Government

Definition

In linguistics, government refers to a syntactic relationship between a head (such as a verb or preposition) and its dependents, where the head determines the case or grammatical form of the dependent elements. This concept is crucial for understanding how certain elements within a sentence interact, particularly in relation to binding theory and constraints on coreference.

5 Must Know Facts For Your Next Test

1. Government can affect how different noun phrases relate to one another, particularly in establishing who or what is being referred to in a sentence.
2. Different types of government can be found in various languages, influencing how syntactic structures are formed and understood.
3. In binding theory, government plays a role in determining the accessibility of an antecedent for a pronoun, impacting the interpretation of sentences.
4. Government not only connects verbs to their arguments but also can extend to prepositions and other heads, showing the interconnectedness of sentence components.
5. Understanding government is key to analyzing syntactic structures and resolving ambiguities in meaning that arise from coreference.

Review Questions

• How does government influence the relationship between verbs and their arguments in a sentence?
  • Government establishes a syntactic link between verbs and their arguments by determining the case or grammatical form of those arguments. When a verb governs its subject or object, it specifies how those noun phrases should be understood within the sentence. This relationship is essential for clarifying roles within the action described by the verb and helps ensure grammaticality in sentence construction.
• What role does government play in binding theory, particularly regarding pronouns and their antecedents?
  • In binding theory, government influences which antecedents are accessible for pronouns. The governing head can create restrictions on which noun phrases can refer to the same entity as a pronoun. For example, if a pronoun is governed by a particular verb, it may only refer back to specific antecedents that are appropriately cased or positioned within the syntactic structure, thereby shaping coreference relations.
• Evaluate how variations in government across languages can affect our understanding of syntactic structures and coreference.
  • Variations in government across different languages can significantly impact our understanding of syntactic structures and coreference. For instance, languages with rich case marking may have distinct ways of expressing relationships between subjects and verbs compared to those with more analytic structures. This diversity highlights how syntactic rules shaped by government can influence meaning-making processes and affect how speakers resolve ambiguities in coreference. By studying these differences, linguists gain insights into the underlying principles governing language use and cognitive processing.

Related terms

Binding Theory: A framework that describes the relationship between pronouns and their antecedents in terms of their reference and scope, focusing on how different types of noun phrases interact in sentences.

Coreference: The phenomenon where two or more expressions in a sentence refer to the same entity, which is essential for understanding meaning and relationships between parts of a sentence.

Case Marking: The grammatical marking of nouns and pronouns to indicate their syntactic function within a sentence, often influenced by the governing head.