Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations and symbols used in this book
- 1 Arabic linguistics: overview and history
- 2 Arabic phonology
- 3 Arabic phonotactics and morphophonology
- 4 Arabic syllable structure and stress
- 5 Introduction to Arabic morphology
- 6 Derivational morphology: the root/pattern system
- 7 Non-root/pattern morphology and the Arabic lexicon
- 8 Arabic inflectional morphology
- 9 Syntactic analysis and Arabic
- 10 Arabic syntax I: phrase structure
- 11 Arabic syntax II: clause structure
- Appendix A Fields of linguistics and Arabic
- Appendix B Arabic transcription/transliteration/romanization
- Appendix C Arabic nominal declensions
- Glossary of technical linguistic terms
- References
- Index
- References
9 - Syntactic analysis and Arabic
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations and symbols used in this book
- 1 Arabic linguistics: overview and history
- 2 Arabic phonology
- 3 Arabic phonotactics and morphophonology
- 4 Arabic syllable structure and stress
- 5 Introduction to Arabic morphology
- 6 Derivational morphology: the root/pattern system
- 7 Non-root/pattern morphology and the Arabic lexicon
- 8 Arabic inflectional morphology
- 9 Syntactic analysis and Arabic
- 10 Arabic syntax I: phrase structure
- 11 Arabic syntax II: clause structure
- Appendix A Fields of linguistics and Arabic
- Appendix B Arabic transcription/transliteration/romanization
- Appendix C Arabic nominal declensions
- Glossary of technical linguistic terms
- References
- Index
- References
Summary
The study of syntax
Benmamoun provides a definition of syntax as follows: “Syntax is the study of phrasal and sentential patterns of natural language. It is the engine that combines the sound/gesture and meaning components of language. Syntax deals primarily with how words combine to form phrases and sentences, and the dependencies that obtain between the constituents of the phrase or sentence” (2009: 391). Thus, the study of syntax deals with phrase structure and clause structure – the way that words interrelate to form coherent, meaningful, and grammatically acceptable sentences. “A linguist … will try to characterize the principles that determine the formation of [Arabic] sentences. The goal will be to provide a systematic description of [Arabic] sentence formation, the grammar of [Arabic]” (after Haegeman 1994: 4). In order to undertake the study of syntax, it is necessary to make certain distinctions between form and function of lexical items within sentences for discussing surface structure phenomena.
A first step is to distinguish labels of linguistic “forms” or “form classes” (such as noun, verb, adjective) from the labels of their linguistic functions in context (e.g., terms such as subject, object, predicate). This enables discussion of the nature of individual words (such as their derivation, meaning, or inflection) separately from the syntactic slots or functions that they fill when used in context, as syntactic constituents. At a more abstract level of analysis, constituency may be viewed from a number of angles that involve hierarchical relations, semantic relations, and various theories of dependency.
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- Information
- ArabicA Linguistic Introduction, pp. 107 - 118Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2014