Surface Syntax of English: A Formal Model Within the Meaning-Text Framework

This volume is the first attempt to describe the syntax of contemporary English exclusively in terms of dependencies (most American works on the subject being in terms of phrase structure, or constituency). The three main features of it are: 1) a fully formal presentation, 2) a reasonably complete coverage of English surface syntax and 3) an exposition oriented towards human readers (rather than computers). Written within a new theoretical framework known as the meaning-text approach, the book views English syntax from a different angle. For example, no transformations are involved and the discussion bears on problems only rarely (if at all) mentioned in current literature. At the same time, it is by no means the presentation of a new linguistic theory only illustrated or justified by English data. Instead, it is a description of English surface syntax based on a new theory, which has been applied to other languages as well (e.g. to Russian).