HKSYU Course Resources

"In broad terms, this book is concerned with aspects of grammar. Grammar is traditionally subdivided into two different but interrelated areas of study - morphology and syntax. Morphology is the study of how words are formed out of smaller units (called morphemes), and so addresses questions such as 'What are the component parts/morphemes of a word like antidisestablishmentarianism, and what is the nature of the operations by which they are combined together to form the overall word?' Syntax is the study of the way in which phrases and sentences are structured out of words, and so addresses questions like 'What is the structure of a sentence like Where's the president going? and what is the nature of the grammatical operations by which its component words are combined together to form the overall sentence structure?' This chapter begins (in 1.1) by looking at a range of approaches to the study of grammar, before going on (in 1.2 and 1.3) to look at how syntax was studied in traditional grammar: this also provides an opportunity to introduce some useful grammatical terminology. In the remainder of the chapter, we look at the approach to syntax adopted within the theory of Universal Grammar developed by Chomsky over the past 6 decades"--