Syntactic Structure and Semantic Interpretation
- Course Code:
- 15PLIH036
- Unit value:
- 0.5
Objectives and learning outcomes of the course
Students will have basic skills in syntactic argumentation, a knowledge of the major construction types which have figured in the development of linguistic theory, and a basic knowledge of Lexical-Functional Grammar. The course will provide a foundation for any student who wishes to write an MA thesis in syntax.
This course is intended to provide a basic introduction to the grammatical theory Lexical Functional Grammar (LFG). LFG takes a highly surface-oriented approach to syntactic analysis and differs from other syntactic frameworks in placing a key role to relational notions such as "subject", "object" and "adjunct". This course introduces key ideas of LFG and develops analyses of a range of phenomena within the theory. The focus will be on analysing syntactic constructions in many other languages and English.
By the end of this course you will:
- be familiar with the basic ideas of LFG
- have developed some understanding of how to apply linguistic tools in the analysis of linguistic data
- have been introduced to LFG analyses of a range of core syntactic constructions
Workload
This course will be taught over 10 weeks with a 2-hour lecture and a 2-hour seminar per week.Scope and syllabus
The course reflects the new structure of the syntax programme within the Linguistics MA – a full-unit course is being replaced by two half-unit courses (the second of which, Advanced Syntax, is already on the books), and we are revising the Term 1 course to fit with Advanced Syntax or Dynamic Syntax in Term 2. Overall, this part of the core of the MA remains unchanged in design – students take 2 terms of syntactic theory – but now the first term course is specifically taught to feed into the advanced classes listed above, which were not offered at SOAS when the original course proposal for the original Syntactic Structure and Semantic Interpretation class.
Method of assessment
One essay of 1,500 to be submitted on the first day of teaching after reading week in which the course is taught (20%); one essay of 1,500 to be submitted at the end of the term in which the course is taught (20%); one essay of 3,000 to be submitted on day 1 of the following term (60%).Required reading
The course is based on Kroeger, Paul 2004 Analysing Syntax, which has already been used for other courses and is available in the library.
