Noun Phrase in English: Its Form, Function and Distribution in Text
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Filozofická fakulta Univerzity Palackého v Olomouci Katedra anglistiky a amerikanistiky Noun Phrase in English: Its Form, Function and Distribution in Text DIPLOMOVÁ PRÁCE Autorka: Bc. Andrea RYŠAVÁ Studijní obor: Anglická filologie Vedoucí práce: Prof. PhDr. Jarmila Tárnyiková, CSc. Olomouc 2012 „Prohlašuji, že jsem tuto diplomovou práci vypracovala samostatně a uvedla úplný seznam citované a použité literatury.“ V Olomouci dne 14. května 2012 ............................ Ráda bych tímto poděkovala vedoucí mé diplomové práce Prof. PhDr. Jarmile Tárnyikové, CSc. za zájem, ochotu, vstřícný přístup a přínosné konzultace. Poděkování patří i mým nejbližším za jejich obětavost a trpělivost, se kterou mě provázeli během mého studia. ABBREVIATIONS [BNC] Examples from the British National Corpus [COCA] Examples from the Corpus of Contemporary American English [AR] My examples, suggestions of translation, etc. [DC] Dan Campbell, native speaker of English, 27 years old, British, living in the Czech Republic for 6 years, Czech University education [KR] Kathy Reichs (2008), followed by page [KK] Kristýna Kučerová (2008), followed by page [WP] Walker Percy (1990), followed by page [Bones] TV series Bones, followed by the title of the episode [Everwood] TV series Everwood, followed by the title of the episode [HIMYM] TV series How I Met Your Mother, followed by the title of the episode [Scrubs] TV series Scrubs, followed by the title of the episode [Cold Case] TV series Cold Case, followed by the title of the episode [Desperate Housewives] TV series Desperate Housewives, followed by the title of the episode CONTENT 1. Introduction 1 2. Theoretical preliminaries 4 2.1 Introduction to the theoretical part 4 2.2 Definitions 4 2.2.1 Noun phrase 4 2.2.2 Classification of words according to the part of speech 8 2.2.3 Quotational compounds 18 2.2.3.1 English-Czech interface 27 3. Practical part 28 3.1 Introduction to the practical part 28 3.2 Noun phrases – English-Czech interface 28 3.2.1 An adjective in premodification 31 3.2.2 Noun + noun structures 31 3.2.2.1 Noun + noun structures – evidence from corpora 33 3.2.3 Participles 39 3.2.4 Other possibilities of premodification or postmofidication 40 3.3 Premodifying noun in plural 40 3.4 Quotational compounds 43 3.4.1 Working definition of quotational compounds 43 3.4.2 Narrowing the scope 47 3.4.3 Data 49 3.4.4 A tentative grouping of quotational compounds 50 3.4.4.1 Fixed expressions 50 3.4.4.2 Most frequent head nouns 57 3.4.4.3 Ad hoc expressions 65 3.4.5 General notes on the previous groups 67 4. Conclusions 68 5. Appendix I 71 6. Appendix II 75 Works cited 81 Resumé 85 Anotace 87 1. Introduction In my thesis, I will concentrate on noun phrase and its form. I will analyse the constituents of a typical noun phrase, standing both in premodification and postmodification, and I will focus on the exceptions from the expectations. I will, however, concentrate in more detail on two possible constituents of a noun phrase – on the resulting noun + noun configurations, where the first noun is the premodifier of the second noun, i.e. the head noun, and on the so-called quotational compounds (both as a modifier and the head of a noun phrase). In the first part I will compare an originally English text to its official Czech translation. The reasons are to find as many various noun phrases as possible, and to overview the similarities and differences in both languages. The noun + noun structure is one of the most frequent possibilities of modifying the noun phrase. It means that the head nouns will be very diverse and the extralinguistic situations will not be limited from the point of view of semantics. In the analysis I will therefore focus not on the general features of these configurations in detail, but I will concentrate on a less frequent case, i.e. premodifying noun in plural. It is important to stress that these configurations of relatively freely connected nouns are different from compound nouns and fixed expressions in strong semantic relationship, e.g. a rocking chair as opposed to a plastic chair. I will focus more on the free combinations of nouns. Since the noun + noun configurations are quite frequent, there was no need to collect and analyse the data long time beforehand. The necessary information and data was easily found everyday in the newspaper or the corpora. The same, however, does not apply in the case of the quotational compounds. These expressions are not so frequent in the language. If I say “not so frequent” (especially compared to adjectives or nouns modifying the head noun) I have in mind the fact that many of the expressions are formed for one situation only, usually not repeated after that. On the other hand, as these expressions are on a scale, many of them have already shifted from the periphery towards the core of the language, and have become fixed and therefore used more often. It is because they are a very convenient, accurate and economical way of describing objects, people, situations, etc. Therefore, in order to be able to analyse them, it was necessary for me to create a set of examples in advance. This supportive corpus is in Appendix I. It has been created over several 1 months of reading (newspapers, fiction, advertisements, etc.) and listening (radio, films and series, everyday conversation with native speakers, etc.). This data is then the basis for searching the corpora for similar examples. The corpora used here are namely the British National Corpus (hereafter only BNC) and The Corpus of Contemporary American English (hereafter only COCA1). A quotational compound is an expression that is cut out of its original environment and as a whole used in a different syntactic position, e.g. I will take this food away with me. – take-away food, etc. The origin of quotational compounds may range from short phrases (face-to-face conversation) to finite clauses (all-you-can eat menu, the I-didn’t-do-it look in her face). It is expected that the quotational compounds are preferred in spoken conversation rather than in written text. From their nature, it is also believed that many of these expressions are created only for one specific purpose in one specific situation, and are not likely to be repeated in future, especially not by different speakers. On the other hand, the expressions cannot be strictly divided into two (or more) generally described groups. They are on a scale, where on one pole are these just described expressions, and towards the other pole there are expressions that were repeated over time, and therefore have become fixed and stable in the language, e.g. a merry-go-round, a drive-through store. In the thesis, I will analyse whether there are some more frequent patterns that are more likely to be repeated, what head nouns are possible to be pre- or postmodified by a quotational compound, and what extralinguistic situations are likely to be described by a quotational compound. Several notes will also deal with situations when the quotational compound is translated in the Czech language. Because of the analytical nature of the English language and syntactic nature of the Czech language, it is expected that the differences will be reflected in the frequency and usage of the quotational compounds. In the theoretical part I sum up several approaches to the noun + noun structures and the quotational compounds, in which parts I use the authors’ terminology. This theoretical background is then used for a detailed analysis in the practical part. I take some of the examples provided by the authors and analyse and compare them together with the additional examples from the corpora. This thesis is supposed to show the less frequent possibilities of pre- and postmodification of a noun phrase. I will focus on examples, which are in grammar 1 All examples are quoted with their original punctuation. 2 books described as marginal cases (e.g. quotational compounds that are often treated as a peripheral example of a phrase in modifying position (Quirk 1985, 1563) and are not described by a special term at all). Therefore by saying “less frequent”, I mean expressions that are not taken for granted to be used in every spoken situation, as their frequency compared to other pre- or postmodifiers, is significantly lower (as compared for example to an adjective in pre-modification). The aim is then to describe the expressions and thus explain the possibilities for employing them in the utterance/text. 3 2. Theoretical preliminaries 2.1 Introduction to the theoretical part In the first part of my thesis I will provide the theoretical background for further analysis carried out in the practical part. I will focus on noun phrase and its modifiers, specifically the expressions and parts of speech that can constitute the attribute both in premodification and postmodification. A detailed analysis will then deal with noun + noun structures, where the first noun modifies the second one – the head of the phrase, and with the so-called quotational compounds. Therefore I will begin with the available definitions and approaches necessary for further analysis. The data for the analysis comes from my own supportive corpus and then I have enlarged the list of these examples by examples from BNC and COCA. I develop and enlarge the topic already discussed in my bachelor thesis called Sequence of Adjectives in the English Noun Phrase (Ryšavá 2008). 2.2 Definitions 2.2.1 Noun phrase Quirk (1985, 1238–1350) describes the noun phrase in detail, both from the point of view of morphology and syntax.