Suggested Answers and Hints - Chapter 1the predicate arguments. Arguments are theta-marked by their predicates, each
receives a label that identifies the part it plays in relation to the meaning of the
predicate.
Q5 The argument structure includes the subject while the subcategorisation frame
does not. The latter contains information on the number and type of complements
while the former on theta-roles. Students could be asked to find their own examples for
verbs that do not take complements, verbs that take one complement (an NP or a PP or
a clause or an AP, etc.), verbs that take two complements, etc.
Q6 Count nouns versus mass nouns, proper nouns and inherently plural nouns;
partitive constructions.
Q7 On one hand, nouns formed from verbs retain the verbs arguments structure.
However, a possessor may appear with every noun and is not determined by the nouns
meaning; the meaning relationship between the noun and the possessor is rather vague;
the possessive relationship is unique to nominals.
Q8 Categories should not be defined independently, instead e.g. the fact that
thematic relationships (argument structures) are available for all thematic categories
should be emphasised. The features ±N, ±V enable us to capture cross-categorial
generalisations (e.g. the ability to appear with a nominal complement).
Q9 According to the text the -ly morpheme may be conceived of as derivational or
as inflectional. Irregularities involve adjectives ending in -ly, adverbs that are
homomorphs of their adjectival pair, adjective–adverb pairs where the -ly form of the
adverb exists but the two are not in complementary distribution (e.g. ‘deep’ used as an
adverb). The difference between them can be explained along the lines that adjectives
modify a noun or appear predicatively while adverbs modify a verb or sentence and
cannot appear predicatively.
Q10 N: zero, PP, clause; V: zero, NP, PP, clause, AP, or a combination of the last
four types; A: zero, PP, clause and P: zero, NP, PP, clause.Exercise 1
The term grammatical function identifies the part a given unit plays in the sentence:
we can have subjects, objects, etc. It is not only phrases that may assume a given
function but clauses as well, that is to say we can express the subject or object of a
sentence with clauses, e.g. That he left surprised us – What surprised? That he left; or
Peter saw that Mary climbed up the tree – What did Peter see? That Mary climbed up
the tree. A clause realising a grammatical function is not to be equated with another
type of clause, relative clauses, which are used for modification, e.g.: Peter/The man
that lives next door left – Who left? Peter/The man that lives next door/*The man (the
original sentence contains information about the man)/*that lives next door; That Peter
left surprised us – What surprised us? That Peter left/*Peter (it was not Peter, the
person, it was the fact that he left that surprised us).