Sentence: general

The sentence is the main object of syntax as part of the grammatical theory.

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

The sentence is characterised by its specific category of predication which establishes the relation of the named phenomena to actual life. The general semantic category of modality is also defined by linguists as exposing the connection between the named objects and surrounding reality. But modality is not specifically confined to the sentence. This is a broader category revealed both in the grammatical elements of language and its lexical, purely nominative elements.

The centre of predication in a sentence of verbal type (which is the predominant type of sentence-structure in English) is a finite verb. The finite verb expresses essential predicative meanings by its categorial forms, first of all, the categories of tense and mood.

The sentence is intonationally delimited. Intonation separates one sentence from another in the continual flow of uttered segments and, together with various segmental means of expression, participates in rendering essential communicative-predicative meanings (such as, for instance, the syntactic meaning of interrogation in distinction to the meaning of declaration). The role of intonation is especially important for sentences which have more than one predicative centre, in particular more than one finite verb. Special intonation contours, including pauses, represent the given speech sequence in the first case as one compound sentence, in the second case as two different sentences.

Classification of Sentences

According to the number of predicative lines sentences are classified into simple, composite and semi-composite (Fig. 110). The difference between the simple sentence and the composite sentence lies in the fact that the former contains only one subject-predicate unit and the latter more than one. Subject-predicate units that form composite sentences are called clauses. Thus, the simple sentence is built up by one predicative line, while the composite sentence is built up by two or more predicative lines.

The difference between the compound and complex sentence lies in the relations between the clauses that constitute them.

Fig. 110

Communicative Classification of Sentences

The sentence is a communicative unit, therefore the primary classification of sentences must be based on the communicative principle. This principle is formulated in traditional grammar as the “purpose of communication”.

From the viewpoint of their role in the process of communication sentences are divided into three cardinal sentence-types: the declarative sentence, the imperative sentence, the interrogative sentence (Fig. 111). These types are usually applied to simple sentences. In a complex sentence the communicative type depends upon that of the main clause. In a compound sentence, coordinate clauses may as well belong to different communicative types.

A declarative sentence contains a statement which gives the reader or the listener some information about various events, activities or attitudes, thoughts and feelings. Statements form the bulk of monological speech, and the greater part of conversation. A statement may be positive (affirmative) or negative. Grammatically, statements are characterized by the subject-predicate structure with the direct order of words. Statements usually have a falling tone; they are marked by a pause in speaking and by a full stop in writing. In conversation, statements are often structurally incomplete, especially when they serve as a response to a question asking for some information, and the response conveys the most important idea. Thanks to their structure and lexical content, declarative sentences are communicatively polyfunctional.

Fig. 111

The imperative sentence expresses inducement, commands which convey the desire of the speaker to make someone, generally the listener, perform an action. Besides commands proper, imperative sentences may express prohibition, a request, an invitation, a warning, persuasion, etc., depending on the situation, context, wording, or intonation.

Interrogative sentences contain questions. Their communicative function consists in asking for information. They belong to the sphere of conversation and only occasionally occur in monological speech.

Alongside of the three cardinal communicative sentence-types, another type of sentences is recognised in the theory of syntax, namely, the so-called exclamatory sentence. In modern linguistics it has been demonstrated that exclamatory sentences do not possess any complete set of qualities that could place them on one and the same level with the three cardinal communicative types of sentences.