From Syntax to Text: the Janus Face of Functional Sentence Perspective

Abstract

The volume deals with the interaction between syntax, informational structure (or functional sentence perspective), and text in present-day English and Czech. Libuse Duskova focuses on the two facets of functional sentence perspective: syntactic structures as carriers of informational structure functions and the connection of functional sentence perspective within the level of text. Functional sentence perspective is investigated as a potential factor of syntactic divergence between English and Czech, and the role of functional sentence perspective is examined with respect to theme development, text build-up, and style. Other topics include the hierarchical relationship between syntax and functional sentence perspective and general and specific questions of word order, with major attention paid to the role of semantics.