Delahunty and Garvey
keep X loose put X straight
leave X clean set X right
make X plain shake X free
wash X clean work X loose
table 2: adjectives as object complements (x = direct ob-
ject)
the noun phrase (np)
We begin our discussion of noun phrases (NP) with NPs that consist of just
a single word and discuss their functional and then their formal properties.
Then we will move on to various types of multi-word NPs.
Simple NPs: single word phrases
The left-hand column in Table 3 lists categories of single words that may
constitute an NP, and which must consequently be its head; the italicized
expressions in the right-hand column in Table 3 are examples of single-word
NPs belonging to the corresponding category.
category of head word example
Noun, count Wombats are playful.
Noun, non-count Cabbage is nutritious.
Subject and object personal pronouns They saw her.
Genitive personal pronoun Mine are chartreuse.
Indefinite pronoun/quantifier None were found.
Wh-word/pronoun Who placed the call?
table 3: single-word nps
All of the word categories in the right-hand column are noun-like, so in
order to abbreviate and to simplify matters, let’s refer to them all as nomi-
nals. Every NP, like every other phrase, must have a head, and any nominal
can be the head of an NP.
From a structural point of view, we can represent the possibilities in Ta-
ble 2 in the following simplified tree structure:
(23) a. NPNominal