Open Journal of Modern Linguistics, 2024, 14, 199-208
https://www.scirp.org/journal/ojml
ISSN Online: 2164-2834
ISSN Print: 2164-2818

Advancements in Understanding the
Syntax-Discourse/Syntax-Pragmatics Interface—Review of Shigeru Miyagawa (2022): Syntax in the Treetops
Jianyong Song1,2, Menglin Deng3
Faculty of English Language and Culture, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou, China
School of Foreign Studies, Xiangnan University, Chenzhou, China
3
School of Foreign Studies, Hunan University of Humanities, Science and Technology, Loudi, China
1
2

How to cite this paper: Song, J. Y., &Deng, M. L. (2024). Advancements in Understanding the Syntax-Discourse/SyntaxPragmatics Interface. Open Journal of Modern Linguistics, 14, 199-208.
https://doi.org/10.4236/ojml.2024.142011
Received: March 20, 2023
Accepted: April 20, 2024
Published: April 23, 2024
Copyright © 2024 by author(s) and
Scientific Research Publishing Inc.
This work is licensed under the Creative
Commons Attribution International
License (CC BY 4.0).
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Open Access

Abstract‘‘Syntax in the Treetop’’ represents the latest groundbreaking work by MIT
linguist Miyagawa, offering profound insights into syntactic structures at the
top of the syntactic tree. It addresses critical issues in understanding the interface between syntax and discourse/pragmatics, particularly in the emerging
field of syntacticization of discourse information. This paper provides an
overview of the key concepts presented in the book, elucidating Professor
Miyagawa’s innovative ideas on expanding syntax into the domain of discourse. Our review highlights several significant contributions made by theauthor, including advancements in the theory of left periphery in syntactic
cartography, the crucial role of syntax in speech acts and conveying meaning,
and the essential distinction between human language and animal communication systems.

Keywords
Syntax in the Treetop, Syntax-Discourse/Syntax-Pragmatics Interface

1. Introduction
In recent decades, linguistic research has increasingly focused on exploring thesyntax of the left periphery of a clause and its intricate interaction with discourse, speaker intention, and real-world context. This emphasis has been particularly heightened following Rizzi (1997)’s influential work on the fine structure of the complementizer phrase (CP). Despite the increasing focus on thisarea, several key questions remain unanswered. Are the characteristics of the left
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periphery universally consistent across languages? What formal mechanisms
govern word order in this domain, and how do the projections within or beyond
the sentence influence the observed phenomena within the clause? Moreover,
how can we effectively model the intricate interplay among syntax, pragmatics,
and semantics? Certain syntax-discourse/syntax-pragmatics issues continue tocaptivate the interest of linguists. These include investigating the interplay between the syntactic structure of sentences and the contextual factors influencing
speakers' production and comprehension. Additionally, scholars seek to elucidate how the interplay among syntax, semantics, and pragmatics can be comprehensively explained using formal syntax (see Miyagawa, 2012, 2017; Sigurðsson, 2004, 2011, 2015, 2019; Speas and Tenny, 2003; Wiltschko, 2014, 2017;
Portner, Pak, and Zanuttini, 2019).
MIT linguist Shigeru Miyagawa’s groundbreaking research, as exemplified in
his latest work Syntax in the Treetops, offers invaluable insights into thesepressing issues and endeavors to address enduring questions in the field of syntax. Miyagawa’s contributions are particularly significant in addressing challenges within the study of syntax-discourse/syntax-pragmatics interfaces, notably concerning the emerging field of the syntacticization of discourse (Haegeman & Hill, 2014), which has currently garnered attention from syntactic cartographers.

2. Key Themes Explored in Syntax in the Treetop
Syntax in the Treetop primarily delves into the structure on the top of the syntactic tree. The author argues that by establishing a connection between the coresyntax and discourse participants, syntax can be expanded and extended into thedomain of discourse. This enables the direct expression of the syntactic-discourse/
syntactic-pragmatic interface within sentences. To support this claim, Miyagawa draws upon extensive evidence from languages around the world, including Basque, Japanese, Italian, Magahi, Niuean, Romanian, Spanish, as well
as from the language of autistic children. He finds that the top of syntactic trees
represents discourse/pragmatic information, with layers above the complementizer phrase (CP) such as the Speaker-addressee Phrase (SAP) and the Commitment Phrase (CommitP) being associated with the speech acts of conversation
participants and discourse. The author delves into the fundamental role of syntax in bridging contextual elements and the semantics of an utterance. This exploration operates under the premise that syntax ‘‘provides the basic frameworkthat makes the performance of a speech act and the conveyance of meaning
possible’’ (x).
The book comprises xviii + 234 pages, divided into six chapters. This section
provides an overview of each chapter’s key themes.
Chapter One introduces the theoretical background. The author explicitly
states that his theory stems from the early research of two scholars. One is Ross
(1970), who proposed the analysis of ‘‘performative analysis’’. Ross attempted to
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express Austin’s (1962) speech act in syntax by analyzing declarative sentences as
linguistic structures containing implicit performative verbs and implicit speakers
and addressees. The author critically adopts the notion of implicit speakers andaddressees within the layers of syntactic structure, but argues against the existence of implicit performative verbs, finding discrepancies with many linguistic
facts, and issues with evidence for implicit speakers and addressees. He argues
that sentences can perform speech acts not because of the existence of implicit
performative verbs but because of the existence of implicit speakers and addressees. By reviewing relevant literature from the past 30 years, the author finds
ample evidence of representations of speakers and addressees in sentences in languages such as Basque, Romanian, Italian, English, as well as some African and
Native American languages. Another foundational study comes from Emonds(1970) in ‘‘Root and structure-preserving transformations’’. By examining thecharacteristics of input and output structures in syntactic transformations,
Emonds found that both the input structures before transformation and theoutput structures after transformation are structures that phrase structure rules
can independently generate, with the output structures after transformation being applicable to other syntactic transformation rules. Thus, he used the term‘‘structural preserving’’ to describe the characteristics of such syntactic transformations. However, not all syntactic transformations exhibit the feature of ‘‘structural preserving’’. Some transformations involve input structures that conformto phrase structure rules but output structures that do not. Once this nonstructurally preserved transformation occurs, the derivation of the entire sentence structure is completed. Emonds found that these non-structurally preserved transformations occur in root sentences. Based on non-structurally preserved syntactic transformations and the syntactic environments in which operations such as fronting of negative elements and topicalization occur, he defined
three types of root sentences. They are the highest sentence on the syntactic tree;
sentences directly dominated by the highest sentence; and sentences in indirect
discourse. The author believes that Emonds’s (1970) definition of root sentences
is conceptually correct but not based on the evidence he proposed; rather, it isbased on the distributional characteristics of speaker-addressee phrases. Although Ross (1970) and Emonds (1970) approach the issues from different
perspectives, they both focus on issues within main clauses related to the characteristics of structures at the top of syntactic trees. The author proposes thatthe environments defined by Emonds (1970) as root sentences are the distributional environments of the syntactic structures at the top of syntactic trees. Next,
based on a critique of Krifka’s (2014) theoretical model (Figure 1), the author
proposes his theoretical model (Figure 2) to represent the syntactic structures at
the top of syntactic trees. He suggests that there exist SAP (Speaker-addressee
Phrase) and CommitP (Commitment Phrase) layers at the top of syntactic trees,with the CP (Complementizer Phrase) layer expressing propositions located below the CommitP layer.
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Figure 1. Krifka’s structural model.

Figure 2. Miyagawa’s structural model.

Chapter Two mainly discusses the syntactic structure of the SAP layer.
Through extensive linguistic evidence, the author argues that the SAP layer insyntactic structure represents the facts of speakers and addressees, elucidating
the view that the SAP layer expresses illocutionary force. By studying the relationship between honorific markers in Japanese and the SAP layer, the author
proposes and argues that honorific markers in Japanese are actually a form of
φ-feature agreement. The initial syntactic position of honorific markers in Japanese is very low, within the tense functional head, and even below the negation
functional head. Through successive movement steps from the functional heads
to the specifier position of the SAP layer, honorific markers can mark the entire
discourse in formal discourse domains, expressing the speaker’s polite tone towards the addressee. Furthermore, from a cross-linguistic comparative perspective, the author compares Japanese with Basque, Magahi, Korean, Thai, and Tamil, further demonstrating the existence of the SAP layer at the syntactic level,
greatly expanding upon earlier research.
Chapter Three primarily explores the syntactic structure of the CommitP
layer. The author convincingly argues that the Japanese sentence-final particles‘‘ne’’ and ‘‘yo’’ correspond to the addressee and CommitP in the SAP, respectively. The former indicates the speaker’s confirmation of the truthfulness of the
proposition to the addressee, while the latter strengthens the speaker’s commitment to the truthfulness of the proposition. He finds that the distribution ofsentence-final particles aligns with Emonds’s (1970) definition of root sentences
because these particles are directed towards the speaker or the addressee, thus
necessitating representation in the SAP. He also investigates the usage of senDOI: 10.4236/ojml.2024.142011

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tence-final particles in high-functioning autistic children, finding an asymmetry
in the use of ‘‘ne’’ and ‘‘yo’’ in Japanese-speaking children with autism. Regardless of training, they do not produce the particle ‘‘ne’’ to confirm the truthfulnessof propositions to the addressee, but they quickly acquire and accurately use‘‘yo’’. This asymmetry suggests that high-functioning autistic children have difficulty interacting with the addressee, leading to a lack of addressee representation in the SAP at the top of their language’s syntactic structure. However, theparticle ‘‘yo’’, which enhances the speaker’s commitment to the truthfulness ofthe proposition, is unrelated to representation in the SAP but is associated solely
with CommitP. Therefore, they can learn to use such particles. Additionally, theauthor examines Romance languages, finding similar sentence-initial or sentence-final particles, often followed by second-person inflectional forms, which
are also related to addressee projection in the SAP.
Chapter Four primarily discusses the non-necessity and syntactic position of
the Judgement Phrase (JudgP) at the top of syntactic trees. Krifka (2019a, 2019b,
2020) suggests a three-tiered structure above the CP layer, comprising the ActP,
CommitP, and JudgP layers. Through discussions on topicalization in German,
Japanese, English, and Spanish, the author finds no need to include JudgP above
the CP layer in the structure solely because of topicalization issues, as JudgP relates to propositions, which are associated with CP. He maintains that, in linewith Rizzi’s (1997) spirit, JudgP should be considered an extension of CP, thereby upholding the viewpoint proposed in the preceding two chapters: discourse
consists of two components, one related to speech acts (the Expressive Component), and the other related to propositional expression (the Propositional
Component), with no other intervening components. The components related tospeech acts are SAP and CommitP, while those related to propositions are CP.
Chapter Five explores the interaction between the Expressive Component and
the Propositional Component through the study of interrogative sentences. In
this chapter, the author aims to address two questions: 1) How is the Expressive
Component represented in interrogative sentences? 2) What specific commitments are speakers asked to make? Regarding the first question, he combines insights from Geurts (2019) and Krifka (2019a, 2019b), proposing the existence of
two commitment phrases in interrogative sentences: one related to the speaker,
called the Speaker Commitment, and another related to the addressee, called theAddressee Commitment. He finds evidence for their existence in the Newari
language, which belongs to the Tibeto-Burman language family. Regarding thesecond question, he extensively examines interrogative sentences and their responses. Typically, in interrogative sentences, the interrogator expects the respondent to commit to exhaustive true propositions. Thus, when asked, ‘‘What
are you bringing to the picnic?’’ the respondent would list everything they plan
to bring to the picnic. Consequently, the respondent’s commitment entails an
exhaustive set of propositions. In Japanese, the author finds this exhaustivenessencoded in sentence-final particles that mark questions. Therefore, the interroDOI: 10.4236/ojml.2024.142011

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J. Y. Song, M. L. Denggator naturally assumes that the respondent will commit to an exhaustive set of
propositions when answering the question.
Chapter Six serves as the concluding section, restating the focus, objectives,
questions, and findings of the study, and briefly discussing their interrelationships. Finally, the author underscores the unique properties of human language
compared to other animal communication systems: human language communication reflects the speaker’s commitment to the addressee.

3. Review
In the field of generative linguistics, since the proposal of the Syntax-Pragmatics/
Syntax-Discourse Interface, it has been a focal point for numerous linguists’ research endeavors (Catasso, 2023). The author’s study holds significant importance in addressing certain issues within this domain. Overall, this book exhibits
several noteworthy features.

3.1. Advancing the Theory of Left Periphery in
Syntactic Cartography
The theory of Left Periphery stands as a significant innovation within syntactic
theory, as it allows for the representation of discourse, pragmatics, and othernon-syntactic factors through syntactic means, thereby directly incorporating
the interface between discourse/pragmatics and syntax into sentence structure(Shi, 2020). The author’s research aligns closely with the syntactic cartography
theories proposed by Rizzi (1997) and Cinque & Rizzi (2010), among others.
However, there are differences in the author’s approach. Firstly, unlike Rizzi(1997), he does not split the CP layer into distinct functional projections but
proposes the existence of different functional projections above the CP layer.
Secondly, the functional projections above the CP layer in the author’s theory
differ from those in syntactic cartography. The author suggests that above theCP layer, there exist SAP and CommitP structures, which are related to the expression of speech acts. In this syntactic structure, SAP is positioned at the top of
the syntactic tree, representing illocutionary force, while CommitP is situated in
an intermediate layer that connects the speaker-addressee representation expressed in SAP with the propositions expressed in the CP, conveying a commitment made by the speaker to the addressee. According to the author, commitment involves a triadic relationship, encompassing the speaker, the addressee,and the proposition content, wherein the speaker commits to the addressee regarding the proposition. This commitment is manifested in declarative sentences
as the speaker’s commitment to the truthfulness of the proposition. Thus, fromthe perspective of the syntactic tree structure proposed by the author, this theory
inherits and develops the theory of Left Periphery in syntactic cartography.

3.2. Emphasizing the Vital Role of Syntax in Speech Acts andMeaning Expression
Speech acts pertain to the level of discourse. Typically, there is a clear division of
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labor between syntax and pragmatics, with issues related to speech acts being
studied within the field of pragmatics. Syntax research primarily focuses on sentence structure and its relationship with truth conditions, without directly addressing discourse in communication. However, the author argues that linguistic
evidence from various languages worldwide and from the language of autistic
children suggests that syntax can indeed represent discourse information andplays a role in actual language use, linking contextual features with discourse
meaning. Therefore, the author proposes the hypothesis in the preface that‘‘syntax provides the basic framework that makes the performance of a speech
act and the conveyance of meaning possible’’. He believes that the realization of
any speech act involves the speaker and the addressee, along with their attitudes
and intentions, all of which are represented in syntax, especially at the top of thesentence structure tree. The book reveals the presence of these relevant elementsin the projections at the top of the sentence structure tree, while also elucidating
their operational mechanisms and their relationship with syntactic phenomena.
He posits that at the top of the syntactic tree, namely above the CP layer, there
exist SAP and CommitP structures. Additionally, these three layers of phrases
serve different functions within the entire sentence. SAP in syntax represents the
speaker and addressee executing speech acts, expressing the relationship between the speaker and the addressee; CommitP links the speech act expressed indiscourse with the meaning of the discourse itself, representing the commitment
made by the speaker to the addressee through the speech act. Together, these
two layers constitute the expressive component of discourse. Therefore, the author divides the entire syntactic structure into two parts: the expressive component relevant to speech act expression and the propositional component relevant
to expressing sentence truth values, highlighting the important role of syntax inbridging the expression of speech acts with propositional meaning.

3.3. Highlighting the Fundamental Distinction between Human
Language and Animal Communication Systems
There exists a significant disparity between human language and animal communication, as there is no direct link between the speech acts expressed in human language and the meaning of the discourse itself. Therefore, various linguistic forms can be used to express the same speech act. How then do listeners
derive the speaker’s intended speech act from the meaning of the discourse itself? Previous research suggests that speech acts can be expressed through specific syntactic structures. For instance, in the sentence ‘‘Pass me the salt!’’, theimperative form indicates an instructive speech act. However, we can also express the intention of needing someone to pass the salt using other sentence
structures, such as the interrogative form ‘‘Can you pass me the salt?’’, whichclearly does not convey an imperative speech act. Yet, within the context, listeners can accurately discern the speaker’s intention. The author argues that there
exists an intermediary between the execution of speech acts and the expressionof meaning, which connects these two aspects of discourse, and that intermeDOI: 10.4236/ojml.2024.142011

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diary is syntax. Syntax provides a framework for the execution of speech acts andthe expression of meaning. In the syntacticization of discourse information, theroles of the speaker and the addressee, as well as the speaker’s commitment tothe addressee, are all reflected in the syntactic structure, positioned above thestructures that express the actual discourse. The SAP projection, representing
the speaker-addressee relationship, embodies the interaction between the speaker and the addressee. What transcends mere communication systems is theCommitP, representing the speaker’s commitment to the addressee, which links
communicative acts with the expression of infinite thoughts in propositional
form. Indeed, as Chomsky (2010) has pointed out, the unique ability of humanlanguage lies in expressing propositional thoughts. However, it is the CommitPthat enables countless forms of complex thoughts to be externalized through alimited set of linguistic actions, thereby showcasing the unique linguistic capabilities of humans. Without the connection provided by CommitP, there would
be no essential distinction between human language and animal communication
systems.
In general, Miyagawa’s monograph provides a clear and insightful analysis of
the syntax-discourse interface from a generative perspective. The book’s structure, particularly the sequencing of chapters, is meticulously designed to guidethe reader through the author’s well-developed arguments. These arguments are
systematically embedded within existing literature on the relationship between
grammar, meaning, and context. The author’s decision to summarize the proposed structure of the left periphery is particularly helpful, especially for readers
who might not go through the entire book. Given these merits, this monographnot only constitutes a brilliant contribution to research but also serves as a valuable resource for teaching syntax.

4. Conclusion
Miyagawa’s contributions significantly advance the study of syntax-discourse/
syntax-pragmatics interfaces, particularly within the field of syntacticization of
discourse. Through innovative theoretical frameworks and comprehensive linguistic analysis across diverse languages, Miyagawa’s research enriches our comprehension of how syntax interacts with discourse and pragmatics, illuminating
fundamental distinctions between human language and animal communication
systems. The exploration of syntax-discourse interfaces holds promise for deepening our understanding of language and communication, providing valuable
insights into the distinctive capacities of human language and the underlying
mechanisms of linguistic expression. Thus, the journey of inquiry into syntax
and its interface with discourse and pragmatics remains fueled by the pioneering
efforts of scholars like Shigeru Miyagawa and the enduring curiosity of linguists
worldwide. Certainly, there are also some shortcomings in this book. Firstly, thereliability of some of the linguistic data presented therein awaits further verification. Secondly, the extent to which the structures at the top of the syntactic tree
are universal in human language still requires more evidence from both diachDOI: 10.4236/ojml.2024.142011

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J. Y. Song, M. L. Dengronic and synchronic perspectives.

Acknowledgements
We extend our heartfelt gratitude for the financial support provided by the Department of Education of Guangdong Province and Guangdong University ofForeign Studies through the ‘‘International Training Program for Outstanding
Young Researchers (2023)’’. We are also grateful for the funding provided by the
project titled ‘‘Research on the Semantic-Syntactic Interface of Verbal Duplicationin Modern Chinese’’ (Project No. XSP22YBC055), commissioned by Hunan Provincial Committee for the Evaluation of Social Science Achievements.

Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.

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