This document discusses and compares the structure of noun phrases in Standard Arabic and Standard English. It notes that Arabic noun phrases can be in either the free state or construct state, and modifiers follow the noun in Arabic but precede it in English. The document outlines principles governing nominal expressions in both languages, including noun movement and adjective ordering. It concludes that while Arabic and English noun phrases differ structurally, both languages share underlying syntactic principles.

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Human’s language is a unique feature of humans. There are many languages but they are
not the same. Standard Arabic and Standard English languages, for example, are different but
alike.
That is, these languages are originally different from one another (Semitic & German) but they
do share some linguistic features at all levels: phonological, morphological, syntactic, semantic,
and pragmatics’ level. Fields known as Contrastive Linguistics, Comparative Linguistics and
Universal Grammar have a lot to do with these areas. In this research-paper, Lado’s theory of
Contrastive Analysis namely his hypothesis of contrastive analysis (CAH) and the steps for
contrasting two languages have been all followed in this study. Sociolinguistically, language is a
means of communication between/among people, societies, communities, regions, countries, etc.
Psycholinguistically, language is a human mental behavior. In spite of this, language has many
languages that is, each country or area in this world have its/their own language. Simply put,
languages are many just like countries are many. Needless to say, major aims of each language
whatever was is, are the same, but this or that language will be necessarily either completely or
different from another language. Instead, one language can be partially similar to another
language but not completely similar to that or this language.
Historically, linguists in nearly all over the world have made many attempts trying to name one
language as the origin of all languages. Moreover, their researchers aimed at formulating or
mapping the languages of the world. However, they may have achieved something, but their
results and findings remain all questionable since they lack enough evidence.

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Strictly speaking and universally, other linguists, led by Chomsky, have attempted another aspect
of language that is looking for universal features/aspects of all the languages of the world.
Namely, this theory is known as Universal Grammar (UG). The similarities they share or they
have in common. Mainly, what is called Comparative Linguistics (CL); researches in this area
conduct their research comparing two or more languages, dialects, etc., attempting to find out
similarities between or among them.
Specifically, another approach has appeared in nearly the early 1940s and prospered in the
1960 and over, called as Contrastive Analysis (CA) or sometimes as (Contrastive Linguistics),
(Lightbown, 2006). Contrastively, contrastivists (researchers working in contrastive analysis
area) attempt from an educational point of view to contrast two languages, concentrating on the
differences between them to be taught for second language or foreign language learners in order
to solve their problems hindering the process of learning this or that particular foreign or second
language.
In regard to (CA) and principally, Fries, Lado and James are considered as the proponents of
CA theory or field study. The basic hypothesis of this theory, however is that where differences
exist, difficulties of learning do exist. On the other hand, where similarities do exist, ease of
learning does exist. Put another way, the more the languages are similar the easier to be learnt
and taught, and the more different they are, the more difficult they are to be learnt and taught,
(Lado, 1957).
For instance, consider Arabic and English languages which are originally different from one
another. More accurately, consider the simple sentence system structure in the two languages.
Basically, they both have the same type of sentence: simple sentence, but a simple sentence
structure in Arabic is entirely different from that in English. For that matter, Arab learners of

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English especially beginners are facing difficulties in building a simple sentence. These
difficulties might be due to their first language (Arabic) transfer (language interference)
according to CA hypothesis.
More importantly and which is the core idea of this research-paper is investigating the validity of
the claim that (SA) is (V+S+O) and (SE) on the other hand is (S+V+O). The structure is always
a type of verbal sentences (sentences which start with a (VP), that is (VP+NP+…) and English
on the other hand, is not always as (NP+VP+…). However, it is important to show that this each
system is different from another. Thus, I will be concentrating in this paper on contrasting briefly
on the structure of the simple sentence in both Standard Arabic and Standard English, and
declaring whether Arabic’s simple sentence is always as (VP+NP+…) and English’s simple
sentence is always as (NP+VP+…) mainly the simple sentence structure in the form of statement
in both systems. Therefore, the two systems are not syntactically contrasted in detail, that is
showing only the basic differences and similarities for proving or disapproving the validity of the
proposed claim that Standard Arabic’s simple sentence structure is always (VP+NP+…) and
Standard English’s simple sentence structure is not always (NP+VP+…). Now considering
looking into the similarities and differences between Arabic and English noun phrases, the
structure of noun phrases in these two different languages and its use in its different sides I will
go into details in the following questions.
1- What are the principles which govern the syntax of nominal expressions in both Arabic
and English in order to clarify the interrelationship of the form and the syntactic
derivation of the noun phrases of the two languages?
2- What are the possible theories and models that may describe the structure of noun
phrases?

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3- What are the similarities and differences between noun phrases in Arabic and English?
What are the principles which govern the syntax of nominal expressions in both Arabic and
English in order to clarify the interrelationship of the form and the syntactic derivation of the
noun phrases of the two languages?
The Arabic noun phrase comes in two states: the Free State (FS) and the construct state (CS).
While in the FS modifiers can intervene between the noun and its complement, this is not
possible in the CS. Also the initial noun in the CS ends with [t] which is absent in the FS form.
In the N-movement, the CS NP as a whole is moved to [Spec, DP], precluding the realization of
the definite article (which is absent to the left of the construct noun).
In Arabic noun phrase, the adjective modifiers usually follow the noun, and may not precede it.
When modifiers appear to the right of the noun, it is the noun phrase itself, which has risen to the
left of the modifier. That no lexical material should intervene the determiner and the noun in
Arabic is not true because in many Arabic dialects, though, insufficient for some speakers,
cardinal numerals occur between the definite determiner and the noun.
In Arabic, NP movement pied- pipes all what it acquires along the derivation, like a snowball,
which gathers weight and size in rolling towards its target. Moreover, the order of APs in Arabic
is systematically reversed with respect to English, and this reversal is quite firm in all varieties of
Arabic.
Thus, if APs are in left- hand specifies positions, as in English, the only way to derive the
inverse order of post- nominal APs, as in Arabic, is by a system in which N is not extracted from
NP and moved as a head, i.e., raising NP to a specifier position preceding the XP housing the
lowest AP, merging the next AP in the next specifier up and snow balling upwards the entire
phrase below the merged adjective.

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In Arabic adjectives are considers as nouns and not as a different functional category. NPs
differ in one major respect from simple NPs in that Simple NPs rise above the adjectives. With
numerals the movement of simple NPs is subject to some variations but no evidence has been
provided to the effect that NP raises to [Spec, D]. In contrary with the facts mentioned about the
simple NP, CS NP precedes not only adjectives, but numerals and demonstratives as well,
providing the evidence that CS NPs raise to [Spec, D].
Regarding the structure of noun phrases in English we can conclude the following:
Based on the locality condition on movement, which is based on the X- Theory of GB. NP-
movement should move an NP to the nearest landing site, a subject position [Spec, IP].
There are three types of NPs:
1. When the NP is a referential expression, as Ali.
2. When the NP is a reflexive element, as Himself.
3. When the NP is an object pronoun, as him.
Reflexives have to be bound to a matching antecedent. A reflexive element, which refers to
another NP, should match with the referential NP to which it refers in grammatical features of
person, number, and gender. Thus, reflexives are not free and cannot occur by themselves.
Furthermore, the antecedent should precede the reflexive it binds, i.e., it must c-command the
reflexive.
The antecedent and the reflexive must be contained in the first clause dominating the reflexive.

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In contrary to reflexives the pronoun must be bound, though not inside the immediately
containing clause, such as reflexives, i.e., it must be locally free.
Those sentences derive as a result of movement leads to postulate more than one representation
for the sentence:
1. The deep structure (DS), which encodes the base position of all the components of the
sentence.
2. The derived or the surface structure (SS), or Spell- Out, which encodes the way in which the
sentence surface in grammar. Every moved element leaves a trace, which is co indexed with its
antecedent.
The Wh- phrase cannot transit through the [Spec, VP], which hosts the trace of the subject that
moves to [Spec, IP] to receive Case (according to VP- internal subject hypothesis). Wh-
movement cannot transit through the higher [Spec, VP] either, because it hosts the trace of the
subject argument, which originates in [Spec, VP] and moves to receive Case. Thus, [Spec, VP] is
an A-position.
At DS there are no traces because the DS is the level of representation that precedes movement
and traces result of movement. Furthermore, it has been argued that at DS all thematic positions
must be filled by arguments to which the verb assigns their thematic roles, which has been
proved to be not true.
I would like to mention the discussion about the relation between the possessor and the
determiner in the presence of a possessor phrase, D must be non- overt in English. It has also
been argued that DPs differ with CPs. Verbs take a wide range of complements, while nouns
have lesser impact on their complements than verbs.

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While V can Case-mark the specifier of its IP complement, i.e., it can assign accusative Case to
the specifier of its complement. Namely the subject of the clause or of the small clause is not
possible for a noun. Thus the impact of a verb on its complement is stronger than that of the
noun. The noun cannot incorporate the head of its complement, thus particle construction is
unavailable in the DP. Passive with preposition stranding, which depends on incorporation for
the verb, is not available in the DP. Some verbs like, love, fear, hate, or verbs like know allow
passivization in the clause while the related nouns do not allow passivization- like patterns in the
DP. Raising by which the subject of a lower non- finite clause is moved to the matrix clause is
not available in the DP.
Now the second question, what are the possible theories and models that may describe the
structure of the noun phrases?
The language universals identified and found valid so far are listed in the book the linguistics
Encyclopedia. Many of the universals listed here are not relevant to the structure of the noun
phrases. When the descriptive adjective precedes the noun, then the demonstrative and the
numeral, with more than chance frequency, do likewise. When the general rule is that the
descriptive follows, there may be a minority of adjectives, which usually precede, but when the
general rule is that descriptive adjectives precede, there are no exceptions. When any or all of the
items (demonstrative, numeral, and descriptive adjective) precede the noun, they are always
found in that order. If they follow, the order is either the same or its exact opposite. If in
apposition the proper noun usually precedes the common noun, then the language is one in which
the governing noun precedes its dependent genitive. With much better than chance frequency, if
the common noun usually precedes the proper noun, the dependent genitive precedes its leading
noun.

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The main purpose of this research was to describe the noun phrases in English and Arabic and
to find out whether the description leads to any conclusions regarding language universals. It was
though worthwhile, nevertheless, to make certain concluding observations regarding the tools
used for description, i.e., principles and constructs like x- bar syntax, Government and Binding,
Theta Theory, and Minimalism, particularly to ascertain whether Minimalism makes it easier to
analyze the structure of the noun phrase from two different languages belonging of two different
families than X-bar syntax. Based on Kayne (1994), cited in Haegeman and Jacqueline (1999:
464), it was found that all projections in English and other languages can be represented in terms
of a single binary branching system in the following schema, which summarize the X-bar format
of the projection.
And for the final question what are the similarities and differences between Noun Phrases in
Arabic and English languages?
There are some similarities and differences between Arabic and English noun phrases. I will
identify these two important points of similarities and differences. First of all the similarities.
Both in English and in Arabic, the head word of a noun phrase can be a noun, a pronoun
(including an indefinite pronoun), or a demonstrative. Both in English and Arabic, the
demonstrative has two functions:
1- The function of a demonstrative pronoun, which can be the head word of a noun
phrase.
2- The function of a determiner occupying a pre-head position in the structure of a noun
phrase.

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Both in English and in Arabic, suffixes can be used for the formation of the plural variant of
a word.
Both in English and in Arabic, the locative adverbs, such as here and there in English, and huna
‘here’ and hunak ‘there’ in Arabic can follow the headword of a noun phrase. Both in English
and in Arabic, noun phrases consisting of a single word or of the headword and its modifiers can
be used as a question. Both Arabic and English allow coordination and apposition in the nucleus
of a noun phrase. Both in English and in Arabic, the headword can take both pre-modifiers and
post-modifiers. 8. Both in English and in Arabic, there are items, which can be used before the
headword in the structure of the noun phrase. Both in English and in Arabic, there are items,
which can be used after the headword in the structure of the noun phrase. Both in English and in
Arabic, there is a definite article. Both in English and in Arabic, the post-modifying item, i.e., the
item occurring after the headword can be (An adjective, an adverb, a prepositional phrase, a
clause). Both in English and in Arabic, the number of the headword of the noun phrase
determines the form of the verb. In neither Arabic nor English can the names of a person be
preceded by the definite article.
Both in English and in Arabic, there are gradable and non-gradable adjectives to be used in the
noun phrase. An example from English: rich, richer, richest, and from Arabic: ghani ‘rich’,
aghna ‘richer’, and al- aghna ‘the richest’. Both in English and in Arabic, the headword of a
noun phrase can be preceded by ordinals.
Second the differences. While English has both definite and indefinite articles and both occur
before the noun, in Arabic there is only the definite article al ‘the’ but no overt indefinite article.
While mass nouns, e.g., milk in (I like milk) and the plural of count nouns, e.g., roses in (I like
roses) need not be preceded by the definite articles, in their Arabic translation, they must be

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preceded by the definite article. In English, sentences are rendered as ungrammatical if an article
co-occurs with demonstratives or possessive words in the same noun phrase; in Arabic this is
possible. English and Arabic differ with regard to the position of ordinals in the noun phrase.
Ordinals can only precede the headword of a noun phrase but in Arabic they can also follow the
headword in the structure of a noun phrase. In English adjectives are not inflected for number
and gender but in Arabic they are. In English there can be a pre-modifying noun in the structure
of a noun phrase without that pre-modifying noun necessarily having a possessive meaning. In
Arabic, a possessive meaning is inevitable in such cases. In Arabic, the number and the gender of
the possessor has an impact on the form of the headword (kitab-u-hu ‘his book’, kitab-u-ha ‘her
book’, kitab-u-hum ‘their book’) but in English the number and the gender has no impact on the
form of the headword at all, e.g., his book, her book, their book. Adjectives in Arabic come post-
nominally, whereas the pronominal position of adjectives is impossible. In English, adjectives
occur mostly in the pre-nominal position but in certain cases they can also be used after the
headword, e.g.
The president elect
The advocate General
So, as expected, there are a number of similarities as well as differences within the structure of
a noun phrase in English and the structure of the noun phrase in Arabic.