Lecture 8. The sentence and the utterance

1. The sentence.

It is rather difficult to define the sentence as it is connected with many lingual and extra lingual aspects – logical, psychological and philosophical. We will just stick to one of them - according to academician G.Pocheptsov, the sentence is the central syntactic construction used as the minimal communicative unit that has its primary predication, actualises a definite structural scheme and possesses definite intonation characteristics. This definition works only in case we do not take into account the difference between the sentence and the utterance. The distinction between the sentence and the utterance is of fundamental importance because the sentence is an abstract theoretical entity defined within the theory of grammar while the utterance is the actual use of the sentence. In other words, the sentence is a unit of language while the utterance is a unit of speech.

The most essential features of the sentence as a linguistic unit are a) its structural characteristics – subject-predicate relations (primary predication), and b) its semanticcharacteristics – it refers to some fact in the objective reality. It is represented in the language through a conceptual reality:

We may define the proposition as the main predicative form of thought. Basic predicative meanings of the typical English sentence are expressed by the finite verb that is immediately connected with the subject of the sentence (primary predication).

To sum it up, the sentence is a syntactic level unit, it is a predicative language unit which is a lingual representation of predicative thought (proposition).

2. Different approaches to the study of the sentence.

a) Principal and secondary parts of the sentence.

b) Immediate constituents of the sentence. IC analysis.

To grasp the real structure of the English sentence, one must understand not only words that occur but also the principles of their arrangement. Each language has its own way of structural grouping. English has dichotomous phrase structure, which means that the phrase in English can always be divided into two elements (constituents) until we get down to the single word. All groups of words are arranged in levels. The name given by linguists to these different levels of relationship is immediate constituents.

Thus, one way of analyzing a sentence is to cut it to its immediate constituents, that is, to single out different levels of meaning.

It is obvious that dividing a sentence into ICs does not provide much information. Nevertheless, it can sometimes prove useful if we want to account for the ambiguity of certain constructions. A classic example is the phrase old men and women which can be interpreted in two different ways. Ambiguity of this kind is referred to as syntactic ambiguity. By providing IC analysis we can make the two meanings clear:

c) Oppositional analysis.

The oppositional method in syntax means correlating different sentence types: they possess common features and differential features. Differential features serve the basis for analysis.

E.g. two member sentence :: one member sentence (John worked:: John! Work! Or: I speak English :: I don’t speak English.

d) Constructional analysis.

According to the constructional approach, not only the subject and the predicate but also all the necessary constituents of primary predication constitute the main parts because they are constructionally significant. Therefore, the secondary parts of the sentence are sometimes as necessary and important as the main ones. If we omit the object and the adverbial modifier in the following sentences they will become grammatically and semantically unmarked: Bill closed the door; She behaved well.

The structural sentence types are formed on the basis of kernels (basic structures). Three main types of propositional kernels may be distinguished: N V, N is A, N is N. However, if we take into account the valent properties of the verbs (their obligatory valency) the group will become larger (8 kernels), e.g. N1 V N2 N3: John gave Ann the book, N1 V N2: I see a house.

The kernel sentences form the basis for syntactic derivation. Syntactic derivation lies in producing more complex sentences

Syntactic processes may be internal and external. Internal syntactic processes involve no changes in the structure of the parts of the sentence. They occur within one and the same part of the sentence (subject, etc.). External syntactic processes are those that cause new relations within a syntactic unit and lead to appearance of a new part of the sentence.

The internal syntactic processes are:

ExpansionCompression

The phone was ringing and ringing They were laughing and singing

ComplicationContamination

(a synt. unit becomes complicated) (two parts of the sentence are joined

I have seen it – I could have seen it together – e.g. double predicate)

The moon rose red

Replacement – the use of the words that have a generalized meaning: one, do, etc, I’d like to take this one.

Representation – a part of the syntactic unit represents the whole syntactic unit: Would you like to come along? I’d love to.

Ellipsis – Where are you going? To the movies.

The external syntactic processes are:

Extension - a nice dress – a nice cotton dress.

Ajoinment - the use of specifying words, most often particles: He did it – Only he did it.

Enclosure – inserting modal words and other discourse markers: after all, anyway, naturally, etc.

3. The utterance. Informative structure of the utterance.

The utterance as opposed to the sentence is the unit of speech. The

main categories of the utterance from the point of view of its informative structure are considered to be the theme and the rheme. They are the main components of the Functional Sentence Perspective (FSP) – actual division of the sentence (most language analysts stick to the term “sentence” but actually they mean “utterance”).

In English, there is a “standard” word order of Subject + Verb + Object: The cat ate the rat – here we have a standard structure (N1 + V + N2). However, there are numerous other ways in which the semantic content of the sentence can be expressed:

1. The rat was eaten by the cat.

2. It was the cat that ate the rat.

3. It was the rat that the cat ate.

4. What the cat did was ate the rat.

5. The cat, it ate the rat.

Which of these options is actually selected by the writer or the speaker will depend on the context in which the utterance occurs and the importance of the information. One important consideration is whether the information has already been introduced before or it is assumed to be known to the reader or listener. Such information is referred to as giveninformation or the theme. It contrasts with information which is introduced for the first time and which is known as new information or the rheme.

Informative structure of the utterance is one of the topics that still attract the attention of language analysts nowadays. It is well recognized that the rheme marking devices are:

1. Position in the sentence. As a rule new information in English generally comes last: The cat ate the rat.

2. Intonation.

3. The use of the indefinite article. However, sometimes it is impossible (as in 1): A gentleman is waiting for you.

4. The use of ‘there is’, ‘there are’. There is a cat in the room.

5. The use of special devices, like ‘as for’, ‘but for’, etc.: As for him, I don’t know.

6. Inverted word order: Here comes the sun.

7. The use of emphatic constructions: It was the cat that ate the rat.

However, sometimes the most important information is not expressed formally: The cat ate the rat after all. The rheme here is ‘the rat’. At the same time there is very important information which is hidden or implicit: the cat was not supposed to do it, or – it was hard for the cat to catch the rat, or – the cat is a vegetarian (this hidden information will depend on the context or situation). In other words, we may say that this sentence contains two informative centres, or two rhemes – explicit and implicit.

4. Functional typology of utterances.

Actional utterance: N + Vact. + Complement – actional predicate

Performative utterance: I + Vperf./Vsay – performative predicate

Characterizing utterance: N + Vbe + A/Q – characterizing predicate

(See the book by E.Morokhovskaya ‘Fundamentals of Theoretical English Grammar’, pp.254-268)