Deep Structure Definition
Deep Structure Definition
Deep Structure Definition
Definition:
In transformational grammar, the underlying syntactic structure (or level) of a
sentence. In contrast to surface structure (the outward form of a sentence),
deep structure is an abstract representation that identifies the ways a sentence
can be analyzed and interpreted.
In transformational grammar, deep structures are generated byphrasestructure rules, and surface structures are derived from deep structures by a
series of transformations.
(See Examples and Observations, below.)
See also:
Case Grammar
Chomskyan Linguistics
Generative Grammar
Kernel Sentence
Linguistic Competence
Linguistic Performance
Relational Grammar
Surface Structure
Transformational Grammar
Walking to the taffrail, I was in time to make out, on the very edge of a darkness thrown by
a towering black mass like the very gateway of Erebus--yes, I was in time to catch an
evanescent glimpse of my white hat left behind to mark the spot where the secret sharer of
my cabin and of my thoughts, as though he were my second self, had lowered himself into
the water to take his punishment: a free man, a proud swimmer striking out for a new
destiny.
I hope others will agree that the sentence justly represents its author: that it portrays a mind
energetically stretching to subdue a dazzling experience outside the self, in a way that has
innumerable counterparts elsewhere. How does scrutiny of the deep structuresupport this
intuition? First, notice a matter of emphasis, of rhetoric. The matrix sentence, which lends
a surface form to the whole, is '# S # I was in time # S #' (repeated twice).
The embedded sentences that complete it are 'I walked to the taffrail,' 'I made out + NP,'
and 'I caught + NP.' The point of departure, then, is the narrator himself: where he was,
what he did, what he saw. But a glance at the deep structure will explain why one feels a
quite different emphasis in the sentence as a whole: seven of the embedded sentences
have 'sharer' as grammatical subjects; in another three the subject is a noun linked to
'sharer' by the copula; in two 'sharer' is direct object; and in two more 'share' is the verb.
Thus thirteen sentences go to the semantic development of 'sharer' as follows:
1. The secret sharer had lowered the secret sharer into the water.
2. The secret sharer took his punishment.
3. The secret sharer swam.
4. The secret sharer was a swimmer.
5. The swimmer was proud.
6. The swimmer struck out for a new destiny.
7. The secret sharer was a man.
8. The man was free.
9. The secret sharer was my secret self.
structure
movement
structure
The difference between the two levels of structural description will simply be
the positions that the moved elements occupy, given the above assumption
that movements do not actually alter the structure. For example, consider the
following two sentences:
(60)
In (60a) the PP in the park is an adjunct to the VP, modifying the VP by adding
information about where the meeting took place. In (60b) the PP has moved to
the front of the sentence, in a similar way to that in which topics are moved to
the front. We can call this movement preposing. Before the preposing takes
place, the PP is in its VPadjoined position:
(61)
After the movement, the structure will look like this:
(62)
We call the structure before movement takes place, a D-structure and the
post-movement structure an S-structure. The D and the S originally stood
for deep and surface, reflecting the fact that S-structures represent an ordering
of the elements which is closer to that which holds in the externalisation of the
sentence (its pronunciation, or whatever) while D-structures represent an
abstract level of description more deeply embedded in the analysis. However,
the words deep and surface have unfortunate connotations which may lead to
misunderstanding. Deep, for example, can be taken to mean meaningful or
ponderous, while surface can mean superficial or apparent. It would be