Terminology

Text grammar.

Text grammar appeared in the 60-s simultaneously in Russia, in Britain and in the USA. The basic idea of t.g. is that the hierarchy of language units doesn’t finish with the sentence. The text is not just a sequence of sentences it’s a unit in itself. The text is what you hear, read or produce. It exists in 2 forms- oral and written. The inial impulse of this theory was connected actual division of the sentence(тема-рема) Theme is what you know about the sentence, and rheme is a new information. It was stated that sentence in one text are not isolated. They are in some relations and these relations make some definite text structure that is different in different texts. Not only sentences but also text can be described with the help of theme and rheme division.

In real texts we can find different combinations of these patterns and these patterns can be used several times. As a result each text is characterized by its own unique specific structure.

Text grammar also analyses texts from the viewpoint of style and communicative purpose. A lot of text structures are singled here:1) a fable structure (rhythmical, exposition, word) 2) radio program (greeting) 3) application (title, information, signature)

Another branch of text grammar is so called discourse analysis. This discipline is interested in text realization and discourse is defined as a situational bound text. The text length is variable even one sentence can be called a text if it describes some real situation. Logically connected sentences in one text constitute super-phrasal units. It means that several sentences in one long text have one topic. And when this topic is over and another one opens the second super-phrasal unit appears. Very often but not always in written text super-phrasal units correspond to paragraphs. Longer texts like whole stories or even novels can also be called texts but in order to denote their great informative value such is term used- macro-text and smaller portions within such big texts are called – micro- text. At the same time text division is still disputable and in linguistics a lot of related terms exist but they should be differenced.

The super phrasal unit- сверхфразовое единство

The complex syntactic entity- сложно-синтаксическое целое

The super- sentential construction- единица, большее чем предложение

The trans-phrasal whole- межфразовое целое

The paragraph- абзац

The discourse- дискурс

The content block- смысловой блок

The prosaic block- прозаическая строфа.

The texteme union- союз\ сообщество текстем

The micro text – микротекст

Text grammar is also interested in such features of the text which make it one wholistic unit.

All sentences in one text are interrelated to a great or to a small agree. These intertextual relations exist in two levels as usually: on the level of meaning and form. Semantic relations are realized and described by one of basic text categories topical (semantic) entity.

On the formal level relations between sentences are realized by another category that is called lexical – grammatical coherency. This category are comprises all lexical and grammatical means that constitute intertextual structure.

Means of cohesion

1) Partialsubstitution

2) Reference

3) Absolute substitution

4) Repetition

5) Key words (semantic groupings): a) family relations b) evolution

6) Antonyms

7) Synonyms

8) Conjunctions

9) Derivatives

10) Ellipsis

Text structure is also supported by several minor categories like local- temporal- reference of text. Another minor category – modality of the text.