Contents
Introduction
1. TheSentence
2. Structureof English Sentence
3. Parts ofthe Sentence
Conclusion
Bibliography
Introduction
The theme of my course paper sounds as following: «Structure ofSentence in English». Before beginning of investigation in our theme, I wouldlike to say some words dealt with the theme of my course paper.
Whenstudying the structure of a unit, we find out its components, mostly units ofthe next lower level, their arrangement and their functions as parts of theunit. Many linguists think that the investigation of the components and theirarrangement suffices. Thus Holliday writes: «Each unit is characterized bycertain structures. The structure is a syntagmatic framework of interrelatedelements, which are paradigmatically established in the systems of classes andstated as values in the structure…. if a unit 'word' is established there willbe dimensions of word-classes the terms in which operate as values in clausestructures: given a verb /noun/ adverb system of word classes, it might be thatthe structures ANV and NAV were admitted in the clause but NVA excluded».
Standing on such ground, I would like to point out tasks andaims of my work
1. The first task of my work is to give definition to term «sentence».
2. The second task is to describe the structure of sentencesin English.
3. The last task of my work is to characterize types of partsof the sentence.
In our opinion the practical significance of our work is hardto be overvalued. This work reflects modern trends in linguistics and we hopeit would serve as a good manual for those who want to master modern Englishlanguage. Also this work can be used by teachers of English language forteaching English grammar.
The present work might find a good way of implying in thefollowing spheres:
1. In High Schools and scientific circles oflinguistic kind it can be successfully used by teachers and philologists asmodern material for writing research works dealing with English verbs.
2. It can be used by teachers of schools, lyceums andcolleges by teachers of English as a practical manual for teaching Englishgrammar.
3. It can be useful for everyone who wants to enlarge his/herknowledge in English.
After having proved the actuality of our work, I would liketo describe the composition of it:
My work consists of four parts: introduction, the main part,conclusion and bibliography. Within the introduction part we gave the briefdescription of our course paper. The main part of the work includes severalitems. There we discussed such problems as the types of sentences in English, theirconstruction, parts of the sentence, and etc. In the conclusion to our work wetried to draw some results from the scientific investigations made within thepresent course paper. In bibliography part we mentioned some sources which wereused while compiling the present work. It includes linguistic books andarticles dealing with the theme, a number of used dictionaries andencyclopedias and also some internet sources.
1.The Sentence
Thenotion of sentence has not so far received a satisfactory definition, whichwould enable us by applying it in every particular case to find out whether acertain linguistic unit was a sentence or not.
Thus,for example, the question remains undecided whether such shop notices as BookShop and such book titles as English are sentences or not. In favour of theview that they are sentences the following consideration can be broughtforward. The notice Book Shop and the title English Grammar mean 'This is abook shop', 'This is an English Grammar'; the phrase is interpreted as thepredicative of a sentence whose subject and link verb have been omitted, thatis, it is apprehended as a unit of communication. According to the otherpossible view, such notices as Book Shop and such titles as English Grammar arenot units of communication at all, but units of nomination, merely appended tothe object they denote. Since there is as yet no definition of a sentence whichwould enable us to decide this question, it depends on everyone's subjectiveview which alternative he prefers. We will prefer the view that such noticesand book titles are not sentences but rather nomination units.
Wealso mention here a special case. Some novels have titles formulated assentences, e. g. The Stars Look Down, by A. Cronin, or They Came to aCity, by J.B. Priestley. These are certainly sentences, but they areused as nomination units, for instance, Have you read The Stars Look Down?Do you like They Came to a City?
Withthe rise of modern ideas of paradigmatic syntax yet another problem concerningdefinition of sentence has to be considered.
Inparadigmatic syntax, such units as He has arrived, He has not arrived, Hashe arrived, He will arrive, He will not arrive, Will he arrive, etc., aretreated as different forms of the same sentence, just as arrives, has arrived,will arrive etc., are different forms of the same verb. We maycall this view of the sentence the paradigmatic view.
Nowfrom the point of view of communication, He has arrived and He has not arrivedare different sentences since they convey different information (indeed, themeaning of the one flatly contradicts that of the other).
2.Structure of English Sentence
Whenstudying the structure of a unit, we find out its components, mostly units ofthe next lower level, their arrangement and their functions as parts of theunit.
Manylinguists think that the investigation of the components and their arrangementsuffices. Thus Holliday writes: «Each unit is characterized by certainstructures. The structure is a syntagmatic framework of interrelated elements,which are paradigmatically established in the systems of classes and stated asvalues in the structure…. if a unit 'word' is established there will bedimensions of word-classes the terms in which operate as values in clausestructures: given a verb /noun/ adverb system of word classes, it might be thatthe structures ANV and NAV were admitted in the clause but NVA excluded».
Now‘a syntagmatic framework of interrelated elements' may describe the structureof a combination of units as well as that of a higher unit, a combination ofwords as well as a sentence or a clause. The-important properties that unitethe interrelated elements into a higher unit of which they become parts, thefunction of each element as part of the whole, are not mentioned.
Similarly,Z. Harris thinks that the sentence The fear of war grew can be described as TN1PN2V,where T stands for article, N for noun, P for preposition and V for verb.
Suchdescriptions are feasible only if we proceed from the notion that thedifference between the morpheme, the word and the sentence is not one ofquality but rather of quantity and arrangement.
Z.Harris does not propose to describe the morpheme (as he calls it) is as VC,where V stands for vowel and C for consonant. He does not do so because heregards a morpheme not as an arrangement of phonemes, but as a unit of a higherlevel possessing some quality (namely, meaning) not found in any phoneme orcombination of phonemes outside the morpheme.
Sincewe assume that not only the phoneme and the morpheme, but also the word and thesentence are units of different levels, we cannot agree to the view that asentence is merely an arrangement of words.
Inour opinion, The fear of war grew is a sentence not because it is TNPNV,but because it has properties not inherent in words. It is a unit ofcommunication and as such it possesses predicativity and intonation. On theother hand, TNPNV stands also for the fear of war growing, the fearof war to grow, which are not sentences.
Asto the arrangement of words in the sentence above, it fully depends upon theircombinability. We have TN and not NT because an article has only right-handconnections with nouns. A prepositional phrase, on the contrary has left-handconnections with nouns; that is why we have TNPN, etc.
Thedevelopment of transform grammar (Harris, Chomsky) and tagmemic grammar (Pike)is to a great extent due to the realization of the fact that «an attempt todescribe grammatical structure in terms of morpheme classes alone – evensuccessively inclusive classes of classes – is insufficient».
Asdefined by Harris, the approach of transformational grammar differs from theabove-described practice of characterizing «each linguistic entity… as composedout of specified ordered entities at a lower level» in presenting «eachsentence as derived in accordance with a set of transformational rules, fromone or more (generally simpler) sentences, i.e. from other entities of the samelevel. A language is then described as consisting of specified sets of kernelsentences and a set of transformations».
ForEnglish Harris lists seven principal patterns of kernel sentences:
1. NvV(v stands for a tense morpheme or an auxiliary verb, i.e. for a (word-)morpheme containing the meanings of predicativity).
2. NvVPN
3. NvVN
4. Nis N
5. Nis A (A stands for adjective)
6. Nis PN
7. Nis D (D stands for adverb)
Asone can easily see, the patterns above do not merely represent arrangements ofwords, they are such arrangements which contain predicativity – the mostessential component of a sentence. Given the proper intonation and replaced bywords 4hat conform to the rules of combinability, these patterns will becomeactual sentences. Viewed thus, the patterns may be regarded as language modelsof speech sentences.
Oneshould notice, however, that the difference between the patterns above is not,in fact, a reflection of any sentence peculiarities. It rather reflects thedifference in the combinability of various subclasses of verbs.
Thedifference between ‘NvV and ‘NvVN’, for instance, reflects the differentcombinability of a non-transitive and a transitive verb (He is sleeping: Heis writing letters. Cf. to sleep, to write letters). The differencebetween those two patterns and ‘N is A’ reflects the difference in thecombinability of notional verbs and link verbs, etc.
Asimilar list of patterns is recommended to language teachers under the headingThese are the basic patterns for all English sentences:
1. Birdsfly.
2. Birdseat worms.
3. Birdsare happy.
4. Birdsare animals.
5. Birdsgive me happiness.
6. Theymade me president.
7. Theymade me happy.
Theheading is certainly rather pretentious. The list does not include sentenceswith zero predications or with partially implied predicativity while itdisplays the combinability of various verb classes.
S.Potter reduces the number of kernel sentences to three: «All simple sentencesbelong to one of three types:
A.The sun warms the earth;
B.The sun is a star; and
C.The sun is bright.»
Andas a kind of argument he adds: «Word order is changeless in A and B, but not inC. Even in sober prose a man may say Bright is the sun.»
Theforegoing analysis of kernel sentences, from which most English sentences canbe obtained, shows that «every sentence can be analysed into a centre, pluszero or more constructions… The centre is thus an elementary sentence; adjoinedconstructions are in general modifiers». S In other words, the essentialstructure constituting a sentence is the predication; all other words are addedto it in accordance with their combinability. This is the case in anoverwhelming majority of English sentences. Here are some figures based on theinvestigation of modern American non-fiction.No Pattern
Frequency of occurrence
(per cent) as sole pattern in combination
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Subject + verb
Babies cry.
Subject + verb + object
Girls like clothes.
Subject + verb + predicative
Dictionaries are books.
Dictionaries are useful.
Structural subjects + verb +
+ notional subject
There is evidence.
It is easy\o learn knitting.
Minor patterns
Are you sure?
Whom did you invite?
Brush your teeth. What a day
2.51
32.9
20.8
4.3
7.9
5.3
5.9
6.4
0.9
Someanalogy can be drawn between the structure of a word and the structure of asentence.
Themorphemes of a word are formally united by stress. The words of a sentence areformally united by intonation.
Thecentre of a word is the root. The centre of a sentence is the predication.
Somewords have no other morphemes but the root (ink, too, but). Some sentences haveno other words but those of the predication (Birds fly. It rains. Begin.).
Wordsmay have some morphemes besides the root (unbearable). Sentences may have somewords besides the predication (Yesterday it rained heavily.).
Sometimesa word is made of a morpheme that is usually not a root (ism). Sometimessentences are made of words that are usually not predications (Heavy rain).
Wordsmay have two or more roots (blue-eyed, merry-go-round). Sentences may have twoor more predications (He asked me if I knew where she lived.).
Theroots may be co-ordinated or subordinated (Anglo-Saxon, blue-bell). Thepredications may be co-ordinated and subordinated (She spoke and he listened.He saw Sam did not believe).
Theroots may be connected directly (footpath) or indirectly, with the help of somemorpheme salesman. The predications may be connected directly (7 think heknows) or indirectly, with the help of some word (The day passed as othershad-passed.).
Thedemarcation line between a word with more than one root and a combination ofwords is often very vague (cf. blackboard and black board, brother-in-law andbrother in arms). The demarcation line between a sentence with more than onepredication and a combination of sentences is often very vague.
Cf.She’d only to cross the pavement. But still she waited. (Mansfield).
Aswe know, a predication in English is usually a combination of two words (orword-morphemes) united by predicativity, or, in other words, a predicativecombination of words. Apart from that the words of a predication do not differfrom other' words in conforming to the general rules of. Combinability. Therules of grammatical combinability do not admit of *boys speaks or *he am. Thecombination *the fish barked is strange as far as lexical combinability isconcerned, etc.
Allthe other words of a sentence are added to those of the predication inaccordance with their combinability to make the communication as complete asthe speaker wishes. The predication Boys play can make a sentence by itself.But the sentence can be extended by realizing the combinability of the nounboys and the verb play into the three noisy boys play boisterously upstairs. Wecan develop the sentence into a still more extended one. But however extendedthe sentence is it does not lose its integrity. Every word in it is not just aword, it becomes part of the sentence and must be evaluated in its relation toother parts and to the whole sentence much in the same way as a morpheme in aword is not just a morpheme, but the root of a word or a prefix, or a suffix,or an inflection.
Dependingon their relation to the members of the predication the words of a sentenceusually fall into two groups – the group of the subject and the group of thepredicate.
Sometimesthere is a third group, of parenthetical words, which mostly belongs to thesentence as a whole. In the sentence below the subject group is separated fromthe predicate group by the parenthetical group.
Thatlast thing of yours, dear Flora, was really remarkable.
Asalready mentioned, the distribution and the function of a word-combination in asentence are usually determined by its head-word: by the noun in nounword-combinations, by the verb in verb word-combinations, etc.
Theadjuncts of word-combinations in the sentence are added to their head-words inaccordance with their combinability, to develop the sentence, to form itssecondary parts which may be classified with regard to their head-words.
Allthe adjuncts of noun word-combinations in the sentence can be united under onename, attributes. All the adjuncts of verb (finite or non-finite)word-combinations may be termed complements. In the sentence below, theattributes are spaced out and the complements are in heavy type.
Heoften took Inene to the theatre. Instinctively choosing the modern Societyplays with the modern Society conjugal problems. (Galsworthy).
Theadjuncts of all other word-combinations in the sentence may be calledextensions. In the sentences below the extensions are spaced out.
Youwill never be free from dozing and dreams. (Shaw).
Shewas ever silent, passive, gracefully averse. (Gals-worthy).
Thedistribution of semi-notional words in the sentence is determined by theirfunctions – to connect notional words or to specify them. Accordingly they willbe called connectives or specifies. Conjunctions and prepositions are typicalconnectives. Particles are typical specifies.
3.Parts of the Sentence
Traditionallythe subject and the predicate are regarded as the primary or principal parts ofthe sentence and the attribute, the object and the adverbial modifier – as thesecondary parts of the sentence. This opposition primary – secondary isjustified by the difference in function. While the subject and the predicatemake the predication and thus constitute the sentence, the secondary partsserve to expand it by being added to the words of the predication in accordancewith their combinability as words. Thus the sentence combines syntactical andmorphological relations, which, in our opinion, it is necessary to discriminatemore rigorously than it is usually done.
Thetraditional classification of the parts of the sentence is open to criticismfrom the point of view of consistency.
Thename attribute really shows the subordinate nature of the part of the sentenceit denotes. The double term adverbial modifier shows not only the secondarycharacter of the corresponding part of the sentence (modifier), but also refersto a certain part of speech (adverbial). The term object does not indicatesubordination, it only refers to the content.
Manywords of a sentence, such as prepositions, conjunctions, articles, particles,parenthetical words, are traditionally – not considered as parts of thesentence, even as tertiary ones But as we know, the parts of a unit are unitsof the next lower level, in our case words. The function of each word in thesentence is its relation to the other words and to the sentence as a whole. Soeach word is as much a part of the sentence as each morpheme is a part of theword (its root, prefix, inflexion, etc.)
Theinfinitive to find in the sentence Your task is to find it is regardedas a part of the predicate and is named predicative. The same infinitive in thesentence Jane is to find it is also considered as a part of thepredicate, but it is not called 'predicative'. It has no name at all, as wellas the infinitives in We ought to find it., We cannot find it, etc.
Whena noun or an adjective is attached to a finite link-verb it is called a'predicative' (He is a, teacher), but when it is attached to a overbidlink-verb (To be a teacher is my dream), it has no name. With objects it isdifferent. The noun letter is an object both in He writes a letter andin He wants-to write a letter.
Manyof these inconsistencies can be done away with if we discriminate between thesyntactical and the morphological relations within the sentence.
Asalready noted, only the words containing the structural meanings ofpredicativity are regarded as the structural subject and predicate. The chiefcriterion for the division of all the other words of a sentence into parts ofthe sentence is their combinability. Thus combinability is the property thatcorrelates parts of speech and parts of the sentence as well as the functionsof notional and semi-notional words.
Thosenotional words in a sentence which are adjuncts of certain head-words will bedivided in accordance with their head-words into attributes, complements andextensions.
Thosesemi-notional words which serve to connect two words or clauses (prepositions,conjunctions) will be regarded as a separate part of the sentence, connectives.
Thosesemi-notional words that are used to specify various words or word combinations(articles, particles) will be called specifies.
Finally,words in a sentence, with zero connections, referring to the sentence and knownas parenthetical elements, are a distinct part of the sentence.
TheSubject
Thesubject is the independent member of a two-member predication, containing theperson component of predicativity. Both members of the predication he sleepscontain the meaning of 'person'. But in sleeps this meaning depends on that ofhe and is due to grammatical combinability. This accounts for the fact thatsleeps cannot make a sentence alone, though it contains all the components ofpredicativity. Sleeps likewise depends on he as far as the meaning of 'number'is concerned. The meanings of 'person' and 'number' in h? arelexico-grammatical and independent.
Thesubject is generally defined as a word or a group of words denoting the thingwe speak about. This traditional definition is logical rather than grammatical.In the sentence This pretty girl is my sister's friend the definition can beapplied to the whole group This pretty girl, to say nothing of the fact that «thething we speak about» is so vague that it practically covers any part of thesentence expressing substantives.
Thesubject of a simple sentence can be a word, a syntactical word-morpheme or acomplex.
Asa word it can belong to different parts of speech, but it is mostly a noun or apro-noun.
E.g.Fame is the thirst of youth. (Byron).
Nothingendures but personal qualities. (Whitman). To see is to believe.
Aword used as a subject combines the lexical meaning with the structural meaningof 'person'. So it is at the same time the structural and the notional subject.
Thesyntactical word-morphemes there and it are only structural subjects because asword-morphemes they have no lexical meaning. But they are usually correlatedwith some words or complexes in the sentence which are regarded as notionalsubjects. In such cases it and there are also called anticipatory orintroductory subjects.
InThere is somebody in the room the notional subject is somebody. In Itrequires no small talents to be a bore (Scott) the notional subject is tobe a bore. In It is raining there is no notional subject and it is notanticipatory. In It is necessary for him to come the notional subject isthe complex for him to come. But a complex may also be used as the onlysubject.
E.g.For him to come would be fatal.
Wemay speak of a secondary subject within a complex. In the following sentence itis the noun head.
Severalthousand people went to see the headless statue ~ yesterday before it wasremoved for a new head to be cast from the original plaster moulds. (DailyWorker).
Thesyntactical word-morphemes there and it may also function as secondarysubjects.
Itbeing cold, we put on our coats. I knew of there being no one to help him.
Theanalysis of sentences like He was seen to enter the house is a point at issue.Traditionally the infinitive is said to form part of the 'complex subject' (He…toenter). B.A. Ilyish maintains that though satisfactory from the logicalpoint of view, this interpretation seems to be artificial grammatically, thissplitting of the subject being alien to English. Accordingly B.A. Ilyishsuggests that only he should be treated as the subject of the sentence, whereaswas seen to enter represents a peculiar type of compound predicate.
Thetraditional analysis, however, seems preferable, for it admits of treating thesentence as a passive transform of They saw him enter the house with the 'complexobject' him enter becoming a 'complex subject' he… to enter. As to thesplitting of the subject, it is another device to bring the structural parts ofthe subject and predicate together (he was), which is so typical of English.
Someauthors as, for example, A. Smirnitsky, M. Ganshina, and N. Vasilevskaya speakof definite-personal, indefinite-personal and impersonal sentences in ModernEnglish. We see no syntactical ground whatever for this classification sincedefinite-personal, indefinite-personal, etc. sentences have no structuralpeculiarities typical of these classes. It is a semantical classification ofsubjects, not sentences.
Ifwe compare the subject in English with that of Russian we shall find aconsiderable difference between them.
1. InModern Russian the subject is as a rule characterized by a distinctmorphological feature – the nominative case, whereas in English it is for themost part (unless it is expressed by a personal pronoun or the pronoun who inthe nominative case) indicated by the position it occupies in the sentence.
2. InModern Russian the subject is much less obligatory as a part of the sentencethan in English. One-member sentences are numerous and of various types, amongthem sentences like nude flume. In English a finite verb (barring the'imperative mood' finites) does not, as a rule, make a sentence without asubject.
3. InEnglish the subject may be a syntactical word-morpheme, a gerund or a complex,which is, naturally, alien to Russian.
ThePredicate
Thepredicate is the member of a predication containing the mood and tense (or onlymood) components of predicativity.
E.g. This dictionary employs a pronunciation that is easy to learn. (Thorndike).
Iwas thinking that Dinny has probably had no lunch. (Galsworthy).
Ishould hate to make you cry. (lb.).
Thepredicate can be a word or a syntactical word-morpheme. When it is a notionalword, it is not only the structural but the notional predicate as well.
E.g. A picture often shows the meaning of a word more clearly than a description.(Witty).
Whenthe predicate is a semi-notional verb or a syntactical word-morpheme, it isonly a structural predicate and is usually connected with a notional word whichmakes the notional predicate.
E.g.He was strong enough for that. (Galsworthy). We can assist our oppressedbrothers in South Africa in their struggle for freedom. (Daily Worker). Does anyoneknow of that but me? (Galsworthy).
Syntacticallystrong, assist and know are complements to the corresponding verbs.
Similarly,if we agree with A.I. Smirnitsky that have in I have friends is asemi-notional verb, we may consider friends as the notional predicate. Butsyntactically friends is a complement to the verb have.
Aswe have seen, predicates may be divided morphologically into words andword-morphemes, and semantically intonational, semi-notional and lexicallyempty (structural).
Whatis traditionally called a predicate is really the combination of the structuraland the notional predicate. If we had a name for the combination, that wouldenable us to make the traditional analysis^ Let us then call the combination acommunicative predicate. We may say then that communicative predicates are inaccordance with their structure divided into 'simple' (consisting of one word)and 'compound' (of more than one word). According to their morphologicalcomposition they are divided into 'verbal' (must see', is to believe) and'nominal' (is a student, became angry). As we see, the latter division depends onthe complements as well as the division into process and qualifying predicates,which will be discussed in the corresponding chapter
Whencomparing the predicates in English and in Russian, we must first of all notethe absence of syntactical word-morphemes used as predicates and the scarcityof morphological word-morphemes in Russian. So the division into structural andnotional (parts of) predicates is not so essential in Russian as it is inEnglish.
Secondly,there are many more sentences without finite verbs in Russian than in English. Он студент. Она больна. Ему холодно.
Thirdly,a Russian predication contains a predicate without a subject much more oftenthan in English.
Complements
Theverb in the sentence forms the greatest number of word-combinations. Theadjuncts of all these combinations are united by the term complements. But thecomplements of a verb are so numerous and variegated that it is feasible tosubdivide them into several groups correlated with the subclasses of verbs. Aswe know, verbs divide into notional, semi-notional and structural ones. Weshall call the adjuncts of the latter two groups predicative complements(predicatives). Notional verbs are subdivided into objective and subjective.The common adjuncts of both groups will be termed adverbial complements(adverbials), those of objective verbs alone – objective complements (objects).
Conclusion
In the conclusion of my work, I would like to say some wordsaccording the done investigation. The main research was written in the mainpart of my course paper. So here I’ll give content of it with the descriptionof question discussed in each paragraph.
The main part of my work consists of following items:
· «The Sentence». Here I gave thedefinition to the term sentence.
· «Structure of English Sentence», in thisparagraph I described the structure of English sentence.
· In the next paragraph «Parts of the Sentence»I describedmain parts of the sentence (subject and predicate), and secondary parts of thesentence.
Standing on such ground I will add that investigation in thequestions dealt sentences in English and their types is not finished yet, so wewill continue it while writing our qualification work.
I hope that my course paper will arise the sincere interestof students and teachers to the problem of adjectives in contemporary English.
Bibliography
1. B. Ilyish, The Structure of Modern English.
2. V.N. Zhigadlo, I.P. Ivanova, L.L. Iofik.» ModernEnglish language» (Theoretical course grammar) Moscow, 1956 y.
3. Gordon E.M. The Use of adjectives in modern English.
4. М.М. Галииская.«Иностранные языки в высшей школе», вып. 3, М., 1964.
5. Г.Н. Воронцова.Очерки по грамматике английского языка. М., 1960
6. O.Jespersen. Essentials of English Grammar. N.Y., 1938
7. Иванова И.П., Бурлакова В.В.,Почепцов Г.Г. Теоретическая грамматика современного английскогоязыка. – М., 1981. – 285 c.
8. Ch. Barber.Linguistic change in Present-Day English. Edinburgh, 1964
9. TheStructure of American English. New York, 1958.
10. World BookEncyclopedia Vol.1 NY. 1993 pp.298–299
11. Internet madrasati2010.bravehost.com/adj.htm
12. Internet www.vestnik.vsu.ru
13. Internet:http://www.englishclub.com/grammar/verbs/theory.htm
14. Inbternet:http://www.englishlanguage.ru/main/verbs_mood.htm