Questions are special sentencial types in English. They end with a question mark and demand an answer. They have a different kind of sentence structure. The finite verb occurs before the subject, and the wh word occurs before the finite verb if the question does not begin with a wh word. In case os the questions beginning with a wh word, the wh word itself is the subject.
The difference in the word order movement is due to transformation rule. This rule is Question Word Movement rule. This can be studies with the following example:
You slice onions with a knife.
you (present tense) slice onions with what
^ |
The tense carried by the verb 'slice' is separated form the actual verb in this representation.
what you (present) slice onions with t
The element t is a wh-trace. It is an invisible mark left by the question word 'what'.
Next, the present tense is moved to the left of the subject. This is called Subject-Auxillary Inversion.
what (present) you slice onions with t
SInce the present tense cannot be pronounced by itself, it needs the right kind of word to dock on to. Hence, the word 'do' is brought to support the present tense.
what do+present you slice onions with t
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