Chapter 1 - Grammatical Foundations: WordsGiven that inflection is a functional category and takes no part in thematic
structure, members of this category do not have theta grids as part of their lexical
entry. Furthermore, their subcategorisation seems to be much simpler than any
thematic category: all inflections are always followed by a verbal element and hence
we might suppose that they all subcategorise for verbal complements:
(147) will category: [+F, –N, +V]
subcat: [verbal]
can category: [+F, –N, +V]
subcat: [verbal]
-ed category: [+F, –N, +V]
subcat: [verbal]
to category: [+F, –N, +V]
subcat: [verbal]
3.5.2 Determiners
The functional category that is most closely associated with nouns are the determiners
which always precede nominal elements:
(148) a the party
b a snake
c this idea of yours
d which friend of mine
Determiners may contribute to the interpretation of the nominal in terms of the
notion of definiteness. This has a number of roles to play in interpreting a sentence.
One of these has to do with how we introduce new items into a discourse and how we
maintain a discourse topic. Consider the short monologue below:
(149) A man walked into a shop. The shopkeeper greeted the man.
In the first sentence, we introduce the main aspects of the story: the man and the
‘shop’ situation. In this sentence the two nouns man and shop are preceded by the
determiner a. This is the indefinite article and one of its functions is to signal new
information that has not been mentioned previously. In the next sentence we have two
more nouns shopkeeper and man (again). This time they are preceded by the
determiner the, which is the definite article. Its function is to indicate information
which has already been given and, therefore, to connect a series of sentences as being
about the same thing. Thus, the shopkeeper is assumed to be the shopkeeper of the
shop mentioned in the previous sentence, not another one round the corner, and the
man is assumed to be the one who we have just been informed has walked into the
shop, not one who was already in the shop, for example.
Determiners are also involved in the interpretation of nouns with respect to
specificity. Compare the following:
(150) a I was looking for the cat
b I was looking for a cat
In the first sentence there is a specific cat that I am looking for, and the speaker
obviously assumes the person who is addressed knows which specific cat he is talking