Glossarypredicate: the part of the clause excluding the subject giving information about the
subject: Mary [is clever/likes chocolate/is waiting for Jamie/was in bed/is a
university student].
prefix: a bound morpheme added to the beginning of a word, e.g. un- in
unimportant.
preposing: the movement of PPs, VPs, negative expressions to the beginning
of the sentence: Under no circumstances would I read another novel by him.
preposition: a syntactic unit preceding its complement, the most often a DP
defining a special syntactic and/or semantic relationship between the
complement and another constituent: cat in the bag/grapes of wrath/tea
without sugar/a reduction of taxes. Feature composition: [–F, –N, –V].
preposition phrase (PP): a phrase headed by a preposition. It usually takes a
DP complement but certain types of CPs can also appear in the
complement position of PPs. PPs themselves can be complements of
different constituents such as verbs, nouns and adjectives.
prepositional complementiser: the complementiser for, introducing non-finite
declarative clauses. Due to its prepositional origin it can assign
accusative Case to visible subjects of infinitival clauses, e.g. in It is
important for Jane/her to win the game. It is very easy to make a difference
between for used as a preposition and for used as a complementiser: when
for is followed only by a DP it is a preposition (I bought a bar of
chocolate for my kids on Saturday.), when it is followed by a DP and a to-
infinitive it is a prepositional complementiser introducing an IP. The DP
appears in the specifier position of this IP as subjects in general do (It is
advisable for you to prepare well for the syntax exam.).
prepositional object: the complement DP of a preposition.
prepositional verb: a verb with a prepositional complement, e.g. look at sg
preposition stranding: one of the strategies of wh-movement when the wh-
element is part of a PP. The wh-element moves alone and leaves the
preposition behind: Whoi did you laugh at ti? See also pied-piping.
Preposition stranding can also be found in passive structures when a verb
taking a PP complement is passivised, in this case preposition stranding is
obligatory: The new student was talked about.
PRO: the phonologically empty DP appearing in the subject position of
non-finite clauses. It bears Null Case and takes the theta-role
assigned by the non-finite verb to its subject.
productive morpheme: a morpheme that can be attached regularly to any
appropriate stem. The formation of the past tense with the -ed ending is a
productive process, a new verb that enters the English language will be
formed with this morpheme, thus, the -ed ending to express past tense is a
productive morpheme.
progressive aspect: the event is viewed as being in progress, e.g. I was having a bath
when my sister arrived. Having a bath was an activity in progress when the
other past activity happened.
Projection Principle: lexical information is syntactically represented.