Abstract
In this study the possibilities have been examined of describing measure phrase sentences and related constructions in terms of base rules, transformations and lexical entries, set up along the lines of Gruber (1967a, b), which conform in principle to the model of generative semantics (or, as it has been called by Seuren (1972), ‘semantic syntax’, as opposed to ‘autonomous syntax’, i.e., interpretative semantics).
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In an earlier conception (Gruber (1965)) the base rules did not generate semantic representations. But in Gruber (1967a, b) they do. Cf. also the diagram given in Gruber (1967a), p. 6.
Lakoff (1970b) argues that there must be global derivational constraints in order to solve the problem of avoiding unwanted sequences of phrase markers during application of rules in the transformational component. If it proves possible to formulate well-formedness conditions on configurations in non-adjacent trees in the derivational sequence of MP sentences there will thus be a third and rather more attractive possibility.
As another instance of different uses of the terms let me cite the following examples (italics are mine): (a) “The meaning of a word must be formalized in terms of the same sort of structures as we have in syntactic construction, i.e., in terms of a tree of elemental semantic categories.” (Gruber (1967a), p. 50.) (b) “I believe that these considerations indicate that syntactic and semantic representations are objects of the same formal nature, namely, ordered trees, whose non-terminal nodes are labeled by syntactic category symbols, and that in each language there is a single system of transformations which convert semantic representations of sentences into their superficial form: these transformations include ‘lexical transformations’, i.e., transformations which replace a portion of a tree by a lexical item.” (McCawley (1967a), p. 55.) Note, incidentally, the difference between McCawley’s view and Gruber’s with respect to tree-restructuring preceding lexical attachment. As De Rijk (1968) notes, McCawley’s using the phrase ‘syntactic category symbols’ while Gruber refers to the same objects as ‘semantic categories’ must be “merely a matter of terminology, not necessarily reflecting any substantive difference between their views.” (p. 8). The fact that the terms ‘syntactic’ and ‘semantic’ could be interchanged in the above quotes illustrates what McCawley means when claiming that the syntax/semantics dichotomy is invalid.
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© 1972 D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht-Holland
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Klooster, W.G. (1972). Epilogue. In: The Structure Underlying Measure Phrase Sentences. Foundation of Language, vol 17. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-2890-5_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-2890-5_5
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