Understanding sentence structures

Introduction

Readers expect information to be presented to them sentence-by-sentence in certain constituent orders. For example, they expect the (S)ubject constituent to come first and be followed by the (V)erb constituent, which in turn is followed by the (O)bject constituent (if there is one).

This fundamental expectation is the basis for the classification of English as an SVO language.

Readers also expect information to be presented to them according to certain general organisational principles. One of these principles is that the new information in a sentence will come at the end of the sentence.

In most cases in English, the specific constituent orders align with the general organisational principles. So there is usually no problem. But when they do come into conflict, writers will most often choose to prioritise one or more of the general organisational principles over the expected constituent order. And they have several specific techniques for doing so.

On this basis, the rest of the article is organised as follows:

• Firstly, we will list and exemplify the common constituent structures, of which the SVO order is just one.
• Secondly, we will analyse the four most important general organisational principles, which can also be viewed as reader expectations.
• Thirdly, we will list and exemplify the specific techniques that result in a A non-canonical constituent structure is a constituent structure that is not one of the seven canonical SV+ sentence orders that are listed in the section below. non-canonical constituent structure due to prioritising a general organisational principle.

Sentence constituents

We have noted that English is classified as an SVO language, with the three constituents being the subject, verb and object. The other two sentence† constituents are the (C)omplement and the (A)djunct (also known as an (A)dverbial).

There are no simple but fully adequate definitions of the constituents. So, let's just look at some examples as being sufficiently explanatory.

The seven canonical sentence structures

According to A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (page 721) there are seven basic (also known as default or canonical) sentence structures formed from a combination of two or more of the five constituents. These are:

1. Subject-Verb (SV):
   • She laughed.
   • My goldfish has died.
2. Subject-Verb-Object (SVO):
   • He collects stamps.
   • I bought a new phone.
3. Subject-Verb-Complement (SVC):
   • She is a politician.
   • The cake smells delicious.
4. Subject-Verb-Object-Object (SVOO):
   • She gave me a gift.
   • He taught the students mathematics.

     Note: me and the students are indirect objects; a gift and mathematics are direct objects.

5. Subject-Verb-Adjunct (SVA):
   • My office is on the top floor.
   • The basketball court was behind the car park.
6. Subject-Verb-Object-Adjunct (SVOA):
   • She put her phone on the bedside table.
   • I keep my precious bike in the hallway.
7. Subject-Verb-Object-Complement (SVOC):
   • I found the movie boring.
   • They elected her captain of the chess team.

As you see, each of the seven constituent structures starts subject-verb (SV).

Reader expectations

Native English readers intuitively expect the information presented to them will conform to one of the seven constituent orders above. For example, they expect the subject to be followed by a verb indicating what the subject does or is. They expect a transitive verb such as put to be followed immediately by an object. So, they will be surprised by I put in the dishwasher the plate.

But, as well as such expectations about the specific constituent order of a sentence, readers also expect that information will be presented to them according to certain more general organisational principles. These principles are explained in the next section.

General organisational principles

The four most important general organisational principles are topic-comment, given-new, end-focus and end-weight. Over stretches of text these principles combine to allow writers to control the information flow, so that the texts are perceived as being cohesive.

- Topic-Comment

This is probably the most basic expectation that readers have about the structure of a sentence. Namely, that it will start with the topic (in other words, who or what the sentence will be about) and that it will be followed by information about the topic. This information is called the comment.

In most cases, the topic of the sentence (i.e. the phrase or clause at the start of the sentence) will also be the grammatical subject. Here are three examples from above, in which the topic/grammatical subject is coloured red, and the comment is the rest of the sentence (the predicate).

• English is classified as an SVO language.
• Good writers will usually wish to comply with the two types of expectation.
• The four most important general organisational principles are topic-comment, given-new, end-focus and end-weight.

In many cases, however, the writer will wish the topic of the sentence to be something other than the grammatical subject. A simple example is Next week my grandmother is arriving from Rome. The topic of the sentence, what the sentence is about, is Next week, and the comment (the rest of the sentence) tells us what is happening next week.

Here are two simple examples of where the topic/start of the sentence is not the grammatical subject. (The topic is coloured red and the grammatical subject green.)

• After the storm, a rainbow appeared in the sky.
• Every other week in winter I go skiing in the German alps.

In summary, the topic-comment structure is the primary organisational principle. It based on the fundamental expectation by readers of how writers should present information to them.

- Given-New

The second reader expectation, and consequently an organisational principle, is that given information should come before new information, generally at the start of the sentence. The concept of what can be categorized as given is somewhat vague. Indeed, not all grammarians like the term given and use alternatives such as discourse-old and common ground.

But basically, what is given is regarded as information that the reader has already been presented with or can be expected to infer from the context. A simple example of what has already been presented to the reader is the pronoun it at the start of the second sentence here:

• My mother sent me a watch for Christmas. It's broken already.

It obviously refers to the watch and is therefore clearly given information.

In the following text, the second sentence starts with new information (namely, the postman):

• My mother sent me a watch for Christmas. The postman broke it when he shoved the parcel through the letterbox.

The second sentence above will probably be regarded as less natural by many readers than:

• My mother sent me a watch for Christmas. It was broken by the postman when he shoved the parcel through the letterbox.

Here's a slightly longer text in which each new sentence (after the first one) starts with new information:

Many readers will find it, too, 'awkward' or unnatural without necessarily being able to identify why. The answer, of course, is that the second and third sentences contravene the given-new principle, and are thus found lacking in cohesion - a major advantage of given-new.

Here is the given-new version:

Another example of what can be called given or discourse-old information is on a stool in I walked into the kitchen. On a stool was a book about cats. Everyone knows that kitchens usually have stools. This is the common ground; in other words, information that the reader can infer.

Compare this with I walked into the kitchen. On a bed was a book about cats. Most readers will probably find on a bed here odd† and classify it as new information in the way that on a stool is not.

- End-Focus

The principle of end-focus is based on the fact that readers generally pay the greatest attention to the end of a sentence. They do this because they have internalised the principle of given-new. They correctly assume that the new information is likely to be the most important element in the sentence and should be the primary focus of their attention.

Note, however, that the principle of end-focus does not have to be in the context of a given-new sentence. For example:

• Inside our shed yesterday I found a family of cats.

The topic of the sentence is Inside our shed yesterday, which sets the scene, but the writer uses the principle of end-focus to indicate to the reader that the presence of the family of cats is the more important information

Fiction writers can use the principle of end-focus to create surprise or suspense by placing the grammatical subject (in red below) at the end. For example:

• Running down the road in a long black coat with her blonde hair blowing in the wind was a young child.

- End-Weight

End-weight is the last general organisational principle to be discussed here. The term has various interpretations. In one interpretation, weight is regarded as synonymous with importance. So we can see the link between end-weight and end-focus in the cat example above.

But the weight of an element according to a different, more common interpretation of this principle refers simply to the length of the element. It states the preference for the longest or most complex element in a sentence to appear last. Here is a simple example of a sentence that contravenes the end-weight principle:

• John turned all the Christmas lights he had strung along the hedge and over the front door on.

The very 'light' particle on at the end of this sentence is infelicitous. Much better is to position the particle directly after the verb.

• John turned on all the Christmas lights he had strung along the hedge and over the front door.

In the following example†, the writer has chosen to contravene the canonical subject-verb-object-complement SVOC order, since the object is very 'weighty' and the complement very 'light' (short).

• He lays bare the mechanisms that construct a narrative whose secondary revisions are attempts to deny the very desire which it expresses... . (The object phrase continues for another five lines.)

The complement is shown in red and the object in green. The canonical SVOC order of the full sentence is very hard to process, since the reader has to hold a great deal of information in her head before understanding the message that the writer wishes to convey:

• He lays the mechanisms that construct a narrative whose secondary revisions are attempts to deny the very desire which it expresses... . (The object phrase continues for another five lines) bare.

-- Principle conflicts

It is not uncommon for general organisational principles to stand in conflict with each other. A typical conflict is between given-new and end-weight. Consider two consecutive sentences from the next section in the article.

They also choose non-canonical constructions in order to give focus or emphasis to a particular element in the sentence. Information packaging is the term for the use of specific techniques to achieve these two goals† and that result in non-canonical constructions.

The second sentence starts with new, not given, information. Namely, the term information packaging. Hence it contravenes the given-new principle. But it conforms to the end-weight principle in that it concludes with the 'weighty' and complex noun phrase complement:

...the term for the use of specific techniques to achieve these two goals and that result in non-canonical constructions

Alternatively, flouting the end-weight principle in order to conform to the given-new principle results in:

They also choose non-canonical constructions in order to give focus or emphasis to a particular element in the sentence. The term for the use of specific techniques to achieve these two goals and that result in non-canonical constructions is information packaging.

Information packaging

So far, we have looked at the canonical constituent orders of sentences and at the general organisational principles or reader expectations of how information will be presented to them.

When these two come into conflict, it is usual for writers to prioritise the latter and write non-canonical constituent orders. They also choose non-canonical constructions in order to give focus or emphasis to a particular element in the sentence.

The term for the use of specific techniques to achieve these two goals and that result in non-canonical constructions is information packaging. The specific information packaging techniques are the subject of the next section of the article.

- Fronting

The first information packaging technique is fronting (also called preposing). Fronting is placing a sentence element other than the grammatical subject at the start of the sentence. The particular element is in most cases an adjunct - either an adverbial phrase or an adverbial clause. We saw an example of this earlier. Namely:

• Next week my grandmother is arriving from Rome.

Here are more fronted adjunct phrases or clauses:

• Occasionally I travel to work by bike.
• After the accident he was unable to walk properly for months.
• All of a sudden, it started to pour with rain.
• While walking in the forest yesterday I saw a wild pig.
• Before she did her homework, she spent an hour playing video games.

Other types of fronted element include complements, objects, non-finite constructions and dependent clauses. When they start the sentence they attain a stronger emphasis and in many cases become the topic. Here are some examples:

• Coffee I like, tea I don't.
• Intelligent she must have been, she came top of her class in all subjects.
• The physics teacher's lectures I don't understand at all.
• The new boss is very good. - That she is.
• Long and difficult though the project was, everyone enjoyed it.
• Whether or not he was there, I cannot be certain.
• I promised to help him and help him I did.

- Inversion

In most cases, placing an element other than the subject at the front of the sentence does not change the constituent order of the rest of the sentence. There are, however, five types of fronting that do change the constituent order of the rest of the sentence, namely subject-verb (SV) inversion†.

Here are examples of the necessary SV inversion in each type. The verb-subject is shown in italics:

• fronting of a negative or restrictive adjunct:
  • Never have I seen such a beautiful sunset.
  • Under no circumstances should you tell her that.
  • Hardly had they arrived in the hotel than they started complaining about it.
• fronting of a 'comparative' adverb or adjective††:
  • So carefully did he hide his medical problems that no-one knew he was ill.
  • Very popular among young people are the videos on TikTok.
  • Fastest to solve the chess problem was the new student from Korea.
  • Such was her popularity that the students elected her president of the student council.
• fronting of a locative or temporal adverb:
  • Here comes the bus.
  • Now is the time to get down to work.
  • There goes my neighbour with her two cute dogs.
• fronting of a prepositional phrase:
  • Down the road came a marching band.
  • On the wall hung a large picture of a sunset.
  • In the middle of the field stood a large scarecrow with broomstick.†††.
• fronting of participle clauses:
  • Attached is my resume.
  • Hidden behind the curtain lay the birthday presents.
  • Sitting on top of the car was a large gray cat.
  • Waiting outside the school for the end of lessons are always many mothers in their cars.

- Passive sentences

Writers use the passive for various reasons, but in the context of information packaging the most important one is to conform to the topic-comment and given-new principles.

In the simple active sentence Jack ate the pizza the topic is Jack. Using the passive equivalent enables the writer to make the pizza the topic: The pizza was eaten by Jack. This may be done, for example, to place the focus on which food was eaten by which person: The pizza was eaten by Jack; the hamburger by Jill.

As for conforming to the given-new principle, let's look first at a simple example:

• The looter ran out of the store with a television. The police arrested him at his home later that day.

The grammatical subject of the second sentence the police is new information. So the sentence contravenes the given-new principle.

The alternative version, using the passive, conforms to the principle. And, incidentally, it is another example of why the passive is better in this context. Namely, because the agent or doer of the action is obvious (it can only be the police who arrested him), and it can be omitted.

• The looter ran out of the store with a television. He was arrested at his home later that day.

As a final example of the importance of the passive in information packaging, here again is the passivized version of the 'awkward' non-passive text from above about the start of the World War II:

• The second world war began in September 1939. It was caused by the invasion of Poland by German troops. At this time Poland was governed by the Polish Socialist Party.

It and Poland are given information, while caused by the invasion of Poland by German troops and was governed by the Polish Socialist Party are both new information. And in this case, they also both conform to the principles of end-focus and end-weight.

- Postposing

Postposing is placing a constituent later than its normal position in the sentence. For example, postposing the object in the canonical SVOA word order exemplified in I play chess every day. Certainly, the result of this postposing, the SVAO order, I play every day chess, is highly infelicitous.

However, there are many occasions on which such postposing is in fact desirable. This applies most typically when the postposing results in a sentence that conforms to the principle of end-weight and/or end-focus.

For example, in the standard SVOA word order sentence,

• I received a letter that had been posted three weeks before in New York but had been delayed by a postal workers' strike yesterday.

the object (in red) has a far greater weight than the adjunct (yesterday).

Much better, in this case, is the postposing of the object in the non-canonical SVAO sentence:

• I received yesterday a letter that had been posted three weeks before in New York but had been delayed by a postal workers' strike.

Here are two more examples. The red words are the postposed object:

• You'll find on your desk the report that the company's advisors finally completed last week.
• She examined carefully all the artefacts uncovered by archaeologists during the 1980s.

The postposing of the object is often also preferable even when the object has a lesser weight than the adjunct it switches places with. In this case, the writer prioritizes end-focus over end-weight:

• Walking into the kitchen I saw on the floor under the table a squirrel.

Postposing of a complement is also possible but will often results in an infelicitous sentence. For example: ?He is at a private school a teacher and ?She wants to become in an orchestra a violinist.†

In summary, postposing is done to comply with the principle of end-weight or of end-focus or of both.

- Extraposition

The next information packaging technique is called extraposition. It's somewhat difficult to give the word a simple definition, so we will start with several examples:

• It has been nice talking to you.
• It was not clear why she did that.
• It is pointless phoning the police.
• It shows a lack of respect to walk into class chewing gum.
• It has yet to be proved whether the virus had a natural origin or escaped from a lab.
• It didn't help his grades that he spent all his time playing video games instead of studying.

The non-extraposed equivalents have a more basic SVC or SVO structure:

• Talking to you has been nice.
• Why she did that was not clear.
• Phoning the police is pointless.
• To walk into class chewing gum shows a lack of respect.
• Whether the virus had a natural origin or escaped from a lab has yet to be proved .
• That he spent all his time playing video games instead of studying didn't help his grades .

As you see, all the extraposed examples start with the non-referential pronoun it and end with a complement clause, thus complying with the principles of end-weight and end-focus.

It is no surprise, therefore, that extraposed sentences such as those above are more common than their non-extraposed equivalents.

Note that the previous sentence is itself an example of extrapositioning! Its non-extraposed equivalent is:

• That extraposed sentences such as those above are more common than their non-extraposed equivalents is no surprise.

This version of the sentence, with its long subject, is more difficult to process, as well as contravening the principle of end-weight.

- Existential 'there'

The existential there is the there at the start of sentences such as There's a cat sitting on our neighbour's car and There was a lot of difficulty coming to an agreement.

Writers choose the existential 'there' since it complies with the given-new, end-weight and end-focus principles. For example, in the following sentences the words in italics are the semantic subject. In each case, this is new information; it has much more weight than its grammatical subject There and it thereby attains the reader's focus.

• There is a crisis in education.
• There was no chance that we could win the game.
• There has been an accident at the factory.

In some cases, there are existential and non-existential equivalents. For example: There's a fly in my soup and A fly is in my soup. But in many cases, such as in the three examples above, there is no acceptable or grammatical non-existential alternative:

• ?A crisis in education exists.
• *No chance that we could win the game was.
• *An accident at the factory has been.

The existential 'there' is a common and useful non-canonical construction.

- Cleft sentences

Cleft sentences are a fairly radical rearrangement of the constituents of a canonical sentence. Basically, they involve dividing the sentence into two parts, with the new part being fronted (preposed) or moved to the end of the sentence (postposed), thus emphasizing a particular element.

So, for example, take the simple sentence John ate the pizza. It can be divided into two parts in the following three ways:

• It was John who ate the pizza. (it-cleft)
• What John ate was the pizza. (pseudo-cleft†)
• The pizza is what John ate. (reverse pseudo cleft)

The it-cleft above emphasises the semantic subject (John) as the pizza eater. This is one use of the structure; namely as a correction of a false claim. For example, the claim that Mary ate the pizza. The response could be expanded as: It was John who ate the pizza, not Mary. She ate the pasta. A similar it-cleft response to a false assumption about where the homework is done is It's in the kitchen that I do my homework (not in my bedroom).

The it-cleft is also common in neutral contexts to provide emphasis to the semantic subject. For example: It was in spring that we met for the first time. Or It is the head of school who will make the final decision.

The pseudo-cleft† (for example, Where I found the key was behind the fridge) allows the writer to place a special emphasis on the complement following the copula (the verb to be). In other words, behind the fridge in the above example.

Clearly, there is end-focus on behind the fridge in the canonical SVOA sentence I found the key behind the fridge. But the pseudo-cleft version amplifies that focus.

And in contrast to the SVOA sentence, the pseudo-cleft version allows compliance with the given-new principle. The given is shared information about the search for the lost key, and the new information is where it was found.

The reverse pseudo-cleft simply inverts the two parts of a regular pseudo-cleft. For example, Behind the fridge was where I found the key. This contravenes the given-new principle and gives greater emphasis to the Behind the fridge adjunct than it would have in the corresponding canonical SVOA version.

In summary, writers use the different cleft sentences to place emphasis on one or other of the sentence elements and to comply with one or more of the general principles of information packaging.

- Topicalization

I have noted earlier that, in most cases, writers intend the first element in a sentence to be the topic of the sentence - what the sentence is about. Fronting is the most common way to establish an element other than the grammatical subject as the topic.

But there are some phrases that explicitly set the topic of the sentence. Here are some examples:

• As for solutions to the problem, we can only hope that one will be found soon.
• Regarding Mia's suggestion, it's not obvious how this will help solve the problem.
• As far as Maik's proposal is concerned, we have other priorities that we need to address beforehand.
• In terms of student satisfaction, we are planning a detailed survey.
• With respect to your vacation plans, you need to check if you need a visa and vaccinations.

In each case above, the topicalization phrase can be considered to be given information, while the rest of the sentence (i.e. the comment) is new information.

- Dislocation

Let's conclude with the specific information packaging technique called dislocation. There is left dislocation as exemplified in That new bike I bought last week, I've already crashed it three times. And right dislocation as in I've already crashed it three times, that new bike I bought last week.

In left-dislocation, the first clause is a clear case of explicit topicalization. For example, the topicalization of that book I lent you, in That book I lent you, can I have it back? Furthermore, the first clause is an example of compliance with the given-new principle, since the prior loaning of the book is common ground or shared knowledge between writer and reader.

The same content in right-dislocation is Can I have it back, that book I lent you? In this case, the second clause is needed in order to clarify the pronoun it in the first clause. Left dislocation overrides the given-new principle, but complies with end-focus.

Here are two more examples of each:

- left dislocation

• My two poodles, they are so intelligent.
• The software update I installed yesterday, it wiped out my hard drive.

- right dislocation

• She's really nice, our new English teacher.
• They are always talking about the weather, my British colleagues.

Summary examples

Before concluding, here is a list of some of the ways that the unmarked† declarative SVOA sentence John ate pizza for dinner can be presented to the reader using the various information packaging techniques.

Hopefully, you now know enough information about information packaging to add one or two more sentences to the list above.

Sentence structures in this article

A large majority of the sentences in this long article comply with one of the seven canonical constituent structures listed at the beginning. And most of those that don't are examples of the fronting of an adjunct† (ASVO, ASVOC, etc).

So, clearly the priority for the English learner is to become very comfortable using those canonical structures, including the fronted adjunct variations. Nevertheless, there is great value in having knowledge of the marked structures analysed here and the reasons why one or other of them may be the best choice in a particular context.

Conclusion

An understanding of the general principles for organising text sentence-by-sentence and knowledge of the specific techniques of information packaging to place a particular focus on one part of the sentence is important for English learners.†

Not only does such understanding and knowledge help learners to become effective writers in the various genres, but it also makes them more competent readers of the texts that others have written - in particular, how to detect structural differences from the norm and how to correctly interpret the writer's reasons for these differences.

More on the topic

Elsewhere on this site are two video projects on the topics covered here: default constituent orders and information packaging principles and techniques.

You can quiz yourself on your knowledge and understanding of information packaging principles. And here you can practise identifying the specific information packaging techniques.

Finally, here is a more detailed look at the topic on an external website. The author gives particular attention to the concept of given as in given-new. His term for given is common ground, namely the common ground between the producer and the recipient of the message.

In contrast to this article, the author includes many examples of how information packaging (he calls it Information Structure) is performed in spoken language, where prosody (for example, intonation) can provide emphasis on a certain aspect of the text in a way that written language cannot.

Sources

The following grammar books were consulted in creating this article. Some of the example sentences here were taken from those sources:

• ^65^ (pages 315-335)
• ^66^ (pages 397-426)
• ^67^ (pages 777-802)
• ^64^ (pages 611-628)
• ^33^ (pages 1363-1447)
• ^52^ (pages 1353-1419)

Note that both the Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English and A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language focus on information packaging in spoken language - an essential aspect of the topic that is not covered in this article.

The Cambridge Grammar of English and the Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English cited above that are both pedagogic grammars aimed at English language learners. The other books are descriptive grammars.

The two pedagogic grammars are good at associating a particular marked sentence structure (i.e. as a result of the specific information packaging technique that has been applied) with one or other of the general organisational principles, such as given-new.

A final point

Grammarians frequently disagree on the classification and terminology of the various elements in a sentence. A particular issue concerns the distinction and overlap between complements and adjuncts.

For example, how should on the top floor in the sentence My office is on the top floor (see above) be classified? A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language classifies it as an adjunct in the SVA sentence structure. But the phrase is clearly needed to 'complete the sentence', which fits the basic definition of a complement.

These kinds of issues are obviously of importance to linguists and grammarians. But for English language learners, the primary audience for this site, grammaticality and usage are fundamentally more important.

So, knowing when to use a pseudo-cleft and how to form it (for example, Where I found the key was behind the fridge) is more important than determining whether behind the fridge is an adjunct or a complement or both.