Rheme – Predicate

Actual division

Sentence Division

Syntactic – subject, predicate, object, attribute, adverbial modifier

Actual – theme, rheme

Actual division is the informative value of different parts of the sentence in the actual process of communication. It shows which component of the denoted situation is informationally more important from the point of view of the speaker.

Informative structure of a sentence:

Theme (“the basis” by V. Mathesius) = the starting point of communication, it usually contains some old, “already known” information (topic, given). < Greek the- ‘to set’

Rheme (“the nucleus” by V. Mathesius) = the basic informative part of the sentence, its contextually relevant communicative center, the “peak” of communication, or the information reported about the theme; it usually contains some new information (comment, focus). < Greek rhe- ‘to say’

+ A transition is an intermediary (промежуточный) part (lecture). It can also be treated as a secondary rheme, the “subrhematic” part of a sentence (Blokh).

For example: Again Charlie is late. – Again (transition) Charlie (theme) is late (rheme).

The rheme is the obligatory informative component of a sentence.

Theme and rheme may include more than one word – a subject group or predicate group.

There may be sentences which include only the rheme; the theme and the transition are optional.

For example: Who sang the song? – Caroline.

Syntactic division or Actual division?

1. Mary helped us a lot. – syntactic analysis?

Mary (S) helped (P) us (O) a lot (AdM).

2. Mary helped us a lot. – actual division analysis?

Theme – Subject

Rheme – Predicate

English fixed word order is compensated by a comparatively free functional sentence perspective:

R – T A woman enters.

T – R – T There is a book on the table.

Actual division builds up concrete contexts out of constructional sentence models chosen to reflect different situations and events.

Contextual relevance of actual division is manifested in contextual ellipsis: the elliptical sentence normally contains the most important part of the information, the rheme, while the theme is omitted,

e.g.: Where is the pond? – In the garden.

Syntactic division – formal grammatical factor

Actual division – semantic contextual factor

The theory of actual division of the sentence is connected with the logical analysis of the proposition (суждение). The principal parts of the proposition are the logical subject and the logical predicate; these two parts correlate with the theme and the rheme.

- Theme = logical subject

- Rheme = logical predicate

The logical subject and the logical predicate, like the theme and the rheme, may or may not coincide, respectively, with the subject and the predicate of the sentence.

Types of actual division:

1. “ direct ”, “ unspecialized ”, or “ unmarked ”

Direct actual division means that the theme coincides with the subject (or the subject group), while the rheme coincides with the predicate (the predicate group) of the sentence, as in Charlie is late. – Charlie (theme) is late (rheme).

2. “ inverted ”, “ reverse ”, “ specialized ”, or “ marked ”

The rheme is expressed by the subject and it precedes the theme, which is expressed by the predicate, e.g.: Who is late today? – Charlie (rheme) is late (theme).

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14