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UNMARKED THEME AND MARKED THEME IN DECLARATIVE CLAUSES

المؤلف:  Angela Downing

المصدر:  ENGLISH GRAMMAR A UNIVERSITY COURSE

الجزء والصفحة:  P207-C6

2026-05-29

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UNMARKED THEME AND MARKED THEME IN DECLARATIVE CLAUSES

In selecting Theme, speakers must choose between a neutral order of clause constituents or a marked order. The order of clause elements in 1 has the Subject as Theme. This is the neutral, unmarked choice in a declarative clause, used when there is no good reason to depart from the usual. Any other constituent but the Subject will be marked, and signals an additional meaning. In the case of 2 the Theme is a circum- stance of time, syntactically an Adjunct, and is marked. However, it does not strike us as very unusual. This is because adjuncts of time can occupy several positions in the clause. Theme 3 is an Object participant whose normal position is after the verb. Objects are not so mobile and sound highly marked in English when brought to initial position. Marked constituent orders always signal some additional meaning and have to be motivated. Thematized Objects tend to express a contrast with something said or expected by the hearer. By specifying Lancaster but not Carlisle as the Object, the speaker refers explicitly to a contrary expectation and justifies the thematized element. We will return shortly to the most frequent types of marked Theme. For the moment, you can ‘feel’ that certain elements sound more striking than others when in initial position.

From these considerations, it is clear that the Theme of a clause represents a choice, both as the absolute point of departure of a discourse and also that of each subsequent clause and of each paragraph. It gives us the choice of taking as point of departure one or other participant in the situation described, or something else, such as a circumstance. It can serve to link up with what has gone before in the discourse and it helps to push the message forward. Because sentences do not normally occur in isolation, and previous sentences and utterances condition later ones, not all thematic choices will be equally appropriate from the point of view of creating a coherent whole.