Clause patterns
Holger Diessel
holger.diessel@uni-jena.de
Framing
John kicked the ball.
Agent Action Patient
NPsubj Verb
NPobj
John is eating a hamburger.
John is eating.
Agent Action
Patient
Agent Action
NPsubj Verb
NPobj
NPsubj Verb
Clause patterns of English
A clause pattern (also called ‘construction’) is a structural ‘frame’ into which
a situation we want to describe is moulded.
Clause pattern
Syntactic structure
Example
Copular clause
sbj vrb sbj-comp
We are a rich family.
Intransitive clause
sbj vrb
None of us works.
Transitive clause
sbj vrb do
We have two cars.
Ditransitive clause
sbj vrb io (np) do (np)
sbj vrb do (np) io (pp)
We bought our son a Ferrari.
We make donations to the church.
Oblique clause
sbj vrb do obl-o (pp)
sbj vrb obl-o (pp)
We keep the cars in the garage.
We sent our daughter to Harvard.
We live in the suburbs of L.A.
We don’t depend on financial aid.
Complex-trans. clause
sbj vrb do do-comp
Our friends consider us lazy.
Copular clause
NP
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
be
NP/ADJ
John is a teacher.
Jane became my friend.
That’s John’s book.
Jack is lazy.
It’s cold.
Intransitive clause
NP
(1)
(2)
(3)
V
John is sleeping.
He is running in the park.
It snowed heavily.
Transitive clause
NP
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
V
NP
Bill opened the door.
He kissed her.
I have a red car.
She doesn’t have any money.
Ditransitive clause
NP
(1)
(2)
(3)
NP NP
Ann send him a letter.
He gave her the car.
She baked him a cake.
NP
(4)
(5)
(6)
V
V
NP PP
Ann gave the book to her friend.
He donated some money to the church.
She received a letter from her mother.
Oblique clause
NP
(1)
(2)
(3)
V
(NP) PP
I thought about it.
John put his hat on the table.
I don’t rely on his support.
Complex transitive clause
NP
(1)
(2)
NP NP
She called him Jack.
I consider this a mistake.
NP
(1)
(2)
V
V
NP AP
John pushed the door open.
I consider him lazy.
Transitivity and valency
There are two view of valency (transitivity):
•
•
The verb-based view
The clause-based view
Each verb takes a certain number of arguments:
(1)
(2)
(3)
She is sleeping.
She knows John.
She gave him the key.
Intransitive
Transitive
Ditransitive
Each clause pattern involves a certain number of arguments:
(1)
(2)
(3)
NP V.
NP V NP.
NP V NP NP.
Intransitive
Transitive
Ditransitive
Transitivity and valency
Some verbs occur in multiple sentence frames:
(1) She cooks every day.
(2) She is cooking a meal.
(3) She cooked him a meal.
The verb-based view:
cook1
cook2
cook3
intransitive
transitive
ditransitive
The clause-based view:
cook
Coercion:
(1) She sneezed.
(2) She sneezed the napkin off the table.
intransitive frame
transitive frame
ditransitive frame