“The potatoes are boiling”: Thetic Sentences as a Means of Presentation on the Scene

• Authors: ADAM Martin
• Year of publication: 2012
• Type: Appeared in Conference without Proceedings
• MU Faculty or unit: Faculty of Education
• Description: Within the Firbasian framework of the theory of FSP, sentences are understood to implement either the Presentation Scale or the Quality Scale; the author’s research into the area of FSP has recently dealt with the role of the English verb operating in the Presentation Scale sentences (Pr-sentences) (Adam 2011, 2012). In addition to the existential there-construction, it is the “prototypical” configuration of the rhematic subject in preverbal position that seems to convey existence/appearance on the scene most frequently in English (A cruel smile hovered over her face.). The present corpus-based paper proposes to shed light on the structure and the function of a rather specific type of Pr-sentences patterning as relatively short structures with a tentatively context-independent subject (The potatoes are boiling. or The kettle is singing.). Such sentences came to be labelled as “thetic” or sometimes “all-new sentences” (Mathesius 1975: 87; Firbas 1992: 86-87; cf. Kuroda 1972; Lewis 2001). The point is that even if from the static point of view (i.e. that of lexical semantics) such sentences do not suggest the characteristic of appearance/existence, they do not appear to be excluded from expressing presentation on the scene.