Basic English Grammar with Exercises

Chapter 1 - Grammatical Foundations: Words

Other features that have been proposed include [±N] and [±V], first suggested by
Chomsky (1970). The ‘N’ and ‘V’ used in these features obviously do not stand for
noun and verb as these categories are to be defined by these features. However, the
fact that nouns are categorised as being [+N] and verbs as [+V] indicates that these
features are meant to have something to do with these categories. To some extent, it is
irrelevant what the features ‘mean’. The important point is which categories share
which features and hence have something in common and which have different
features and hence are distinguished. From this perspective we could have used
features such as [±1] and [±2].
Consider now the intuition that nouns and verbs are diametrically opposed
categories. We can account for this if we assume that they have exactly the opposite
features to each other. We have said that nouns are categorised as a [+N] category and
so verbs must be [–N] if we are to maintain that they oppose nouns. Similarly, as verbs
are [+V], nouns must be [–V]. We therefore categorise nouns and verbs as the
following:

(24) nouns = [–F, +N, –V]
verbs = [–F, –N, +V]

Note, both nouns and verbs are thematic categories and hence they share the [–F]
feature, but in every other way they differ.
How can we capture the sense that determiners have something in common with
nouns and modal auxiliary verbs have something in common with verbs, even though
one of these pairs of elements is function and the other is thematic? The answer is
fairly easy. The pairs may differ in terms of the [±F] feature, but they are similar in
terms of the [±N] and [±V] features:

(25) determiners = [+F, +N, –V]
modals = [+F, –N, +V]

In other words, determiners are the functional equivalents to nouns and modals are
functional verbs.
To develop the system a little further, consider the intuitions that adjectives seem
to have something in common with nouns, as they are typically used to modify nouns,
as in crazy kid or thoughtful suggestion, but they also seem to have something in
common with verbs, as they have certain distributional properties in common:

(26) a Rick is











running

rich

b the











running

rich robber

In this example, rich is an adjective and running is a verb and obviously they can both
appear in similar environments. But if nouns and verbs are diametrically opposed to
each other, how can adjectives be similar to both? The answer is that adjectives share
different features with both nouns and verbs. Thus, we may categorise both nouns and
adjectives as [+N] and both verbs and adjectives as [+V] and in this way adjectives
will share features with both nouns and verbs. Of course, they will also have features
different from nouns and verbs, but as we do not want to categorise adjectives as the