Pre-noun modification Noun Phrase
20 11
Something strange happened last night.
12
Lobster Newburg is difficult to prepare.
Greenbaum Quirk, 1997, p.379 A post-modification can be classified into restrictive or non-restrictive.
When the head can be viewed as a member of a class which is linguistically identified only through the modification is called restrictive. Whereas, when the
head can be viewed as a member of a class that has been independently identified is called non-restrictive. It provides additional information and not essential for
any modification which modifies the noun Greenbaum Quirk, 1997, p.364. The following examples distinguish the function of post-modification in a noun
phrase structure. 13
The woman who is standing in the corner is Michelle Obama.
14
Mr. Lee, whom I met yesterday, needs to meet you now.
From the examples above, it can be analyzed that sentence 13 is restrictive. It is indicated that the relative clause functioned as an identification of
the noun headword. It helps the speakers in specifying the topic. As obvious from sentence 14 which is non-restrictive, the commas are used to provide additional
information and not necessary to identify the noun it modifies. When the relative clause is omitted from the sentence 14, it may not change the meaning of the
sentence. In conclusion, noun phrase comprises a head and elements which modify
the head. The elements may be adjectives, complement, determiners, nouns, non- finite clauses, prepositional phrases, and relative clauses. Those elements may be
21 classified into three potential parts which are determinative, pre-noun
modification, and post-noun modification. Since post-noun modification is often combined or comprised all items mentioned above, it may function to identify a
specific subset.