Subcategorization

Alternative forms

• subcategorisation, {{3}}

Origin

- + sub + categorization

Full definition of subcategorization

Noun

1. Placing something into a subcategory.
2. (grammar) The practice of specifying what types of complements a word may take when that word acts as the head of a phrase of a certain category; this specification restricts the wordʼs category, making it smaller, hence a “subcategory” of the wordʼs category.
• 1988, Andrew Radford, Transformational grammar: a first course Chapter 7, It seems a simple enough matter to extract a general principle of subcategorisation out of (81), along the lines of:
  (82)      SUBCATEGORISATION PRINCIPLE
  (82)      Any lexical item of category X will be subcategorised with respect
  (82)      to the range of idiosyncratic Complements (i.e. sister constituents)
  (82)      which it permits within the (minimal) X-bar containing it
  The subcategorisation frame for X will simply be an unordered list of the sets of categories which X permits as its Complements: we assume that the relative ordering of X and its Complements will be determined by independent principles (e.g. the HEAD FIRST PRINCIPLE).