The Boundary between Competence and Performance - Prof. Fredreck J. Newmeyer

Class 4:
The Boundary between
Competence and Performance
1
FREDERICK J . NEWMEYER
UNIVERSI TY OF WASHINGTON, UNIVERSI TY OF
BRI T ISH COLUMBIA,
AND SIMON FRASER UNIVERSI TY

2
The fundamental distinction in generative grammar
is between competence (knowledge of language)
and performance (language use).
Competence is now often referred to as ‘I-Language’.
The distinction goes back to Ferdinand de Saussure
and his langue vs. parole.

3
But there are important differences between langue and
competence.
Saussure thought of syntax as forming part of parole, not
langue:
“La phrase est le type par excellence du syntagme.
Mais elle appartient à la parole, non à la langue …”
Also, for Saussure and later functionalists, langue was a
taxonomy of elements, not a system of generative rules.

4
The competence-performance distinction is based
on the commonplace observation that there is a
difference between what we know and what we do.
One could compare competence to the score of a
symphony and performance to the actual
performance of that symphony.
No two performances will be exactly the same.

5
But how do we know which phenomena deserve a
competence explanation and which deserve a
performance explanation?
Short answer: We don’t know before we have
undertaken a complete analysis.
There will always be disagreement over the analysis
of borderline phenomena.

6
Just because a sentence is unacceptable, it does not
follow that it is ungrammatical.
Chomsky and Miller (1963) called attention to the
following unacceptable sentence:
The rat [S the cat [S the dog chased] ate] died
They argued that the sentence is grammatical.

7
Why is the sentence grammatical?
The rat [S the cat [S the dog chased] ate] died
Regular rules of sentence embedding generate it.
It would really complicate the grammar to have to
‘shut off’ embedding at a certain level.
We know why it is unacceptable: it is confusing.

8
Sometimes it will not be clear whether an unacceptability
is due to competence or performance.
[That he left] is a surprise.
Normally one can delete a that complementizer in
English. But deleting that in the above sentence leads to
unacceptability:
??[He left] is a surprise.

9
Why is the sentence He left is a surprise unacceptable?
Chomsky and Lasnik (1977) say that it is ungrammatical. It
violates a filter prohibiting two tensed verbs in a row after an
initial subject.
Bever (1970) says that the sentence is grammatical. It is
unacceptable because it violates a processing principle:
The first N … V … (N) … sequence is processed as the
main clause unless the verb is marked as subordinate.
Who is right? We don’t know.

10
Nevertheless, not all linguists accept the
competence-performance dichotomy.
A leading sociolinguist once wrote that the distinction
is ‘almost incoherent’ (Labov 1972).
Statistical approaches to grammar popular in
artificial intelligence and natural language processing
often question the distinction.

11
But the greatest objection to the competence-performance
distinction come from the direction of
functional linguistics.
Many functionalists believe that (almost) all aspects
of grammar can be derived from the needs of
communication and other functions of language.
Hence there is no need to construct a competence
grammar.

12
A quote from Johanna Nichols:
“Functionalists maintain that the
communicative situation motivates,
constrains, explains, or otherwise
determines grammatical structure,
and that a structural or formal
approach is not merely limited to an
artificially restricted data base, but is
inadequate even as a structural
account.”
JOHANNA
NICHOLS

FUNCTIONAL LINGUISTICS
13
Recall that Saussure thought that syntax was part of
parole.
His thinking led many functionalists to look for non-structural
approaches to syntax.
Let’s do a quick historical survey of functional
linguistics.

14
Many European structuralists — especially those of
the Prague School — attempted to construct a
parole-based theory of the sentence, where the
order of elements is determined by discourse-function,
not structural rules.
The Prague-based linguists developed the theory of
Functional Sentence Perspective, which tries to
explain word order in terms of discourse-based
notions like theme (old information, topic) and rheme
(new information, focus), etc.

15
Modern functional linguistics is a direct descendent
of Praguean Functional Sentence Perspective …
… combined with the type of typological studies
initiated by Joseph Greenberg.
JOSEPH GREENBERG, 1915-2001

16
• It is functional linguists who have taken the lead on
studies of grammaticalization:
• lexical categories > functional categories and pronominal
elements > clitics > derivational affixes > inflectional
affixes > zero
• English modals might, will, and others were verbs that
were grammaticalized to auxiliaries.
• Suffixes like –ful (wonderful), -able (breakable), and -
ment (enjoyment) were one full words that became
affixes.

17
• The (apparently) gradual nature of
grammaticalization has been posed as a direct
challenge to standard versions of generative
grammar and has led to a lively debate.
• One book devoted to grammaticalization has
claimed that ‘grammaticalization theory’ calls for a
‘new theoretical paradigm’ to replace formal
linguistics.

18
Some leading grammaticalization theorists:
ELIZABETH TRAUGOTT BERND HEINE MARTIN HASPELMATH

19
The most extreme functionalists not only reject the
autonomy of syntax (Chomsky’s hypothesis), but
also the competence-performance distinction
(Saussure’s hypothesis).

THE FUNCTIONALIST ORIENTATION
20
SYNTAX, MEANING,
USAGE, ETC. ALL
COMPLETELY
INTERTWINED

FORMALISM AND FUNCTIONALISM
21
Most linguists believe that given the autonomy of
syntax, it is impossible to provide functional
explanations based on language use for why
grammatical systems have the properties that they
have.

22
ELIZABETH BATES, 1947-2003 BRIAN MACWHINNEY
“The autonomy of syntax cuts off [sentence structure] from
the pressures of communicative function. In the [formalist]
vision, language is pure and autonomous, unconstrained
and unshaped by purpose or function.”

23
My goal in this class:
TO ARGUE THAT THE AUTONOMY OF SYNTAX
AND FUNCTIONAL EXPLANATION ARE FULLY
COMPATIBLE.

24
Quotes like that from Bates and
MacWhinney make it sound like if a
system is autonomous, then a
functionalist explanation of that system
is impossible.

25
That is not true. And it only seems to be linguists
who have this curious idea.
In other domains, formal and functional accounts
taken as complementary, not contradictory.

26
Chess is a formal
autonomous system:
There are a finite number
of discrete statements and
rules.
Given the layout of board,
the pieces & the moves,
one can ‘generate’ all of
the possible games of
chess.

27
But functional
considerations went into
the design of the system
— to make it a satisfying
pastime.
And external factors can
change the system — for
example a decree from
the International Chess
Authority.

28
Furthermore, in any
game of chess, the
moves are subject to
the conscious will of the
players, just as any act
of speaking is subject to
the conscious decision
of the speaker.

29
So chess is
autonomous
and explained
functionally.

30
The liver can be
described as an
autonomous
structural system.

31
But still it has been
shaped by its function
and use.
It evolved in response to
selective pressure for a
more efficient role in
digestion.

32
And it can be
affected by
external factors.

33
So the question is whether
grammar in general and syntax in
particular are — in relevant
respects — like the game of chess
and like our bodily organs.

34
My answer is ‘Yes’!

FUNCTIONAL EXPLANATION
35
Let’s look more deeply at some
functional explanations.
We’ll talk about the three most
important types.

36
a. Parsing: There is pressure to shape grammar so
the hearer can determine the structure of the
sentence as rapidly as possible.
b. (Structure-Concept) Iconicity: There is pressure
to keep form and meaning as close to each other as
possible.
c. Information flow in discourse: There is pressure
for the syntactic structure of a sentence to mirror the
flow of information in discourse.

PARSING
37
JOHN A. HAWKINS,
EFFICIENCY AND
COMPLEXITY IN
GRAMMARS (2004)

PARSING
38
CENTRAL INSIGHT: It is in the interest of the hearer
to recognize the syntactic groupings in a sentence
as rapidly as possible.
LANGUAGE USE: When speakers have choice, they
will follow the parser’s preference.
GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE: Typological facts
about grammars will reflect parsing preferences.

PARSING
39
Minimize Domains (MD): The
hearer (and therefore the parsing
mechanism) prefers orderings of
elements that lead to the most
rapid recognition possible of the
structure of the sentence.

PARSING
40
MD explains why long (or heavy)
elements tend to come after short
(or light) ones in English:
 a. ?I met the twenty three people who I had
taken Astronomy 201 with last semester in
the park.
 b. I met in the park the twenty three people
who I had taken Astronomy 201 with last
semester.

PARSING
41
S
S
NP VP NP VP
I V NP PP I V PP NP
met D N’ P NP met P NP D N’
the 23 .. 201 in the park in the park the 23 ... 201
Distance of 14 words Distance of 4 words

PARSING
42
Typological predictions of Minimize Domains:
Verb-object languages (like English and French)
tend to put heavy elements on the right.
a. That John will leave is likely.
b. It is likely that John will leave.

PARSING
43
Object-verb languages (like Japanese) tend to put
heavy elements on the left:
a. Mary-ga [kinoo John-ga kekkonsi-ta
to] it-ta
Mary yesterday John married
that said
‘Mary said that John got married
yesterday’
b. [kinoo John-ga kekkonsi-ta to] Mary-ga
it-ta

PARSING
44
a. S[S’[ that S[ John will leave]] VP[[is likely]]
b. S[ NP [it] VP[ is likely S’[that S[John will leave]]]]

PARSING
45
a. S1[Mary-ga VP[S’[S2 [kinoo John-ga kekkonsi-ta] to] it-ta]]
b. S2[S’[S1[kinoo John-ga kekkonsi-ta] to] Mary-ga VP[it-ta]]

PARSING
46
MD makes even more interesting predictions about
grammatical competence.
That is where we have grammaticalized orders —
cases where the speaker has no choice about the
positioning of phrases.

PARSING
47
Notice that the verb and what follows it tend to
line up in short-to-long order:
I [convinced - my students - of the fact - that
linguistics is interesting]

PARSING
48
I convinced my students of the fact that linguistics is interesting
We have a short verb,
then a longer direct object,
then a still longer prepositional phrase,
and finally a still longer subordinate clause.
verb dir.
obj.
prep.
phrase
subordinate
clause

PARSING
49
Why do VO languages
tend to have prepositions
and OV languages tend to
have postpositions?

PARSING
51
Another important processing principle proposed by
Hawkins:
Maximize On Line Processing: If node B is
dependent on node A for a property assignment, the
processor prefers B to follow A.

PARSING
52
 MAXIMIZE ON LINE PROCESSING:
a. Fillers tend to precede gaps:
COMMON: Whati did you put ____i on the table?
RARE: You put ___i on the table whati?
b. Antecedents tend to precede pronouns:
COMMON: Maryi is very proud of herselfi.
RARE: Of herselfi is very proud Maryi
c. Topics tend to precede predications:
COMMON: John is going to Geneva today (where John is the topic of the
sentence)
RARE: Is going to Geneva today John (where John is the topic of the
sentence)

STRUCTURE-CONCEPT ICONICITY
53
 There’s another way that grammars seem designed for
language users. In general what we find is an iconic
relationship between form and meaning.
There is an iconic relationship between the two faces

54
 That means that the form, length, complexity, or
interrelationship of elements in a linguistic representation
reflects the form, length, complexity or interrelationship of
elements in the concept that that representation encodes.

STRUCTURE-CONCEPT
ICONICITY
55
There are two types of possession in human language:
Inalienable possession: John’s liver Alienable possession:
John’s book
JOHN AND HIS LIVER JOHN AND HIS BOOK

56
In English, John’s liver and John’s book have the
same structure.
But in a majority of languages, it is more complicated
to say John’s book than John’s liver.

57
And there is no language in the world where it is
more complicated to say John’s liver than to say
John’s book.

58
So when the relationship between the possessor and
the object is very close (like between yourself and
your liver), the structural distance between them is
very small.

INFORMATION FLOW IN DISCOURSE
59
THE ARGUMENT:
 Language is used to communicate.
 Communication involves the conveying of
information.
 Therefore, the nature of information flow
should leave and has left its mark on
grammatical structure.

60
There are 6 ways to say: Lenin
cites Marx in Russian — a
typical ‘free word-order’
language:
a. Lenin citiruet Marksa.
b. Lenin Marksa citiruet.
c. Citiruet Lenin Marksa.
d. Citiruet Marksa Lenin.
e. Marksa Lenin citiruet.
f. Marksa citiruet Lenin.

61
In each case, old information comes before new
information.
A functionalist claim is that the discourse principle of
Communicative Dynamism governs the order.
The passage of time from past to present to future is
mirrored iconically in discourse by ordering of old
information before new information.

62
But some
functionalists, like
Talmy Givón, argue
that language works
precisely the
opposite way!
TALMY GIVON

63
According to Givón and others, new information
comes before old information; that is, more important
information comes before less important information.
This idea is called ‘Communicative Task Urgency’ by
Givón.

64
Even English shows Communicative Task Urgency:
John is the person that I talked to.

CONVINCING AND UNCONVINCING
FUNCTIONAL EXPLANATIONS
65
How can we be sure that a
functional explanation is
convincing?
Three criteria:
a. precise formulation
b. demonstrable linkage between cause and effect
c. measurable typological consequences

66
Let’s illustrate these with respect to an
uncontroversial cause and effect: Cigarette smoking
and lung cancer.

67
Precise formulation?
YES: It is easy to gauge
whether and how much
people smoke.

68
Demonstrable
linkage? YES: The
effect of
components of
smoke upon cells is
well known.

69
Measurable
typological
consequences?
YES: The more
people smoke, the
more likely they are
to get lung cancer.

70
By these three criteria, parsing and
structure-concept iconicity-based
explanations are valid.
 Explanations based on
information flow in discourse are
not.

71
PARSING (MINIMIZE DOMAINS)
1. It is formulated precisely.
2. There is demonstrable linkage between cause
and effect: The advantage to parsing rapidly is
hardly controversial. Every word has to be picked
out from ensemble of 50,000, identified in 1/3
second, and put in the right structure.
3. There are hundreds of typological predictions.

72
STRUCTURE-CONCEPT ICONICITY
1. It can be formulated precisely (most models are
structured so there is a close relationship between form
and meaning).
2. There is demonstrable linkage between cause and
effect: Comprehension is made easier when syntactic units
are isomorphic to units of meaning than when they are not.
There is experimental evidence as well — semantic
interpretation of a sentence proceeds on line as the
syntactic constituents are recognized.
3. Typological predictions: certainly, but need to be tested.

THE PROBLEMS WITH EXPLANATIONS BASED ON
‘INFORMATION FLOW IN DISCOURSE’
73
Two competing theories about how information flow
in discourse is supposed to influence grammar:
1. Communicative Dynamism (old information
precedes new information)
2. Communicative Task Urgency (new information
precedes old information)
They both can’t be right at the same time!

74
A very interesting
generalization:
 Old-before-new is generally true for VO
languages.
 New-before-old is generally true for OV
languages.

75
Jack Hawkins’s parsing theory (MD) predicts:
 short-before-long for VO languages (e.g. in
English, post-verbal PP’s tend to be ordered in
terms of increasing length)
 long-before-short for OV languages (e.g. in
Japanese, -ga, -o, and –ni phrases tend to be
ordered in terms of decreasing length)

76
Where MD predicts short-before-long, you get old-before new.
 Where MD predicts long-before-short, you get new-before-old.
But old information is shorter than new information.
So, as Hawkins has shown, both ‘Communicative Dynamism’
and ‘Communicative Task Urgency’ are parsing effects.
They have little to do with discourse principles affecting
grammatical structure!

77
Word order facts can be reduced to the effects of parsing
pressure to a great extent.
The desire to maintain structural parallelism is as
important as the desire to model information flow.
There is little reason to believe that the conveying of
information is the central ‘function’ of language, that is,
one that would be expected to shape language structure.
 Information flow-based explanations attribute to speakers
and hearers more knowledge than they actually are likely
to have.
The recognition of form takes precedence over the
recognition of the information conveyed by that form.

THE COMPATIBILITY OF FORMAL AND
78
We have seen that wh-constructions are specified by
autonomous rules and principles.
That doesn’t mean that external functional
motivations weren’t involved in giving these
constructions their shape.
Certainly their function has helped to shape their
form.

79
Some wh-constructions are operator-variable
constructions.
 It’s ‘natural’ that operators should precede the variables
that they bind.
 The function of the wh-phrase in direct questions is to focus
on a bit of missing information.
 It’s natural that you’d want to place this element at the
beginning.
 Subjacency is at least to some degree functionally
motivated.

80
 The issue isn’t whether properties of wh-constructions
are externally motivated or not.
Certainly they are.
The issue is whether in a synchronic grammar the formal
properties of these constructions are best characterized
independently of their meanings and the functions that
they serve.
And the answer is ‘yes’ — they should be so
characterized.

81
The reason is that whatever functional
considerations went into shaping a particular formal
structure, that structure takes on a life of its own, so
it is no longer a mirror of whatever functions brought
it into being.
In other words, the autonomous structural system
takes over.

82
For example, one cannot derive constraints just from
parsing since there are sentences that are constraint
violations that pose no parsing difficulty.
Some examples from Janet Fodor:
*Who were you hoping for ___ to win the game?
*What did the baby play with ___ and the rattle?

83
 And there are pairs of sentences of roughly equal ease to the
parser, where one is grammatical and the other is a violation:
a. *John tried for Mary to get along well with ___.
b. John is too snobbish for Mary to get along well with ___.
a. *The second question, that he couldn’t answer ___
satisfactorily was obvious.
b. The second question, it was obvious that he couldn’t answer
___ satisfactorily.
 The structural system of English decides the grammaticality
— not the parser.

84
Languages are filled with constructions that arose in
the course of history to respond to some functional
pressure, but, as the language as a whole changed,
ceased to be very good responses to that original
pressure.
Rather, the functionally motivated structure
generalizes and comes to encode meanings and
functions that don’t reflect the original pressure.

85
Parsing ease, pressure for an iconic relationship
between form and meaning, and so on really are
forces that shape grammars.
Adult speakers, in their use of language, are
influenced by such factors to produce variant forms
reflecting the influences of these forces.

86
Children, in the process of acquisition, hear these
variant forms and grammaticalize them.
In that way, over time, certain functional influences
leave their mark on grammars.
But these influences operate at the level of language
use and acquisition — and therefore language
change — not internally to the grammar itself.

WHY IS THERE A COMPETENCE-PERFORMANCE
DISTINCTION?
87
It’s partly a question of efficiency.
It is more efficient to make use of
old familiar formal patterns than to
keep creating news ones.

DISTINCTION?
88
• Language serves many functions, which pull
on it in many different directions (thought /
communication).
• For this reason, virtually all linguists agree
that there can be no simple relationship between
form and function.

DISTINCTION?
89
• Two functional forces do seem powerful
enough to have ‘left their mark’ on grammar:
 The force pushing form and meaning into
alignment (pressure for iconicity).
 The force favouring the identification of the
structure of the sentence as rapidly as
possible (parsing pressure).

DISTINCTION?
90
• Even these two pressures can conflict with
each other, however — in some cases
dramatically:
 Where there is parsing pressure to postpose
proper subpart of some semantic unit.
 Where preference for topic-before-comment
conflicts with pressure to have long-before-short,
as in Japanese.

DISTINCTION?
91
• The problem, then, is to provide grammar
with the degree of stability rendering it immune
from the constant push-pull of conflicting forces.
• A natural solution to the problem is to
provide language with a relatively stable core
immune to the immanent pressure coming from all
sides.

DISTINCTION?
92
• That is, a natural solution
is to embody language with
a structural system at its
core.

DISTINCTION?
93
Put another way, an autonomous syntax as an intermediate
system between form and function is a clever design solution to
the problem of how to make language both learnable and usable:
This system allows language to be
• nonarbitrary enough to facilitate acquisition and
use
and yet
• stable enough not be pushed this way and that by
the functional force of the moment.

DISTINCTION?
94
We started by raising the question: Is language
structure shaped in part by external function?
The answer is yes!
And surprisingly, not only is this conclusion
compatible with the idea of formal generative
grammar, it even explains why formal grammars
have some of the properties that they do.

DISTINCTION?
95
The competence-performance
distinction
is functionally motivated!

The Boundary between Competence and Performance - Prof. Fredreck J. Newmeyer

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