LIN102H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Phrase, Nonpast Tense, Affix
Document Summary
Tense serves as the head of a tense phrase. Tense situates the event/ situation being described in a clause in relation to an established or inferred reference point in time. English has a two-way tense system that distinguishes between past and non-past. English uses modal verbs to express situations that take place in the future. In a tense phrase on a tree, tense can be marked using abstract features such as [past] or. Independent clauses in english must have either a tensed verb or a modal auxiliary verb. Clauses cannot have both a modal and an auxiliary. This implies that modal verbs and bound tense morphology are both of the same syntactic categories and as such, they will occupy the same position in a syntactic structure, meaning they cannot occur in the same place. T functions as the head of tp. This also implies that syntax determines the inflection of words. Words can be the output of syntax.
