The Nominal Clause and the Noun Phrases: A Comparative Study of Albanian and English

Abstract

The nominal clause and noun phrases in Albanian and English are in an oppositional relationship. This study makes descriptions of syntactic structure using constituent analysis between the two languages. The question that now emerges is what kind of language is implied by this type of description. Tufte (1971, p.41) rightly noted that “Noun phrases are any and all structures headed by a noun, or by a pronoun, or any other word or structure that stands in for a noun. Thus, even an entire clause may function as a noun phrase”. Furthermore, the fact that phraseological categories coexist  or are "projections" of specific word-level categories demonstrates that categories are complex entities. This was originally emphasized in Harris (1951) and was expanded upon by Muysken (1985) and Chomsky (1970).