Introducing English Linguistics

Clause functions
Clause functions are best defined in terms of their relationship to one
another. While the pronouns I and me can clearly be regarded as subject
and object pronouns, respectively, noun phrases in English have no such
markings. Consequently, other linguistic criteria need to be considered to
determine which function a particular element in a clause should be
assigned. For instance, noun phrases can function as subject, object, com-
plement, or adverbial. However, whether a noun phrase is functioning as,
say, subject or direct object will depend upon the relationship the noun
phrase has with the predicator. In the sentence The child paints pictures, the
noun phrase The child is subject, not pictures, because subjects agree with
predicators in number and direct objects do not. If child had been plural,
the predicator would have had a different form: The children paint pictures.
Of course, if the verb is changed to the past tense, agreement becomes
irrelevant, since the same form, painted, would have been used with either
child or children: The child/children painted pictures. This latter example does
not invalidate agreement between subject and verb as an indicator of
what is subject in a sentence. It simply indicates that additional linguistic
criteria are needed to define each of the clause elements.
Because subject and predicator are functions that most clauses contain,
these functions will be considered first as they help define the four types
of sentences in English: declarative, interrogative, exclamatory, and
imperative sentences. The section will close with a discussion of the
remaining clause functions: objects (direct and indirect), complements
(subject and object), and adverbials.
Although terms such as “subject” and “direct object” are used fairly
consistently across various grammars of English, in some more tradition-
ally based grammars other functions have different names. For instance,
in some grammars, “predicate adjective” is used instead of “subject com-
plement.” For the sake of consistency, the terms used in this section (with
one exception) follow those used in Quirk et al. (1985). The one difference
concerns the term “verb,” which Quirk et al. (1985) use to describe both the
form of verbs as well as their function. Since this dual use of the term
“verb” might create unwanted ambiguity, the term “predicator” is used
instead to describe the function of verbal elements and “verb” reserved
only to describe their form.