Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

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Scott Lawson
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Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Scott Lawson »

The expansion of the simple sentence is always an expansion of a complete sentence. Or in other words; a predicate cannot be expanded until it is first completed or modified and a subject cannot be expanded unless it is already contained in the sentence? Is that correct? I just want to verify that I understand the comments in Smyth 922 – 924 correctly.

Mark 14:60c τί οὗτοί σου καταμαρτυροῦσιν;

At Mark 14:60c I would identify καταμαρτυροῦσιν; as the predicate but it seems to me that a predicate with a transitive verb can be both complemented and expanded by a noun in any of the oblique cases – right? If so, how do I determine whether τί or σου is the complement? Or is it possible they together make the complement?
Scott Lawson
Scott Lawson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Scott Lawson »

Scott Lawson wrote:a predicate with a transitive verb can be both complemented and expanded by a noun in any of the oblique cases
I think I should have worded it,"...a predicate with a transitive verb can be both completed (or have its complement) in any of the oblique cases..." I hope that's a better use of meta-language.
Scott Lawson
Stephen Carlson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Stephen Carlson »

I hate to be a wet blanket, but I don't think Smyth's discussion of "expansion" is current at all today. It looks like a pre-50s, primitive attempt at analyzing the structure of a clause which has been obsoleted by syntax trees and other modern techniques. I can't recall a single exegetical analysis that uses this terminology. While there is much I admire and respect about traditional grammars, this isn't one of them. I would simply ignore it.
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
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Scott Lawson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Scott Lawson »

Stephen Carlson wrote: It looks like a pre-50s, primitive attempt at analyzing the structure of a clause which has been obsoleted by syntax trees and other modern techniques. I can't recall a single exegetical analysis that uses this terminology.
I see.

I also have in hand SYNTAX OF NEW TESTAMENT GREEK by James A. Brooks and Carlton L. Winbery (1979) which also has a discussion in part III, on the THE EXPANSION OF THE SUBJECT (pg. 163) and THE EXPANSION OF THE PREDICATE (pg.172) and also makes use of syntax trees.

I'll move on to analyzing the structure of clauses, then. Uh...Robertson and Smyth both have quite a number of pages devoted to the subject, or is there some other more modern work you recommend?
Scott Lawson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by MAubrey »

There is no modern syntax. Sorry.

The best you can do is probably Helma Dik's work on word order along with Steve Runge and Stephen Levinsohn's work on information structure.
Mike Aubrey, Linguist
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Stephen Carlson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Stephen Carlson »

Scott Lawson wrote:
Stephen Carlson wrote: It looks like a pre-50s, primitive attempt at analyzing the structure of a clause which has been obsoleted by syntax trees and other modern techniques. I can't recall a single exegetical analysis that uses this terminology.
I see.

I also have in hand SYNTAX OF NEW TESTAMENT GREEK by James A. Brooks and Carlton L. Winbery (1979) which also has a discussion in part III, on the THE EXPANSION OF THE SUBJECT (pg. 163) and THE EXPANSION OF THE PREDICATE (pg.172) and also makes use of syntax trees.
Thanks for pointing out B & W. Those diagram aren't really syntax trees but rather good old-fashioned sentence diagramming. A syntax tree follows a theory of syntax, while sentence diagramming is by-and-large pre-theoretical (except to the trivial extent that everyone has a theory).
Scott Lawson wrote:I'll move on to analyzing the structure of clauses, then. Uh...Robertson and Smyth both have quite a number of pages devoted to the subject, or is there some other more modern work you recommend?
I'll second Mike's recommendation of Levinsohn and Runge for NT Greek.
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
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Scott Lawson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Scott Lawson »

Thanks!
Scott Lawson wrote: Mark 14:60c τί οὗτοί σου καταμαρτυροῦσιν;

At Mark 14:60c I would identify καταμαρτυροῦσιν; as the predicate but it seems to me that a predicate with a transitive verb can be both complemented and expanded by a noun in any of the oblique cases – right? If so, how do I determine whether τί or σου is the complement? Or is it possible they together make the complement?
So....in the above example what would τί and σου be considered? Are they the DO and IO respectively?
Scott Lawson
Scott Lawson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Scott Lawson »

Stephen Carlson wrote:I don't think Smyth's discussion of "expansion" is current at all today. It looks like a pre-50s, primitive attempt at analyzing the structure of a clause which has been obsoleted by syntax trees and other modern techniques.
Would this idea of the "expansion of the predicate and subject" perhaps correspond to a noun phrase functioning as subject and the verb phrase functioning as predicate in the idea/theory of binary structure of simple sentences?

Stephen you made an interesting comment on October 27th (in part the reason I'm pursuing this idea) about a passage in Romans that seems to be related to my inquiry on "expansion" but you used the word "raised." Is it in fact related?
Stephen Carlson wrote:by Stephen Carlson » October 27th, 2012, 1:29 am


I'm not one of those who restrict the term "direct object" to accusative objects of verbs. Of course, being in the accusative is a great sign of being a direct object, but I think that other oblique cases can supply a direct object too if the argument behaves like the prototypical direct object, e.g., being able to be raised into the subject by passivization.
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Stephen Carlson »

Scott Lawson wrote:
Stephen Carlson wrote:I don't think Smyth's discussion of "expansion" is current at all today. It looks like a pre-50s, primitive attempt at analyzing the structure of a clause which has been obsoleted by syntax trees and other modern techniques.
Would this idea of the "expansion of the predicate and subject" perhaps correspond to a noun phrase functioning as subject and the verb phrase functioning as predicate in the idea/theory of binary structure of simple sentences?
Could be. I just see this as some primitive approach to syntax that's handled differently these days.
Scott Lawson wrote:Stephen you made an interesting comment on October 27th (in part the reason I'm pursuing this idea) about a passage in Romans that seems to be related to my inquiry on "expansion" but you used the word "raised." Is it in fact related?
Stephen Carlson wrote:by Stephen Carlson » October 27th, 2012, 1:29 am
I'm not one of those who restrict the term "direct object" to accusative objects of verbs. Of course, being in the accusative is a great sign of being a direct object, but I think that other oblique cases can supply a direct object too if the argument behaves like the prototypical direct object, e.g., being able to be raised into the subject by passivization.
I have to apologize a bit for the term "raising." It basically means moving up (and usually to the left) in the syntax tree. But that depends on the syntactical theory you're using to construct the tree. Perhaps "be promoted to the subject by passivization" is a better way to put it.
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
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Scott Lawson
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Re: Expansion of the predicate and subject of a sentence.

Post by Scott Lawson »

Okay! Thanks Stephen!
Scott Lawson
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