LTNHT' 4 THE S m T m OF INFLECTIONAL

ELEMENTS: TENSE & AGmEMENT

Structure

Objectives
Introduction
4.1.1 The inflectionalelement W L : verbal morphology, clausal syntax
4.1.2 The transformation of Affix-Hopping
Tense
4.2.1 Tense and finiteness
4.2.2 Tense as Case-assigner
4.2.3 Aspect and Tense
Agreement
4.3.1 Patterns of agreement
4.3.2 The agreement element AGR
4.3.3 AGR 6s Case-assigner
Conclusion
Let Us Sum Up
Key Words
Bibliography
Questions & Exercises
Notes on "Questions & Exercises"

4.0 OBJECTIVES

The objectives of this unit are that at the end of this unit you should be able to

e recognize verbal inflection (lNFL) as a significant syntactic constituent,-

e understand the transfornation of Affix-Hopping and its subsequent
development,
e understand how verbal inflection participates in syntactic government,
e understand the role of Tense and finiteness in the syntax of clauses,
e understand the phenomenon of Agreement and its syntactic relationship to
Case.

4.1 INTRODUCTION

4.1.1 The inflectional element INFL: verbal morphology, clausal syntax,

In Unit 3, we have seen how Cases and thematic roles are assigned by the verb along
with its inflectional component. In this unit, we shall be concerned with the
inflectional component of the verb. In the paper on English morphology; the notion
of inflectional morphology was introduced. Verbbl inflection carries information
about the inflectional categories of tense, sometimes aspect and mood, and person, '

number, and (in some languages, though not in English) gender. All. of these
inflectional categories have a wider role to play in the syntax of the clause in which
the verb occurs with its inflection, and therefore a special kind of syntactic element
INFL (from "inflection") is recognized for the composite inflectional component of ,
the verb.
AS it turns out, the element N F L satisfies the tests for syntactic constituency that we The Syntax 01
have learned about in Unit 1. Thus, it can replace a distinct syntactic constituent such Inflectional
as a modal auxiliary like may or must, as shown by the examples (la) and (lb): Elements

(1) a. Ahmed go= to school every day.

b. Ahmed go to school every day.

Here, the present-tense third-person singular-number inflectional element -(e)s with

the verb go in (1a) is the inflectional element NFL. The same element can occur in
different distributional positions (e.g., with an auxiliary verb such as do or be), as
(2a) and (2b) demonstrate:

(2) a. Does Ahmed go to school every day?

b. 1s
- Ahmed going to school these days?
(= be+-(e)s)

Since INFL is not necessarily a full d r d , when it occurs as a suffix in English it

needs a verb -- either a main verb or an auxiliary -- to attach to. Therefore, in the
absence of auxiliary be or have, the verb do is brought in to "support" the INFL
element. The insertion of auxiliary do to support the INFL element is an insertion
transformation called Do-Support. (No phrase structure rule has the power to insert
or delete or move any syntactic constituents -- for these operations we have to
formulate specific transformational rules.)

4.1.2 The transformation of Affix-Hopping

Let us for a moment remember the deep-structure order of INFL and the verb to
which it attaches in a clause. As we saw in the ConcIusion of Unit 2, the head of the
clause is I, i.e., INFL, and the VP occurs as its complement to the right of it.
Therefore, INFL precedes the V head of the VP, i.e., occurs to the left of V. When
the JNFL element COMBINES with the V into an inflected verb-form such as walkr
or goes, however, we find INFL actually SUFFIXED to the verb root, i.e., as a
morphological element combining with V, PNFL occurs to the RTG-HTof V. How to
reconcile these two apparently contradictory observations in our theory of English
grammar?

This is done by proposing that a minor trhnsformational rule called Affix-Hopping

operates on a morphological N F L element to make it "hop" over a verb -- whether a
main verb or an auxiliary verb -- that occurs to its right (either in deep structure itself
or by being inserted by a transformation such as Do-Support), so that it ends up
morphologically suffixed to the verb-root.

4.2 TENSE

4.2.1 Tense and finiteness

Tense refers to the inflectional manifestation of the time of an action, event or state
expressed by a clause, where the time is gauged as preceding, coinciding with, or
following the time of reference of the clause. The syntax and semantics of tense is a
complex and fascinating area for further study and research; here we shall embark on
just an introductory exploration of the syntactic role of tense ip English sentences.
Consider the following sentences:

(3) a. Ram walked five kilometres yesterday.

b. Ram walks five kilometres every day.
c. Ram will walk five kiloinetres tomorrow.
English Syntax
Although the subject and the main verb-root are the same in all the three sentences
(3a-c), the inflected form of the verb changes according to whether the action
expressed by the sentence is in the past, the present, or the future. The forms walked,
walks, and will walk are the (third-person singular) Present-tense, Past-tense, and
Future-tense forms, respectively, of the verb-root walk in English. While the (simple)
Present and Past tenses are morphologically expressed in the suffixes -s and -ed,
respectively, the Future tense is expressed syntactically in English, by the
fiistorically modal) future auxiliaries will and shall preceding the main verb.

4.2.2 Tense as Case-assigner

Tense plays an important role in deciding the function of INFL as governor and Case-
assigner to the subject. Tensed W L can assign Nominative Case to the subject of its
clause, whereas infinitival W L cannot. The need for Exceptional Case-Marking
(see Unit 3) arises within the structure of English syntax because of this, in order that
the subject of an infinitival complement clause need not go Caseless.

To understand the role of Tense as Case-assigner, we need to have an understanding

of tensed INFL as the governor of the subject. In Unit 1, we briefly mentioned that
the notion of government is based on the notion of c-command: a governor must (at
least) c-command the syntactic constituent that it governs. We now revise this
observation and introduce the relationship of m-command, because it turns out that
the notion of government is based on a relationship of m-command, a broader notion
than c-command. The relationship of m-command is defined as follows:

(4) m-command: A node X nz-command another node Y if and only if

the lowest maximal projection dominating X also dominates Y, and
neither X dominates Y nor vice-versa.

To understand what this means, let us consider the following phrase structure:

Det
AN'

In this phrase structure tree, the only maximal projection (i.e., phrasal category of the
general type XP or X") dominating I is IP; this is also a maximal projection that
dominates NPI,the subject in the Spec(ifier) of IP. Therefore, I m-commands I T ! ,
even though it does not c-command NP,. Furthermore, I is the closest head m- I

commanding NPI. Therefore, I is a likely governor of MI.Note that there is another

head element, V, which is also dominated by IP. However, V does not m-command
NP1, since the lowest maximal projection dominating V, viz., VP, does not dominate
NP1. Moreover, V is not the head closest to NPI. On two counts, therefore, V cannot
be the governor of the subject NPI. However, V is the governor of another syntactic ,
constituent, viz., its direct object NP2. To see why, note that V m-commands NP2 --
the lowest maximal projection dominating V is VP, which also dominates IT1.
Because of the function of Tense as Case-assigner, it is impossible for the subject of a The Syntax
finite complement clause to receive Accusative Case through Exceptional Case- Inflectional
Marking (see Unit .3), unlike in the case of the subject of an infinitival complement Elements
J
clause.

42.3' Aspect and Tense

Aspect is another verbal inflectional category that often occurs closely allied with
Tense. Unlike Tense, however, Aspect refers not directly to the time of an event but
rather to the status of completion or progression of an event at the time referred to by
the Tense on the verb. English has three distinct,aspects for each of the three tenses.
These are (i) the simple or indefinite aspect, (ii) the perfect aspect, and (iii) the
progiessive or continuous or imperfect aspect. These are illustrated by the three
sentences below:

(6) a. Ram &a book every day.

b. Ram has read this book.
c. Ram is reading that book at the moment.

The tense for all these sentences is the Present tense -- even for (6b), which expresses
the fact that Ram's reading of this book is complete relative to thepresent mornent of
time. The verb-form reads in (6a) is a simple present (or present indefinite) verb-
form; the combination of auxiliary verb has and main verb read in (6b) is in the
present perfect; and the combination of auxiliary verb is and main verb reading in
(6c) is in the present continuous Tense-Aspect combination.

As a functional category, Aspect does not share the feature of finiteness that Tense
possesses, and hence verb-fons such as the perfect (i.e., "past") participle and the
progressive participle (in -jug), which possess the perfect and the progressive Aspect,
respectively, count as non-finite forms. An Aspect-bearing INFL elcinent. therefore,
is not ordinarily empowered to assign Nominative Case.

4.3 AGREEMENT

4.3.1 Patterns of agreement

Languages display a rich and interesting diversity in the patterns of agreement that
they adopt. English has only subject-verb agreement (and antecedent-anaphora
agreement, which we shall see in Unit 5); there are languages in which the verb
agrees not oilly with the subject but also with a direct object or an indirect object, and
sometimes even with a possessor. Furthermore, some languages display distinct
patterns of agreement depending on whether the verb is transitive or intransitive:
typically, in this pattern of agreement the transitive verb shows the same agreement
marking with a direct object as the intransitive verb would show with the subject;
additionally, the transitive verb may also mark agreement with its subject. This
pattern of agreement is called ergativity, or the ergative-absolutive pattern of
agreement. .
A.3.2 The agreement element AGR

A finite inflected verb may be morphologically marked for agreement with the
subject, particularly for the Present-tense third-person singular. Moreover, in a
number of languages a, pronominal subject can be dropped altogether if its person and
number (and sometimes gender) features can, for all numbers and persons, be inf~rred
from the momhological agreement marking on the inflected verb. This has led to the
Ettglish Syntax postulation of an element AGR, which can be morphologically expressed as
agreement marking, as a component of the verbal inflection element INFL.

4.3.3 AGR as Case-assigner

Like Tense, AGR also possesses the ability to assign Case -- the difference is that, in
the case of AGR, Case is assigned through the coindexing of AGR with the relevant
NP. In English, AGR also happens to occur as part of the INFL element of F ~ T E
clauses alone -- non-finite verb-forms such as participles and infinitives do not I
display any morphological agreement with their subject. However, since AGR/isa
category of Universal Grammar, and since there are languages in which even non-
finite verb-forms and predicate adjectives often carry agreement with the subject of
the clause, the need has increasingly been felt to separate out AGR as a distinct
functional head with its own maximal projection, AGR-P. The subject of such'a
verb-form can be assigned Nominative Case through coindexation with the AGR
head element, as follows:

(8) AGR-P

/----'
Spec V'

After the subject has moved upward from the Spec of VP into the Spec of AGR-P, it
gets Case through coindexation with AGR. Thereafter, the AGR element and the
verb V can undergo Affix-Hopping to combine into a single inflected morphological
word.

4.4 CONCLUSION

-
As more and more evidence on Tense and agreement has come to light through
research on a wide variety of languages, it has been felt necessary to split the INFL
head into at least two distinct functional head elements T (for Tense) and AGR (for
agreement), with their own maximal projections TP and AGR-P, respectively. The
following kind of cross-linguistic tree representation has therefore been proposed by
Chomsky (1991) and others:

(9) AGR-P
Spec AGR'

AGR IPlTP

Spec
nI'/T'
-
Spec
1
SUBJ
A
v
V'

NP
I
I
DIR OBJ
 Given this kind of tree representation, a finite inflected verb is assumed to acquire Tlie Syntax of
agreement and Tense through upward head-to-head movement: the verb first moves Inflectional
up to the T (or INFL) head where it acquires Tense, and then the V-T combination Elements
again moves upward to the AGR head where it acquires morphological agreement.
Whether the movement is covert or overt movement, however, depends on the
specific language. In English, there is some evidence that verb movement is covert --
i.e., takes place at a level of interpretation of the inflected verb -- rather than being
'
overt, i.e., actually undergoing physical movement upward.

-
4.5 LET US SUM UP

1. Verbal inflection (INFL) is a crucial syntactic element that carries the tense
and agreement features of a finite verb.
2. The tense con~ponent01a finite INFL carries info~mationon the time of an
action relative to the time of utterance (or writing) of the sentence or clause.
3. Aspect is different, in that it carries information on the status of completion
or progression of the action or state expressed by the verb in the sentence or
clause.
4. The agreement component AGR of a finite INFL encodes person and number
agreement of the (finite) verb with the subject.
5. Usually T (i.e., Tense) and AGR (i.e., Agreement), but not Aspect, can
function as Case-assigners.
, 6. Non-finite (i.e., participial or infinitival) INFL cannot therefore assign Case.
7. AGR assigns Case to the subject through the special device of coindexation
with it.

- -

4.6 KEYWORDS

AGR: The syntactic constituent corresponding to

agreement marking in verbal inflection NFL.

Agreement: In English, the concord that is found in the

inflectional marking of a (usually finite) verb with
certain grammatical features such as number and
person carried by the subject of that verb. Example:
I am happy, Thou grJ happy, She Q happy, but They
-happy.
are

Aspect: The status of completion or progression of the

action, process, or state expressed by a verb -- e.g.,
the difference between the present perfect Ram has
eaten and the present progressive Ram is eating.

Auxiliary (verb): A "helping" verb that occurs in certain syntactic

contekts alongside the main verb, usually to support
the verbal inflection for tense and agreement -- e.g.,
the auxiliary has in Ram has left is in the present-
tense third-person singular form'.

The syntactic symbol corresponding to verbal

inflection, especially tense and agreement inflection;
the functional head of a clause (IP).
 Inflection: One of the .two major kinds of mo~phologica1
marking found on words (the other being
derivation); in English syntax, it refers specifically
to verbal inflection.

Modal (auxiliary): A special kind of verb that expresses necessity,

ability, possibility, or doubt, and occurs alongside
the main verb in a clause, as in (I doubt whether)
Sita come today.

The marking of a verb for the time of the action,

process or state expressed by the verb relative to
some specific time of reference, usually the time of
utterance of the sentence or clause.

4.7 BIBLIOGRAPHY

O n the rationale for I(NFL) as a syntactic head: Radford 1988, pp. 303-3 13,508-
515.

1 On the splitting of I
N n into Tense and AGR: Chomsky 199 1 .
'
Chomsky, Noam (1991) "Some notes on economy of derivation and representation1'.
In Robert Freidin, ed., Principles and Parameters in Comparative
Grammar, pp. 41 7-454.

Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Reprinted in Noam Chomsky (1995) The Minim~list
Program, pp: 129-166. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. .

Radford, Andrew (1988) Transformational Grammar: A First Course.

Cambridge [U. K.]: Cambridge University Press.

4.8 QUESTIONS & EXERCISES

Provide some syntactic arguments why INFL should be considered a

syntactically significant element (and not merely a morphologically
significant one).

We have seen that finite W L carries both tense and agreemen?, Is it

possible for any finite verb-form to change according to tense alone if its
agreement features are kept constant (e.g., third-person singular)2, If so, give
examples. If not, say why. Conversely, is it possible for any finite verb-fonn
to change according to its agreement features if the tense is kept constant
(e.g., Present tense)? If so, give examples. If not, say why.

3. Do you think English verbal inflection justifies the breaking up o f INFL into
two separate syntactic head types T and AGR, with their own maximal
projections? Give one or more arguments in support of your answer. I

NOTES O N "QUESTIONS & EXERCISES"

1. Substitution: "Are you leaving?" -- "Yes, I am."

Conjoining: John can, and will, finish all the work today. I
54
 Distribution: John likes fishing. John does not like fishing. D o 9 John The Syntax af
like fishing? Yes, John does like fishing. Inflectional
Elements
2. Yes: walked, walks, will walk; comes, came, will come.
Yes: am, (art,) is, are, are, are; go, (goest,) goes, go, go, go.

3. Argument against: Only finite INFL has both tense and agreement in
English; non-finite INFL does not.
Arguments in favour: Morphologically T and AGR are separable elements;
moreover, AGR assigns Case through coindexation, whereas T does not. .