1. The document discusses Transformational Generative Grammar, which is a theory of grammar developed by Noam Chomsky that uses transformations to relate deep and surface structures of sentences. 2. It defines key concepts of transformational grammar like deep structure, surface structure, and transformations. Deep structure is the underlying form of a sentence before rules are applied, and surface structure is the final spoken/heard form. 3. Examples of transformations provided include passive, extraposition, and various focusing transformations like end-focus that place important information at the end of sentences.

1. COURSE CODE: MELT 104
TOPIC: TRANSFORMATIONAL
GENERATIVE GRAMMAR
PROFESSOR: MA. MARTHA
MANETTE A. MADRID Ed.D
Discussant: Ruth Ann L. Llego

2. TRANSFORMATIONAL
GENERATIVE GRAMMAR

3. Words can be arranged in many
ways as there are many ways to
arrange words.

4. After rejecting linear finite state grammars and after showing the
limitations of phrase- structure(PS) descriptions, a formalized version
of immediate constituent analysis, Chomsky developed a grammar
with a tripartite structure.( Youssef Aoun & Dominiques Sportiche
1980.Transformational Grammar& the Study of Language)
The Birth of Transformational Generative Grammar
a set of phrase-structure rules
a set of morphophonemic rules that
convert sequences of morphemes into
sequences of phonemes
transformations modifying the output strings
of elements generated by the PS –rules into
strings that can serve as the input to the
morphophonemic rules.
generative component
generating the
underlying structures
transformational
component modifying
structures into surface
structures

5. TRANSFORMATIONAL GENERATIVE GRAMMAR
Morphophonemic rules

6. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
Transformational grammar
or transformational-generative
grammar (TGG) is a generative grammar,
especially of a natural language, that has been
developed in the Chomskyan
tradition of phrase structure grammars.
(English grammar - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammar )

7. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
It is a theory of grammar that accounts for the
constructions of a language by linguistic transformations and
phrase structures. "In transformational grammar, the term
'rule' is used not for a precept set down by an external authority
but for a principle that is unconsciously yet regularly followed in
the production and interpretation of sentences. A rule is a
direction for forming a sentence or a part of a sentence, which
has been internalized by the native speaker."
(D. Bornstein, An Introduction to Transformational Grammar. Univ. Press of America, 1984)

8. Phrase Structures

9. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
TG [transformational grammar] is not a
mathematical grammar. The processes it
describes are not mathematical processes
and the symbols it describes are not used
with their mathematical meaning.

10. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
"Chomsky's grammar is a 'generative
grammar of the transformational type.‘
he means that among the rules are those for
transforming one type of sentence into
another(affirmative into negative, simple into
compound or complex, and so forth);
(W.F. Bolton, A Living Language: The History and Structure of English. Random House, 1982)

11. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
"The credit for making the concept of
transformation popular and significant belongs
primarily to Zellig S. Harris and Noam Chomsky.
. . . Harris introduced the concept of
transformation to linguistics in order to reinforce
the effectiveness of the method of
reducing utterances to certain basic sentence
structures.
" (Kazimierz Polanski, "Some Remarks on Transformations," in Linguistics Across
Historical and Geographical Boundaries, ed. by D. Kastovsky, et al. Walter de Gruyter,
1986)

12. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
The transformational grammar
was a theory of how grammatical
knowledge is represented and
processed in the brain. Developed
by Noam Chomsky in the1960's,
the transformational grammar
consisted of:

13. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
1. Two levels of representation of the
structure of sentences which includes
an underlying, more abstract form,
termed 'deep structure', and the
actual form of the sentence produced,
called 'surface structure'.

14. ACCORDING TO GROVER HUDSON, ESSENTIAL
INTRODUCTORY LINGUISTICS. BLACKWELL, 2000)
 "A deep structure is . . .
the underlying form of a
sentence, before rules
like auxiliary inversion
and wh-fronting apply.
 After all raisings apply, plus
relevant morphological and
phonological rules (as for
forms of do), the result . . . is
the linear, concrete, surface
structure of sentences,
ready to be given phonetic
form."

15.  D-Structure is an abstract
representation of a sentence. It
can represented in the form of
a hierarchical tree diagram, or
"phrase structure tree,
depicting the abstract
grammatical relationships
between the words and phrases
within a sentence.
 S-structure corresponds to
the version of a sentence
that can be spoken and
heard.
 Surface structures are
derived from deep
structures by a series
of transformations.

16. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
Example:
The dog bit the cat.(D-Structure)
The cat was bitten by the dog.
( S-Structure)
where an optional transformation
called "passive" had applied.

17. DEFINITIONS
TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
2. A system of formal
rules specifying how
deep structures are to
be transformed into
surface structures.

18. In TGG, sentences are generated by a (subconscious) set
of procedures. It is part of the mind ability.
The goal is ….. To figure out what we (subconsciously)
know……. A theory of the linguistic intuition (unconscious
knowledge) of a native speaker.
The ‘rules’ in TG do not tell
us how to produce
language> They tell us the
‘ORDER’ in which to put
words and phrases.
Note:
TGG allow us to generate an infinite number
of sentences via transformations.

19. Transformation is a rule that takes an
input typically called the Deep Structure
(in the Standard Theory) or D-structure
(in the extended standard theory
or government and binding theory) and
changes it in some restricted way to result
in a Surface Structure (or S-structure).
A typical transformation in TG is
the operation of subject-auxiliary
inversion (SAI).
This rule takes as its input a
declarative sentence with an
auxiliary.
John has eaten all the heirloom
tomatoes. >
Has John eaten all the heirloom
tomatoes?

20. ….”(Noam Chomsky, lecture
given in January 1969 at
Gustavus Adolphus
College in Minnesota. Rpt.
in Language and Mind, 3rd
ed. Cambridge Univ. Press,
2006)
the rules relating deep and
surface structures-

21. TRANSFORMATIONAL
GRAMMAR
Transformations
1. Passive Agent Deletion.
[Someone] ate the cake.
When the subject agent is not identified, we use an indefinite
pronoun to fill the slot where it would appear in the deep structure.
The cake was eaten.
In many instances, we delete the agent in passive sentences.
The cake was eaten [by someone].
T-G grammar proposes a deletion rule that eliminates the
prepositional phrase containing the subject agent. We can say,
therefore, that sentence has undergone two transformations,
passive and passive agent deletion." (James Dale Williams, The
Teacher's Grammar Book, 2nd ed. Lawrence Ehrlbaum, 2005)

22. 2. Extraposition
A construction (or transformation) in which a clause that acts as a
subject is moved (or extraposed) to the end of the sentence and
replaced by dummy it in the initial position.
An extraposed subject is sometimes called a postponed subject.
The use of it as a subject (or dummy subject) in sentences about time
and weather (e.g., It's raining again.) and in certain idioms (e.g., It's
OK). Also known as ambient "it" or empty "it."
Unlike the ordinary pronoun it, dummy it refers to nothing at all; it
simply serves a grammatical function. In other words, dummy it has
a grammatical meaning but no lexical meaning.

23. [T]he dramatist deliberately uses
a marked word order to focus
attention [on] that part of the
information that is comically most
surprising."
3. end-focus
It is the principle that state that the most important
information in a clause or sentence is placed at the end. End-
focus is a normal characteristic of sentence structures in
English.
(Terence Murphy, "Exploring the Concept of Emergent Coherence in a Corpus of
Korean ESL Texts." Learning Culture and Language Through ICTs: Methods for
Enhanced Instruction, ed. by Maiga Chang. IGI Global, 2009)

24. "To be technically
accurate, end focus is
given to the last open-
class item or proper
noun in a clause (Quirk
and Greenbaum 1973).
.."
(Michael H. Cohen, James P.
Giangola, and Jennifer
Balogh, Voice User Interface
Design. Addison-Wesley, 2004)
In the sentence, 'Sean Connery was
born in Scotland,' the last open-class
item is the noun 'Scotland.' By
default, it is the focus, the new piece
of information in this sentence.
In contrast, 'Sean Connery' is the topic
(subject) of the sentence, or the old piece
of information on which the speaker
makes some comment.
Old information is generally placed in the
subject, whereas new information is
generally housed in the predicate.

25. Someone parked a large furniture van last
night right outside our front door.
"[T]here are end-focusing processes that produce marked end focus.
Parked right outside our front door
last night it was, a large furniture
van.
Some of these end focuses are clearly more marked than others, as the
reader can confirm by reading them aloud--they involve a successively
more indignant intonation pattern!"
(Keith Brown and Jim Miller, Syntax: A Linguistic Introduction to
Sentence Structure, 2nd ed. Routledge, 2002)
A large furniture van, right outside our front door last
night, parked!

26. 4. End-Focus and Genitives (Possessive Forms)
"Quirk et al. (1985) argue that the
choice between the s-genitive and
the of-genitive is, among other things,
determined by the principles of end-
focus and end-weight.
Accordingly, the s-genitive should be preferred when the
possessum is more important than the possessor, while
the of-genitive should be favored if the possessor is the
more communicatively important (and complex) element
. . .."
(Anette Rosenbach, Genitive Variation in English: Conceptual Factors in
Synchronic and Diachronic Studies. Mouton de Gruyter, 2002)
According to these principles, the
more complex and
communicatively more important
constituents tend to be placed
toward the end of the NP.

27. 5. Reversed Wh-Clefts
"Reversed wh-clefts have the main focus at the beginning of the
first unit, not at the end after be, as in regular wh-clefts. Some
combinations (that's what/why/how/the way) are stereotyped, as
are the thing is/the problem is.
All you need is LOVE. (regular wh-cleft)
LOVE is all you need. (reversed wh-cleft)
What you should do is THIS. (regular wh-
cleft)
THIS is what you should do. (reversed wh-
cleft)
The effect is to put the new information as end-
focus, but to indicate its selectively new status
very clearly.
(Angela Downing and Philip Locke, English Grammar: A University Course, 2nd
ed. Routledge, 2006)

28. S-Structure
Who will John see.
Wh-movement
D-Structure
John will see who.

29. Sentence
Transformations

30. Grammaticality - correctness in terms of grammar
It is possible for a sentence to be both grammatical and
meaningless.
Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.(Chomsky)
…meaningful but ungrammatical (non)-sentences
Man the bit sandwich the.
The meaning of which is fairly clear, but no native speaker would accept as well
formed.

31. Innate Linguistic Knowledge
Chomsky is clear that a generative
grammar models only the knowledge
that underlies the human ability to
speak and understand.

32. I-Language and E-Language
( Chomsky, 1986)
 Internal language is the
mentally represented
linguistic knowledge that
a native speaker of a
language has, and is
therefore a mental object
— from this perspective;
most of theoretical
linguistics is a branch of
psychology.
 External Language
encompasses all other
notions of what a
language is, for example
that it is a body of
knowledge or behavioral
habits shared by a
community.