The complex Sentence

Complex Sentence is a polypredicative construction, built up on the principle of subordination. It is a pattern derived from at least 2 base sentences: the matrix (principal clause) S & the insert S. (subordinate). Two or more base sentences are clausalized and joined into one construction (clauzalisation - Derivational relation – constructional).When these 2 are combined, the matrix S becomes the main/ principle clause, the insert S – a subordinate clause. Ex. The bell rang. (insert S)+ the students left. (matrix S)> When the bell rang, (subord cl) the students left. (main cl).

The dominant positional status of the principal clause does not mean that it expresses the central informative part of the communication: any clause of a complex sentence can render its rheme or its theme.

Subordinating connectors (subordinators)

Pronominal words: (take a notional position)

- I don’t know when she’ll come

Pure conjunctions (don’t take a notional position)

- When she comes, I’ll tell her about you.

Classification of subordinate clauses:

} 1. functional principle ( = functions of words, subordinate clauses are divided on the analogy of the positional parts of the simple sentence that underlies the structure of the complex sentence)

Subject, object, predicate, attribute etc.

E.g.: What you see is what you get. - What you see (the subject, the subject subordinate clause) is what you get (the object, the object subordinate clause).

} 2. categorial principle ( semantics ) M.Blokh (Clauses are classed by the nominative properties of notional words, which are reflected in their part-of-speech clasif-on)

· substantive-nominal (of primary nominal position, name an event as a certain fact) - subject, predicative, object cl-s. e.g.: What I want to say is that I know the answer. It is essential that you should be here(subject clause, it-sentence). What I want to say is that I know the answer.(predicative clause). She says he is here.(object clause)

· qualification-nominal ( of secondary nominal position) -(the position occupied by the cl might be oc-ed by an adj, name a certain event, which is referred, as a characteristic to some substance, represented either by a word or by another clause); e.g.: Where is the letter that came today?

ü Attributive clauses (who, whom, whose, which, that)

-descriptive: This is a book which can be useful./ limiting (restrictive) This is the book which I bought yesterday.

-Defining Sam is a person who doesn’t give up easily./ Non-defining Sam, who doesn’t give up easily, keeps on working

Cleft-sentence (It is he who has done it for us.)

It is I who started all this. ( Comp. Hello! It’s me! )

· clause of adverbial position name a certain event, which is referred, as a characteristic to another event, to a process or a quality, clauses of time, place, manner, condition, etc e.g.: I won’t leave until you come.

The clauses of a complex sentence can be connected with one another more or less closely. The degree (intensity) of syntactic closeness between the clauses reflects the degree of mutual dependence of their proposemic content.

Date: 2015-12-24; view: 947