Syntaksi

Syntaksi, commonly translated as syntax, is a branch of linguistics that studies the rules and processes that govern the structure of sentences in natural languages. It investigates how words combine into phrases, how phrases are organized into larger units, and how the hierarchical arrangement of these units affects meaning and interpretation. Syntaksi distinguishes between surface word order and the deeper, constituent structure that underlies sentences, and it interacts closely with morphology, semantics, and discourse.

Core concepts in syntaksi include constituency (how sentences are divided into meaningful units like noun phrases and verb phrases), phrase structure, and the idea of hierarchical trees that represent grammatical relationships. The field also explores dependencies (how words relate to each other across a sentence), grammatical functions (such as subject and object), and movements or transformations that can alter order without changing underlying structure. Different theoretical frameworks model these ideas in various ways, including phrase structure grammars, dependency grammars, transformational-generative grammar, head-driven phrase structure grammar, and construction grammar.

Typology is a key area, comparing how languages differ in basic word order (for example SVO, SOV, VSO) and in mechanisms like case marking and agreement. Syntaksi also studies universals and language change, as well as cross-linguistic similarities and differences in sentence construction. Methods range from descriptive analysis of corpora to formal modeling and computational parsing. Applications include language teaching, parsing in natural language processing, and various areas of linguistic research.