Сomposite sentence as a polypredicative structure

The composite sent. is a poly-predicative structure and on the basis of the type of link it is subdivided into compound type (linked by coordination) and the complex type (linked by subordination).

The compound (с\с) sent. is analyzed in different branches of grammar in a different way.

Traditional approach. It pays special attention to the role of connectors of the sent.. According to it the meaning of the whole sent. is not only the sum of meanings of each clause. The general meaning can be completely changed by the connector (conjunction, conjunctive word).

When he made up his mind…

After he made up his mind…

As he made up his mind…

Structuralism treats any compound sentence as a result of transformations of some simple sentences.

Semantic syntax treats the meaning of the sent. in terms of deep structure, that is formally expressed by the surface structure.

Within the compound type the clauses are equal in rank, but not all of them are absolutely independent. Only the 1^st one is absolutely autosemantic. All the others are synsemantic. The 1^st clause can never be elliptical, it can’t include substitute words and anaphoric pronouns.

Clauses in the compound sent. are linked with the help of coordination, but logically this link can convey different meanings. Thus coordination is divided into copulative, disjunctive, adversative and casual-resultative links.

Accordingly the same types of conjunctions are singled out.

1) Copulative (копулятивная, соединит.) (and, both….and…, neither…nor…, not only…but…, besides, then).

2) Disjunctive (разделительная) (or, either…or.., otherwise, else- в противном случае)

3) Adversative (противительная) (but, while-тогда как, however-тем не менее, nevertheless, yet, still).

4) Casual-resultative (причинно-следственная) (for, accordingly, hence-таким образом, therefore, thus).

Compound sent. can be syndetic and asyndetic. Most links are actualized syndetically, but very often conjunctions can be omitted. Only the disjunctive link is always syndetic.

If the conjunction is used, it is considered to be the primary means of syntactic link in the sent. (not the only). There are a lot of other means that also establish links between the clauses and show that these clauses are rather tight connected.

Secondary means:

1) The order of clauses (it’s not always possible to change the order).

2) The grammatical forms of the predicates.

(if they coincide in time or they are relatively used)

3) Structural arrangement of clauses (parallelism, ellipsis, substitution.)

4) The semantic link that is not marked in any way, but understood from the context and graphically marked by dashes and commas.

The complex (с\п) sent.

The complex sent. is extremely popular, because it can express different types of logical relations. It includes parts not equal in rank. One is independent, but all the subordinate clauses are synsemantic, depend on the principle clause. Sometimes it is possible to change the order of clauses especially in adverbial type, but it does not change the status of each clause.

Complex sentences are classified as to different principles. The traditional classification is based on the functional principle, because the type of the subordinate clause is associated with the sent.parts (член предложения).

Eg. The only reason I came is because he asked me to.

Predicative type of clause.

Another classification is based on the link between the PC (principle clause) and the SC (secondary clause).

 

1) Correlative type

 

PC
	antecedent

SC

conjunction

It was just that what upset me. (that-antecedent, what-conjunction)

2) Complemented type. PC contains some element devoid of the lexical meaning and it is complemented by the SC.

It is believed that this winter will bу cold.

3) Inclusive type. In this case the SC fulfills the function of one of the primary sent. parts and it can’t be omitted.

What he said irritated everybody.

 

	SC What he said	PC

 

4) Co-dependant type

In this case clauses are absolutely unseparable, depend on each other and usually express relations of gradation.

The more we read the more we know.

5) Loose-connection type.

In this case the principle clause is autosemantic and in most cases it is possible to change the order of clauses.

I was writing when he entered.- When he entered I was writing.

Connectors

Clauses in a complex sent. can be linked in 2 ways: syndetically (by means of subordinating conjunctions or connectives) and asyndetically.

A conjunction only serves as a formal element connecting separate clauses, whereas a connective serves as a connective link and has a at the same time a syntactic function in the subordinate clause it introduces. Subordinate clauses are: subject clauses, predicative clauses, object c., attributive c., adverbial c. of time, place, condition….

Conjunctions: that, if whether

Connectives: who, which, what, whatever, where, when, how…

Adverbial clauses of Time: when, while, as soon as, as long as, scarcely, no sooner than..

Place: where, wherever

Cause: as, since, because

Purpose: that, in order that, so that, lest

Condition: if, unless, on condition that, provided

Concession: though, although, however, whatever

Result: so that, so, such

Manner: as

Comparison: than, as, as if, as though.

 

 

SENTENCE IN THE TEXT: TEXT AS A LANGUAGE UNIT. DISCOURSE AS ITS SPEECH MANIFESTATION. INTER-TEXTUAL STRUCTURE, THEME-RHEME RELATIONS IN THE TEXT, BASIC TEXT CATEGORIES - SEMANTIC (TOPICAL) ENTITY AND LEXICO-GRAMMATICAL COHERENCY. MEANS OF COHESION.

The text is the highest unit of the syntactic level that possesses all features that characterize any other language unit. According to Sossure, any language unit is 2-sided, with the exception of phoneme. All of them have the plane of content and the plane of expression. And the text is not an exception. It has already been proved by textual linguistics (or text grammar): this discipline appeared in the 70s in Russia and abroad (Москальская, Звегинцев, Michael Halliday, Harris, etc.) The main concept is that the largest unit of language is not the sentence, but the text.

The analysis of each text is compared with the analysis of the sentence. It was noticed that both the sentence and the text contain the same logical structure. A minimal sentence can be divided into 2 logical parts: Theme and Rheme. The theme is smth known. The rheme is some new information (portion of inf.) that is given in a sentence. It was noticed that texts also include portions of already known inf. and some new things. At the same time if most sentences correspond to the linear “theme-rheme’ structure, but the text, that also includes these 2 elements, as a rule, is more complicated. Moskalskaya investigated a lot of real texts and managed to prove that irrespective of their complexity and difference it’s possible to speak about some types of text structure. The types are universal for all languages (see below).

 

The starting point of development of text grammar was connected with the following:

· Many language facts, such as article determination (the way article determines words). Word-order, structural incompletion of the sentence, peculiarities of theme-rheme division and many others can be adequately interpreted only in some context that is wider than the sentence.

· Any text is not just a succession of isolated and disconnected sentences, but it’s a unity and it possesses a powerful integral potential.