Origins of Transformational Generative Grammar

2.2. Surface Analysis (Taxonomix Analysis)

Structural grammars only describe the surface structure of sentences. They cannot effectively handle important grammatical facts (which are part of a native speaker’s knowledge of language), like the relationship between active and passive sentences, positive, negative and interrogative sentences, and the deep dissimilarities that exist between superficially identical sentences. The following sentences are seen to be structurally similar if their analysis considers only their surface layer, but if another layer is considered, they would be revealed to be dissimilar.

Examples

- John is eager to please.

- John is easy to please.

- Pierre a conseillé à Jean de consulter un spécialiste.

- Pierre a promis à Jean de consulter un spécialiste.

Chomsky and others criticized structuralist and post-Bloomfieldian theories as a whole as being based on a representation of a sentence in terms of surface structure alone. Such approaches are unsuccessful in distinguishing the surface from the underlying structures of a sentence.