followed by an NP and more than one PP, or a verb followed by two NPs or a verb followed by two NPs and a PP, or a verb followed by two NPs and more than one PP.
While these structures are more and more complex, we can actually write them very simply with a single phrase structure rule:
VP → V (NP) (NP) (PP)*
In this rule we have explicitly written two separate NPs, rather than (NP)*, because (in general) there is a maximum of two NPs in a VP, whereas it is possible to continue adding as many PPs as you like.
There are two more types of phrases, that also need to be paid attention to: adjective phrases and adverb phrases.
Adjective phrases. As well as noun phrases, there are also adjective phrases.
Why do we need them ? Well, consider the following sentences.
He was a very talented architect [59]
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