Cristina Tamayo

1. UNIVERSITY OF THE ARMED FORCES
TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
GROUP 2
Dayana Cristina Tamayo

2. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
System of language analysis that identifies the relationship
among various elements of a sentence making use of rules
It implies a logical and analytical process to understand in a
meaningful way the words
It explores the thought behind the words

3. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
NOAM CHOMSKY
American theoretical linguist who revolutionized the
filed of linguistics through cognitive capacity of language
He refers to the mind comprises an extensive cluster of
innate modules as the language.
Chomsky’s theories of grammar and language are
referred to as “generative” or “transformational”

4. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
He developed and promoted the concept of grammar as being a
broader theory regarding language structure
Chomsky’s theories explain the syntactic and semantic properties
of sentences by means of modifications of the phrase structure
Recursive properties of language enable humans to combine
arbitrary concepts indefinitely, making the human thought
unlimited.

5. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
SYNTACTIC STRUCTURE
It describes three components
Structure component of the phrase
Transformation component
Morphophonic component
Any sentence structure contains a Noun Phrase, and a Verb Phrase

6. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
DEEP AND SURFACE STRUCTURE
The deep structure is a theoretical construct that seeks to
unify several related structures
The surface structure is the superficial arrangement of
constituents and reflects the order in which the words are
pronounced

7. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
Essential characteristics of this model
Semantic interpretation
Phonetic interpretation
Transformations coverts semantics level to phonetic
level

8. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
GRAMMATICAL THEORIES
Construction and Evaluation
The theory of universal grammar presents that if a person is
brought up under normal conditions, he will develop language
with certain properties:
distinguishing nouns from verbs
distinguishing function words from content words

9. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
Linguistic Performance
Chomsky mentioned that linguistic errors are committed in
the real world, they are irrelevant in the study of
competencies

10. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
Linguistic Competence
Construct and understand grammatical sentences with the
knowledge of language

11. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
GRAMMATICALITY
The interpretation of sentence according the rules and
constraints of the relevant grammar
It is a linguistic intuition which reflects innate linguistic
competence of speaker
Its goal is to generate well-formed sentences in an specific
language

12. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
MINIMALISM
 It is mode of inquiry characterized by the flexibility of the
various directions
 Chomsky attempts to approach universal grammar from below
 This implicates economy of derivation and economy of
representation ideas

13. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
ECONOMY OF DERIVATION
It is a principle stating that movements only occur in order to
match interpretable features with uninterpretable features
case
agreement

14. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
ECONOMY OF REPRESENTATION
It is a principle that grammatical structures must exist for a
purpose. The structure of a sentence should not be more
complex or larger
derivations

15. TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR
UNIFORMITY IN DERIVATION
Rules don’t apply arbitrarily in derivation, they apply
throughout derivations