Deep structure

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Deep structure ( English deep structure ) is in the generative grammar transformation Noam Chomskys the name given to the abstract syntax based on a set or set member , which the projected from the lexicon information , and semantic (in particular predicate relations argument -relationships) contains. By transformations from the sets of are surface structure ( English surface structure generated).

In the early days of generative syntax, the surface-depth structure model was also correlated with Chomsky's and Fodor's idea of ​​a universal grammar. They assumed that the diverse structures and meanings of the linguistic utterances are related to a set of rules that both generate the use of language through transformations and enable understanding. Fodor calls the abstract basic structures the language of the mind and assumes a genetic disposition. Therefore every person can have this language competence. Chomsky's concepts were controversially discussed in the Linguistics Wars and varied several times (see Interpretative Semantics ).

In later versions of Chomsky's theory (e.g. from the government binding theory ) the meaning of the deep structure was restricted, and it was no longer viewed as the sole connection point to the meaning of the sentence.

Web links

Wiktionary: deep structure  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. Chomsky, Noam: Syntactic Structures . Mouton The Hague / Paris 1957.
  2. Chomsky, Noam: aspects of syntactic theory (Translation of: Aspects of the Theory of Syntax, 1965). Frankfurt 1969.
  3. Wolfgang Sternefeld: Syntax. A feature-based generative description of German. Volume 1. 3rd edition. Narr, Tübingen 2008, pp. 295-301.