syntax 4 DAY 33 – nov 13, 2013

1. syntax 4DAY 33 – nov 13, 2013 Brain & Language LING 4110-4890-5110-7960 NSCI 4110-4891-6110 Harry Howard Tulane University

2. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Course organization • The syllabus, these slides and my recordings are available at http://www.tulane.edu/~howard/LING4110/. • If you want to learn more about EEG and neurolinguistics, you are welcome to participate in my lab. This is also a good way to get started on an honor's thesis. • The grades are posted to Blackboard.

3. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Review

4. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Linguistic model, Fig. 2.1 p. 37 Discourse model Semantics Sentence level Syntax Sentence prosody Word level Morphology Word prosody Segmental phonology perception Segmental phonology production Acoustic phonetics Feature extraction Articulatory phonetics Speech motor control INPUT

5. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Ambiguity • What does ambiguous mean? • In linguistics, it means having more than one meaning. • This is different from vague or not clear. • We have already mentioned lexical ambiguity. • bank

6. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Sentence comprehension and syntactic parsing Ingram I, §13 On-line processing, working memory and modularity

7. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University A part-of-speech or morphological ambiguity • (22) Flying planes can be dangerous. • [NP [Adj flying] [N planes]] can be dangerous • Flying planes are dangerous. • [NP[VP[V flying] [NP planes]]] can be dangerous • Flying planes is dangerous.

8. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University My favorite attachment or syntactic ambiguity[note that this is the 2nd example on the recording] • One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. • What an elephant was doing in my pajamas, I'll never know. • I [[shot an elephant] in my pajamas] • I shot an [[elephant] in my pajamas]

9. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University A diagram of the difference S S NP I VP NP I VP NP an elephant PP in my pajamas NP V shot V shot Det an N elephant PP in my pajamas

10. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Minimal attachment principle • Avoid unnecessary embedding (i.e. attach an element as high in the tree as possible). • Now let's look at a lot more examples.

11. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Another attachment ambiguity • Ingram's first example • (21) the house on the hill by the sea • What is by the sea? • the house on the [[hill] by the sea] • <the house is on the hill and the hill is by the sea> • the [[house on the hill] by the sea] • <the house is on the hill and the house is by the sea> • Which reading did you get first?

12. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University A diagram of the difference NP NP NP PP by the sea N house PP Det the Det the PP on the hill N house P on NP Det the NP N hill PP by the sea

13. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University More examples of ambiguous sentences • Paraphrase how you understand this sentence: • (25) John told the girl that Bill liked the story. • (26) John told the girl something – namely, that Bill liked the story. • = sentential complement reading • John told the girl [S that Bill liked the story] • (27) John told the story to the girl that Bill liked. • = relative clause reading • John told the girl [S that Bill liked] the story

14. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University A diagram of the difference S S VP VP NP John NP John V told NP the girl V told NP S that Bill liked the story NP the story Det the N girl S that Bill liked

15. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Testing minimal attachment • Paraphrase how you understand these sentences: • (28) Joe carried the package for Susan. • Joe carried [the package for Susan] • Joe carried [the package] [for Susan] • (29) Joe included the package for Susan. • Joe included [the package for Susan] • Joe included [the package] [for Susan] • Which of these obey minimal attachment?

16. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University Attachment of for Susan S S VP VP NP Joe NP Joe V carried / included NP the package V carried / included NP PP for Susan Det the N package PP for Susan

17. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University A different kind of problem • The old man the boat. • The man whistling tunes pianos. • The cotton clothing is made of grows in Mississippi. • The complex houses married and single soldiers and their families. • The author wrote the novel was likely to be a best-seller. • The tomcat curled up on the cushion seemed friendly.

18. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University What does it mean to lead someone down the garden path? • The Cambridge Dictionary of American Idioms says that the negative connotation of ‘leading someone down the garden path’ is “based on the idea that a path in a garden is very pleasant, so someone who is brought along it can be deceived without noticing it.”

19. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University The second most famous sentence in linguistics • The horse raced past the barn fell. • Ingram pp. 261-4 has an extensive discussion of this sentence. Please read and mull over it. • Unfortunately, he does not relate all the details that he discusses to the neuroscience of sentence processing. • So let’s consider this chapter/section? finished and go on.

20. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University NEXT TIME Continue with Ingram §13, On-line processing, working memory and modularity