| This study explores those grammatical features of our language that allow grammatical ambiguity to occur. Building on the research of Norman Stageberg and others who have provided examples of grammatical ambiguity and identified types, this study goes a step further to identify several sets of "enablers," those grammatical features that allow grammatical ambiguity to occur. Each major type of grammatical ambiguity has a different set of enablers, though some members of the sets may occur in more than one set. The bulk of the text discusses each of the enablers, and the relationship of each to particular types of grammatical ambiguity, including the syntactic environment of the enabler and its function in creating ambiguity. The conclusion briefly examines a context in which the taxonomy of ambiguity enablers could be useful for generating ambiguity. |
