- •2. Categorial method of studying word-combinations (the categories of connotativeness, reproducibility, idiomaticity, conceptual determination and sociolinguistic determination).
- •3) The category of idiomaticity.
- •4) The category of conceptual determination.
- •5) The category of sociolinguistic determination.
- •6. Compound sentences. Classification of dependent clauses.
- •7. Scientific prose style
- •8. Publicistic style (newspaper and speeches).
- •9. Colloquial style and the style of official documents. The Colloquial Style
- •6. Functional styles
- •6. Compound sentences. Classification of dependent clauses.
- •8. Publicistic style (newspaper and speeches).
- •3.The sentence. The concept of predication.
- •Components of a sentence Clauses
- •Complete sentences
- •Classification By structure
- •By purpose
- •Major and minor sentences
- •Predicate in traditional English grammar
- •Kind-level predicates
- •Collective vs. Distributive predicates
- •10.English punctuation
- •9. Colloquial style and the style of official documents.
- •Stage-level predicates
- •Individual-level predicates
- •Kind-level predicates
- •Collective vs. Distributive predicates
- •Interrogative clauses
3.The sentence. The concept of predication.
In the field of linguistics, a sentence is an expression in natural language, and often defined to indicate a grammatical unit consisting of one or more words that generally bear minimal syntactic relation to the words that precede or follow it. A sentence can include words grouped meaningfully to express a statement, question, exclamation, request or command.
Components of a sentence Clauses
A clause consists of a subject and a predicate. The subject is typically a noun phrase, though other kinds of phrases (such as gerund phrases) work as well, and some languages allow subjects to be omitted. The predicate is a finite verb phrase: a finite verb together with zero or more objects, zero or more complements, and zero or more adverbials.
There are two types of clauses: independent and subordinate (dependent). An independent clause demonstrates a complete thought; it is a complete sentence: for example, "I am sad." A subordinate clause is not a complete sentence: for example, "because I had to move."
See also copula for the consequences of the verb to be on the theory of sentence structure.
Complete sentences
A simple complete sentence consists of a single clause (subject and predicate). Other complete sentences consist of two or more clauses (see below).
Classification By structure
One traditional scheme for classifying English sentences is by the number and types of finite clauses:
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A simple sentence consists of a single independent clause with no dependent clauses.
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A compound sentence consists of multiple independent clauses with no dependent clauses. These clauses are joined together using conjunctions, punctuation, or both.
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A complex sentence consists of at least one independent clause and one dependent clause.
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A complex-compound sentence (or compound-complex sentence) consists of multiple independent clauses, at least one of which has at least one dependent clause.
By purpose
Sentences can also be classified based on their purpose:
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A "declarative sentence" or "declaration", the most common type, commonly makes a statement: "I am going home."
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An "interrogative sentence" or "question" is commonly used to request information — "When are you going to work?" — but sometimes not; "see" rhetorical question.
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An "exclamative sentence" or "exclamation" is generally a more emphatic form of statement expressing emotion: "What a wonderful day this is!"
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An "imperative sentence" or "command" tells someone to do something: "Go to work at 7:30 in the morning."
Major and minor sentences
A major sentence is a regular sentence; it has a subject and a predicate. For example: I have a ball. In this sentence one can change the persons: We have a ball. However, a minor sentence is an irregular type of sentence. It does not contain a finite verb. For example, "Mary!" "Yes." "Coffee." etc. Other examples of minor sentences are headings (e.g. the heading of this entry), stereotyped expressions (Hello!), emotional expressions (Wow!), proverbs, etc. This can also include nominal sentences like The more, the merrier. These do not contain verbs in order to intensify the meaning around the nouns and are normally found in poetry and catchphrases.
Sentences that comprise a single word are called word sentences, and the words themselves sentence words
Predicate
In traditional grammar, a predicate is one of the two main parts of a sentence the other being the subject, which the predicate modifies. For the simple sentence "John is yellow" John acts as the subject, and is yellow acts as the predicate. The predicate is much like a verb phrase.
In many current theories of linguistic semantics (notably truth-conditional semantics), a predicate is an expression that can be true of something. Thus, the expressions "is yellow" or "is like broccoli" are true of those things that are yellow or like broccoli respectively. This notion is closely related to the notion of a predicate in formal logic, which includes more expressions than the former one, such as nouns and some kinds of adjectives.