SYNTAX1

S Y N T A X

What is syntax ?

Syntax means the study of how words are well structured or arranged in a sentence by turning it into a clear and structured one.

What is a top to botton analysis ?

It stands for the starting from a larger unit of the sentence to arrive to the smallest part of it.

What constituents do you identify in the following sentences ?
Jenny bought a sandwich and ate it.
The children play soccer in the park.
My boyfriend is intelligent.

In the last examples we can identify as constituents the sentence, the clause, the noun phrase, a verb phrase, a morpheme and words.

[[[[ jenny ][bought]] [[a] [sandwich]] [and] [[ate] [it]]]]
[[[[the] [children]] [[play] [soccer]] [in] [[the] [park]]]]
[[[[my] [boyfriend]] [[is] [intelligent]]]]

[s1[s2 [np jenny][vp bought] [np a sandwich] and [vp ate] [np it]]]

what is a tree diagram ?

It is an illustration in order to show the constituent structure of sentences.

What is a subordinated clause ?

When one clause is contained inside another clause.

write down the bracketing representation of 2 subordinated clauses.

[[[[The] [man]]] [[that] [[came] [yesterday]] [[was] [sick]]]]

[[[[I] [believe]] [[that] [[he] [will not] [[come] [back]]]]
The rules conditioning the organization of texts are the rules of constituents.
The rules which determine the structure of sentences make up sentence of noun phrases and verb phrases.