Definition. Characteristics.Sentence

Sentence definition
the immediate integral unit of speech built up by words according to a definite syntactic pattern and distinguished by a contextually relevant communicative purpose.
a portion of the flow of words of one speaker containing a complete thought.

Word vs. Sentence
Nominative units
Predicative
Modal
Word: objects and phenomena of reality
Sentence: situation
Sentence: reflects the connection between the nominal denotation of the event and objective reality, showing the time of the event
Reality of the situation, attitude of the speaker

Predication and modality
connection between the named objects and actual reality.
Modality is a broader category, revealed not only in grammar, but in the lexical elements of language:
Modal verbs: can, may, must…
Particles and adverbs: just, even …
Modal words: perhaps, unfortunately…
Predication = syntactic modality, expressed by the sentence.

Modality
Objective: real / unreal situation
Subjective: speaker’s attitude towards the situation (action)
Mood
Modal verbs
Modal words

What type of modality?
England and America are two countries separated by a common language. (G. B. Shaw)
Even if you do learn to speak correct English, whom are you going to speak it to? (Clarence Darrow)
We have really everything in common with America nowadays except, of course, language. (O.Wilde)
Every English poet should master the rules of grammar before he attempts to bend or break them. (Robert Graves)

Predication
Broad meaning: relation between the sentence and reality
Narrow meaning: structural core (kernel) of the sentence

Predication
the finite form of the verb = the predicate
tense, mood, person, and voice = the main predicative meanings, actual evaluations of the event.
You get married at twenty, you're going to be shocked who you're living with at thirty. (Peter Blake)

Expressing predication
verbal time/tense and mood
word order
functional words
Intonation in oral speech

e.g.,
The Internet is like alcohol in some sense. It accentuates what you would do anyway. If you want to be a loner, you can be more alone. If you want to connect, it makes it easier to connect. (Esther Dyson)
verbal time and mood
word order
functional words
Intonation in oral speech

Hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance? (Edgar Bergen)
Things are only impossible until they're not. (Jean-Luc Picard)

Too bad the only people who know how to run the country are busy driving cabs and cutting hair. (George Burns)
Only the mediocre are always at their best. (Jean Giraudoux )

Word? Sentence?
What?
Thanks.

Word vs. Sentence
Word
Sentence
a ready-made unit, reproduced in speech
produced each time in speech (except for a limited number of idiomatic utterances.)

Nominalization: S > NP
transformation of a sentence into a nominal phrase
His father arrived unexpectedly >
his father’s unexpected arrival,
the unexpected arriving of his father
no predication

Nominalization
She recovered soon. =>
She grew vegetables at home. =>

Sentence as a unit of speech (“parole”) = utterance
intonation: To London? To London!
pauses, pitch movements and stresses, which separate one sentence from another in the flow of speech:
Казнить нельзя помиловать

Sentence as a unit of language (‘langue’)
typical models, generalized sentence patterns:
SP The bird sings.
SPO1 The hunter killed a bear.
SPCComp He is a boy/ young.
SPO2O1 Sam gave him a book.
SPO1Compo He painted the door white.
There PrS There is a book on the table.

Case Theory of the Sentence
by L. Tesnière
V
|
Actants
(participants in the process)
= valencies
Circonstants
(circumstances)

He gave me this book yesterday.
gave (V)
receiver object
me book
yesterday (time)
- (place)

Proposition
nominative content of a syntagmatically complete average sentence
processual situation = an event:
process (actional or statal) as its dynamic center,
the agent of the process,
the objects of the process, and
various circumstances of the process.

Experience teaches slowly and at the cost of mistakes. (James A. Freude)
Process?
Agent?
Objects?
Circumstances?

What are the propositions?
I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from him. (Galileo Galilei)
I always learn something from people.
Every person knows something.
I can learn.

Functions of the sentence
predicative function , or reality-evaluating
nominative

Sentence predication
Evaluation of the situation
real or unreal
the purpose of communication:
declaration
interrogation
inducement
affirmation and negation

Communicative Types of Sentences
Declarative statements
Interrogative (questions)
Imperative (commands)
? Exclamatory ?
I can do nothing to you.
What can I possibly do to you?
Do something!
What can he possibly do to you!

Problem of the exclamatory sentence
Not a communicative type:
Do not express communicative intent
Express intensity of tone

Affirmative sentences.
Negative sentences
I don’t know this.
???
I know nothing.
I saw him nowhere.
It was difficult for him not to do it.
not grammatical structure:
affirmative

Semantic types of the sentence
Existential (There is a book on the table.)

Structural and semantical
Definite-personal (I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.)
Indefinite-personal (They say we’ll have a warm spring this year.)
Impersonal (It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite .)

Structural classification

Simple sentence structure (based on main parts)
One-member sentence
Two-member sentence
Fire!
Come on!
Helen sighed.

One-member sentence
No separate main parts (no subject, no predicate) <= V. Vinogradov.
Either subject or predicate <= A.Shakhmatov

Is it a one-member sentence?
Why not?
Haven’t heard from you so long!
No. These are elliptical sentences, with one or more of their parts left out but easily restored from the context.

One-member sentences

Structural types of sentences:

Structural type (based on secondary parts)

Глоссарий
Предикативность
Модальность
Высказывание
Валентность
Актант
Сирконстант
Пропозиция
Декларативное предложение
Вопросительное предложение
Повелительное предл.
Утвердительное предл.
Отрицательное предл.
Простое предложение
Сложносочиненное пр.
Сложноподчиненное пр.
Бытийное предложение
Определенно-личное пр.
Неопределенно-личное
Безличное предложение