Microsoft Word Theoretical Course of English Grammar

Nino Kirvalidze
101
of a lingual sign until the required content is supplied. These scholars indicate, that such a 
mechanism would work best if the distance between the pro-form and the co-referring
expression is kept within limits, for instance, inside the boundaries of a single sen-
tence. They provide the following example:
“I don’t know if 
he
is serious, but 
my roommate
wants
to walk a tightrope over Niagara Falls.”
Cataphoric reference is less common than anaphoric but its use make the speech 
dramatic and more expressive. In this example the use of cataphora makes the speech 
dramatic and more expressive. A pronoun may look ahead to an entire event rather than 
an individual object, as in Halliday and Hasan’s next example: 
“I would never have believed 
it
. 
They’ve accepted the whole scheme
.” 
Cataphoric reference is less common than anaphoric, but in written texts it can be 
used for dramatic or stylistic effect, as well as for such pragmatic purpose as to intensify 
the readers’ interest stimulating them to get the necessary information for filling up the 
gap created by the pronoun. In news stories and literature, examples of cataphoric use
of pronouns are often found in the opening sentences of the text. The initial use of cata-
phoric reference is considered as the manifestation of the author’s communicative strategy 
to engage and hold the reader’s attention with a “read on and find out” message. 
The third type of co-referencial devices is exophora that implies a reference to as-
sumed, shared worlds outside the text (Gk. “exo” = “outside”). Exophoric reference is 
mainly used to describe generic or abstract situations. It occurs when the speaker chooses 
not to identify a person or a thing but instead refers to them as abstract entities by generic 
words such as indefinite pronouns 
“everyone”, everybody”, “everything”,
etc.: 
Everybody
loves his own mother.
No-one
drives a car when he is drunk. 
Everyone likes to relax in his garden. 
Another cohesive device is ellipsis. It is the omission of elements normally re-
quired by the grammar which the speaker or writer assumes are obvious from the context 
and therefore need not be raised. This is not to say that every utterance which is not fully 

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Theoretical Course of English Grammar 
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