Natural Syntax: English Relative Clauses¹

• Authors: Janez Orešnik
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Natural Syntax is a developing deductive theory, a branch of Naturalness Theory. The naturalness judgements are couched in naturalness scales, which follow from the basic parameters (or "axioms") listed at the beginning of the paper. The predictions of the theory are calculated in what are known as deductions, whose chief components are a pair of naturalness scales and the rules governing the alignment of corresponding naturalness values. Parallel and chiastic alignments are distinguished, in complementary distribution. Here almost only chiastic alignment is utilized, this being mandatory in derivations limited to unnatural environments. (This paper deals with relative clauses, which are dependent clauses, an area of low naturalness in Natural Syntax.)The exemplification is taken from English. The chief aim is to solicit predictions about various aspects of relative clauses. For instance, the known fact is made predictable that more English relative clauses are finite than non-finite. The most frequent issues addressed in the deductions are acceptability judgements, the behaviour of subordinators, the difference between integrated and supplementary clauses, movement ex situ, etc.Some related work: Orešnik (2003a, b; 2004; 2007 [with Varja Cvetko-Orešnik]; 2007).

Keywords

EN

naturalness; syntax; morphosyntax; English; relative clause

• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Journal: Poznań Studies in Contemporary Linguistics
• Year: 2008
• Volume: 44
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 61-101

Dates

published

2008-03-01

online

2008-03-28

Contributors

author

Janez Orešnik

• University of Ljubljana

References

• Carter, R. and M. McCarthy, 2006. Cambridge grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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• Cvetko-Orešnik, V. and J. Orešnik, 2007. "Natural Syntax: Three-value naturalness scales". Slovenski jezik. Slovene linguistic studies 6. 235-49.
• Gallego, Á.J., 2005. T-to-C movement in relative clauses
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• Mayerthaler, W., 1981. Morphologische Natürlichkeit. Wiesbaden: Athenaion.
• Orešnik, J., 2003a. "Naturalness in English: (A) The genitive, (B) The pronouns". Linguistica 43. 119-140.
• Orešnik, J., 2003b. "Naturalness: Some English (morpho)syntactic examples". Studia Anglica Posnaniensia 39. 77-101.
• Orešnik, J., 2004. Naturalness in (morpho)syntax: English examples. Ljubljana: Slovenska akademija znanosti in umetnosti.
• Orešnik, J., 2007. "Natural Syntax: Negation in English". Poznań Studies in Contemporary Linguistics 43. 97-111.[WoS]
• Quirk, R., S. Greenbaum, G. Leech and J. Svartvik, 1985. A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman.

Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/v10010-008-0004-0