Syntax: The Sentence Patterns of Language

WHAT IS SYNTAX?

"Syntax is the part of grammar that represents a speaker's knowledge of sentences and their structures."

J. B. Molière

The rules of syntax are the combination beetwen phrases and phrases into the same sentece; indicating the correct order of the sentence, for example in english language the correct order for a sentence is SUBJECT+VERB+OBJECT, if you change the order, the sentences will no have sense, and it will be grammatically incorrect, the peolple will understand you but it is not the correct form.

Also, another important aspect is to describe the relationship beetwen the meaning of words and the arrangement of those words , in other hand you must to specify the relations of a sentence, such as subject or direct obeject, so you have to provide the complete information, Syntactic rules also specify other constraints that sentences must adhere to you have to give the complete sentences and with coherence, for example, you can not say: “I saw” you must give what did you see.

The rules of syntax allow both of these groupings, which is why the expression is ambiguous. In the first structure old and men are under the same node and hence old modifies men. In the second structure old shares a node with the entire conjunction men and women, and so modifies both.

SENTENCE STRUCTURE

The most important thing you have learn are these key symbols:

S- sentence

NP-noun phrase

VP-verb phrase

PP- prepositional phrase

N-noun

V-verb

P-preposition

DET-determiner

COOR- coordinator

C-complementizer

AUX- auxiliary verb

CP-complement phrase

X2- ítem number.

To make a correct sentence structure you must use:

Det-N-V-Det-N

This is the correct form to write sentences, this indicates that you have to imply a determiner, which is followed by a noun, followed by a verb and so on.

For example:

• "the baby drink the milk."

The Baby drink the milk

(Derterminer) (noun) (verb) (determiner) (noun)

It's sometimes easier to see the parts and subparts of the sentence in a tree diagram:

Here, the "tree" is upside down with its "root" encompassing the entire sentence: the baby drink the milk and its "leaves" being the individual.