Glossary

adjunct

Adjunct (or adverbial) is the function of a clausal modifier. Adjuncts are not arguments, i.e., verbal complements, because they are non-obligatory sentence elements. They occur in initial position as well as in mid- and end-position. Their semantic contribution is to add information to the semantics of the core clause (circumstance adverbials/adjuncts), on the attitude of the speaker toward it (stance adverbials/adjuncts), or to connect sentences (linking/connective adverbials/adjuncts). Syntactically, an adjunct can be realized by a phrase or a clause (traditionally referred to as an “adverbial clause”).

agent

The semantic role associated with an entity in the clause that willfully brings about an event or change of state is referred to as the “agent.” Syntactically, an agent is usually realized in the subject position, but not every verb requires an agent (think of verbs like be, happen, fall). In the passive construction, the agent of the verb shows up in a by-phrase or remains implicit.

animacy

A noun phrase referring to a living entity is called “animate.” Animacy is a semantic concept with syntactic ramifications. For example, for an animate possessor, the ’s-genitive is preferred over the of-genitive (the Queen’s house vs. the house of the Queen).

argument

Arguments are phrases required by the verb to express the verb’s meaning in syntax. They are typically realized in subject and object position and can be categorized by their semantic roles, such as agent, theme, or goal.

because X

In the “because X” construction, the word because is followed by a minimal phrase, most often a noun phrase consisting of just one word (“because rules”). Because in this construction is sometimes referred to as the “new because.”

bracketing

Discourse markers are defined by their bracketing function because they are used to connect or mark a boundary within ongoing speech.

canonical sentence

The canonical sentence in English follows the pattern subject–verb–complement, with the agent argument of the verb realized as the subject. Non-canonical sentences are derivations from this more basic pattern, for example through movement operations. They are often motivated by the discourse environment.

CARS model

CARS (Creating a Research Space) is an acronym for a pattern of three rhetorical moves characteristic of the research article: establishing a territory, identifying a niche or space, and occupying that space.

clefting

A cleft construction divides a single clause into two parts in order for one part to become foregrounded. The foregrounded element becomes the complement of a main clause, while the rest of the sentence is turned into a subordinate clause and thereby backgrounded. In it-clefting, the pronoun it becomes the subject of the matrix clause that has the foregrounded part as its complement, and the backgrounded material appears as a relative clause (It’s the cake there that I like).

coherence

The meaningfulness of a text not only results from its cohesion, but also relies on implicit assumptions and background knowledge. Coherence results from processes of interpretation, for example, of pronouns or discourse connections.

cohesion

Cohesion is the cover term for all explicit ties within a text, i.e., for all lexical and grammatical connections. Grammatical cohesion is a synonym for the grammar of discourse.

comment clause

Clauses which function as discourse markers, rather than a true matrix clause (I mean, you know, I think, you see), are also described as a parenthetical or “comment clause.”

complement clause

A complement clause is a clause required by verbs like say, think, promise, usually taking on the role of direct object. Finite complement clauses are typically introduced by the complementizer that, which can also be left out (→ that-omission). Nouns and adjectives can also be followed by complement clauses, but clauses after nouns and adjectives are always optional.

complementizer

In the narrow sense, a complementizer is a subordinating conjunction that introduces a complement clause (such as that, if, whether). Some linguists also use the term for all subordinating conjunctions, including those that introduce adverbial clauses, such as before, after, because.

conjunction

When dealing with the grammar of discourse, conjunction is not a word class, but the superordinate term for the different kinds of relationships between sentences within discourse. Conjunction is one area of grammar that creates cohesion in a text.

connectives

Elements that connect sentences or other parts of a discourse (paragraphs, sections) are called sentence or discourse connectives. Connectives can be coordinators, like and or but, or connective adjuncts, such as next, in addition, or however. Connectives are classified by their semantics as expressing an additive, temporal, causative, or adversative relation, and into “pure” and “impure” connectives by the amount of information included.

context

(or discourse context) The context of an utterance consists of situational context and the surrounding text, which is also called “co-text.” Non-linguistic properties determining the context are the channel or medium, the relationship between speaker and hearer, the setting, a specific topic or purpose, the formality of the situation, and the like.

coordination

Coordination is the syntactic connection of elements that have an equal syntactic status. In phrasal coordination phrases of the same type are connected, while clausal coordination expands a simple sentence into a compound, or coordinate, sentence. Within discourse, the coordination of utterances without a connective is called “zero” coordination.

coordinator

Coordinators, or coordinating conjunctions, connect phrases or clauses of an equal syntactic status. This means that none of the two elements connected by a coordinator is a dependent element. Coordinators with a function within discourse, not within the sentence, are called sentence or discourse connectives.

core clause

The core clause tells us who did what to whom and reaches from the subject to the complement position. The area before or after the core clause is referred to as → sentence periphery.

corpus

In principle, any collection of utterances from real language use, but typically a searchable electronic database of written and/or spoken discourse. A corpus can be a collection of full texts, but more often it is comprised of randomly selected text excerpts. A popular collection of freely available corpora can be found at the website English-corpora.org.

co-text

The co-text is the concrete surrounding, i.e., preceding and subsequent, text in which a sentence is situated.

data cleaning

Results from a corpus search need to be checked for precision. Minimally, false positives need to be removed before you proceed with analyzing the data set. This kind of check is referred to as “data cleaning.”

digital discourse

In this book, we are using the label “digital discourse” to refer to discourse that is constituted by and makes use of features associated with digital media, such as using links, hashtags, and → textism. Digital discourse is typically medially written, but conceptually oral. Genres of digital discourse include tweets, text messages, email, and online chats.

discourse marker

Discourse markers are elements that do not belong to the core clause but occur parenthetically at the beginning, within, or at the end of an utterance (elements such as and, now, so, or well, you know, or I mean). They bracket the ongoing discourse or provide some kind of cue for the interaction going on between speaker and listener. In addition to discourse markers that typically occur as parentheticals, “freestanding” discourse markers are elements that can also occur just on their own (e.g., oh, ok).

discourse type

There are many different discourse types, resulting from various kinds of discourse classification. A discourse type can be a very general, supposedly universal category (such as narration, or argumentation), but more often it is identical with a → genre (such as textbook, short story, or telephone call).

ellipsis

In the general sense, ellipsis means the absence of one or several obligatory grammatical elements in a sentence. The missing information is to be recovered from the surrounding discourse or the discourse situation. A common type of ellipsis, on which we also focus in this book, is subject ellipsis, i.e., the omission of the grammatical subject in a sentence (Didn’t manage to do my homework).

endophoric reference

Pronouns that have a referential relation located within the text express endophoric reference. Anaphoric pronouns point backward for their resolution, cataphoric pronouns point forward in the text.

existential construction

In an existential construction, the subject is placed later in the clause, and is replaced by there as an empty (“dummy”) subject (There’s a free table over there). The construction serves information packaging and usually occurs with an NP as a subject that contains new information.

exophoric reference

Pronouns that point to an entity in the situational context, and not in the preceding or subsequent text, are used as exophoric pronouns. Typically, first- and second-person pronouns as well as demonstrative pronouns have exophoric reference.

extended reference

Pronouns have extended reference when they refer to an entire proposition, and not to another nominal entity within the surrounding text or the discourse situation. Both the pronoun it and the demonstrative pronouns (this, that, these) can be expressions of extended reference, but speakers have a preference for interpreting it as referring to an entity and this as referring to a proposition (I visited my mom yesterday. It/This seems to have done her a lot of good).

extraposition

Extraposition, or, more precisely, it-extraposition, is a construction that moves a subordinate clause with the syntactic function of subject into the sentence-final position. The position of the subject is filled by the pronoun it (It is too bad that you won’t be able to come). Complex sentences in which extraposition could occur, but the subject clause remains in the original position, are described as cases of non-extraposition (That you won’t be able to come is too bad).

focus

Generally speaking, the focus of a sentence is what the speaker wants to highlight as its most important part. The focus can be marked through stress, positioning, and/or lexical choices. Focused information is not necessarily new, the importance can also result from a contrast (contrastive focus). The normal position for the focus is sentence-final (end-focus), while focus-marking (or a marked focus) is realized by a range of non-canonical constructions.

foregrounding

The highlighting of one sentence element by way of a cleft construction can be described as foregrounding this particular element. In that an it-cleft makes one sentence element the complement of a new matrix clause, turning the remainder of the sentence into a subordinate clause, the original clause is split into foregrounded and background information.

functional linguistics

Functional linguistics is often used as a cover term for all linguistic concepts and theories aiming at the description of grammar from the point of view of language use. More specifically, a functional perspective on syntax focuses on aspects of information structure, topic, and focus.

genre

In this book, we are focusing on genre as a situational determinant of linguistic variation. For example, the genre of research articles is characterized by a high number of inanimate subjects because the discourse is typically not about who did what to whom. A genre analysis approach to syntactic usage patterns typically considers the text as a whole and examines both pervasive features and typical features of the text that can be explained through the factors anchored in the discourse situation.

get-passive

The get-passive is a non-canonical passive in English. It is formed with get, rather than be, and is used more often in informal contexts than the be-passive (He got fired). Syntactically, get in the get-passive does not behave like an auxiliary verb (*He gotn’t fired).

given and new information

Given information generally describes information that has been mentioned in previous discourse and is therefore, or for some other reason, known to the reader or listener. Givenness may result from mere repetition, or from information being evoked by the discourse, inferable, or otherwise anchored to some previously mentioned element. New information is information that is not known or accessible to the reader or listener at the moment of an utterance.

grammaticalization

Developments in language whereby lexical expressions come to serve grammatical functions and often continue to develop new functions are generally described as “grammaticalization.” Grammaticalization typically goes along with the loss of meaning and categorial restrictions and is a common process through which discourse markers come about.

hashtag

Hashtags consist of a pound sign (#) followed by linguistic material and are used in digital discourse to establish the discourse topic (#discoursesyntax) or to express stance (#cantdeal). They may or may not be integrated into the syntax of an utterance.

inference

An inference is a pragmatic kind of meaning, i.e., meaning that is not encoded literally, but needs to be “inferred” by the reader or listener based on world knowledge and/or pragmatic plausibility.

information packaging

The principle that given information tends to precede new information in an utterance is known as “information packaging.” Constructions that arise from the need to follow this principle (such as inversion or the passive) are said to serve an “information-packaging” function.

information status

→ Given and new information

inversion

Inversion describes the positioning of the entire verb phrase in front of the grammatical subject of the clause. Full inversion contrasts with subject–auxiliary inversion (such as in interrogatives) and results from the fronting of a PP, NP, AdjP, VP, or AdvP, which often have locative or directional meaning (Into his life came a new taste). Locative inversion is the most common semantic type of inversion, while non-locative inversion also occurs, usually with a fronted AdjP or NP (More important/Another important issue is the following …).

left-dislocation

Left-dislocation is a construction that results from moving an NP of the core clause to the clausal beginning, with a pronoun filling the gap that is created by this movement (Lentils, I can’t stand them). Left-dislocation differs from topicalization, i.e. mere NP-fronting, in that it has the general function of identifying the referent of the fronted NP from the ground of knowledge established by the discourse. Left-dislocation does not require the referent of the NP to be directly recoverable from the text, but strengthens its role as the topic for the following discourse.

matrix clause

A matrix clause is the main clause of a complex sentence, i.e., it has a subordinate clause as one of its sentence constituents.

narrative mode

There are many views on the defining properties of narrative discourse, but a narrative “mode” is more straightforward than these. It is present in a text that has a structure based on chronology, i.e., texts in a narrative mode, with a narrative syntax, put the sequence of events they report into a corresponding sequence of two (or more) sentences.

particle shift

The word order pattern in which a verb is separated from its particle is known as “particle shift,” as in look it up. While the term implies that this word order results from moving the particle, there are also analyses that propose that it is the noun phrase that has been moved away.

passive construction

In a passive construction, the semantic object (the entity undergoing a change or targeted by the action expressed by the verb) becomes the subject of the clause, and the agent argument, normally the subject of a clause, can remain unexpressed (short passive) or is realized inside a PP (long passive). In English, the canonical passive is formed with a form of be and the past participle of the lexical verb (The horse was kicked [by the cow]).

premodifier/postmodifier

Pre- and postmodifiers are optional elements within a noun phrase, i.e., phrasal elements that are added to and semantically modify the head noun. The premodifying element is usually an adjective or noun (phrase), whereas postmodifying elements can be a relative clause, a prepositional phrase, or an adverb or adjective (phrase).

preposition stranding

Preposition stranding – ending a clause on a preposition – results from moving a noun phrase that is the object of a preposition to the beginning of a sentence, which regularly happens in English in question formation (Who did you buy this for __?), passivization (He was laughed at __ in school), and relative clause formation (He is a person I just can’t see eye to eye with__). The syntactic alternative to preposition stranding is pied piping, which fronts the whole prepositional phrase (For whom did you buy this?), but most speakers prefer preposition stranding, especially in informal contexts.

presupposition

A presupposition, or presupposed information, is information that does not constitute truly given information for the reader or listener, but is presented as if already known. An it-cleft can have the function of evoking a presupposition, through placing new information into the subordinate clause and thus backgrounding it, which creates the impression that the information could still be known.

Principle of End-Weight

The Principle of End-Weight refers to the preference for presenting short phrases before long phrases, all things being equal. It is one of the motivating factors for extraposition (over a clausal subject) and the use of by-phrases in the passive.

pronoun

Pronouns constitute a category of lexemes that are used instead of a noun phrase when the entity they are referring to is identifiable by the reader or listener. Personal pronouns refer to the speaker, the listener, or some other entity, while demonstrative pronouns refer to entities within the local or temporal discourse situation or within the preceding or upcoming text. Hearers interpret pronouns following both semantic, grammar-based principles, and pragmatic, coherence-based plausibility.

proposition

In simple terms, the term “proposition” refers to the semantic content of a sentence. Sentences that are variants of each other express the same propositional content, i.e., they underlie the same truth conditions. For example, if the sentence Sally switched off the radio is true, the sentence Sally switched the radio off is also true. Both sentences have the same propositional content.

rate of occurrence

When interpreting frequencies gathered from a corpus, the rate of occurrence is a normalized count of a given feature of grammar, its frequency computed as a rate per a certain number of words. The formula for calculating a rate of occurrence is:

• (raw count ÷ total word count) × reference size in number of words

Rates of occurrence are used to compare frequencies from corpora or sub-corpora that differ in length.

recoverability

If a discourse entity is fully accessible by the reader or listener, this means that it is recoverable. Recoverability is a necessary condition for an elliptical reference (→ ellipsis) and means that the entity is either anaphorically recoverable from the preceding text, or situationally recoverable if the referent can be retrieved from the surrounding context.

reference

Reference describes the relation between a linguistic form and the entity or situation the speaker or writer is dealing with (the referent). Reference can be expressed by a full NP or by a pronoun.

reference grammar

A reference grammar is a comprehensive description of the grammar of a language, written from a linguistic perspective. It is different from a pedagogical grammar designed for language learners and a style manual providing guidance on language use in specific situations. For this book, we have chosen the Cambridge Grammar of the English Language as our main point of reference (Reference Kaltenböck, Keizer and LohmannHuddleston & Pullum 2002).

register

Registers are functional language varieties, which are described and systematically analyzed from the perspective of the discourse situation. A register analysis identifies features of grammar as register features if they are more pervasive in a target register than in other kinds of texts. It can take place at different levels of specificity, so that registers range from widely studied varieties such as conversation or academic writing to sub-registers like article introductions or office-hour consultations. Register analysis thus combines the identification of register features with their explanation in the light of the situational context.

retrievability

Information is understood as retrievable if it is either mentioned in the preceding discourse or inferable from the discourse situation.

semiotic triangle

The semiotic triangle highlights that the meaning of a linguistic expression does not have a direct relation to an object or other aspect of the outside world, but that this relation exists via a learned mental representation (the concept). In this way, the model explains that the same referent can be covered in discourse by using different linguistic expressions (e.g., noun phrases or pronouns).

sentence periphery

The sentence periphery is what precedes the subject and follows the complement. A syntactic construction that targets the left sentence periphery is → topicalization.

spoken vs. written language

→ written vs. spoken language

syntactic complexity

At the sentence level, syntactic complexity is measured through the number of embedded clauses inside a sentence. A sentence with no embedded clauses is, in this sense, not complex. At the level of phrases, syntactic complexity is measured through phrasal length and depth (the level of embedding). High phrasal complexity is a marker of written language.

syntactic variation

The concept of syntactic variation relates to the fact that the same propositional meaning can be expressed in different ways. For example, the two sentences The horse kicked the cow and The cow was kicked by the horse are true under exactly the same truth conditions and can be considered variants of each other. Like linguistic variation in other domains (e.g., phonology), syntactic variation is highly systematic.

textism

Textisms are instances of non-standard written language associated with the register of texting, such as abbreviations, number homophones (l8 for late), and emoticons. The language associated with the register of texting is sometimes referred to as “textese.”

text-linguistic approach

In a text-linguistic study, the objects of analysis are the linguistic properties of a specific discourse type or register. For example, one might look at why conversations, relatively speaking, use more pronouns than other registers.

that-omission

In complement clauses after verbs, the complementizer that may be realized or omitted. The two versions (with and without that) are considered to be an example of syntactic variation.

theme/patient

The semantic role associated with the argument of the verb that undergoes the action or a change of state is referred to as the “theme” or, less often, the “patient.” In canonical sentences, the theme argument is realized as the direct object.

topic

The concept of topic has several facets, the most straightforward one being the entity that a sentence is “about” (usually its subject). Topic also refers to what the discourse is about, i.e., to its current focus of interest. Entities that are the topic of one or several utterances in discourse possess topicality, reflected by their topic continuity, or topic persistence (which can be measured, for example, by the number of times an entity recurs in a sequence of sentences).

topicalization

In topicalization, or NP-fronting, a noun phrase that normally belongs somewhere later in the clause is moved to the beginning of the sentence (in front of the grammatical subject) (Lentils I hate). This movement adds extra emphasis to the constituent and often turns it into the sentence focus. The construction has a close link to the preceding text: The referent of the NP must be given or at least inferable (What about having lentil soup? Lentils I hate).

transitivity

The property of verbs and prepositions to require a noun phrase as complement is referred to as transitivity. Intransitive verbs like sleep or frown are not followed by a noun phrase, ditransitive verbs are followed by two noun phrases (give John an apple). Whether or not a verb is transitive depends on the verb’s semantics. There are also linguists who consider transitivity a property ascribed to sentences, rather than verbs, but that is not the definition we are working with in this book.

utterance

An utterance is a sentence or other linguistic unit together with its context of occurrence. A sentence becomes an utterance if it is looked at as bound to the situation in which it is used, which is why the same sentence, repeated or used under new conditions, easily gives rise to many utterances.

variable

In a research design, a variable is what takes on different values and is used to predict an effect. Discourse syntax typically works with properties of the discourse situation and with genres as the “predictor” variable, while a pattern of syntactic variation or the occurrence of certain grammatical features is the “dependent,” or “outcome” variable.

variationist approach

In a variationist research design, the objects of analysis are a specific pattern of syntactic variation and the reasons why one might choose one variant over the other in a given speech situation. For example, one might look at the choice of passive voice over active voice or at complement sentences without that over complement sentences with that.

verb-particle construction

In the verb-particle construction a verb forms a semantic unit with a particle that is often semantically opaque (eat up, put off, give up). The verb-particle construction allows two word order sequences: In the continuous pattern, the verb is followed immediately by the particle (give up an idea); in the discontinuous or split pattern, the verb is separated from the particle by an intervening noun phrase or pronouns (give it up). The latter pattern is also referred to as → particle shift.

voice

The grammatical category “voice” refers to the mapping of arguments to syntactic positions. In active voice, the agent becomes the subject of the clause, and in passive voice, the semantic object becomes the subject of the clause. Usually, voice is also marked morphologically on the verb (→ passive construction).

world knowledge

World knowledge is one part of the background knowledge that speakers use when creating and interpreting discourse. Apart from their world knowledge, speakers also use knowledge of the discourse situation when looking out for the coherence of a text (for example, when interpreting a relation among sentences, or retrieving the referent of a pronoun).

written vs. spoken language

The distinction between written vs. spoken language is both medial (written language has visual output, spoken language has phonetic output) and conceptual (written language tends to be planned and more formal, spoken language tends to be less formal and more spontaneous). The arrival of → digital discourse has challenged this dichotomy.