You specialize in syntax. Could you explain what syntax is? And how does it differ from the broader concept of grammar? (Questions about Taiwanese; part 3)

[The 'Questions about Taiwanese' series consists of drafted answers to interview questions prepared for an episode recording of the NTNU International Taiwan Studies Centre Podcast.]

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Okay, so syntax is all about how words and phrases are put together to make a sentence. Syntacticians, like me, dig into sentence structures and how words, especially those function words, connect with each other. Grammar, though, that's a much bigger deal. It covers all the rules of a language – not just sentences, but also sound features and changes studied in phonetics and phonology, word formation studied in morphology, and how language works in different situations studied in pragmatics. Basically, grammar includes all the rules in a language.

That said, my main focus is on how sentences are formed. I don't specialize in the details of sounds, word composition, or the more situational aspects of language. My expertise is primarily in sentence structure.