English Morpho-Syntax

The course is a linguistic introduction to word structure and sentence structure in English. The topics of study involve morphemic structure of words, inflectional forms, derivation, compounding, hierarchical structure of a sentence, forms and functions of a sentence, information processing and flow, grammatical principles of word order, and punctuation. At the end of the course, students should be able to identify and analyse different morphological categories and their functions, give an account of different word formation types in English, to analyse sentences according to their structural elements, to identify the relationship between sentence elements, to recognize non-canonical word order and specific English structures, and to be able to explain the discourse functions of such structures, and use punctuation correctly.

To provide students with knowledge and to teach them to apply theoretical and methodological principles of English morphology and syntax.

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Definition, aims, and scope of morphology. Definition, aims, and scope of syntax. Units of language. Parts of the word: roots, affixes and their shapes. Parts of the sentence. Coordination. Subordination. Hierarchical classification of parts of the sentence, the procedure of the identification of parts of the sentence. Morphological analysis of words. Types of morphemes. Morphemes and allomorphs. Words and their forms: inflection. Words and grammar: lexemes, word forms, and grammatical words. Derivation. Parts of speech and conversion. Compound words, blends and phrasal words: differences between compound words and phrasal words, blends and abbreviations. Endocentric and exocentric compounds. Meaning and structure; affixes as the main constituents. Elaborate compound forms. Classification of parts of speech. Structure of the sentence. The division of the sentence into phrases and clauses and relationship between them. English syntax from functional perspective. Information processing. Functional sentence perspective. Given/new information. Theme/rheme. Grammatical principles of word order. Marked members of the sentence. Theme and focus. Grammatical means of information coding. Fronting. Inversion. Postponement. Passive construction. Clefts. Existential sentences. Extraposition. Methods and resources used in morphological and syntactic research.

1. Basic morphological terms and hierarchical grammatical structure of the English language explained properly. 2. Word parts, phrases and different types of sentences identified and analyzed properly. 3. Information processing discussed adequately. 4. Punctuation used correctly. 5. Different data sources used efficiently and properly in the study of morphological and syntactic phenomena.