Gradience in English Clause Combination

Abstract

The previous chapter described clause combination in some of the most important reference grammars of the English language. It then synthesized this work into a model of English clause grammar that distributed the core clause categories along a hierarchy of integration, rather than viewing the clause system as the binary system of integration with the only relevant levels being subordination and coordination. Some preliminary work was done to show that this notion of hierarchy is more than only a model of the clause system, but that it reflects something cognitively real about the English clause system (Givon 1993). Exploring the influence of the clause hierarchy in other patterns of discourse as well as the developmental trends of the language occupies much of the remainder of the book; however, before doing so, the aim of this chapter is to explore more exhaustively the notion of gradience in the English clause system. While the previous chapter focussed mostly on the common core clause types to represent a category (Biber et al. 1999), within each of the clause categories along the hierarchy there are a range of subtypes. When these are considered closely, it becomes difficult to draw categorical boundaries in the English clause system and it is perhaps better represented therefore by a fuzzy grammar. Further, the clause categories of English might better be described as having prototype members and radial members, in which the prototypes are quite distinct from other clause categories, but the radial members are less so.