Catena (linguistics)

In linguistics, a catena (English pronunciation: kəˈtiːnə, plural catenas or catenae; from Latin for "chain") is a unit of syntax and morphology, closely associated with dependency grammars. It is a more flexible and inclusive unit than the constituent and its proponents therefore consider it to be better suited than the constituent to serve as the fundamental unit of syntactic and morphosyntactic analysis. The catena has served as the basis for the analysis of a number of phenomena of syntax, such as idiosyncratic meaning, ellipsis mechanisms (e.g. gapping, stripping, VP-ellipsis, pseudogapping, sluicing, answer ellipsis, comparative deletion), predicate-argument structures, and discontinuities (topicalization, wh-fronting, scrambling, extraposition, etc.). The catena concept has also been taken as the basis for a theory of morphosyntax, i.e. for the extension of dependencies into words; dependencies are acknowledged between the morphs that constitute words. While the catena concept has been applied mainly to the syntax of English, other works are also demonstrating its applicability to the syntax and morphology of other languages. Two descriptions and two definitions of the catena unit are now given. Catena (everyday description) Any single word or any combination of words that are linked together by dependencies. Catena (graph-theoretic description) In terms of graph theory, any syntactic tree or connected subgraph of a tree is a catena. Any individual element (word or morph) or combination of elements linked together in the vertical dimension is a catena. Sentence structure is conceived of as existing in two dimensions. Combinations organized along the horizontal dimension (in terms of precedence) are called strings, whereas combinations organized along the vertical dimension (in terms of dominance) are catenae. In terms of a cartesian coordinate system, strings exist along the x-axis, and catenae along the y-axis. Catena (informal graph-theoretic definition) Any single word or any combination of words that are continuous in the vertical dimension, that is, with respect to dominance (y-axis).

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Scrambling (linguistics)

Scrambling is a syntactic phenomenon wherein sentences can be formulated using a variety of different word orders without any change in meaning. Scrambling often results in a discontinuity since the scrambled expression can end up at a distance from its head. Scrambling does not occur in English, but it is frequent in languages with freer word order, such as German, Russian, Persian and Turkic languages. The term was coined by Haj Ross in his 1967 dissertation and is widely used in present work, particularly with the generative tradition.

Constituent (linguistics)

In syntactic analysis, a constituent is a word or a group of words that function as a single unit within a hierarchical structure. The constituent structure of sentences is identified using tests for constituents. These tests apply to a portion of a sentence, and the results provide evidence about the constituent structure of the sentence. Many constituents are phrases. A phrase is a sequence of one or more words (in some theories two or more) built around a head lexical item and working as a unit within a sentence.

Gapping

In linguistics, gapping is a type of ellipsis that occurs in the non-initial conjuncts of coordinate structures. Gapping usually elides minimally a finite verb and further any non-finite verbs that are present. This material is "gapped" from the non-initial conjuncts of a coordinate structure. Gapping exists in many languages, but by no means in all of them, and gapping has been studied extensively and is therefore one of the more understood ellipsis mechanisms.