Performative Subordinate Clauses - Proceedings of the Tenth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (1984)

Oct 22, 2026

Uploaded by moss~

The paper analyzes English subordinate clauses that permit “main-clause” constructions, focusing on performative subordinate clauses in if- and because-clauses. It contrasts pairs such as “I’m leaving, because here comes my bus” vs. the ungrammatical “I’m leaving, if here comes my bus,” showing that the differentiating construction typically confined to main clauses can appear only in because-clauses. The study examines additional cases (e.g., negative questions, exclamations) and argues that an explanation requires a theory of grammatical constructions with semantic and pragmatic constraints.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages10

Reading Time25 min

AccessFree to download

Some Speech Act Constructions

Berkeley Linguistics Society Performative Subordinate ClausesAuthor(s):George Lakoff Proceedings of the Tenth Annual Meeting ofthe Berkeley LinguisticsSociety(1984),pp.472-480 Please see "How to cite"in the online sidebar for full citation information. Please contact BLS regarding any further use of this work.BLS retainscopyright for both print and screen forms of the publication.BLS may becontacted via http://linguistics.berkeley.edu/bls/. The Annual Proceedings of the Berkeley Linguistics Societyis published onlinevia eLanguage,the Linguistic Society of America's digital publishing platform. Performative Subordinate Clauses George LakoffUniversity of California,Berkeley In traditional grammar,a grammatical construction was a syntacticconfiguration(often a complex configuration),paired with conditions on meaningand use.In classical transformational grammar,transformations were intended tocapture the syntactic aspects of constructions.For example,the passive transfor-mation was to account for sentences displaying what had been called passive con-structions;the question transformation was to account for question constructions;and so on.Of course,transformational grammar ignored the semantic and prag-matic aspects of constructions.Generative semantics,in part,tried to recon-struct the traditional concept of the construction by including semantic andpragmatic conditions on individual transformations. Within recent formal theories of grammar,the concept of the constructionhas almost completely disappeared.Generalized phrase-structure grammar has adegenerative form of construction in which simple phrase-structure rules arepaired with constraints on truth-conditional semantics.But the complex con-struction --including constraints on pragmatics --has virtually disappeared fromthe literature on formal syntax and semantics.Grammatical constructions are atbest considered an epiphenomenon,to be accounted for by other,more general,principles;at worst,they are ignored. One purpose of this paper is to point out an area of English grammar thatrequires grammatical constructions in their full form --syntactic configurationspaired with semantic and pragmatic conditions.A second purpose of this paperis to revive a rich tradition of grammatical analysis that has waned in recentyears--the tradition of semantically-based syntax.I will attempt to do this bytaking a very traditional kind of question in syntax:what kinds of syntacticconfigurations can occur in what kinds of subordinate clauses?It is a syntacticquestion of the most basic kind.I will then try to show that a general answer tothis question cannot be given in syntactic terms alone,and moreover that it canbe given only within a theory that contains grammatical constructions thatinclude semantic and pragmatic constraints. The phenomenon I'll be discussing can be seen in the sentences: -I'm leaving,because here comes my bus. -*I’m leaving,if here comes my bus. If-clauses and because-clauses are both adverbial clauses.It is usually assumedthat whatever can occur in one kind of adverbial clause can occur in another. These examples indicate that that simply isn't true.Because-clauses permit con- structions that if-clauses forbid. What is of particular interest in these examples is that the constructionthat differentiates them,as exemplified by Here comes my bus,is usually assumedto be a main-clause construction --a construction that occurs only in mainclauses.What is a main-clause construction doing in a subordinate clause at all?And why does it occur in because-clauses but not in if-clauses?Do other main-clause constructions act in the same way?And if so,which ones do,and why? A quick look at other constructions that are supposed to occur only in mainclauses shows that Here comes my bua is not alone.Take,for example,a negativequestion like Ian't it a beautiful day?!It shows exactly the same behavior: -We should go on a picnic,because isn't it a beautiful da

FAQs

What central contrast does the paper make between because-clauses and if-clauses?

Because-clauses allow constructions that if-clauses forbid, illustrated by examples where “main-clause” behavior appears after because but not after if.

Why is the appearance of main-clause constructions in subordinate clauses considered problematic?

Main-clause constructions are usually assumed to occur only in main clauses, so their presence in subordinate because-clauses raises questions about the underlying grammatical mechanism.

What kind of explanation does the author propose the theory must include?

The paper argues that a syntactic-only answer is insufficient and that the theory must include grammatical constructions with semantic and pragmatic constraints.

Oct 22, 2026

Uploaded by moss~