An idiom can be defined as a group of words or an illustration that brings out a fugurative meaning when these words are combined, which is meaning is dissimilar from the actual meaning of the specific words. Idioms are difficult for people whose first language is not English. And in some circumstances for native English speakers. An example of an idiom; Anna was as happy as a clam on the day of her birthday. Generally, clams are known to be selfish and have no feelings. But when one opens a clamshell, the clam appears to smile.
Generative grammar is the grammar that shows the structure and how sentences are interpreted that indigenous speakers of the specific language hold as belonging to their language. Frank Parker and Kathryn Riley claim that generative grammar is a kind of unconscious knowledge that permits individuals, regardless of the language they speak, to form “correct” sentences. (Parker and Riley, 2009)
. Idioms have a point of controversy between several Generative grammar scholars in their works, such as Chomsky, who was dissatisfied with the structural approach as he was reckoning for specific syntactic classification of idioms which permits us to say idioms pose a difficulty for generative grammar.
‘Katz and postal (1963), in their work, argue that the whole meaning of an idiomatic expression or sentence that contains an idiomatic expression is different from the meaning of the idiom’s constituent parts. In their view, then, polymorphemic words whose compositional meanings are different from the meanings of their constituent parts form an idiom. For example, A wordlike classroom is considered as an idiom since it indicates a ‘study room’ in a school, and it is distinct from words class and room, that respectively have various meanings. They also considered phrases whose meaning cannot be retrieved from the individual words, for example, kick the bucket. Any linguistic structure whose meaning cannot be retrieved from its constituent elements qualifies as an idiom in such an approach.
According to Weinreich (1969), Only expressions such as pull someone’s leg are considered idioms. In contrast, single words such as the telephone are not. He agrees with Katz and Postal that only expressions whose meaning cannot be retrieved from their constituent parts are idioms. He, however, limits the expanse of idioms when he uses the illustration to indicate only phrases with both a literal as well as an idiomatic or figurative representation since he supposes only expressions creating ‘ambiguity,’ for example in pull someone’s leg can qualify as idioms. Weinreich (1969) as well makes a stern contrast among idioms and also ‘stable collocations,’ like part and parcel, that word co-occurring since they don’t seem idiomatic. According to him, idiomaticity causes ambiguity. He suggests that when words co-occur, it does not qualify the expression formed to be termed idiomatic since it does not include a figurative or metaphorical usage an idiomaticity characteristic According to Firth, semantic view, shows idioms as irregular units, though he mainly focuses on their transformational insufficiencies and ambiguity, which are essential but not the single defining features.
Furthermore, another way idioms have proven to be problematic to generative grammar is in the use of active and passive voice. According to generative grammar, sentences are not seen as consisting of any unfounded individually-taken words. In this instance, the definition of the sentence components is the one that determines the actual meaning of the complete sentence. Nevertheless, in the sentences having an idiomatic composition, the description will appear in a different form: using the passive voice in those constructions forms no difficulty. This feature in those sentences that possess idiomatic composition, however, designates the stability of idioms, having fixed or set expressions. Since idioms nature is complex, in English to be precise, it is not extraordinary that some of the idioms like (spill the beans, break the ice, bury the hatchet,) can probably be used in passive voice. Another problem idioms prove in generative grammar is in syntactical transformations. For example, not all idioms are capable of undergoing the plural and singular changes. In idioms like smelling a rat, kick the bucket, chew the fat, plural forms of the words buckets, rats, fats appear unnecessary. The singular form can also be impracticable in other words like (spill the beans, rain cats, and dogs). Changes on tense forms as well as the number look to be minimal changes in idioms. Idioms can also be viewed in numerous typologies. For example, decoding idioms like kick the bucket have to be ‘learned whole’ understanding that it is impossible to work out the specific meaning of the phrase on the first hearing (Evans, 2006). In contrast, encoding idioms like wide awake may be understood on the first. This broad typology makes studying idioms a challenge.
Summing up all the features specified above, we can see enough prove that idioms prove problematic to generative grammar. One way is that scholars had a controversy in the study of idioms and their definition and structural usage in the English language.