Introducing English Linguistics

Self-study activities
1. In the new president of the company, why is the company a constituent,
but president of not a constituent?
2. If you define a verb as being a word that expresses “action” or “a state of
being,” is your definition notional or formal?
3. Provide a formal definition of the noun television.
4. In the sentence The weather has been awful lately, why does The
weather have the form of a noun phrase but the function of subject?
5. Why is the word order in a sentence like I have never taken such a good
course considered unmarked and the word order in Never have I taken
such a good course marked?
6. Identify the head words in the phrases below
(a) the small glass that contains 3 ounces of water
(b) very rapidly
(c) somewhat happy
(d) might have wished
(e) in the heat of the summer
(f) farmers hoping for rain
7. Match the phrase in the left-hand column with the phrasal category in
the right-hand column in which the phrase would be classified. Use Quirk
et al.’s (1985) definition of verb phrase, which includes only the lexical
verb, plus optional auxiliaries.
(1) can study
a. noun phrase
(2) sufficiently soft
b. verb phrase
(3) very softly
c. adjective phrase
(4) after the movie
d. adverb phrase
(5) an effectively presented talk
e. prepositional phrase
(6) hard as a rock
(7) rapidly
(8) furniture
(9) against the tide
(10) difficult problem
8. In English, adjectives come before nouns; in Spanish, they usually come
after nouns. Is this difference between English and Spanish a conse-
quence of the linear nature of syntax or the hierarchical nature of syntax?
9. In the examples below, identify all main and subordinate clauses.
(a) The principal hired three new teachers.
(b) Although it rained quite a bit last night, we did not experience any
flooding.
(c) The physician treated all the individuals who were in the accident.
(d) To achieve success, people must work hard.
(e) Working extra hours can lead to increased stress.
(f)
We left the party early because we were tired.

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INTRODUCING ENGLISH LINGUISTICS
The information in each of the above grammars is also available in shorter, more pedagogically oriented
textbooks: Greenbaum and Quirk’s A Student’s Grammar of the English Language (London: Longman,
1990); Huddleston and Pullum’s A Student’s Introduction to English Grammar (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2005); and Biber et al.’s Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English
(Harlow, England: Pearson Education Limited, 2002). Another, more empirically based overview of English
grammar is S. Greenbaum’s Oxford English Grammar (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996).

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C H A P T E R
English words:
Structure and
meaning
6
This chapter focuses on words: their internal structure and
the ways that linguists and lexicographers (those who cre-
ate dictionaries) have studied their meaning. The chapter
opens with a discussion of the various ways that linguists
have approached the study of meaning. It then continues
with a description of the morpheme, the smallest unit of
meaning, and how various kinds of morphemes are com-
bined to create words. The remaining sections describe two
general ways of characterizing the meanings of words: