GOVERNMENT-BINDING

THEORY

Rohima Nur Aziza Al Hakim (F013221011)

Upi Laila Hanum (F013221010)
S3 _ Ilmu Linguistik _ UNHAS

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 Government and Binding as a syntactic theory, was
developed by Noam Chomsky in the 1980s. The theory was
a revision of his earlier theory: transformational-
generative grammar (TGG).
*Government Theory

govern which literally means, ‘to control’,’, ‘determine’ or ‘influence’.

In linguistics, to ‘govern’ is to require a specific morphological form of
accompanying words. In other words, here, a word or part of speech dictates the
case, mood or inflectional ending of another closely associated word, such a word
is said to govern the other word in the sentence. E.g., prepositions in English,
govern the accusative.
(1) Give to him.
(2) Look at them
The verbs give and look govern the prepositions to and at respectively while the
accusative pronouns, him and them are governed by to and at respectively.

*Binding Theory

To ‘bind’
November 28, 2022 is to ‘tie’, ‘restrict or limit something’. 3
 Government: Binding:

shows the deals with the

relationship of a referents of
noun or pronoun in anaphors, pronouns,
a sentence (a and referential
syntactic relation) expressions.
In other words, GB Theory describes the conditions
and structural relations between nouns.

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 Nouns Involved:

1.Anaphors 3.Re-
: expression:
• myself •Proper name
• hersel (Upi)
• Himself, •Common
etc. 2.Pronouns noun(cat).
:
•I
•you
•her
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•she, etc. 5
 Binding theory consist
of 3 principles:

1. Principle A 3. Principle C

2. Principle B

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 1. Principle A

TP
An anaphora must be
bound in its binding
domain / the same
clause as its NP
VP
antecedent.
Upi

E.g. Upi loves V NP

herself.
The underlined words are
loves
connected, therefore the herself
anaphora “herself” is
refered to Upi.
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 2. Principle B

TP

A pronoun must be free

in its binding domain NP
VP

Upi

E.g. Upi loves her. V NP

The underlined words are
loves
not connected, therefore her
the pronoun “her” is
refered to someone else.
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 3. Priciple C
TP
An R-expression must
be free
NP VP

E.g. Upi told Ima Upi

that she was tired. V NP CP
Ima
told
Upi doesn’t need to
be bounded to C TP
anything in order to
that
have a meaning,
although “she” bound NP VP
to it.
she

V AdjP
November 28, 2022 was tired 9
 QUESTIONS:
1.Some notions in TGG and GB are just
the same, they only use different
terms . Do you agree with this?
(Rohima Nur Aziza Al Hakim)
2.How do you see Standard Generative
Theory? In relation to GB Theory. (Upi
Laila Hanum)

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