Sentence Constituents, their Functions and Relations
Syntactic constituents or phrases cannot be understood at the word level. The real “parts of speech” are higher units than words. It is the relationship of words in content that provides the syntactic relations and functions necessary for syntax to take place . For example, a book is just a noun or a verb out of context, but once we place it in a sentence – Books are expensive in college- it becomes an NP (Noun Phrase), with a higher value than that of a noun. Most people, however, identify a phrase with a group of words – Most old books are cheap- but we do not necessary require the accompanying words to consider the subject an NP since syntax sees a phrase as a constituent of a sentence, with functions and relations with other phrases within that sentence.
Here are the most common syntactic constituents or units (phrases), universal to all languages, and the syntactic functions they perform within sentences:
Noun Phrase (NP)
The core of a NP is always a noun or a substituting pronoun and it
can be composed of …
- a single noun or pronoun– Cars are necessary/They are a commodity
- determiners (such as articles, quantifiers, demonstratives, possessives, numerals, etc) - a car / a few cars/ that car/ my car/ two cars
- adjectives – an old American car
- modifying nouns - sports cars
- prepositional phrases (PP) the car on the lot/ the car behind the tree
The syntactic functions frequently performed by the NP are …
- subject - The red car is a Toyota.
- object - I bought a Japanese car.
- object of a preposition – I need an oil change for my old car.
- object complement – I consider the Lexus the best car in the market.
- verb complement (predicative) – Acura is a very reliable car.
Verb Phrase (VP)
The core of a VP is always a finite verb, i.e. a conjugated verb (non- finites are the gerund, participle, and infinitive and can not be the core of a VP, because it can not predicate).
The VP can be accompanied by many phrases and is considered the most syntactically complex of all phrases:
• NP – I love my old car.
• AvP (Adverb Phrases) - The car broke yesterday.
• PP – I drive my car on the expressway.
• Inf P (Infinitive Phrase) – I want to buy a new car.
• Grd P (Gerund Phrase) – I enjoy driving to the ocean.
• Part P (Participle phrase) – She came begging for a new opportunity.
However, it only performs one single syntactic function: Predicate.
Adjective Phrase (AjP)
The core of an AjP is always an adjective and can be accompanied by:
AvP (functioning as intensifier) – very famous/ really happy/ pretty good
The syntactic functions frequently performed by the AjP are:
• noun modifier (inside a NP) – the very beautiful girl
• object complement – She makes me very happy.
• verb complement (predicative) – She is extremely smart.
Adverb Phrase (AvP)
The core of an AvP is always an adverb and can be accompanied by another adverb (intensifier):
She likes ice cream very much.
The syntactic functions frequently performed by the AvP are:
• complement or adverbial -- She works very fast.
• intensifier (inside an AjP) – He tried very hard.
Prepositional Phrase (PP)
This is the only phrase that is exocentric (the core is not the word that names it;(all the others are endocentric).
about a new concept / from speaking out loud
The syntactic functions frequently performed by the PP are:
• post-modifier (inside a NP) – the woman in red
• complement or adverbial – He does his work in the morning.
