Number of Theme and Beneficiary Definiteness of Theme and Beneficiary

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2.2.8 Number of Theme and Beneficiary

Number plays important roles in syntactic variation of grammar. Number is a typologically important category in grammar Greenberg 1966. Bresnan 2002, Bresnan et al. 2007 add that feature number is greatly matter in some types of morphosyntactic variation in English. In the dative data set, words with formal plural marking like –s-es and such kind of instance like fish that the context clearly indicated that it was plural, were coded as „plural; other words were coded as „singular‟. This research uses the categorization of Bresnan 2007, classifying the feature number into singular and plural. In a special pronoun you, the antecedent was checked to find out whether the pronoun you is plural or singular. The sentences below exemplify the feature number of theme and beneficiary See also Appendix 3. 13. Availing herself of the decided preference shown her, she might have aimed at making her husband a party in the dispute; and, by his means, have verb : making theme : a party : singular beneficiary : her husband : singular

2.2.9 Definiteness of Theme and Beneficiary

In his research on predicting syntax, dative construction, Bresnan 2010 use the coding system as utilized by Garretson 2004. When the theme or recipient is placed into a phrase in the context of There isare __ permits an 27 existential interpretation, then the NP is coded as indefinite. Referring to Cueni 2004, examples of indefinite NPs include one, a little bird, more jobs, something I can eat ; examples of definite NPs include her, that bag, the dog, my photo album, Diane, all my classmate. This research employs the categorization system by Theijssen 2009 which divide the feature definiteness into two, definite and indefinite. All syntactic object heads that were preceded by a definite article or a definite pronoun e.g. demonstrative and possessive pronouns, and all objects that were proper nouns or definite pronouns themselves, were annotated definite. The remaining objects were given the value indefinite. The examples below illustrate the feature definiteness of theme and beneficiary See also Appendix 3. 14. it might assist in the accomplishment of her hopes. You took your part – made me a promise that you would exercise all your abilities as an actor, to verb : made theme : a promise : indefinite beneficiary : me : definite

2.3 Corpus Linguistics