English Syntax: Verb Types and Relative Clause Variation
Verb Classifications and Structures
Intransitive verbs (H): These do not require a complement. Example: She signed.
Copulative verbs (H + PCS): These take a complement which refers to the subject. Examples: She is happy; they are angry. Note that the Predicative Complement of the Subject (PCS) can be an adjective, noun, prepositional phrase, or clause.
Transitive verbs (H + DO): Example: I am eating an apple.
Complex-transitive verbs (H + DO + PCO or H + PCO + DO): Example: You are driving my family mad.
Ditransitive verbs (H + IO + DO): Example: The teacher gave the students an interesting talk.
Prepositional Transitive (H + DO + PO): Example: He convinced the jury of his innocence.
Phrasal Verb Categories
Intransitive phrasal (H + NC): Example: Peter didn’t turn up.
Transitive phrasal (H + DO + NC or H + NC + DO): Example: He turned down the offer.
Phrasal prepositional (H + NC + PO): Example: I cannot put up with so much hypocrisy.
Phrasal transitive prepositional (H + DO + NC + PO): Example: They put their success down to their effort.
Sociolinguistic Variation in English
Research suggests a shared underlying grammatical system with modest regional differences in usage. Sali A. Tagliamonte studies how English speakers choose between two ways of expressing the same meaning:
- Double Object Construction (DOC): She gave him the book. (Subject + Verb + Recipient + Theme)
- Prepositional Dative (PD): She gave the book to him. (Subject + Verb + Theme + Recipient)
Using a variationist sociolinguistic approach, Tagliamonte analyzes real spoken English from different communities to understand what influences this choice. She shows that the alternation is not random, but follows consistent grammatical patterns.
Key Factors Influencing Choice
- Animacy: Human recipients are more likely to appear in the DOC. Less animate recipients favor the prepositional dative. Indefinite or new recipients also favor PDs.
- Pronominality: Pronouns such as him or me strongly favor the DOC.
- Length: Longer noun phrases are usually placed later in the sentence, favoring the PD.
- Information structure: Information that is already known tends to come before new information, making the DOC more likely in many contexts.
Tagliamonte concludes that although different English varieties (such as British, Canadian, and American English) may use the two constructions with different frequencies, they are influenced by the same linguistic constraints. This suggests that speakers share a common underlying grammar and that grammatical variation is systematic, predictable, and shaped by both syntax and discourse.
Relative and Subordinate Clauses
Adnominal Relative Clauses: These act as modifiers of a noun, which serves as the antecedent.
- Restrictive: Used without commas.
- Non-restrictive: Used with commas.
- Non-finite: These involve two verbs related to the same subject. Example: ‘The car purchased in Seattle was a vintage Mustang.’
- Infinitival: Headed by the infinitive form of a verb. Example: ‘The first person to speak at the conference was an expert in linguistics.’
Sentential Relative Clauses: The antecedent is a whole clause, and ‘which’ is the relativizer used to introduce them. Example: The weather is nice, which makes me happy.
Nominal Relative Clauses: The antecedent and relativizer are fused. Examples: Whoever said that is a liar; what you told me is not true.
Adverbial Relative Clauses: Example: I lived with my aunt when I was working in London. These are normally introduced by wh-words.
Adverbial Subordinate Clauses: These are normally adjuncts of place, time, and manner. Example: I go to the gym because I want to be fit.
Complement Clauses
The main goal of Bohmann and Schlüter’s study is to explain why English speakers choose either that or which in restrictive relative clauses, even though both forms are grammatically possible.
For example:
- The book that I bought is interesting.
- The book which I bought is interesting.
Factors Influencing the Choice
- Register (style): That is much more common in informal spoken English, while which appears more frequently in formal and written English.
- Linguistic context: The type of noun, the complexity of the sentence, and the grammatical role of the relative pronoun all affect the choice.
- Prescriptive rules: Many grammar books and style guides teach that that should be used in restrictive clauses and which only in non-restrictive clauses. However, the study demonstrates that real speakers and writers do not always follow this rule.
- Historical development: The frequency of which in restrictive clauses has decreased over time, partly because of changing writing practices and the influence of style guides.
Study Conclusions
- The variation between that and which is systematic, not a free choice.
- Speakers are influenced by grammar, style, and context, rather than by a single fixed rule.
- Although prescriptive rules have affected written English, actual language use is more flexible, and both forms remain part of standard English.
The study is important because it shows the difference between prescriptive grammar (how people should use language) and descriptive linguistics (how people actually use language).