deep structure

WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2025

deep′ struc′ture, [Ling.]

1. Linguistics (in transformational-generative grammar) the underlying semantic or syntactic representation of a sentence, from which the surface structure may be derived. Cf. surface structure.

• 1960–65, American.

Collins Concise English Dictionary © HarperCollins Publishers::

deep structure noun

1. a representation of a sentence at a level where logical or grammatical relations are made explicit, before transformational rules have been applied
   Compare surface structure