GrammarSoft ApS

6. Group forms and group level constituent function

Groups (or phrases) are here defined as syntactic constituents that are not clauses, and consist of more than one word. In order not to be clauses, none of the group node's immediate constituents must be a predicator or a complementizer (subordinator). Every group features 1 head (H) and one or more dependents (D), which may be either modifiers (Dmod) or arguments (Darg). In this text, we will denote all kinds of group level dependents with the umbrella term adjects.

As on the clause level, arguments are valency bound. Modifiers are on the group level what adjuncts are on the clause level - they are "free" constituents without valency slots. The word class inventory of a group's head and dependents defines the group's form category. Accordingly, 4 main types of groups can be distinguished:

group type	typical heads	typical adjects (modifier or argument dependents)
np noun phrase	noun proper noun "substantival" pronoun	adjective article "adjectival" pronoun
ap adpositional phrase	adjective adverb "adjectival" pronoun	adverb
pp prepositional phrase	preposition	noun "substantival" pronoun icl fcl
vp verb phrase	verb (main verb [semantically] or 1. auxiliary [dependency])	verb (auxiliaries [semantically] or 2./following verbs [dependency]) preposition or the conjunction que

Groups can be classified in yet another way, as hypotactic (endocentric) , katatactic (exocentric) and paratactic. Hypotactic groups (np- or ap-type groups) can semantically be substituted by their head, which is not true of katatactic groups (pp-type). Some grammarians even base their definition of head on a group being hypotactic according to this substitution rule - thus, a pp would not have a head at all, since none of its constituents can stand for the whole group. Verb groups (vp) are the most special of all: they are hypotactic in the sense that the main verb can semantically replace the whole vp, but in dependency and valency terms, it is the main verb (or a subordinated AUX<:icl), that is an argument of the auxiliary, not the other way around. A paratactic group consists of two co-ordinated constituents, usually of the same form type, that share a common function label. Parataxis will be discussed in detail in chapter 9 (Co-ordination).

symbol		category	examples
np	np propp pronp	noun phrase sintagma nominal nominalsyntagme	Era um homem como outro qualquer. (np) A velha avó dormia na rede. (np) Vou fazê-lo eu mesmo. (pronp) O seu nome era Mário Moreno dos Santos. (propp)
ap	adjp advp detp	adpositional phrase sintagma adposicional adpositionssyntagme	As árvores no jardim eram muito velhas. (adjp) Foi um presidente um pouco iconoclasta. (adjp) Nesta saia, parece mais jovem do que as amigas. (adjp) Costuma falar muito devagar. (advp) Ainda hoje vivem de caça e pesca. (advp) Era muito mais vinho do que imaginava. (detp)
vp		verb phrase sintagma verbal verbalsyntagme	Ele continua mexendo nas tarefas dos outros. Vem de lhes propor um acordo. Temos que lhe dar mais dinheiro.
pp		prepositional phrase sintagma preposicional præpositionssyntagme	Abriu a janela da sala Gostou do que viu. Pedro da Silva Mudamos para São Paulo.

6.1.

Noun phrases (np)

The prototypical np is headed by a noun, and allows a choice of adnominal adjects (group-level dependents), typically pre- and post-modifiers. Heavy (i.e. long or complex) modifiers and adnominal arguments appear only to the right of the head.

Typical premodifiers are:

Compare: um grande homem (great) - um homem grande (big)

Only certain adjectives tend to occur in premodifier position. In some cases, grammarians even disagree on the word class of a prenominal modifier, because it looks like an adjective (and inflects like one), but functions like a (determiner) pronoun or numeral. Consider the following cases:

Determiner pronouns in postmodifier position are rare, comprising possessives and - with a change in meaning - todo. próprio and mesmo occur postnominally with independent "substantival" pronouns, that do not allow premodifiers:

"Adjectival" modifiers need not be individual words, but can become complex forms themselves (adjective phrases), as discussed in chapter 6.2:

Some nouns (titles, professions, family membership terms etc.) may have noun or proper noun (name) modifiers, and complex names may themselves be described as np's with a proper noun head and a chain of one or more proper noun modifiers to the right, yielding "left leaning" (read: head to the left) analyses for name expressions.

Name modifiers can be "isolated" from their head noun by other (adjectival) modifiers:

Not all names are simple chains of proper nouns - some integrate recognizable adjectives, numerals or prepositional phrases that one would want to mark as such:

In the last example, "name-hood" first arises on the np-level, since neither of the two constituents of the modifier np qualifies as a proper noun (prop).

One way of marking what's part of a name and what isn't, in terms of constituents, is by means of constituent bracketing. Thus, instead of marking a and Grande in a Grande São Paulo as "sister"-modifiers on the same level, one would first bracket Grande onto são Paulo, forming a complex head for the article a:

Apposition adjects are identifiers and help define or denote the referent of the np in question, while adject predicatives are descriptive and act much like adjunct predicatives (fC) on the clause level. As a matter of fact, ambiguity as to whether a non-argument predicative attaches at clause or group level is not at all rare. Thus, predicatives left of the subject (a), or comma-separated predicatives to the right of the predicator (c) are clearly fC, while the same predicative "feels" more like a DN-constituent if found directly to the right of the subject (b).

One argument in favour of the DNc analysis for (b) is the fact that the constituent can be replaced by a DN relative clause (which cannot be moved to other positions in the sentence): O hipopótamo, que era contente com a vida, ... Note that it is the comma-separation between np-head and the DN dependent, that makes a DNc. For que-clauses, the distinction between DN (without comma) and DNc (with comma) equals the semantic distintion between restrictive (necessary) and parenthetical (non-necessary) relative clauses.

Finally, all np's can be modified by certain operator adverbs denoting negation (nem) , set inclusion (também, só) or avaliation (até) :

até ele, nem Pedro, só isso, dinheiro demais

However, in the presence of other modifiers, it becomes clear, that these "operators" don't mingle with other modifiers and it does not seem entirely satisfying to treat them as constituent-sisters of ordinary modifiers. Rather, they modify the whole np, as could be expressed by adding one bracket or tree level to our syntactic analysis, with the "inner np" as the complex head of a kind of "meta-np" (np') :

Further discussion:

One of the functions of the operator adverbs mentioned above is that of focus marker (cp. chapter 11 on focus-constructions). Focus marker dependents (Dfoc) put their head into focus, and they can be attached to heads of any form (x), - words, groups, clauses and compound units, generating a meta-constituent of the same form (x'). By using the Dfoc tag in these cases, we do not have to uphold the awkward distinction between DN, DA, DP and so on, for what appears only one type of function (Dfoc).

As a positive side effect, most independent ("substantival") pronoun groups (até ele, ele mesmo) become "meta-words", - which is more in line with one's view on independent pronouns as "unmodifiable" (cp. 6.4).

In order to avoid conflict with VISL's general definition of words and groups, we will, however, refrain from using terms like pron, n, adj etc. for focused individual words. Thus, ordinary group form categories (or, at most, np?, ap? etc.) will be used in these cases, too.

6.2.

Adpositional phrases (ap)

The term adpositional phrase will here be used to lump together adjective phrases (adjp) , adverb phrases (advp) and (adjectival) determiner pronoun phrases (detp) , all of which allow the same prototypical type of modifier - intensifier/quantifier adverbs, - and not much else. Thus, all three types of ap's can be premodified by the adverb muito .

There is a certain confusion as to the status of prepositions as a form or a function category, and one could argue that even the prototypical function of a preposition (as "pp-header" governing an np) is really one of subordinator ("SUBpp"). This "functional" view of the category preposition explains why many grammars treat conjunctions (que) or or relative adverbs (como) as "prepositions" if they head a comparandum with an np body: pior que isso, bela como a tia.

6.4.

Pronoun phrases

Pronoun phrases can be divided into determiner phrases (detp) and independent pronoun phrases (pronp). Detp's are a subclass of ap's and the few determiner pronouns - possessives and quantifiers - that allow dependents, take modifiers of the intensifier/quantifier type, like adjp's and advp's: