MASARYK UNIVERSITY Faculty of Arts

Department of English and American Studies

Philology – English Language

Vladimíra Ježdíková

Conjuncts in English Scientific Prose

Dissertation

Supervisor: doc. PhDr. Renata Povolná, Ph.D.

2011

I hereby declare that I have worked on this dissertation

independently using only the sources listed in references.

...........................................................

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my deep gratitude to my supervisor, doc. PhDr. Renata

Povolná, Ph.D., for her guidance, expert and helpful advice, inspiring criticism and support

that she has provided me with during the supervision of my doctoral dissertation.

My great thanks are also due to doc. PhDr. Ludmila Urbanová, CSc., for her help,

motivation and kind support throughout the course of my study.

Finally, I would like to thank my husband and my family, who have always

encouraged me and supported me. I appreciate their tolerance and patience especially during

the final stages of my studies.

Table of contents

1 Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 1

1.1 Research motivation and objectives .................................................................................... 2

1.2 Hypotheses ............................................................................................................................ 3

1.3 The scope of investigation .................................................................................................... 4

2 Theoretical framework.............................................................................................................. 7

2.1 Style ....................................................................................................................................... 7

2.1.1 Scientific prose style .................................................................................................... 11

2.2 Style and genre .................................................................................................................... 15

2.3 Approaches to the study of style ........................................................................................ 16

2.3.1 Pragmatics, semantics and context.............................................................................. 17

2.3.2 Coherence and cohesion .............................................................................................. 20

3 Previous research on conjuncts ............................................................................................. 24

4 Criteria of investigation .......................................................................................................... 31

5 Text analysis.............................................................................................................................. 36

5.1 Formal realization ............................................................................................................... 38

5.1.1 Single-word and multi-word conjuncts ...................................................................... 42

5.1.2 Analysis of multi-word conjuncts ............................................................................... 43

5.1.3 Analysis of single-word conjuncts .............................................................................. 51

5.1.4 Problems with excerpting conjuncts ........................................................................... 61

5.2 Position of conjuncts in the sentence structure ................................................................. 70

5.2.1. Position in clause......................................................................................................... 70

5.2.2 Position in simple sentences versus sentence complexes .......................................... 75

5.2.3 Position in paragraph ................................................................................................... 82

5.3 Punctuation .......................................................................................................................... 88

5.4 Semantic role of conjuncts ............................................................................................... 104

5.4.1 Listing conjuncts ........................................................................................................ 108

5.4.2 Summative conjuncts ................................................................................................. 113

5.4.3 Appositive conjuncts .................................................................................................. 117

5.4.4 Resultive conjuncts .................................................................................................... 119

5.4.5 Inferential conjuncts................................................................................................... 122

5.4.6 Contrastive conjuncts ................................................................................................. 123

5.4.7 Transitional conjuncts ................................................................................................ 125

6 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................. 129

List of tables ............................................................................................................................... 137

Abbreviations ............................................................................................................................. 140

Glossary of terms ...................................................................................................................... 141

References................................................................................................................................... 145

List of investigated texts ........................................................................................................... 150

Appendix..................................................................................................................................... 153

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1 Introduction

In the last decades linguistics started focusing its attention on the structure of larger

parts of language. From phonetics and phonology, which were at the centre of interest mainly

at the beginning of the twentieth century and the development of which was remarkably

contributed to by the Prague Linguistic Circle, linguists‟ interests moved to higher language

levels. Using the latest results of these still very important disciplines, linguists inquire into

discourse structure, coherence, cohesion and style. They deal with the way the addressee

perceives written or spoken language messages, decodes information not only from the

meanings of individual words or sentences but also from the way discourse is organized, how

the new information follows from the previous text, what holds the text together.

Discourse analysis concerns more than one level of meaning – apart from the literal

meaning there can be another indirect, hidden meaning. The ability or inability to understand

all levels of meaning can be influenced by the addressee‟s knowledge of extra linguistic

reality (setting, time...), cultural background and education.

Since my profession is to teach English to university students majoring in other

subjects than the English language and literature, I can see that they often have problems to

understand a scientific text as a whole even if they can translate the meanings of individual

words or sentences. Therefore I have decided to concentrate on the means used to achieve

cohesion in scientific texts, focusing on one particular means of cohesion which is called

conjuncts. I have chosen three types of texts, namely research articles from a recognized

scientific journal, a textbook written for students studying to become specialists in a given

field and conference papers. The sphere of scientific prose style is too wide for the purposes

of my analysis. Therefore I deal with one sphere of scientific prose style only, namely

scientific prose style texts dealing with computers and information technology.

I have analysed and compared the above-mentioned texts from the point of view of

cohesion, searching for the basic tendencies and differences between their cohesive devices as

well as the text structure, which follows from the way cohesive means connect individual

sentences or larger parts of texts.

In the present work I have tried to contribute to the analysis of cohesive means,

namely conjuncts. By analysing and comparing the way conjuncts are used in different types

of scientific texts I have also attempted to contribute to further study of different genres of

scientific prose style.

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1.1 Research motivation and objectives

The main objective of this doctoral dissertation is to investigate some cohesive

devices, namely conjuncts, in English scientific texts on computers and information

technology.

There are several reasons why I have decided to choose cohesive means in scientific

prose style as the topic of my doctoral work and why all the sample texts are from the same

branch of science:

The first reason is connected with my profession. Since the major part of my teaching

consists of teaching English for Specific Purposes to non-philological students, I have decided

to concentrate on cohesive devices in texts which are written in scientific prose style.

The second reason is my endeavour to exclude the differences in style, and therefore

in cohesive means, which could be caused by the fact that my texts would be from different

scientific branches because the way humanities and natural sciences write about their subject

matters is often substantially different (Knittlová 2000: 138) and these differences could

influence the results of my investigation.

Moreover, I have attempted to avoid differences arising from different themes even in

articles about natural sciences. To obtain text samples which are comparable as far as their

topic is concerned, the analysed material has been chosen from scientific texts focusing on

one branch of natural sciences only, namely the field of computer science.

The objective of the present work is to excerpt conjuncts which are used in three types

of texts about computer science, to investigate the frequency of occurrence of both individual

conjuncts and the whole semantic groups of conjuncts. The frequencies of occurrence in the

three investigated types of text samples have been compared and further analysed from the

point of view of the position of conjuncts in clauses, simple sentences and sentence

complexes, and paragraphs. Another task of my quantitative analysis has served as the point

of departure for the qualitative analysis, which has investigated the formal realization of

conjuncts and their semantic role.

The method of investigation has proceeded from the investigated language material

through analysis to making general conclusions. The results of the investigation have been

obtained by means of inducing general theoretical conclusions from particular individual

examples. Therefore the method used in the present work can be called inductive.

The present work is based on the functional approach to the examined language

phenomena as formulated and promoted by the Prague Linguistic Circle, namely Mathesius

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(Vachek 1999). The functional analysis used in this work describes all linguistic items from

the point of view of their function in language.

The dissertation is a comparative study, which exploits both quantitative and

qualitative methods. It is grounded within the framework of the linguistic disciplines such as

pragmatics, stylistics and syntax, and also follows Halliday and Hasan‟s theory of cohesion

(1976).

The analysed corpora have been created exclusively for the purposes of this work. The

three groups of texts were retrieved from:

1) papers on computers from conference proceedings (10 papers)

2) articles on computers taken from a scientific journal (12 articles)

3) a textbook on computers designed for college students.

1.2 Hypotheses

The basic hypothesis is that different academic settings, anticipated addressees and purpose of

the three text types examined influence both the frequency of occurrence and variety of

conjuncts used. For the purposes of the present investigation, the following research

hypotheses have been formulated:

1) The frequency of occurrence of conjuncts differs in different text types of scientific prose

style.

1a) The text type which was originally designed for oral presentation (conference papers) has

higher frequency of occurrence of conjuncts than the other two text types.

1b) Authors of the text types aimed at the addressees with more advanced shared background

knowledge use more conjuncts than those of the text types designed for college

students.

2) Individual conjunct tokens occur with different frequency of occurrence in different text

types investigated in the study.

3) Text types aimed at the addressees with more advanced shared background knowledge

utilise a higher number of conjunct tokens.

4) Individual text types prefer different conjunct tokens: stylistically more formal text types

prefer conjunct tokens with a higher level of formality, while informal conjuncts are

preferred in the textbook.

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5) The preference for a certain position of conjuncts in the clause does not differ in individual

text types of scientific prose style.

6) The placement of conjuncts into sentences with different levels of complexity (simple

sentences versus sentence complexes) differs in individual text types.

7) The placement of conjuncts at the beginning of the first sentence of a paragraph is

preferred in scientific texts on computers.

8) The tendency to use punctuation with conjuncts differs more between individual authors

than between individual text types analysed.

9) Authors of individual text types prefer different semantic classes of conjuncts.

1.3 The scope of investigation

The material under investigation is taken from authentic scientific texts on computer

science, all of which are intended for technically educated reading scientific public, yet the

texts are different in the purpose for which they have been written, the presupposed type of

readers and the situational framework in which they are presumed to be read.

The expected background knowledge of the reader and the shared scientific

attainments of the reader and the writer are part of the general context of experience (Firbas

1992), while the permanent reflection in a text of the presence of the author as well as of the

type of reader to whom the text is intended is part of the situational context (ibid.). Both

situational context and context of experience create important basis for the possibility of

stylistic differentiation not only between basic styles but also inside styles themselves,

dividing them according to differences in these contexts into genres with a distinct use of

stylistic devices typical for a particular style.

For my analysis, three basic types of scientific texts have been chosen, representing

particular genres of scientific prose. The first text sample is a textbook on computer science

designed for college students called Discovering Information Systems, which was published in

2003. Situational and experiential context influence the way the topic is presented and,

together with the topic itself, decide which concrete style a particular text will belong to.

Therefore, the present study understands the sub-style called the style of textbooks (učební

styl in Czech) as belonging to scientific prose style, in agreement with Hausenblas (1996)

who states that the complexity of certain subject matters of textbooks enforces the use of

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scientific stylistic means which are regarded appropriate for students at higher levels of

education.

In accordance with Jelínek‟s statement (2002) that the author of a scientific text adapts

the text, its terminology and syntax to the presupposed addressee, my investigation

concentrates on scientific prose texts with a different type of reader. It tries to investigate how

the use of cohesive devices, namely conjuncts, is influenced by the extent of the concentration

on the addressee. Therefore, apart from the textbook oriented on students, another group of

texts under investigation is articles from a scientific journal dealing with research and practice

in information technology, especially computers. The journal is called The Journal of

Research and Practice in Information Technology and it has been published continuously

since 1967.

My hypothesis is that conjuncts as particular signals of style of scientific works differ

not only according to the topic and supposed type of addressees but also according to the

setting so that there could be found differences in conjuncts between texts belonging to the

same scientific prose style but designed for different social contexts.

Hence, to compare the way scientific information is conveyed among the members of

the relatively closed community of computer scientists, I have decided to choose papers from

conference proceedings on computer science as the third type of texts for my analysis.

The analysed papers were published online in proceedings from conferences (1997-

2008) which were organized by USENIX – the Advanced Systems Computer Association,

whose conferences take place all over the world and whose office is in Berkeley, California.

Conference proceedings have been chosen as an example of mostly information-

oriented and therefore more closed type of genre to be compared to the genres of a scientific

journal article and a college textbook in which the addressees are respected, although only to

a certain extent.

Another criterion is the different setting and purpose of texts. Thus the three groups of

texts also differ in their purpose, i.e. teaching knowledge on computer science, publishing

texts on practice and discoveries in the field of computers for both practitioners and scientists,

conveying information about the latest scientific research, and the anticipated social situation,

i.e. a college student studying in his or her dormitory or at school, a computer science

practitioner reading in his office and a gathering of specialists at a conference.

In connection with the selection of the material for my analysis, let me mention the

difficulties with the very restricted access to the scientific texts which are mostly available on

subscription only. Another problem is caused by the international character of conferences

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and scientific journals to which participants of different nationalities submit their papers. As

my work aims at investigating the written texts produced by native English speakers, the

selection of material for my research focuses on these types of text. Sometimes biographical

notes included after articles have been of some help but mostly the only orientation data, as

far as the mother tongue of the authors is concerned, have been their place of work and the

English origin of their surname.

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2 Theoretical framework

Before focusing on the proper analysis of the investigated texts, it is essential to

describe the theoretical framework which the present study builds upon. Since the main topic

is the analysis of some cohesive means used in texts representing scientific prose style, the

following chapter deals with some basic concepts of style in English and Czech linguistics,

concentrating particularly on scientific prose style. The chapter further considers various

approaches to the study of style, including the role of explicit markers of coherence and

cohesion in the shaping of styles.

2.1 Style

Since my investigation focuses on the analysis of cohesive means in a particular style,

allow me to deal first with the concept of style. The term „style‟ can be defined in many

different ways, therefore I will focus on those definitions of style and those authors writing

about style that are relevant for the present work.

Crystal and Davy (1969) mention four basic meanings of the concept of style although

they admit that only the first two are studied in stylistics. Style can be regarded as “a selection

of language habits, the occasional linguistic idiosyncrasies which characterise an individual‟s

uniqueness” (ibid.: 9) or “style may refer to some or all of the language habits shared by a

group of people at one time, or over a period of time, as when we talk about … the style of

Old English „heroic‟ poetry, ... or styles of public speaking” (ibid.: 10). The third meaning of

the concept of style is restricted to the evaluative meaning of style as judging the manner of

language expression of people without description of the formal characteristic features “and

hence this sense is in no way descriptive and objective” (ibid.: 10). And finally, the fourth

meaning of style is associated only with literary language.

It should be noted that Crystal and Davy (1969) exclude the third and fourth

definitions of style from the scope of their stylistic investigation and consider only the first

two definitions. While their first definition is about the style of an individual, the second,

more general definition of style, approximates to particular register definition.

Since the present work is based on the functional approach which was formulated by

the Prague Linguistic Circle, allow me to consider the concept of style from the standpoint of

this Czech linguistic school and its followers. The Czech definition of style as formulated by

Mathesius (1947: 12) was translated into English by Vachek (1974) as “individual, unifying

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character found to be present in any work resulting from intentional activity” (ibid.: 114).

Kořínek (1941) defines style as [“specific reflection of the aim of discourse in the language

material”] (ibid.: 29) (translated by the author of the present work).

Dontcheva-Navrátilová (2010) also stresses the functional approach to style, defining

style as “a selection of language means from the alternatives offered by the repertoire of

language as a system and the organization of these language means in discourse for the

expression of meaning with reference to topic, context, audience and intention” (ibid.: 9).

Both Mathesius (1947) and Kořínek (1941) in their above-cited definitions stress the

intentionality of the selection of stylistic language means. Mathesius‟s definition (1947)

emphasizes that the characteristic features of style are perceived by the addressee not at

random but intentionally as a certain organizational structure, typical of all the parts of a

work, i.e. connecting, unifying items. The author or speaker arranges selected language items

according to the function they should have in the discourse which is being created, thus we

can speak about basic functional styles. Dontcheva-Navrátilová (2010) emphasizes the

influence of topic, context, audience and intention on the selection of language means.

The theory of functional styles as elaborated by Havránek (1932) distinguishes

between functional styles called „functional languages‟ (conversational, matter-of-fact,

scientific and poetic) corresponding to basic language functions; for example, the theoretical

technical function is ascribed to scientific style. Furthermore, by distinguishing five concrete

purposes typical of the given four functional styles Havránek (ibid.) implies further possible

division of individual styles based on the overlapping of functional languages and their

purposes.

Although Vachek (1974) does not deal particularly with scientific style, his

classification of functional styles, which is based on three different criteria according to which

he approaches the analysed texts, should be mentioned here, for his criteria recognize the

importance of the author‟s approach to the subject matter, to the recipient, and also of the

medium used. He stresses the adaptability of language to the expressed facts, to the recipient,

and the purpose, which he regards as the very essence of style, and suggests the existence of a

large number of mixed styles and stylistic sub-types, which are results of the adaptation of

language to new purposes and circumstances (ibid.: 214-215).

As compared to the Czech stylistic theory, the English approach to style and stylistics

is very varied. One of the British linguists who is close to the Prague Linguistic Circle and its

functional linguistics is Halliday (1994), who developed a linguistic theory called systemic

functional linguistics, in which he inquires into the predictability as well as possibility of

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choices language users can make in particular situations to fulfil the aims of their

communication. The author of the message chooses from the language system between three

basic modes of meaning according to the information he or she wants to deliver and its

context. The choices available are from ideational function concerning the transfer of ideas,

logical relationship between participants, circumstances and content, textual function for

expressing the message, its theme and rheme, for tying the language elements together, and

the interpersonal function reflecting our social relationship to addressees by the mode of our

discourse (requesting, asserting, ordering, and asking). The basic modes of meaning exist

simultaneously.

Similarly to Vachek (1974), Halliday (1994) and Halliday and Hasan (1989) stress the

multidimensional approach to language, which distinguishes various functions which

language can express to fulfil particular aims in a given situation. Nevertheles, Halliday and

Hasan‟s conception of style (1989) is fundamentally different, since they explain stylistic

variations in terms of registers, which help speakers of a language to predict the stylistic

means which will or should probably be chosen. Registers are interpreted as “a configuration

of meanings that are typically associated with a particular situational configuration of field,

mode and tenor” (ibid.: 30-31).

In Halliday and Hasan‟s theory (1989), field, mode and tenor of discourse are

contextual aspects the specification of which helps participants of language communication to

recognize and fully understand a given register. The field of discourse concerns the themes

that the language expresses (e.g. teaching process, selling and buying goods, delivering a

lecture, legal act). The mode denotes the way in which the message is delivered to the

addressee (e.g. written lectures, reports, forms to be filled in, spoken monologue or dialogue,

commentary on TV). The tenor refers to the relationships between the author and the recipient

(addressee); for example, teacher and pupils, shop assistant and customer, two colleagues at

work.

Halliday and Hasan (1989) also emphasize a correlation between the three language

functions and the three contextual aspects. Various expressions of ideational function are

recognized in the field of discourse, those of interpersonal function in the tenor and those of

textual function in the mode of discourse.

Another book on style which is important for my analysis is the already quoted Crystal

and Davy‟s Investigating English Style (1969), namely owing to the authors‟ emphasis on the

influence of the setting and the aim of a discourse. Crystal and Davy (1969), in their study on

stylistics, which has become a classic, write about the multiple relationships between the

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situation and the type of language used. That is the reason why they use the notion of

situational variables defined as “dimensions of situational constraint” (ibid.: 64) of which the

situation consists. They suggest the study of ranges of acceptability and appropriateness of

stylistically distinctive language features in different situational constraints together with a

scale of utilisation of these features, which can help identify the more or less restricted

language registers. In order to describe the conditions influencing language variations, Crystal

and Davy (ibid.) establish eight dimensions of situational constraints. Since the dimensions of

time, dialect and individual stylistic features of every language user are regarded as relatively

stable, most of the stylistic analysis is based on a relatively temporal group of four

dimensions, namely dimensions of province, status, modality and singularity. Further, the

discourse dimension labelled „point of view‟ is recognized; it refers to the way people

participate in discourse (monologue – dialogue, written – spoken). Most important for the

present work is Crystal and Davy‟s (1969) analysis of the dimensions of province, modality,

point of view and status.

An interesting aspect of Crystal and Davy‟s analysis is that the dimensions of stylistic

variables may be described at various levels of specificity. Thus, inside the dimensions of

province, which describes the professional uses of language, Crystal and Davy (ibid.)

distinguish the language of media from the language of science at the general level or the

language of popular scientific style from that of theoretical academic style, the language of

visual media from printed media at the lower, more in-depth level. Modality, which concerns

typical linguistic forms, patterns connected with certain topics and their purpose, can also

exhibit differences inside one province; for example, academic prose can differ in modality if

the text is in the form of a lecture, journal article or textbook chapter.

The importance of the dimension of status, referring to the position of the language

user on the social hierarchy scale, lies in its ability to influence levels of formality, degrees of

politeness of a discourse. The features of singularity and individuality are taken into account

in the present analysis of computer texts, although they are not the main point of interest,

since the analysis rather focuses on common and general tendencies in the use of conjuncts in

the three text types. Singularity features are a “cover-term for…personal, occasional features”

(Crystal & Davy 1989: 76), which the authors use intentionally and which can distinguish

them from other authors. Similar but permanent features of individuality describe the non-

linguistic features of participant‟s personality he or she is not able to change deliberately (e.g.

characteristics of voice, pronunciation).

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Bakhtin‟s stylistic theory (2006) connects style and the classification of styles with

genres; therefore his conception will primarily be discussed in the section dealing with genres

(see Section 2.2 below). I would like to notice here a special feature of Bakhtin‟s linguistic

theory (2006) – the emphasis he puts on the dialogic character of language, for he sees every

type of discourse, spoken as well as written, as a dialogue where the writer or speaker has

always a particular type of addressee‟s response in mind when communicating. He even

mentions the addressee and superaddressee.

In my opinion, the concept of dialogic character of language can be interpreted as an

approach to language which sees the text not as a product, but as a process and stresses the

role of the addressee and the context. This point of view including linguistic as well as extra

linguistic context is characteristic for pragmatics. I would therefore call Bakhtin‟s linguistic

theory of styles and genres „pragmatic‟ with a prevailing focus on the addressee.

Finally, I would like to mention that the present study follows the conception of

functional stylistics of the Prague Linguistic Circle, which concentrates not only on the

situationally distinctive uses of language means (lexical, syntactic, and semantic) according to

the language user‟s intention, but also on the function they perform (Havránek 1932: 33).

2.1.1 Scientific prose style

Since the present work focuses on the use of cohesive means, namely conjuncts, in

scientific prose style, the next section describes the place of scientific prose style in the

classification of styles and the main features which distinguish this style from other styles.

In Czech linguistics, scientific prose style is distinguished from the style which is

called popular scientific style (Urbanová & Oakland 2002, Knittlová 2003, Krhutová 2009).

Krhutová (2009) classifies the style of science and technology as a high style, which “follows

the rules of scientific prose” (ibid.: 55), and distinguishes it from popular scientific style. In

Knittlová‟s conception (2003), popular scientific style can partly overlap with other styles.

Hausenblas‟s division of scientific style (1996), which includes the language of

textbooks, is important for the present work. Hausenblas (ibid.) devotes quite a large amount

of attention to the style of textbooks, which used to be classified as a subtype of practical

scientific style. He demonstrates that the style of textbooks can – according to the topic, text

construction or way of its presentation – belong not only to practical scientific but also to

theoretical scientific style (scientific prose style).

In English linguistics, Crystal and Davy (1969) do not present so systematic overview

of styles – they call them „the language of...‟ (ibid.). They try to detect all the various possible

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levels and angles for further investigations into the area of English style. However, they

mention scientific English, namely the province of scientific English and popular science,

which is characterized as informal. The possibility of mixing the two varieties of English –

the scientific English language with the language of newspaper reporting is suggested in their

work as well.

Of Czech authors concerned with special provinces of scientific English, which can

also be called sub-styles of scientific and popular scientific style, it is worth mentioning

Krhutová (2007, 2009), whose work concentrates on the province of English for electrical

engineering.

In Halliday‟s terminology (Halliday & Hasan 1989) and in his concept of registers,

scientific prose style belongs to the intermediate language varieties, lying between closed

registers with restricted, prescribed language (e.g. military language, the language of games

such as cards) and open registers such as spoken everyday communication. Halliday (ibid.)

contraposes registers, which are characterized as varieties based on different uses, to dialects,

which differ according to the speaker‟s or writer‟s geographic place of origin.

Like other registers, the scientific register differs in semantics, which is linked

inseparably with differences in vocabulary, in grammar and syntax. Ideally, there should not

be any phonological or phonetic varieties of scientific register. Nevertheless, it would be

interesting to ascertain if this presumption is valid for both the scientific prose style and

popular scientific style.

Owing to its more frequent use of less specific terminology, its wider group of

addressees, allowed paraphrasing, explicit explanations, the popular scientific style is in the

sphere of intermediate open registers (Halliday & Hasan 1990), more approaching the open

registers than the scientific prose.

Bakhtin (2006) mentions two different technical styles – abstract scientific and

scientific-technical style. In his classification of styles, technical styles are included in the

creative type of style where the topic is usually not completely exhausted but “by becoming

the theme of the utterance (i.e. of a scientific work) the subject achieves a relative finalization

under certain conditions, when the problem is posed in a particular way, on the basis of

particular material, with particular aims set by the author, that is, already within the

boundaries of a specific authorial intent” (ibid.: 77).

As for the characteristic features of scientific prose style, this style is often mentioned

in connection with the restricted register owing to its stable, strictly prescribed scientific

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terminology and restricted register of stylistic means (Crystal & Davy 1969, Halliday &

Hasan 1989).

Scientific terminology is fixed, with exactly defined meanings even if it changes with

new achievements of developing scientific disciplines. English technical terms are known for

their high semantic condensation – they often consist of a main term with long strings of

specifying pre-modifiers and post-modifiers with various relationships between individual

words (Knittlová 2003).

As far as the lexical density (Halliday 1994: 350-352) of scientific terms in scientific

prose style and popular scientific style is concerned, the density of scientific terminology is

higher in scientific prose style, which is connected with its lower degree of explicitness, as

exemplified in Krhutová (2009).

Scientific prose style has to explain complicated technical processes, observations,

suggest hypotheses, prove their validity by experiments, and persuade other experts about

results unbiased by any preconception. Therefore, it is strictly objective, avoiding any

emotionally coloured expressions, exclamations, diminutives, stylistically marked words or

phrases (Knittlová 2003).

Unambiguity and exactness are demanded not only of scientific terminology, but also

of the word order, syntactic sentence structure, text structure and linking devices because

scientific prose style deals with hypotheses and theories about various phenomena more than

popular scientific style.

A highly stressed demand for logical structuring of sentences and text (Urbanová

2008) is another feature typical of this style, since the language as a means of thinking has to

express the most difficult, complex, exact and subtle inductions or deductions.

Logical reasoning and explanations in academic texts are reflected in the syntactic

structure of sentences, which usually proceed from the known information (theme) to the new

information (rheme). The logical structure of a text can be recognized in the sentence

structure – very important are conditional clauses, clauses of reason, purpose, and time

(Knittlová 2003). The exact expression of relations of subordination, coordination,

dependence between sentence members or between sentences contributes to the scientific

exactness of expression.

Scientists need to specify the situation in which an investigation takes place together

with conditions for which a theory is valid. Therefore the use of adverbs and adverbials,

which exactly describe the contextual features of time, place, manner, etc., becomes important

in their style of writing. On the other hand, another typical feature is the tendency to use

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compact, brief language which exploits the inclination of the English language to

condensation (Vachek 1990, Tárnyiková 1993) by means of infinitives, participles, and

gerund constructions.

The above-described features of scientific prose style together with the high semantic

and grammatical condensation may cause a certain degree of vagueness or ambiguity, which

sometimes prevents mainly ESL speakers or translators from correct or exact understanding.

Another feature typical of scientific prose style is the impersonality, which prefers

passive voice where the object of action is stressed and the agent (i.e. a researcher or research

team) recesses into the background. A frequent use of constructions like “it is + Adj + to

infinitive; it is + Adj + that” (Herbert 1971) serves the same purpose.

In addition, the precise logical formulation of ideas is supported by other means

determining exactly the dependence between sentences or parts of sentences. These

expressions (e.g. now, further, finally) indicate cohesive links of a particular sentence with

ideas in the previous sentences (Swales 1994, Kirszner & Mandell 2009). They can express

the relationship between the whole parts of text, individual sentences or just parts of

sentences.

Since the scientific terminology is strictly given and the exactness of style is more

important than the diversity of stylistic expression, scientific prose style may seem rather

monotonous as far as the repetition of the same constructions and technical terms is

concerned, especially if it is compared to the style of fiction. Yet, when readers concentrate

on the repeated words and phrases connecting sentences which express individual steps of the

scientist‟s reasoning process, they notice how important these items are for an uncomplicated,

unambiguous, comprehensible flow of reading.

English scientific texts are concerned with topics and terminology from a given

scientific field. The expected knowledge is mostly implicit, i.e. not written or spoken about,

but is presupposed to be part of the generally shared background of a particular science.

A very important criterion which distinguishes popular scientific style from the

scientific prose style is the presupposed shared knowledge. According to Krhutová (2009), the

amount of the shared scientific knowledge “is profound in the style of science and technology

and rather low and superficial in the case of the popular scientific style” (ibid.: 53).

15

2.2 Style and genre

The term „genre‟ is difficult to define since it is used not only in literary studies but

also in linguistics where its definitions exert a large variety of views on genres and

approaches to their study, and the debate about the definitions and boundaries of genres and

sub-genres is still going on.

One approach to the concept of genre in linguistics stresses its role in cultural

background in society (Malinowski 1960, as quoted in Swales 1990), integrating

anthropological point of view into linguistics.

Inseparable relation between genres and styles is advocated by Bakhtin (2006), whose

classification of styles according to 1) typical forms (genres) of the discourse, 2) the speaker‟s

intention, and 3) semantic exhaustiveness of the discourse topic includes both literary and

linguistic approach to genres. He concentrates on genres, which according to his theory are

governed by general language styles – style and genre must not be separated. Bakhtin‟s

division of genres into primary and secondary is worth noting here, since it indicates the

complex character of genres, their mutual interdependence and constant evolution. Primary

genres include common, everyday language, while secondary genres concern literary,

scientific, legal and journalistic texts. Secondary genres/styles are more complex although

they include elements of primary genres because primary genres enter secondary ones and are

changed, developed and sophisticated within them.

Biber and Conrad (2009) see genre, register and style as three different perspectives on

the research into different types of texts. Their definition of genre concerns the conventional

ways of constructing texts, distinguishing the aim of text and situational context. Although

they distinguish genre from register, which they connect with the analysis of most frequent,

pervasive and functional features (e.g. tenses), the terms „genre‟ and „register‟ are often

named „register/genre‟ because of their common orientation on the purpose and situational

context. Biber and Conrad‟s (ibid.) concept of style as not functional but aesthetically valued

features of text is very distinct from the approach to style of the Prague Linguistic Circle and

its followers, which has been adopted in the present analysis.

Genres represent certain situationally and conventionally set boundaries for certain

types of discourses. The limitation and possible variety inside genres is also investigated by

Halliday and Hasan (1989), who use the term „generic structure potential‟, which is connected

with „contextual configuration‟ of field, tenor and mode. They state that it is possible to

determine the potential structure of text (generic structure potential) by expressing “the total

16

range of optional and obligatory elements and their order in such a way that we exhaust the

possibility of text structure for every text that can be appropriate to a CC1” (contextual

configuration 1) (ibid.: 64).

While Halliday and Hasan (1989) emphasize primarily contextual determination of

genres, Hyland (2002) identifies genres as social actions which are designed so as to

successfully accomplish their purposes which are recognized by the society (ibid.: 219). He

focuses on social relationships with consequent expected and recognized ways of shaping

texts so that, similarly to Halliday and Hasan (1989), he also arrives at the limits which are set

upon genres, in Hyland‟ s conception (2002) by the participants.

Another linguist dealing with genres is Swales (1990, 2004), whose definition of

genres is crucial for my work. He distinguishes genres, which he sees as texts, from registers,

which are defined as “more generalizable stylistic choices” and are generally called “the

language of”; for example, the language of scientific reporting (ibid.: 41). In Swales‟s

conception, genre is defined as “a class of communicative events, the members of which share

some set of communicative purposes” (ibid.: 58), which are recognized by the discourse

community. Genres also exhibit similar patterns as far as their structure, style, content and

intended audience are concerned (ibid.). He is concerned with genre analysis of academic

discourse, concentrating primarily on the detailed analysis of the genre of research article. He

contributed to the description of the so-called IMRD structure of research articles

(Introduction – Method – Results – Discussion) (Swales 1990) by elaborate analysis of

individual steps of paragraph construction.

According to Swales‟s study (1990, 2004), conference papers, journal articles and

textbooks, which are the object of my analysis, are specified as individual genres. Conference

papers and research articles are included in the group of prepared-text genres (Swales 1990:

62, ibid. 2004: 14), while textbooks are regarded as belonging to teacher-student genres (ibid.

1990: 66).

2.3 Approaches to the study of style

Let me now proceed to the approaches to the study of style which the present work

drawns on and discuss the linguistic disciplines whose findings are employed in my analysis.

Since the topic of the study concerns cohesive means, it seems essential to deal with the basic

concepts associated with this issue.

17

2.3.1 Pragmatics, semantics and context

The stylistic dimensions of the text types investigated here cannot be fully understood

without studying the social and cultural situation in which the texts were created. Therefore

pragmatics as a linguistic discipline which deals with the influence which extralinguistic

context and relations between language users have upon discourse has been exploited for the

purposes of the present work.

Mey‟s definition of pragmatics as “the study of the conditions human language uses as

these are determined by the context of society” (1994: 42) emphasizes that the social customs,

habits, presupposed ways of behaviour are present in different cultures in the form of

unwritten, yet generally shared rules of communication. While encoding or decoding their

messages, language users use their knowledge of the generally shared cultural background.

The language user‟s position on the social hierarchy scale and their superior, inferior

or equal relation to other language users participating in communication is reflected in the

way they form their language messages. The participants of a discourse are often not quite

aware of the role which context plays in their statements as their decisions are made on the

subconscious level of their minds (Leech 1983). Nevertheless, various social, cultural or

institutional constraints which they encounter in their social language interaction are mostly

the factors which influence their choice of appropriate stylistic means.

The role of the addressee in the shaping of the texts analysed has been another concern

of the pragmatic aspect of the analysis in the present work. Mey‟s (1994) approach to

pragmatics, which is dominated by his orientation to the world of users and their role in

context, has brought important ideas for my analysis.

Other pragmatic aspects influencing communication can be the time and setting of

interaction and the distance between participants. Special personal or physiological features

together with signals of person‟s profession or social status such as clothes, special

vocabulary, physical handicap, age and gender function as pragmatic markers in both the

extralinguistic and linguistic context. The present work attempts to take into account

especially the setting and the distance between participants which are supposed to exist in the

investigated genres.

However, certain types of pragmatic aspects such as gestures, facial expressions,

pronunciation and intonation are excluded from the written form of communication. They can

be partly substituted by explicit emotive expressions, evaluative adverbs, or, in the case of

18

intonation, by word order. It has been almost impossible, though, to identify most of these

pragmatic aspects from the written texts analysed.

The influence of society and its culture which comprises also sociological factors has

been emphasized by Halliday and Hasan (1989). They see text as social event, both a product

and a process (ibid.: 5), emphasizing the function of language, which is a notion central to the

present work.

Thus, the pragmatic approach to style widens the scope of factors which are

investigated as influencing the choice of language devices and their function in text. The

inclusion of the pragmatic point of view to stylistic analysis is based on the utilisation of

correspondence and differences between both disciplines. Both are focused on “speakers‟

choices from among a range of grammatically acceptable linguistic forms, although

pragmatics looks primarily at choice as the means chosen to perform actions (request,

inform... ) and stylistics studies choice with particular interest in the consequences on the

linguistic level (formality or informality, elegance or inelegance... ) and the effects produced

on the hearer (aesthetic, affective, ... )” (Hickey 1993).

Another concept which is crucial to discuss and define here is context. Halliday and

Hasan (1989) view context as consisting of not only verbal but also non-verbal environment,

which exists simultaneously with every text and maintains the connection between text itself

and the reality in which a text is perceived. The narrow approach to the term „context‟ named

„co-text‟ is advocated by Brown and Yule (1983), although they also mention the context of

situation. Mey (1994: 31) distinguishes the concept of user context and studies principles

governing this context in microstructure or macrostructure of communication.

The concept of context has been developed in Firbas‟s work on functional sentence

perspective (1992), where the complexity of context is mentioned. Firbas discusses four types

of context – the context of general human experience, situational context, verbal context and

context of the communicative intention of the speaker. He recognizes context as a graded

phenomenon, distinguishing between the immediately relevant verbal and situational context,

which is embedded in the entire preceding verbal and situational context.

The social point of view on language as advocated in Halliday and Hasan (1989)

concentrates mainly on the context of situation as it is reflected in the situational features of

the participant‟s social relations. Firbas‟s communicative intention (1992) is thus divided into

two situational features by Halliday and Hasan (1989): into the purpose of communication,

which is part of the field of discourse, and into the rhetorical mode such as persuading, phatic

communication, which is part of the mode of discourse.

19

In accordance with Firbas (1992) and Urbanová (2001), the present work distinguishes

between the narrow context which includes the verbal and cognitive context (context of the

communicative intention of the speaker in Urbanová (ibid.)) and the broad context which

comprises both the context of general experience and the situational context.

The present work is concerned with conjuncts which express cohesive links with the

preceding or following verbal context of text, represented either by the previous/following

sentence or larger parts of texts. One of the aims of my analysis is to examine the influence of

the context of communicative intention of the authors of text, the presupposed background

knowledge of the addressees and the setting; therefore the context of general experience and

the situational context are investigated from the point of view of their influence on cohesive

means used in the three text types analysed in my study.

Since one of the criteria which have been devised for the analysis of conjuncts in my

work is the criterion of the semantic role of conjuncts, another discipline relevant for the text

analysis in my study is semantics, a linguistic discipline studying meaning. This linguistic

discipline is called linguistic semantics by Lyons (1968), who stresses the investigation of

meaning from the point of view of its encoding in the vocabulary and grammar (ibid.). The

description and explanation of meaning in natural languages is seen as the main task of

semantics by Leech (1969).

If the triangle of reference by Ogden and Richards (1923) or its variation as presented

in Lyons (1968) in the form of a triangle of significance are considered, it may be noted that

“the form is related to its referent through mediating (conceptual) meaning associated with

both independently” (ibid.: 404).

The conceptual meaning, therefore, can change according to the changes of context in

which a referent is perceived by the language user and also according to the language context

in which the form of a word is used. Consequently, cohesive devices are important for the

creation of conceptual meanings of individual words of a text.

Semantics investigates not only the meanings of individual words, but also the

semantics of larger parts of discourse. Sentence semantics (Lyons 1996) works with units of

higher level; therefore it exploits the illocutionary, locutionary and perlocutionary meanings

any uttered sentence can perform.

As far as the relationship between cohesion and semantics is concerned, it should be

mentioned that a text can be looked upon as a semantic unit (Halliday & Hasan 1989) or as a

semantic concept (Tárnyiková 2002), the meaning of which is presupposed by the

communicative intention which unifies the text as a whole and which cannot be derived from

20

the semantic meaning of individual sentences. Halliday and Hasan (1989) proceed in their

semantic approach even further, since when they discuss their approach to the study of

language, they define language as a system of meanings.

The introduction of the speech act theory (Austin 1962, Searle 1969, 1979) and text

semantics to the domain of semantics indicates that semantics does not study just the relation

of language to the denoted object or to other language signs (Morris 1993). Semantics is also

concerned with language context, although it is especially pragmatics which recognizes the

importance of studying language in context because context helps language users to resolve

ambiguity in meaning, supplies information necessary for understanding the associative

meaning and narrows down the conceptual meaning to suit concrete context-dependent

situation. Therefore the present work has adopted the semantico-pragmatic approach to the

investigated cohesive phenomena.

2.3.2 Coherence and cohesion

Since the present work is intended as a comparative study investigating certain aspects

of cohesion in different types of text, it is crucial to start this section by defining the basic

terms, concentrating mainly on the concepts of cohesion and coherence since these are

connected with the investigated cohesive devices – conjuncts.

The overall meaning of a text which enables us to perceive the text as a continuous

sequence of sentences expressing and gradually developing the same idea is called coherence.

Coherence refers to the ways in which “the configuration of concepts and relations which

underlie the surface text are mutually accessible and relevant” (de Beaugrande & Dressler

1981: 4). In order to achieve coherence, the author intentionally organizes text into a

hierarchical structure which will be able to express the author‟s logical argumentation and

unfolding of his message. It can be said that coherence is connected with the ideological

content of text (Hoey 1991). Readers try to decode text coherence in their minds and, since

their knowledge of the outer world is varied, their perception of text coherence may be

different. The same text can be recognized as coherent or not coherent in dependence on the

education, background knowledge or personal qualities of mind of the readers. Text can be

coherent even if it does not contain any formal signals of cohesion.

Povolná (2010), who focuses primarily on the coherence of spoken English, does not

understand coherence as a static feature of text but stresses that “coherence is a matter of

interpretation and permanent negotiation of meaning between all conversational partners”

(ibid.: 115). Cohesion, on the contrary, is rather a feature of the formal structure of a text (de

21

Beaugrande & Dressler 1981, Tárnyiková 1992). Cohesion and coherence are mutually

dependent and interrelated to that extent that it is difficult to divide the interplay of both

coherent and cohesive aspects of text into separate coherent and cohesive items.

Cohesion provides connections between smaller or larger parts of texts, helps readers

in orientation in the linear text arrangement. The reader presupposes that a text is coherent

and therefore he or she looks for internal continuity between individual pieces of information.

Cohesive means, which are detectable more easily than internal informational coherence,

support the recognition of text coherence by readers.

When speaking about text cohesion, the notion of texture should be mentioned.

Halliday and Hasan (1976) suggest the following definition of texture: “The concept of

texture is entirely appropriate to express the property of being a text. A text has texture and

this is what distinguishes it from something that is not a text. It derives this texture from the

fact that it functions as a unity with respect to its environment” (ibid.: 2).

The texture of a text is expressed by means of its structure but that is not enough.

Texture is also expressed by means of its unifying semantic relations because text is not just

structural but also semantic unit. Therefore, cohesion is another factor that enhances the

texture.

Even if cohesive devices are formally expressed in the surface structure of a text, at

the same time they are semantic units having their own meaning. The antagonism of cohesion

being both a formal and semantic concept follows from the fact that the system of language

has more levels. The deep semantic level is encoded in the formal surface structure through

lexical units and their grammatical relation.

Halliday and Hasan (1976) define cohesive relations as “relations between two or

more elements in a text that are independent of the structure, for example between a personal

pronoun and an antecedent proper name, such as John … he” (ibid.: 4).

While Halliday and Hasan (ibid.) advocate the semantic character of cohesion because

they view text as a semantic unit, Lyons (1996: 263) sees cohesion merely as a formal quality

of text. Since the cohesive means named conjuncts, which are the topic of my analysis,

express both formal and semantic cohesive links between words and parts of texts

(Greenbaum 1969, Hoey 1991, CGEL), my work concentrates on both the formal and

semantic analysis of the cohesive means called conjuncts. It follows the concept of cohesion

presented in Halliday and Hasan (1976) where they emphasize the relationship between

information structure of a text and cohesion, which is seen as “part of the text-forming

component in the linguistic system” (ibid.: 27).

22

Halliday and Hasan (1976) distinguish lexical cohesion expressed through lexical

words and grammatical cohesion expressed by grammatical words. The main types of

grammatical cohesion are reference, substitution, ellipsis, conjunction. Lexical cohesion

consists of reiteration of words or parts of text. Cohesion can be viewed as an interplay of

both grammatical and lexical types of cohesion.

The connection between cohesive means is called cohesive tie by Halliday and Hasan

(1976). There can be a cohesive tie between two related expressions or multiple cohesive ties

connecting a larger number of cohesive items. Cohesion exists inside sentence or between

sentences, or it can stretch across paragraphs and even longer parts of text.

Reference (ibid.) is grammatical cohesion where one member of a cohesive tie can be

interpreted only by reference to another expression or part of text. Reference to previous text

is called anaphoric reference and that to the following text cataphoric reference. One member

of the cohesive tie of reference is usually a personal or a possessive pronoun, definite article,

demonstrative pronoun or an adverb.

Substitution refers to replacing one member of cohesive tie by a substitutive item.

Thus, nominal substitution is usually achieved by means of pronoun one, verbs are replaced

by appropriate forms of the verb do. Substitutive so and not presuppose the whole clauses;

therefore they function as clause substitutes (ibid.).

A special kind of cohesive tie is ellipsis in which one member of the tie is omitted. Yet

the meaning of the omitted item is presupposed by the other member of cohesive tie,

eventually by the preceding structure of sentence.

Conjunction contributes to text cohesion since its main function is to connect parts of

text. Conjunctive cohesion is achieved not only by the grammatical link of one text item to

another but also by the semantic meaning of linking conjunctive expressions. Conjunction

connects parts of text by establishing certain meaning relation between them (Hoey 1991).

The type of cohesion which is called conjunction by Halliday and Hasan (1976) can be

realized by means of conjunctions, adverbs or prepositional phrases. Therefore it should not

be identified with the word class of conjunctions only.

Lexical cohesion refers to cohesion created by lexical words. The repeated words may

be identical, although they are frequently synonyms, superordinate or subordinate

expressions. Even different words with similar associative meaning and words which

collocate establish cohesive ties across text.

However, while the other types of cohesion express just the connection between their

cohesive items, eventually particular relationship between cohesive items, conjunctive

23

cohesion, which is the topic of this study, expresses some relation between parts of text. In

other words, conjunction puts parts of text into various positions of mutual dependence or

expresses links between sections of text. Interpretation of the preceding and following text

depends on the semantic meaning of conjunction.

Halliday and Hasan (1976) distinguish the following types of conjunctive relation:

additive, adversative, causal, temporal, continuative (ibid.).

Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English (1999) (further abbreviated as

LGSWE) deals with cohesion from the point of view of syntax and the function cohesive

items have in the sentence structure. That is the reason why cohesive conjunctions are named

linking adverbials in LGSWE. Other clause elements which may have linking function are

stance adverbials (ibid.; Hunston & Thompson 2000: 71). Both linking adverbials and stance

adverbials are described as sentence members which are on the borderline between major and

peripheral sentence members. Formal characteristic features of adverbials in LGSWE also

include the forms by which adverbials can be realized, notably by adverb phrases,

prepositional phrases, clauses (ibid.: 131).

When dealing with cohesion, de Beaugrande and Dressler (1981) recognize cohesion

as one of seven standards of textuality. A text that does not satisfy any of these standards of

textuality is not communicative. The standards of textuality include: cohesion, coherence,

intentionality, acceptability, informativity, situationality and intertextuality and, apart from

that, a text should also meet the principles of efficiency, effectiveness and appropriateness

(ibid.).

De Beaugrande and Dressler‟s (1981) conception defines cohesion as “the ways in

which the components of the surface text, i.e. the actual words we hear or see, are mutually

connected within a sequence” (ibid.). De Beaugrande and Dressler also stress the role of

syntax and grammatical rules indicating interdependencies of words.

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3 Previous research on conjuncts

The following chapter deals with the concept of one class of adverbials, namely

conjuncts, in previous linguistic studies. It concentrates on the gradual development of the

concept of conjunct and different approaches to the classification of conjuncts.

Winter (1968, as quoted in Huddleston et al. 1968) deals with cohesion in scientific

texts, especially the relationship between sentences, where he distinguishes sentence adjuncts

from conjunctions. He does not divide sentence adjuncts into conjuncts and disjuncts yet, but

studies sentence adjuncts as one homogeneous group. Different classes of sentence adjuncts

which he recognizes are based on the type of connection they create with the previous text.

All the sentence adjuncts which he investigates are anaphoric with the exception of sentence

adjuncts of doubt and certainty.

In his later work, Winter (1977, 1982) predominantly examines various types of

clausal relations and the influence of context on the interpretation of these relations. Winter‟s

book Towards a Contextual Grammar of English (1982) is devoted mainly to the sentence,

clause, their definitions and interrelations in written English texts; nevertheless, it also

mentions interpolation clauses which interrupt other clauses to convey the author‟s evaluation

of the information included in the clause. Interpolation is classified as having the function of

evaluative super-adjunct which operates above the clausal level. Other interesting types of

clauses Winter (ibid.) describes are the evaluative clause and connective clause which

evaluate and connect the previous sentences or parts of text and which cannot stand in

isolation because they have their meaning just in a particular context of other clauses.

Greenbaum (1969) is only concerned with adverbials realized by adverbs. The

isolation of certain syntactic features of adverbials in Greenbaum‟s study Studies in English

Adverbial Usage (1969), namely of adverbials most peripheral to the clause structure, led to

the classification of two types of adverbials – conjuncts and disjuncts. The semantic

classification, which follows after the syntactic analysis, defines disjuncts as adverbials

evaluating either the form or the content of a text. Conjuncts, on the other hand, express

connection between parts of text. The main syntactic criterion distinguishing conjuncts from

disjuncts is the inability of conjuncts to serve as the response to a yes-no question (ibid.: 25).

Crystal and Davy‟s book on style Investigating English Style (1969), issued in the

same year as Greenbaum‟s study (1969), deals with various types of cohesion that are

relevant to stylistic analysis. Unlike most grammars at that time, which covered just the

analysis of individual sentences, Crystal and Davy (1969) call for the necessity to start

25

grammatical analysis of a style by describing its “sentence-linking features” (ibid.: 44).

Although the authors do not use the term cohesion, their concept of sentence-linking features

includes features such as anaphora, repetition of lexical items, ellipsis and sentence initiators,

which are discussed under the notion of cohesion in later linguistic studies. Moreover, Crystal

and Davy make reference to adverbials with cohesive function which, especially in sentence

initial position, indicate the existence of a previous sentence (ibid.: 44).

In 1971, Huddleston published a revised version of his contribution to the analysis of

scientific English (see Huddleston et al. 1968). Huddleston‟s study (1971) concentrates on the

syntactic analysis of a corpus of written scientific English texts and the linguistic description

of their grammatical and syntactic properties.

Discourse sentence adverbs are mentioned in connection with their possible function

of the marked theme. Huddleston (ibid.) adopted Halliday‟s concept (1969) of the theme as

“the leftmost element, or group of elements, in the clause” (Huddleston 1971: 315) and he

defines the marked theme as “any element (or group) preceding the mood subject other than

wh-items and conjunctions” (ibid.: 315).

Although Greenbaum‟s detailed classification (1969) of various types of sentence

adverbs is mentioned by Huddleston, his analysis deals only with the whole class of sentence

adverbs without distinguishing between conjuncts and disjuncts. On the other hand, modal

and comment adjuncts are mentioned separately from sentence adverbs.

In A Grammar of Contemporary English (GCE) (Quirk et al. 1973), co-authored by

Greenbaum, the same diagnostic criteria as in Greenbaum‟s study (1969) are used to

distinguish conjuncts from disjuncts and adjuncts. Adjuncts, disjuncts and conjuncts are

classified as adverbials with more possible ways of realization in GCE (1973), while

Greenbaum‟s original study (1969) is particularly concerned with adjuncts, disjuncts and

conjuncts realized by adverbs.

The classification of adverbials in GCE (1973) is based on the position of adverbials in

the sentence structure. Adverbials which are integrated into the sentence structure are named

adjuncts. Adverbials which are peripheral to the clause structure are further subdivided into

two groups – disjuncts and conjuncts. The connective function prevails in conjuncts, while

disjuncts express the attitude or emotions of the author to his text or the author‟s comments

concerning the content of the text. The main function of disjuncts is, therefore, to disconnect

or disassociate parts of text to mark a change in the flow of ideas or to insert an attitudinal

comment of the author.

26

Other authors investigating connective lexical as well as grammatical items are

Halliday and Hasan (1976). Their book on cohesion in English texts introduces not only

reference, substitution, ellipsis and lexical cohesion but also the type of grammatical cohesion

expressed by conjunctive expressions. The conjunctive relation created by conjunctive

expressions is called conjunction although the conjunctive expressions are referred to as

conjunctive adjuncts, discourse adjuncts or conjunctives, which are synonymous terms in

Halliday and Hasan‟s classification (ibid.). Conjunctive adjuncts are described as cohesive

items that can be expressed by adverbs, compound adverbs, prepositional expressions with

that (ibid.: 231).

It may be stated that there is certain contradiction in Halliday and Hasan (1976)

because conjunctions (and, but, or) are included in the group of adverbs functioning as

conjunctive adjuncts. Moreover, the term conjunction is used for conjunctive adjuncts, also

named discourse adjuncts, while in the other grammars mentioned in this chapter (GCE 1973;

CGEL 1985; LGSWE 1999; CaGEL 2002) conjunctions are viewed as a word class that is

distinguished from adverbs and, moreover, single coordinating conjunctions are not included

among adverbs.

Brown and Yule (1983) deal with conjuncts, adjuncts and disjuncts in terms of

discourse analysis and study their role in the representation of discourse topic and discourse

structure. Conjuncts, adjuncts and disjuncts which are placed initially in a sentence can serve

as formal markers of a new paragraph or indicate a shift in topic.

In the theme – rheme structure, these adverbials are often part of the theme, yet they

do not contribute to the discourse content and structure in the same way as other thematic

elements of the sentence because they just direct the reader in how he or she shall connect the

individual parts of discourse from formal, and consequently also from contentual, point of

view in his or her mind.

Thematic adverbials comment on the structure and content of a discourse from a

higher, metalingual level and that is the reason why Brown and Yule (ibid.) also call them

„metalingual comments‟ or „hedges‟ (ibid.: 133). Another important feature of Brown and

Yule‟s approach to various cohesive markers is that they regard them as optional discourse

elements in contrast to Sacks (1995), who views them as tying cohesive rules.

Further linguistic investigation resulted in the separation of a new type of adverbials,

namely subjuncts, from adjuncts in A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language

(CGEL) (Quirk et al. 1985) so that four adverbial types – adjuncts, subjuncts, disjuncts and

conjuncts – are defined. Subjunct is defined as an adverbial having a subordinate role with

27

other clause elements or with the whole clause (ibid.: 566). While the category of adjuncts has

undergone substantial changes with the separation of a new grammatical function of adverbial

– that of subjunct – the concept of conjuncts in CGEL (1985) is basically the same as in GCE

(1973). Nevertheless, more conjuncts are listed in CGEL (1985) and a brief characteristic of

individual classes of conjuncts is given.

Hoey (1991) in his work Patterns of Lexis in Text (1991) is concerned mainly with

stylistic and lexical aspects of discourse. He deals with lexical organization of text, patterns of

repetitions of lexis and its contribution to the creation of a text. The analysis of individual

sentences or longer stretches of text shows the role of various patterns of links between

individual lexical items and their function in forming cohesion as well as coherence of the

whole text. Hoey, however, concentrates on lexical links between words. Conjuncts are only a

marginal topic for him. Yet he describes the connective function of conjuncts, highlights the

fact that they can connect not only the previous sentence with the following one, but also

longer passages of the text. Conjuncts put parts of text into semantic relationship without

changing the information involved in them (ibid.: 103).

Halliday (1994) as a representative of the systemic-functional grammar studies the

function of linguistic elements, the way language is used in a particular context and the

linguistic system which is created by the uses of language. In his book on functional

grammar, Halliday (ibid.) deals with conjuncts in the part that is concerned with the textual

function of language. This part of Halliday‟s grammar follows the Prague Linguistic Circle

and its theory of functional sentence perspective, which studies each clause from its

contextual organization into thematic and rhematic part (ibid.: 37). When naming typical

thematic elements, Halliday also enumerates conjunctive adjuncts and modal comment

adjuncts which correspond to conjuncts and disjuncts in the CGEL terminology. In agreement

with CGEL, conjunctive adjuncts and modal comment adjuncts are distinguished from

conjunctions by Halliday. Conjunctive adjuncts serve to express the semantic relationship of a

clause to the preceding text and modal comment adjuncts express the authors‟ judgement

about the text, while conjunctions establish both the semantic and grammatical relationship

and connect two clauses or sentence members into one structural unit (ibid.: 48-50).

Another author who deals with cohesion from the point of view of systemic functional

linguistics is Martin (1992), whose study on the system and structure of the English text is

grounded in Halliday and Hasan‟s work (1976). While Halliday and Hasan concentrate on

cohesion between clauses, Martin‟s book (1992) elaborates and extends their discourse

analysis by concentrating mainly on discourse semantics which studies larger units and

28

investigates cohesive relations both between and inside complex clauses. Martin (ibid.)

distinguishes three basic types of conjunctive relations – cohesive relations, which express

logical connections between sentences or parts of text, hypotactic and paratactic conjunctions,

which express relations inside sentences. In accordance with Halliday and Hasan‟s work

(1976), Martin‟s division (1992) is also based on the distinction between internal and external

conjunctions. External conjunctions display the organization and relations of the external

world the text describes while internal conjunctions construct the organization of a text. When

studying internal conjunctions, Martin focuses on those that cannot be used externally, which

are mostly cohesive conjunctions. Although included into the word class of conjunctions,

Martin‟s cohesive conjunctions correspond to adverbials called conjuncts or disjuncts in

CGEL (1985).

Neither Biber et al. in the Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English

(LGSWE) (1999), nor Huddleston and Pullum in The Cambridge Grammar of the English

Language (CaGEL) (2002) introduce the concept of conjuncts.

Instead, the division of adverbials into circumstantial adverbials, stance adverbials and

linking adverbials is implemented in LGSWE (1999), which corresponds with the adjunct –

disjunct – conjunct distinction applied in GCE (1973). The semantic division of linking

adverbials into subclasses is almost identical with the division of conjuncts in CGEL (1985).

CaGEL (2002) does not apply the adjunct – disjunct – conjunct distinction, either. The

main criterion for the basic division of adjuncts is their orientation to either the verb phrase or

the clause. Nevertheless, the clause oriented group of adverbials also includes a subgroup of

connective adjuncts. In addition, the seven types of connective adjuncts are further divided

into two sub-groups – pure connectives (e.g. moreover, also) and impure connectives (e.g.

therefore), in which the linking function is combined with some other function.

Among Czech linguists it is worth mentioning above all Dušková (1984), who

investigates cohesive means in English texts and their Czech translations. Although she

mentions both the grammatical and lexical means of cohesion, her study concentrates on the

grammatical cohesive features, namely reference, substitution and ellipsis.

Conjuncts are dealt with by Dušková in Mluvnice současné angličtiny na pozadí

češtiny (1988), in which a contrastive approach to the English and Czech adverbials is used.

Dušková divides adverbials into two basic types – adverbials integrated into the sentence

structure (adjuncts) and adverbials that are not integrated into the sentence structure (sentence

adverbials). The latter are further subdivided into sentence modifiers evaluating the way of

conveying the utterance, sentence modifiers evaluating the content of the utterance and

29

sentence modifiers which are used as means of textual connectedness (conjuncts). Conjuncts

are divided semantically into five groups according to the type of cohesive link they express

with the preceding text.

Dušková (1988) also deals with sentence modifiers from the point of view of

functional sentence perspective. She stresses their inherently non-rhematic character in

connection with the fact that the mobility of sentence modifiers in the sentence structure does

not influence their communicative dynamism (ibid.: 475).

The type of adverbials named conjuncts is also included in larger groups of sentence

linking devices, whose investigation contributes to the further development of the

classification of conjuncts. Conjuncts are also included among sentence connectors (e.g. by

Swales 1994, Leech and Svartvik 1988) or transitional words (e.g. by Kirszner & Mandell

2009).

In her investigation of the coherence and cohesion of English texts Povolná (2010a,

2010b) focuses on discourse markers, whose definition is broader than that of conjuncts since

discourse markers include not only conjuncts but also conjunctions and disjuncts. She

concentrates on the role of contrastive discourse markers in written academic texts, comparing

their use by native and non-native speakers (Povolná 2010b), and on the interactive discourse

markers in three genres of English spoken conversation (Povolná 2010a).

The main focus of Swales‟s studies (1990, 2004) lies in the field of the analysis of

research genres, mainly the research article. He studies sentence connectors from the point of

view of their function in the model of the research article structure (Swales 1990: 141).

During the description of individual typical parts of research articles, for which he uses the

scientific terms moves and steps, Swales (1990) notices that certain moves and steps in the

development of research articles are often indicated by the use of certain sentence connectors.

For example, move 2, which is called establishing a niche (ibid.: 141) and deals with

particular research fields requiring further investigation, often opens with adversative

sentence connectors such as however, nevertheless, yet, unfortunately, but.

In addition to his linguistic investigations, Swales has been engaged in teaching EAP

to graduate students, which is reflected in his handbook of academic writing (1994), in which

examples of the use of sentence connectors in the construction of research papers are cited.

Moreover, Swales and Lockman (2010) investigated academic writings of university

students in a paper which focuses on the frequency of occurrence of sentence connectors. The

list of sentence connectors which have been examined in Lockman and Swales‟s paper (ibid.)

includes only the sentence connectors that are classified as conjuncts in CGEL (1985), which

30

indicates a certain change in the concept of sentence connectors since in the previous work

Swales (1990) included even conjunctions and disjuncts among sentence connectors. The

comparison of the frequencies of occurrence of conjuncts in students‟ papers, scientific

articles and scientific speech has brought interesting results concerning the similarity between

students‟ papers and scientific articles on the one hand, and differences between academic

speech, which prefers simpler and shorter conjuncts, and academic writing on the other.

31

4 Criteria of investigation

Before dealing with the criteria of investigation applied in the present study, allow me

to turn attention to the criteria which were used for the analysis of conjuncts in other works.

The investigation of adverbials in Greenbaum (1969) and in CGEL (1985) is based on the

analysis of basic semantic and syntactic features of conjuncts, the latter including the position

and grammatical realization of adverbials. The analysis of adverbials in LGSWE (1999) and

CaGEL (2002) is also focused on their semantic categories, syntactic realization, position and

distribution, although additional criteria are stressed in CaGEL (2002), such as the

restrictiveness of adjuncts, i.e. their influence on the truth value of the utterance.

Based on some previous studies of adverbials (Greenbaum 1969, CGEL 1985) and my

preliminary investigation into conjuncts during their excerption from the studied material, the

following criteria of investigation have been devised for the analysis of conjuncts in the

present work:

1) formal realization

2) position of conjuncts in the sentence structure

a) position of conjuncts in the clause

b) position of conjuncts in the sentence complexes and simple sentences

(e.g. position of conjuncts in simple sentences versus complex and compound

sentences)

c) position of conjuncts in paragraphs

3) punctuation

4) semantic role

The criteria of investigation have been chosen with regard to the specific function

which conjuncts have in the sentence structure and in the structure of a text. It is not possible

to analyse the function of conjuncts in the sentence structure since conjuncts are very loosely

integrated into the sentence structure and therefore they do not fulfil the function of a sentence

constituent. As stated in CGEL (1985), it is necessary “to look beyond the particular

grammatical unit in which they appear” (ibid.: 631).

Unlike some adjuncts, conjuncts are not obligatory sentence constituents, which is

reflected in the fact that neither are they in the scope of pro-forms nor can they serve as an

answer to yes-no question (Greenbaum 1969, CGEL 1985). In reality, they are not necessary

in sentences, their use or omission depends on the decision of the author of a text, the way he

or she perceives and intends to convey a particular type of connection between parts of text,

32

i.e. within the sentence or even within the paragraph. Therefore, the syntactic function of

conjuncts is closely connected with their semantic role and position in the sentence structure.

The criterion of formal realization of conjuncts varies in different grammars and

linguistic studies. CGEL (1985), LGSWE (1999) as well as CaGEL (2002) mention the

following possible formal realizations of adverbials: adverb or adverb phrase, prepositional

phrase, noun phrase, finite clause, non-finite clause, verbless clause.

LGSWE (1999) attributes the same syntactic types of realization to conjuncts, while

CGEL (1985) is concerned just with the formal realizations of adjuncts, not mentioning the

realization forms of other subtypes of adverbials – conjuncts and disjuncts.

In my investigation, the formal realization of conjuncts by phrases and clauses is

distinguished. Phrasal realization can take the form of prepositional phrases (e.g. on the other

hand) or adverb phrases, which are further divided into single-word adverb phrases (e.g.

however, so) and multi-word adverb phrases (e.g. more precisely). Clausal realization forms

are divided into finite clauses (e.g. that is), non-finite clauses (e.g. to conclude) and verbless

clauses.

Formal realization:

– phrases – adverb phrases – single-word adverb phrases

– multi-word adverb phrases

– prepositional phrases

– clauses – finite clauses

– non-finite clauses

– verbless clauses

As for the concept of adverb phrases and prepositional phrases, the present inquiry

adheres to their definition in CGEL (1985), where prepositional phrase is defined as a phrase

which “consists of a preposition followed by a prepositional complement” (ibid.: 63). Thus

the prepositional phrase consists of at least two obligatory elements – a preposition and its

complement. On the other hand, adverb phrases represent another type of construction for

they have just one obligatory element. In this respect they are similar to adjective phrases

since they “have a head (an adverb) to which optional elements may be added; e.g. (rather)

slowly” (ibid.: 61).

The analysed corpora did not contain any conjuncts in the form of verbless clauses,

therefore the above-mentioned division of clausal realization forms has been reduced to

conjuncts in the form of finite and non-finite clauses only, the clausal realization form of

verbless clause having zero occurrence in the texts analysed.

33

Further criterion deals with the position of conjuncts in the sentence structure, which is

further subdivided into the position of conjuncts in the clause and the position of conjuncts in

the sentence. The criterion of position in the clause distinguishes seven basic positions of

conjuncts in the clause – initial, initial medial, medial medial, medial, end medial, initial end,

and end position. Following CGEL (1985), the positions are defined according to the

placement of a conjunct before or after the basic obligatory sentence constituents. It is

important to note that the criterion of position is just a complementary criterion investigating

positional preferences in connection with various formal realizations and different semantic

roles of conjuncts.

Although some conjuncts are restricted to initial position in the clause (Greenbaum

1969, CGEL 1985), the majority of conjuncts are mobile. The analysis has tried to find out

how relevant the position of conjuncts is to the range of conjunct, i.e. whether it links two

clauses, or whether it operates just between sentence constituents.

Another criterion is the position of conjuncts in the sentence which distinguishes

between the occurrence of conjuncts in simple sentences versus sentence complexes. In

accordance with Tárnyiková (2007), sentence complexes are understood as “a configuration

of clauses within a larger unit, i.e. a complex”, corresponding to souvětí in Czech (ibid.: 23-

24).

The following Greenbaum‟s statement (1969) explains the special relation between the

placement of conjuncts in certain types of subordinate clauses and their function in the main

clause: “When a conjunct appears in a time, place, or conditional clause preceding a

superordinate clause, the conjunct is in reality functioning in the superordinate clause…”

(ibid.: 39).

Further, the last criterion connected with the position concentrates on the position of a

conjunct in the paragraph in order to determine the existence of cohesive links across

paragraph boundaries.

Another reason for considering the position of a conjunct in the paragraph has been the

fact that a certain number of conjuncts occurred in the second sentence of a paragraph. The

analysed material also contains a noticeable amount of conjuncts in the second half of

paragraphs. Therefore the criterion of the position of a conjunct at the beginning or at the end

of a paragraph, namely in initial or final sentence in a paragraph, has been included.

Moreover, the criterion of the position of conjuncts in paragraphs also contributes to

the determination of individual rhetorical moves (Swales 2004) in a text which, unlike

paragraphs, are not formal but functional units. A rhetorical move is defined as “discoursal or

34

rhetorical unit that performs a coherent communicative function in a written or spoken

discourse” (ibid.: 228) and it does not always correspond to a sentence or paragraph.

The looser incorporation of conjuncts into the sentence structure is also sometimes

expressed by their separation from the rest of the sentence by a comma.

My study concentrates on the punctuation marks following or preceding conjuncts in

order to find out whether there are any interdependences between the semantic roles of

conjuncts, their position and the pertinent punctuation marks in the investigated types of

scientific texts.

In speech, conjuncts are often marked by slight pauses (LGSWE: 80) and by

intonation pattern, which is used in Greenbaum‟s study (1969) to distinguish conjuncts from

adjuncts in controversial cases, such as again which is interpreted as conjunct when it occurs

in an independent tone unit with a falling-rising, falling or level nuclear tone (ibid.: 49). Since

the analysed material consists of written texts only, it has not been possible to analyse it from

the point of view of its intonation, although the study of tone units of conjuncts could suggest

another interesting topic for further research.

However, the intonation criterion has been used in controversial cases when an

expression could be understood either as a conjunct or as an adjunct, such as that cited by

CGEL (1985):

Where did she go then? (ibid.: 643).

In the above example, the expression then could be understood as a time adjunct or an

inferential conjunct. In order to distinguish the conjunct then from the time adjunct then, the

conjunct then is pronounced in a separate tone unit.

The semantic criterion deals with the similarity of meaning which is shared by certain

groups of conjuncts which are therefore recognized as individual semantic classes of

conjuncts with particular semantic roles in text. The basis of the semantic criterion are

therefore the meaning relations in the text which conjuncts help to express.

The distinction between the word-meaning, sentence-meaning and the meaning of text

(Lyons 1996), which is more context dependent than the meaning of sentences (ibid.: 37), has

been important for the present analysis since it reflects the existence of more levels of

meaning in texts.

35

In accordance with CGEL (1985), the following semantic classification of conjuncts

has been applied to the material under investigation:

conjuncts – listing – enumerative

– additive

– summative

– appositive

– resultive

– inferential

– contrastive

– transitional

The semantic criterion concentrates on significant contrasts of meaning which exist

between individual classes of conjuncts and attempts to find relations between the occurrence

of conjuncts in the text types investigated and the semantic classes to which they belong.

Moreover, the results of quantitative analysis of the realization forms of conjuncts are further

analysed from the point of view of the meaning relations between parts of text which the most

frequent conjunct realization forms help to determine and the level of stylistic formality

which conjuncts help to establish.

Finally, it should be stressed that the analysis of formal realization, position and

meaning of conjuncts should contribute to better understanding of their function in text since

the present study, in accordance with Prague School (Vachek 1999), focuses on the functional

analysis of texts.

36

5 Text analysis

The investigated material contains longer stretches of texts that were written by means

of computer programming language or with mathematical symbols which are not regarded as

proper English text in my analysis. Therefore, for the purposes of my study, all the materials

under investigation have been adjusted so that the programming language and mathematical

symbols have been removed. Names of authors, contents, key words, bibliography and index

have also been excluded. Tables and footnotes, if they occurred in the body text, have not

been taken into account, either. Titles of individual chapters as well as subtitles of particular

parts of text have not been removed as they contribute to cohesiveness and organizational

structure of written language.

Mathematical symbols and words or signs of programming languages occasionally

occur individually in sentences where they act as sentence constituents. The removal of these

symbols would affect cohesiveness and comprehensibility of sentences or even paragraphs,

hence mathematical symbols and programming words have been considered as sentence

constituents in these cases and therefore these have not been removed from the analysed texts.

Altogether, the full texts consisted of 244,295 words from which, after the application

of the above-described criteria, the body texts comprising 201,035 words have been

excerpted. Since the investigation aimed at comparing the use of conjuncts in three types of

texts, it was necessary to analyse the same number of words in each of the examined three

groups so as to make the comparison of conjuncts possible.

The body text of the analysed college textbook comprises 66,948 words (full text had

73,416 words). It was necessary to analyse twelve scientific journal articles comprising

87,751 words and ten conference papers consisting of 83,128 words in order to get

comparable materials for my investigation, with body texts of 66,881 words of scientific

journals and 67,206 words of conference papers.

The following table lists the analysed materials according to their titles, number of

words in the full text and in the analysed body text. The examples from the scientific journal

articles analysed are indicated by the abbreviation JRPIT (Journal of Research and Practice

in Information Technology), those from conference papers by the name of the organisation

under the patronage of which the conferences were held, which means USENIX (the

Advanced Computing Technical Association, originally named Unix Users Group).

37

Table 1

Number of words in analysed texts

Type of text Body text Full text

Textbook

Discovering Information Systems 66 948 73 416

Textbook–total 66 948 73 416

Scientific journal articles

T1 An Experiment in Inspecting the Quality of Use Case Descriptions 6 832 9 817

T2 Audio-Visual Speech Recognition using Red Exclusion and Neural

Networks 9 871 12 566

T3 Designing and Implementing a Grid Application for Cumulative

Agrichemical Residue Tracking 5 629 6 500

T4 The Effect of Reusability on Perceived Competitive Performance of

Australian Software Firms 4 640 6 541

T5 The Future of Open Source Software 5 362 5 880

T6 The Mobile Internet and Small Business 5 638 7 725

T7 Validation of a Computer User Satisfaction Questionnaire to Measure IS

Success in Small Business 4 523 7 466

T8 A Model for Investigating Software Accidents 4 954 6 353

T9 From Narrative Therapeutic Guidelines to Decision Support: Design for

Production Efficiency and Safety 4 546 5 764

T10 A Decentralised Approach to Electronic Consent and Health Information

Access Control 7 220 8 981

T11 Identifying Critical Components During Information Security

Evaluations 4 252 5 002

T12 The Australian Community Ocean Model 3 414 5 156

Scientific journal articles – total 66 881 87 751

Conference papers

T1 A Distributed File System for a Wide-Area High Performance

Computing 4 136 5 162

38

Type of text Body text Full text

T2 Machine Learning for Efficient Neighbour Selection in Unstructured

P2P Networks 4 142 5 209

T3 Efficient and Transparent Dynamic Content Updates for Mobile Clients 9 364 10 629

T4 Leveraging Good Intentions to Reduce Unwanted Network Traffic 4 072 5 127

T5 Bump in the Ether: A Framework for Securing Sensitive User Input 9 939 11 931

T6 EnsemBlue: Integrating Distributed Storage and Consumer Electronics 10 586 12 582

T7 TFS: A Transparent File System for Contributory Storage 9 068 11 390

T8 KLEE: Unassisted and Automatic Generation of High-Coverage Tests

for Complex Systems Programs 9 821 12 965

T9 Predicting Computer System Failures Using Support Vector Machines 3 951 5 162

T10 Delegating Responsibility in Digital Systems: Horton‟s „Who Done It‟ 2 127 2 971

Conference papers – total 67 206 83 128

Total 201 035 244 295

5.1 Formal realization

From the investigated materials 1,714 conjuncts have been excerpted. Besides the

frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in the three types of texts, the analysis deals with the

formal realization of conjuncts. The basic distinction is between the conjuncts realized by

single-word conjuncts and those realized by multi-word conjuncts, which are further

distinguished according to their syntactic realization types.

Table 2

Frequency of conjuncts in the investigated texts

Type of text Conjuncts Number of words in body text %

Textbook 449 66 948 0.7

Scientific journals 594 66 881 0.9

Conference papers 671 67 206 1.0

Total 1 714 201 035 0.9

39

The frequency analysis of conjuncts in the corpora under examination has proved

statistically important differences between the number of conjuncts in textbook, scientific

journals and conference papers (see Table 2 above). The differences in the frequency of

conjuncts indicate the fact that authors of conference papers use conjuncts more frequently,

which can be due to the fact that their papers were originally written for oral presentation,

which is more difficult to comprehend properly without clear cohesive devices.

It has not been possible to reach equal number of words in the body text in each group

of texts because only whole articles have been analysed for the purposes of the present

inquiry. Consequently, the necessity arises to present the frequency of conjuncts also in

percentages of occurrence in order to illustrate the overall distribution of conjuncts in the

three text types analysed.

As can be seen from Table 2, percentual representation of conjuncts in the investigated

material is quite low, the frequency of conjuncts being one per cent or lower in all three text

types compared. The average frequency of conjuncts in the present inquiry amounts to 0.9 per

cent, with conference papers having the highest (1.0%) and the textbook the lowest frequency

of conjuncts (0.7%).

Based on my results, it has to be stressed that in spite of their relatively low frequency

in the inquiry, conjuncts are important means of cohesion since they facilitate text

comprehension. Conjuncts are also important stylistic means which contribute to the

perception of text as belonging to a given style.

In addition, connectors divide discourse into smaller parts which are more

comprehensible for readers. Urbanová (2008) mentions the term chunks of text between

which conjunctions and conjuncts serve as discourse markers (Fraser 1988, Schiffrin 1994,

Povolná 2010b) of their reciprocal relationship.

Although conjuncts are used in all styles, they are typical of scientific prose style

(LGSWE 1999, Knittlová 2000), in which they are particularly important owing to their

ability to express connection between complex logical sequences of sentences, which are

characteristic for academic style of writing. It is worth mentioning that Knittlová (2000) notes

that conjuncts, which she calls connective formulae (ibid.: 144), must not be omitted during

the translation of English scientific articles.

Table 2 comprises all conjuncts occurring in the investigated texts, consequently even

the enumerative conjuncts expressed by means of digits or by means of individual letters are

included in the total number of conjuncts. Both digits and series of individual letters in the

alphabetical order are recognized as conjuncts by Greenbaum (1969), CGEL (1985) and

40

CaGEL (2002). They can establish connection between sentences or paragraphs, as in

Example 1.

Example 1

There are three steps in the establishment of a secure input session:

1. Verification by the BitE Mobile Client of an attestation produced by the host platform,

including verification that the desired application was loaded (Section 4.1.1).

2. Interaction between the user and her trusted mobile device to confirm that it is indeed her

desired application which is requesting secure input (Section 4.1.2).

3. Establishment of the session keys which will be used to encrypt and authenticate the actual

keystrokes entered by the user (Section 4.1.3).

(USENIX – T5: 190)

In some cases conjuncts expressed with numerical digits can co-occur with

enumerative conjuncts in the form of alphabetical series of letters, as in Example 2, which

also comprises the conjuncts then and otherwise:

Example 2

4. Examine each of the components in the chosen cutset:

(a) If all the components in the cutset can be shown to block propagation of red data,

then the device is secure and the evaluation is complete.

(b) Otherwise, substitute the results of the component evaluations back into the

diagram, and return to step 2.

(JRPIT – T11: 320)

It has to be emphasized that conjuncts expressed by digits or series of individual letters

in alphabetical order have been excluded from further inquiry since only conjuncts expressed

in words have been taken into consideration in the present work.

The frequency of digital conjuncts as well as conjuncts expressed by means of

individual letters is quite low in the analysed texts. In most texts, there are about one to two

occurrences of these types of conjuncts, the highest frequency of occurrence is nine in one of

the conference papers (Text 8). The total number of all digital conjuncts and conjuncts in the

form of series of individual letters is 37 in the materials under examination, i.e. 2.2 per cent of

all conjuncts in the material.

The lowest distribution of digital conjuncts and series of alphabetical letters

functioning as conjuncts was in the textbook (1.3%), as compared to 2.1 per cent in

conference papers and 2.9 per cent in scientific journals, although explication, which is

typical for textbooks and other didactic materials, usually includes enumeration and listing.

41

These results indicate that the authors of the investigated texts do not use series of numerical

digits and letters in alphabetical order as frequently as could be expected in scientific types of

texts. Other means of cohesion and ordering of facts are preferred, such as enumerative

conjuncts expressed by words (see Table 29), formal layout of paragraphs, subdivision of

paragraphs, indention and various types of graphic symbols such as , . (For more details,

see Tables 1a, 1b in the Appendix.)

Altogether 1,714 conjuncts have been excerpted from the analysed texts. After the

exclusion of digital conjuncts and conjuncts in the form of individual letters (37 occurrences)

the remaining 1,677 conjuncts, which represent 97.8 per cent of the excerpted conjuncts, have

been taken into consideration for the purposes of further analysis in the present study.

It has to be stated that authors of the analysed scientific prose texts use predominantly

conjuncts which are listed in grammars such as CGEL (1985), LGSWE (1999) or in the study

by Greenbaum (1969). Hence, most conjuncts which have been excerpted from the investigated

texts are those which have been mentioned by Greenbaum (ibid.) and CGEL (1985), while the

„new‟ conjuncts, i.e. those not mentioned by CGEL, LGSWE (1999) or Greenbaum (1969)

constitute a minority of the analysed set of conjuncts. They are as follows: additionally, along

the way, as a starting point, either way, for comparison, for this reason, in aggregate, in any

way, in total, on the reverse side, put another way, to put it into other words.

An interesting finding is that, with the exception of the conjunct additionally, all the

conjuncts which have been devised by authors of the investigated texts belong to the group of

multi-word conjuncts. The only two realization types of conjuncts realized by non-finite

clauses (put another way, to put into other words) also belong to the group of conjuncts which

are not listed in the above mentioned grammars.

Apart from conjuncts and disjuncts, another type of linking expressions and phrases

occurs in the analysed texts; for example, as described below, as discussed earlier, as can be

seen, as will be shown below. They are, together with conjuncts and disjuncts, included in the

so-called transitional words and phrases which are recommended for the use in students‟

essays by handbooks and textbooks on academic style of writing (Kirszner & Mandell 2009,

Rodburg 1998). These were not included in the analysed set of conjuncts because even if they

express the link between ideas in individual paragraphs and help to lead the reader from one

part of text to another, they differ from conjuncts in more respects. They contribute to the

meaning of the discourse and, although they are partly automated phrases, they are part of the

syntactic structure of a complex or compound sentence. Therefore their function in cohesion

is more of a lexical nature, which distinguishes them from conjuncts.

42

5.1.1 Single-word and multi-word conjuncts

In the obtained corpus, a distinction was drawn between single-word and multi-word

conjuncts. Considering the number of types of single-word and multi-word conjuncts which

are enumerated in the lists of conjuncts in Greenbaum (1969) or CGEL (1985), single-word

conjunct types clearly prevail over multi-word conjuncts.

It is important to note here that, as far as the frequency of single-word and multi-word

conjuncts is concerned, the present inquiry has taken into consideration the fact that scientific

prose style employs more multi-word conjuncts than the style of conversation, in which most

conjuncts are realized by means of single adverbs (see the results in LGSWE 1999: 884).

Since the style of scientific documents, as opposed to spontaneous conversation, is based on

preliminary planning and the possibility of repeated restructuring or correcting of the already

written parts of texts, the resulting structure of text is more complex both formally and in its

content, which necessitates more complex conjuncts to express more elaborate cohesive ties.

Table 3

Conjuncts realized by single-word conjuncts or by multi-word conjuncts

Type of text Single-word conjuncts Multi-word conjuncts All conjuncts

No. % No. % No.

Textbook 326 73.6 117 26.4 443

Scientific journals 449 77.8 128 22.2 577

Conference papers 504 76.7 153 23.3 657

Total 1 279 76.3 398 23.7 1 677

During the analysis of conjuncts into single-word and multi-word forms, some

borderline cases had to be considered. Since the main criterion was the number of words in a

conjunct, compound adverbials such as furthermore, anyway, which can only be spelt as one

word, were classified as single-word conjuncts. Single adverbials in the comparative or

superlative form (more precisely) were included in the group of multi-word conjuncts.

The abbreviated conjunct i.e., derived from its Latin full form id est, is classified as

belonging to single-word conjuncts since its abbreviated form behaves like one word.

Another conjunct which is in the form of an abbreviation is e.g., which stands for

exempli gratia in Latin. The abbreviated conjunct e.g. has also been classified as a single-

word conjunct.

43

On the other hand, English employs a different lexical term for example, which ranks

among multi-word conjuncts, as the equivalent full form of e.g., and the multi-word conjunct

that is as the equivalent of the Latin abbreviation i.e. It is worth noting that conjuncts e.g., i.e.,

for example belong to the group of the most frequent conjuncts of all.

When the frequency of occurrence of multi-word conjuncts in the three types of texts

is compared, it is evident that the frequency of multi-word conjuncts is highest in the

textbook, namely 26.4 per cent, while it amounts to 23.3 per cent in conference papers. The

frequency is significantly lower in scientific journals since it amounts only to 22.2 per cent of

all conjuncts in scientific journals analysed.

The above results indicate that single-word conjuncts are preferred in all types of

examined texts since they represent 73.6 per cent to 77.8 per cent of all conjuncts in the data

(with 73.6% of single-word conjuncts in the textbook, 76.7% in conference papers as

compared to 77.8% in scientific journals).

When considering the results presented above, it should be stressed that single-word

conjuncts predominate in scientific journals and conference papers, while the distribution of

single-word conjuncts (326 occurrences = 73.6%) and multi-word conjuncts (117 occurrences

= 26.4%) is more balanced in the analysed textbook.

It follows from the above mentioned results that it is necessary to deal with multi-word

conjuncts in greater detail in order to explain the different preferences in individual types of

texts. Hopefully, the following analysis of multi-word conjuncts and their placement in the

sentence structure will explain some tendencies.

5.1.2 Analysis of multi-word conjuncts

Let me now turn attention to a more detailed analysis of multi-word conjuncts in order

to present some further details about this class of conjuncts. The results obtained in Table 3

above will be further analysed in terms of syntactic realization types and their frequency of

occurrence in the three types of texts.

Conjuncts in the form of multi-word structures were further distinguished according to

their syntactic realization into the following categories, the reasons being stated and

exemplified in Chapter 4 above.

1. phrases – adverb phrases (more accurately)

– prepositional phrases (in addition, in particular, for example)

2. clauses – finite clauses (that is, what is more)

– non-finite clauses (to put into other words)

44

As far as clausal realization types of multi-word conjuncts are concerned, it should be

noted that (as stated above in Chapter 4) since no cases of occurrence of single-word or multi-

word conjuncts in the form of verbless clauses have been found, these realization forms are

not mentioned in the following table.

Table 4

Multi-word conjuncts

Type of conjunct Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers Total

No. % No. % No. % No.

Adverb phrase 4 3.4 4

Prepositional phrase 112 95.7 113 88.3 147 96.1 372

Finite clause 15 11.7 5 3.3 20

Non-finite clause 1 0.9 1 0.7 2

Verbless clause

Total 117 100.0 128 100.0 153 100.0 398

The results presented in Table 4 indicate that multi-word conjuncts realized by

prepositional phrases are markedly dominant in all types of texts under examination,

representing 95.7 per cent in the textbook, 88.3 per cent in scientific journals and 96.1 per

cent in conference papers of all conjuncts expressed by more than one word.

Multi-word conjuncts realized by means of adverb phrases are most exceptional in the

data, with only four occurrences in my corpus, all of them found in the analysed textbook.

Example 3

It is also our conviction that university students need to be introduced from the first

year to academic pluralism: too often undergraduate students are given the impression that

there is one single correct approach or, even worse, that most problems have one and only

one correct solution.

(DIS: iv)

Example 4

She informs me “36 200 kilograms” but obtained this figure by looking at the size of

the pile of sugar and making a rough estimate, or, even worse, checked the brown sugar

instead.

(DIS: 17)

45

In both examples above the conjunct even worse is placed in initial position in the last

clause in a compound sentence where it is preceded by the conjunction or. The conjunct even

worse is separated from the rest of the clause by commas indicating its loose links with the

sentence structure. This conjunct in both sentences expresses that the following sentence is a

substitution or an alternative of the preceding clauses, and so it can be stated that they also

amplify the meaning of the conjunction or.

The frequency of finite clauses is about 11.7 per cent in scientific journals as

compared to 3.3 per cent in conference papers. There are no multi-word finite clauses in the

textbook at all.

The non-existent verbless clauses and the low frequency of occurrence non-finite

clauses in my data clearly indicate that with regard to clausal realization types, finite clauses

are preferred in all the analysed texts.

Based on the results presented in Table 4 above, it can now be stated that all the texts

under investigation show unambiguous preference for prepositional phrases in the realization

of multiple-word conjuncts since the percentage of prepositional phrases functioning as

conjuncts in all texts is 88.3 - 96.1 per cent.

For the purposes of further comparison with single-word conjuncts, the overall

comparison of phrasal and clausal realization of multi-word conjuncts has been conducted.

Based on the data in Table 4 above, it can be stated that in scientific journals and

conference papers, the proportion of clausal and phrasal realization of multi-word conjuncts is the

same as the proportion of prepositional phrases and clausal realization since prepositional phrases

are the only representatives of phrasal realization in these texts, with zero occurrence of adverb

phrases. In scientific journals, the proportion between phrasal realization and clausal realization is

88.3 per cent as compared to 11.7 per cent. In conference papers, the proportion between phrasal

realization and clausal realization is 96.1 per cent as compared to 3.9 per cent, which indicates

slightly higher preferences for clausal realization of multi-word conjuncts in scientific journals.

On the other hand, it is only the textbook in which conjuncts are realized by two types

of phrases, namely adverb phrase and prepositional phrase. The proportion of multi-word

conjuncts in the form of phrases to clausal realization in the textbook is 99.1 per cent for

phrases and 0.9 per cent for clauses, which shows that in the textbook there is the lowest

frequency of occurrence of clausal realization.

The distribution of individual multi-word conjuncts in the investigated texts has been

analysed in detail in Tables 2a-2c/2 (see Appendix at the end of the study). Conjuncts are

grouped according to their clausal or phrasal realization in the texts examined.

46

As can be seen from Tables 2a-2c/2 (see Appendix at the end of the study), the data

concerning the frequency of occurrence of individual multi-word conjuncts in the investigated

texts indicate that the number of individual multi-word conjunct tokens which can be found in

individual texts is worth commenting on. It is necessary to emphasize here that under

individual conjunct token one individual conjunct realization form such as in contrast, on the

other hand and its occurrence in a text without regard to its real frequency is meant.

Table 5

Number of multi-word conjunct tokens

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

Multi-word conjunct tokens 23 19 17

Table 6

Number of multi-word conjunct tokens in scientific journals according to individual articles

Scientific journal articles T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12

Multi-word conjunct tokens 5 5 6 2 2 4 4 3 4 5 6 2

Table 7

Number of multi-word conjunct tokens in conference papers according to individual papers

Conference papers T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10

Multi-word conjunct tokens 4 6 7 4 5 5 7 8 3 3

Although semantic realization of multi-word conjuncts will be considered below (see

Section 5.4), it is worth noting here that the number of individual multi-word conjunct tokens is

the highest in the textbook (23 individual conjunct tokens) and considerably lower in scientific

journals (19 tokens) and in conference papers, where only 17 multi-word conjunct tokens are

represented. The following ten multi-word conjuncts are represented in all the three analysed

texts: at the same time; for example; for instance; for this reason; in addition; in other words;

in particular; in this case; of course; on the other hand. Four of them, for example, for instance,

in addition and on the other hand are the same as the conjuncts which are cited in LGSWE

(1999) as the most frequent multi-word conjuncts in academic prose (ibid.: 886).

As can be seen from Table 8 below, the most frequent conjuncts in all texts are the

conjuncts for example, belonging to the class of appositive conjuncts, which will be dealt with

47

later in this work (see Subsection 5.4.3 below). In scientific journals and conference papers,

the second most frequent conjuncts are also appositive conjuncts, namely for instance.

Only one conjunct token from the two most frequent conjuncts in all texts does not

belong to the class of appositive conjuncts – the additive conjunct in addition, which ranks

among the two most frequent conjuncts in the textbook.

Table 8

Multi-word conjuncts with regard to their frequency

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. %

for example 43 36.8 for example 48 37.5 for example 55 35.9

in addition 24 20.5 for instance 16 12.5 for instance 25 16.3

on the other hand 9 7.7 that is 15 11.7 in contrast 17 11.1

of course 7 6.0 in particular 14 10.9 in particular 10 6.5

for instance 6 5.1 in addition 7 5.5 in addition 9 5.9

in this case 6 5.1 in this case 5 3.9 as a result 8 5.2

in particular 4 3.4 in contrast 4 3.1 in this case 6 3.9

even worse 2 1.7 by contrast 3 2.3 on the other hand 6 3.9

above all 2 1.7 on the other hand 3 2.3 that is 5 3.3

better even 1 0.9 at the same time 2 1.6 in total 3 2.0

either way 1 0.9 for one thing 2 1.6 in aggregate 2 1.3

after all 1 0.9 of course 2 1.6 of course 2 1.3

along the way 1 0.9 after all 1 0.8 at the same time 1 0.7

at the same time 1 0.9 as a result 1 0.8 for comparison 1 0.7

by comparison 1 0.9 as a starting point 1 0.8 for this reason 1 0.7

by the way 1 0.9 for another 1 0.8 in other words 1 0.7

for this reason 1 0.9 for this reason 1 0.8 put another way 1 0.7

in any case 1 0.9 in any case 1 0.8

in any way 1 0.9 in other words 1 0.8

in other words 1 0.9

in the same way 1 0.9

on the reverse side 1 0.9

to put it into other words 1 0.9

Total 117 100.0 128 100.0 153 100.0

48

Another conjunct which is also classified as an appositive conjunct, namely that is, is

not so frequent in the study. There is zero occurrence of the conjunct that is in the analysed

textbook. That is occurred both in journal articles and conference papers, although with lower

frequency as compared to for example and for instance. Still, it belongs to the most frequent

multi-word conjuncts in scientific journals, with the frequency of occurrence being 11.7 per

cent, while its frequency of occurrence in conference papers is remarkably lower – 3.3 per

cent.

It can be deduced from the above results that the dominance of appositive conjuncts

for example and for instance in the texts examined is obvious. In order to reach more detailed

conclusions about the reasons for diverse frequency of that is and for example, they should be

compared to the frequency of occurrence of their abbreviated equivalents i.e. and e.g.

respectively, which will be considered in Subsections 5.1.3 and 5.4.3 below.

Another criterion which has been applied during the analysis of multi-word conjuncts

is the number of words by which they are realized. The basic distinction was drawn between

multi-word conjuncts expressed by two words and those expressed by a phrase or clause

consisting of more than two words.

Table 9

Distribution of multi-word conjuncts according to the number of words (in individual

conjuncts)

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. %

2 for example 43 36.8 2 for example 48 37.5 2 for example 55 35.9

2 in addition 24 20.5 2 for instance 16 12.5 2 for instance 25 16.3

2 of course 7 6.0 2 that is 15 11.7 2 in contrast 17 11.1

2 for instance 6 5.1 2 in particular 14 10.9 2 in particular 10 6.5

2 in particular 4 3.4 2 in addition 7 5.5 2 in addition 9 5.9

2 even worse 2 1.7 2 in contrast 4 3.1 2 that is 5 3.3

2 above all 2 1.7 2 by contrast 3 2.3 2 in total 3 2.0

2 better even 1 0.9 2 of course 2 1.6 2 in aggregate 2 1.3

2 either way 1 0.9 2 after all 1 0.8 2 of course 2 1.3

2 after all 1 0.9 2 for another 1 0.8 2 for comparison 1 0.7

2 by comparison 1 0.9 3 in this case 5 3.9 3 as a result 8 5.2

3 in this case 6 5.1 3 for one thing 2 1.6 3 in this case 6 3.9

3 along the way 1 0.9 3 as a result 1 0.8 3 for this reason 1 0.7

3 by the way 1 0.9 3 for this reason 1 0.8 3 in other words 1 0.7

49

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. %

3 for this reason 1 0.9 3 in any case 1 0.8 3 put another way 1 0.7

3 in any case 1 0.9 3 in other words 1 0.8 4 on the other hand 6 3.9

3 in any way 1 0.9 4 on the other hand 3 2.3 4 at the same time 1 0.7

3 in other words 1 0.9 4 at the same time 2 1.6

4 on the other hand 9 7.7 4 as a starting point 1 0.8

4 at the same time 1 0.9

4 in the same way 1 0.9

4 on the reverse side 1 0.9

6 to put it into other words 1 0.9

Total 117 100.0 128 100.0 153 100.0

It is clear from Table 9 that the most frequent conjuncts are two-word conjuncts,

which constitute more than 78 per cent of all multi-word conjuncts, which is in accordance

with the law of efficiency of language (Peprník 2006: 11). Since most conjuncts are

prepositional phrases, the two-word conjuncts consist of a preposition followed by a noun in

most cases (for example, by contrast) although some two-word prepositional conjuncts also

consist of a preposition followed by a pronoun (above all) or a determiner (for another).

As for the conjunct for another, in fact it is an elliptical form of the expression for

another thing, since the conjunct for another co-occurs in pair with the conjunct for one thing,

the resulting pair of conjuncts then being for one thing … for another, as in the following

example:

Example 5

For one thing that requires the CART administrators at each institution using CART to

constantly ensure they have up to date data. For another, some datasets, such as GIS data,

are just too large, and there may be proprietary and other limitations prohibiting their export

to other GIS’s.

(JRPIT – T3: 128)

The only representatives of two-word adverbial phrase conjuncts occurring in the

material analysed are better still and even worse, in which the irregular adverbs worse or

better (in the comparative) are modified by another adverb, namely even or still. Although

conjuncts normally do not accept premodification, the conjuncts worse and better are

exceptions since they allow modification by even and still (Greenbaum 1969: 43).

50

Two-word finite clause conjuncts are also represented by one type of conjunct only,

although with very high frequency of occurrence, namely the conjunct that is, consisting of

the demonstrative pronoun that and the verb to be in the 3rd

person singular form of the

present simple tense.

Conjuncts which consist of three or four words include expressions that further modify

or determine nouns which are parts of these conjuncts. The modifying expressions are an

article (as a result, in the meanwhile) or a determiner (in other words).

Table 10

Distribution of multi-word conjunct tokens

Conjunct Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

above all x

after all x x

along the way x

as a result x x

as a starting point x

at the same time x x x

better even x

by comparison x

by contrast x

by the way x

either way x

even worse x

for another x

for comparison x

for example x x x

for instance x x x

for one thing x

for this reason x x x

in addition x x x

in aggregate x

in any case x x

51

Conjunct Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

in any way x

in contrast x x

in other words x x x

in particular x x x

in the same way x

in this case x x x

in total x

of course x x x

on the other hand x x x

on the reverse side x

put another way x

that is x x

to put it into other words x

Table 10 illustrates the distribution of multi-word conjunct tokens. If it is compared to

the frequency of occurrence of individual tokens (see Table 8 above), it could be observed

that tokens with the highest frequency of occurrence, such as for example or in particular

occur in all three text types, while conjuncts with very low frequency of occurrence, such as

on the reverse side, by comparison, have occurred in just one type of text. The analysis has

shown that six of nine multi-word conjunct tokens with the highest frequency of occurrence

are identical in all the three text types analysed (see Tables 8 and 10), namely the conjuncts

for example, for instance, in addition, in particular, in this case, on the other hand. The

congruence between the most frequent multi-word conjunct tokens is even higher in scientific

journals and conference papers, since eight of nine most frequent conjunct tokens are identical

in these two text types, including the conjuncts in contrast and that is, which have not

occurred in the textbook at all.

5.1.3 Analysis of single-word conjuncts

As stated in Section 5.1 above, the basic formal distinction in the present inquiry has

been drawn between single-word and multi-word conjuncts. Therefore, after analysing multi-

word conjuncts, the formal features of single-word conjuncts should be taken into

consideration.

52

Since the total frequency of single-word conjuncts has been illustrated in Subsection

5.1.1 above, this subsection will deal with their formal realization, their frequency of

occurrence in individual texts as well as their tokens.

Formally, single-word conjuncts are realized mostly by single adverbs, with zero

occurrences of non-finite clause and noun-phrase single-word conjuncts. Ordinal numerals

first, second, third together with their -ly forms firstly, secondly, thirdly, also function as

single-word conjuncts, but syntactically they function as adverbs and therefore they have been

added to phrasal realization by single-word adverbs.

Furthermore, single adverbs could be further subdivided into adverbs derived by the

suffix -ly (derivational adverbs), such as consequently, conversely, simple adverbs, such as

then, further, and adverbs formed by compounding, in which independent words are joined

together to make new adverbs, e.g. moreover, furthermore.

Abbreviated forms of multi-word conjuncts that is and for example, namely the

abbreviations i.e. and e.g., have been counted as single-word adverbs, the reasons being stated

above (see Subsection 5.1.1). Because i.e. and e.g. have been classified as one word, they

could not be regarded as belonging to finite clauses or prepositional phrases as their

unabbreviated counterparts since prepositional phrases are supposed to be formed by at least

two words, and the single-word conjunct i.e. cannot be regarded as a clause with a finite verb.

Consequently, another formal realization type has been added to the already existing ones,

conjuncts realized by abbreviations.

Another important criterion is the frequency with which individual single-word

conjuncts have been used in the corpora analysed; therefore the following table summarizes

single-word conjuncts according to their frequency of occurrence.

Table 11

Single-word conjuncts with regard to their frequency of occurrence

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. %

e.g. 64 19.6 however 123 27.4 however 119 23.6

however 47 14.4 thus 81 18.0 e.g. 61 12.1

i.e. 43 13.2 e.g. 32 7.1 thus 45 8.9

then 35 10.7 therefore 26 5.8 then 33 6.5

so 30 9.2 then 23 5.1 therefore 29 5.8

53

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. %

therefore 25 7.7 so 20 4.5 finally 25 5.0

finally 15 4.6 hence 18 4.0 so 23 4.6

thus 14 4.3 i.e. 18 4.0 i.e. 21 4.2

hence 9 2.8 also 13 2.9 first 15 3.0

again 6 1.8 similarly 13 2.9 second 14 2.8

instead 6 1.8 furthermore 7 1.6 furthermore 12 2.4

nevertheless 6 1.8 moreover 7 1.6 hence 12 2.4

also 5 1.5 specifically 7 1.6 specifically 10 2.0

firstly 3 0.9 finally 6 1.3 additionally 9 1.8

similarly 3 0.9 overall 6 1.3 instead 9 1.8

yet 3 0.9 further 5 1.1 further 8 1.6

alternatively 2 0.6 yet 5 1.1 yet 6 1.2

else 2 0.6 additionally 4 0.9 alternatively 5 1.0

namely 2 0.6 rather 4 0.9 conversely 5 1.0

rather 2 0.6 again 3 0.7 otherwise 5 1.0

equally 1 0.3 first 3 0.7 similarly 5 1.0

furthermore 1 0.3 firstly 3 0.7 also 4 0.8

specifically 1 0.3 instead 3 0.7 rather 4 0.8

worse 1 0.3 otherwise 3 0.7 accordingly 3 0.6

though 3 0.7 again 3 0.6

consequently 2 0.4 moreover 3 0.6

namely 2 0.4 still 3 0.6

nevertheless 2 0.4 consequently 2 0.4

second 2 0.4 overall 2 0.4

accordingly 1 0.2 fifth 1 0.2

conversely 1 0.2 fourth 1 0.2

correspondingly 1 0.2 likewise 1 0.2

nonetheless 1 0.2 namely 1 0.2

secondly 1 0.2 nevertheless 1 0.2

next 1 0.2

secondly 1 0.2

third 1 0.2

worse 1 0.2

Total 326 100.0 449 100.0 504 100.0

54

The results given in Table 11 indicate that the most frequent conjunct is however,

followed in its frequency by the conjuncts e.g. and thus. Other conjuncts with high frequency

are therefore, so, then and i.e. Therefore it can be deducted from these results that the most

frequent cohesive relationships expressed by single-word conjuncts are concession and

apposition, the concessive relationship being preferably expressed by the conjunct however as

compared to other concessive conjuncts which occur in the corpora with lower frequency

(nevertheless, yet, though, nonetheless). As for appositive relationship, this is most frequently

expressed by the conjunct abbreviation e.g., although the other appositive conjunct in the

abbreviated form (i.e.) also belongs to more frequent conjuncts, ranking third by its frequency

in the textbook, eighth in scientific journals and conference papers.

The third highest frequency of occurrence among single-word conjuncts is occupied

by the conjunct thus, which can specify cohesive relations as summative, resultive or

appositive, and which, in its summative and resultive function, can alternate with therefore,

which, together with resultive so, also belongs to the eight most frequent single-word

conjuncts in all the three investigated text types.

An interesting fact is that in all three corpora analysed, there are nearly the same

conjuncts among the most frequent conjuncts with eight highest percentage of occurrence

(with the same percentage possibly shared by more than one conjunct). The conjuncts

however, e.g., therefore, so, thus, then and i.e. are the most frequently used single-word

conjuncts in all three analysed texts, the only difference being finally and hence, which are

very frequent in one or two corpora only, namely finally in textbook and conference papers

and hence in scientific journals.

Consequently, the above described similarities indicate that in all three corpora the

logical structure of text often involves explanation, deduction and reasoning, which demands

these logical relations to be expressed by a large amount of resultive cohesive devices. Since

the authors, as their text proceeds, seek to include all circumstances, objections, and during

their exposition attempt to delimit the validity of their hypotheses, they often have to admit

later in the text that their previous statements are limited or doubted, which is in the structure

of text manifested by the frequent use of the concessive conjunct however.

Frequent exploitation of appositive conjuncts in the scientific texts analysed in the

present work is the consequence of numerous exemplifications in the texts since theoretical

parts are illustrated by concrete examples. Such high frequency of appositive conjuncts seems

to imply the tendency of texts to coordinate constructions, which facilitate the connection of

55

abstract notions with their actual concretizations (appositive exemplification and the conjunct

e.g.) or enhances explanation by presenting the reader with two coordinate and at least partly

co-referential constructions, each of them presenting a given problem from another point of

view (appositive equivalence and the conjunct i.e.).

The above-mentioned tendency also includes the multi-word appositive conjuncts for

example and for instance, which are among the most frequently used multi-word conjuncts,

and even the conjunct that is, which, however, is not as frequent as the former two conjuncts.

The comparison of the frequency of occurrence of the abbreviation conjuncts e.g. and

i.e. to their multi-word counterparts for example and that is is displayed in another part of this

work (see Subsection 5.4.3). Let me now only note that the analysed corpora show preference

for the abbreviated form of the conjunct i.e. rather than its multi-word full form that is. The

situation is different with the conjunct e.g., which is preferred to its full form for example in

the textbook and conference papers only, while scientific journals give priority to for

example. (For more details on the frequency of occurrence of individual single-word conjucts

in the texts examined see Tables 3a-3c/2 in Appendix.)

Table 12

Number of single-word conjunct tokens

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

Single-word conjunct tokens 24 34 38

The number of tokens of single-word conjuncts differs considerably in the textbook

and in the other two types of text. While there are 24 single-word conjunct tokens in the

textbook, the other analysed types of text exploited a considerably higher number of conjunct

tokens, the frequency of occurrence being 34 single-word conjunct tokens in scientific

journals and 38 in conference papers.

Before coming to a conclusion from the above-mentioned analysis of the frequency of

conjunct tokens in different text types, it is necessary to consider scientific journals and

conference papers not only as two homogeneous groups but also as individual scientific

journal articles and conference papers because the number of conjunct tokens used in

individual scientific journal articles or conference papers differs from the average number of

conjunct tokens in the two given text types.

56

Table 13

Number of single-word conjunct tokens in individual scientific journals

Scientific journal articles T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12

Single-word conjunct tokens 11 13 10 10 9 12 13 12 9 9 13 7

Table 14

Number of single-word conjunct tokens in individual conference papers

Conference papers T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10

Single-word conjunct tokens 17 12 22 9 15 16 15 19 8 2

As can be concluded from the results in the above tables, no individual journal article or

conference paper uses all conjunct tokens which have been excerpted in the present work.

Although the overall occurrence of single-word conjunct tokens in scientific journals is 34

tokens, the occurrence in individual journal articles ranges from seven to 13. The total number

of single-word conjunct tokens is 38 in conference papers, which is similar to the total number

of single-word conjunct tokens in scientific journals (34 tokens). On the other hand, the number

of single-word tokens of conjuncts differs more considerably in individual conference papers

than in individual scientific journal articles, the range being two to 22 single-word conjunct

tokens per one conference paper. Thus the number of single-word conjunct tokens in individual

conference papers differs remarkably. The differences in the number of conjunct tokens used

can be attributed to different stylistic preferences of the individual authors of papers as well as

to their efforts to extend the variety in vocabulary and hence in conjunct tokens.

Similar numbers of conjunct tokens in scientific journal articles can be credited to a

larger attention the authors pay to the style of their journal contributions, which can be further

enhanced by corrections suggested during the proofreading process in the editor‟s office of

the given scientific journal.

Moreover, another factor contributing to a different number of single-word conjunct

tokens might be the uneven length of texts, i.e. different numbers of words in their body texts.

Comparing text lengths to the number of conjunct tokens used in texts, however, does not

seem to yield any significant results as far as the interdependence of the number of words in a

text and the number of conjunct tokens is concerned in scientific journals. The four shortest

scientific articles are texts numbered T12, T11, T7 and T9, which use seven, 13, 13 and nine

conjunct tokens respectively, as compared to the overall range of seven to 13 conjunct tokens

in journal articles regardless of their length.

57

Certain dependency of the number of conjunct tokens on the number of words in the

body text is implied in conference papers since papers with the lowest number of words (T10,

T9, T4, T2) exploit the lowest numbers of conjunct tokens (2, 8, 9 and 12 conjunct tokens

respectively). This tendency is, however, disturbed by T1, in which 17 conjunct tokens are

used, although the number of words in its body text is one of the lowest of all.

Table 15

Number of single-word conjunct tokens as compared to number of words in body text

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

66 948 24 T1 6 832 11 T1 4 136 17

T2 9 871 13 T2 4 142 12

T3 5 629 10 T3 9 364 22

T4 4 640 10 T4 4 072 9

T5 5 362 9 T5 9 939 15

T6 5 638 12 T6 10 586 16

T7 4 523 13 T7 9 068 15

T8 4 954 12 T8 9 821 19

T9 4 546 9 T9 3 951 8

T10 7 220 9 T10 2 127 2

T11 4 252 13

T12 3 414 7

The survey of the distribution of single-word conjunct tokens in Table 16 indicates

that a certain number of conjunct tokens is identical in all the investigated text types. The

present analysis has excerpted 19 different single-word conjunct tokens which are identical in

all the three text types, which is a rather high number when compared to the total number of

single-word conjunct tokens in the text types examined. It means that in the textbook, in

which the total number of single-word conjuncts is 24, only five conjunct tokens are not

identical with the single-word conjunct tokens used in the other two text types. After further

analysis of these five single-word conjunct tokens it can be said that two of them (else,

equally) have occurred in the textbook only, other two single-word conjunct tokens

(alternatively, worse) have also occurred in conference papers and another single-word

conjunct token (firstly) has occurred in both the textbook and scientific journals.

58

The congruence is even higher between scientific journals and conference papers,

since altogether 30 different single-word conjunct tokens are identical in both text types.

Moreover, eleven of these identical single-word conjunct tokens have occurred only in these

two text types.

As for the single-word conjunct tokens which have occurred in one text type only,

there has been used only a low number of single-word conjunct tokens which do not have

identical counterparts in the other text types, namely two single-word conjunct tokens in the

textbook (else, equally), three in scientific journals (correspondingly, nonetheless, though)and

six in conference papers (fifth, fourth, likewise, next, still, third).

Table 16

Distribution of single-word conjunct tokens

Conjunct Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

accordingly x x

additionally x x

again x x x

also x x x

alternatively x x

consequently x x

conversely x x

correspondingly x

e.g. x x x

else x

equally x

fifth x

finally x x x

first x x

firstly x x

fourth x

further x x

furthermore x x x

hence x x x

however x x x

59

Conjunct Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

i.e. x x x

instead x x x

likewise x

moreover x x

namely x x x

nevertheless x x x

next x

nonetheless x

otherwise x x

overall x x

rather x x x

second x x

secondly x x

similarly x x x

so x x x

specifically x x x

still x

then x x x

therefore x x x

third x

though x

thus x x x

worse x x

yet x x x

If the results of the analysis of the distribution of single-word conjunct tokens (see

Table 16) are compared to the analysis of the distribution of multi-word conjunct tokens (see

Table 10 above), the largest difference in conjunct tokens seems to be in the textbook because

eleven of 23 multi-word conjunct tokens in the textbook have occurred in this text type only,

while only four multi-word conjunct tokens which have been used in one text type only have

been excerpted from both scientific journals and conference papers.

60

Altogether, the number of both single-word and multi-word conjunct tokens which

have occurred in one text type only is 13 in the textbook, seven in scientific journals and ten

in conference papers. These results have to be considered in connection with the fact that 14

conjunct tokens have occurred in scientific journals and conference papers only (as compared

to three tokens in the textbook and scientific journals, and two in the textbook and conference

papers), which indicates that the largest variety of conjunct tokens is in conference papers,

followed by scientific journals. The results also show the difference between the conjunct

tokens used in the textbook on the one hand and in scientific journals and conference papers

on the other.

In the end, allow me to present the overall survey of conjunct tokens of both single

and multi-word conjuncts.

Table 17

Number of conjunct tokens

Type of conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

Single-word

conjunct tokens 24 51.1 34 64.2 38 69.1 96 61.9

Multi-word

conjunct tokens 23 48.9 19 35.8 17 30.9 59 38.1

Total 47 100.0 53 100.0 55 100.0 155 100.0

Table 17 indicates that single-word conjunct tokens are preferred in all the three

corpora, yet the largest preference for their use is in conference papers, in which multi-word

conjunct tokens represent only 30.9 per cent of conjunct tokens, as compared to 35.8 per cent

in scientific journals and 48.9 per cent in the textbook. The lower number of multi-word

conjunct tokens in scientific journals is in accordance with my hypothesis that conference

papers prefer single-word conjuncts more than the textbook or scientific journals, since they

were originally prepared for oral presentation.

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5.1.4 Problems with excerpting conjuncts

Let me now mention the issues which have had to be solved during the excerption of

conjuncts from the texts analysed. There have been in particular difficulties which concerned

the conjuncts so and then.

Both Greenbaum (1969) and CGEL (1985) classify so as a conjunct, although so is

also described, together with yet, as having some features of coordinative conjunctions in

CGEL. So and yet behave like coordinators, since they can link clause constituents as well as

clauses. They can also occur in asyndetic coordination where their function is similar to that

of coordinators. In CGEL the following example with the conjunct so in asyndetic

coordination is cited:

The rain fell, so we all went home (ibid.: 923).

On the other hand, so and yet still have the features of conjuncts; for example, they can be

preceded by a conjunction, as in the following example taken from my material:

Example 6

These links have a standard format and so their construction can be automated.

(JRPIT – T9: 74)

The authors of GCEL (1985) classify yet and so as “conjuncts which are nevertheless

more coordinator-like than more typical conjuncts, such as however and therefore” (ibid.:

928), and they recommend that “these words which share some of the distinguishing features

of coordinators may be called semi-coordinators” (ibid.).

Consequently, with regard to the division of linking expressions (called linkers by

CGEL) into coordinators, subordinators and conjuncts, the semi-coordinators so and yet will

be placed on the scale between coordinators and conjuncts. In spite of their partial

coordinative features, so and yet have been classified as conjuncts in the present work.

Apart from that, the conjunct so has to be distinguished from the conjunction so,

which is an abbreviated form of the conjunction so that introducing either resultive clauses or

clauses of purpose. The conjunction so in resultive clauses is indistinguishable from the

conjunct so in asyndetic coordination, the only criterion being the possibility to insert and in

front of so in coordination (CGEL: 1009).

Greenbaum (1969) goes even further in his statement of the resemblance of the

conjunct so in asyndetic coordination and so as a variant of so that in resultive clauses by

stating that when that is omitted in the resultive conjunction so that “we are left with the

62

immobile conjunct so, which can be preceded by and, unlike the compound conjunction”

(ibid.: 71). By means of this statement Greenbaum (ibid.), unlike CGEL (1985), indicates that

so, a shortened variant of the conjunction so that, in resultive clauses is not a conjunction, but

a conjunct.

While taking into consideration the above-mentioned criteria, the main question left is

how to distinguish so in resultive clauses from so in clauses of purpose, in which so is always

unambiguously taken as a conjunction (Greenbaum 1969: 71; CGEL 1985: 1008-1009).The

modal auxiliaries can, may, should and would, which in clauses of purpose are required, have

been helpful in this case as well as the ability of clauses with so (that) expressing purpose to

be moved in front of the main clause. Another important feature is that resultive clauses tend

to be divided from the previous clause by a comma, while the clauses of purpose do not.

In the following example, so stands at the beginning of a clause in which the modal

auxiliary can is used and the clause with so is not divided by a comma from the previous

clause. Moreover, the clause with so (that) is mobile, since it can be moved in front of the

main clause. Therefore, so is regarded as a conjunction introducing the clause of purpose in

this case and has not been included in the examined data.

Example 7

It is increasingly important to design software for reuse so future changes can be

implemented as easily and cheaply as possible.

(JRPIT – T3: 125)

On the other hand, the sentence below is an example of a sentence where so could be

interpreted both as conjunct introducting asyndetic coordination (so = therefore) and as so

introducing a resultive clause (so – abbreviated form of so that). Since in both cases so is a

conjunct (Greenbaum 1969: 71), so is viewed as a conjunct in this clause in my analysis.

Example 8

However, updating of master files still takes place at predetermined intervals, and not

at the time of each transaction, so management reporting remains unreliable.

(DIS: 95)

However, the decisive criterion is the meaning of individual clauses and of the whole

sentence, as in the following examples with the conjunct so in asyndetic coordination, where

it functions as a semi-coordinator at the same time.

63

Example 9

Switches I and L are sources of red control signals only, so we ignore them for now,

but see the discussion on covert channels in Section 5.

(JRPIT – T11: 317)

Example 10

Inspection of factor loadings suggested a high degree of overlap among these items, so

we retained the first three and then added two new items which assessed whether the system

saved time and money.

(JRPIT – T7: 32)

Apart from its function as a pro-form or its intensifying function, which are not

connected with conjuncts, the expression so has also occurred in the structure as … so where

as and so have been placed in the initial position in two successive clauses. This structure is

included in the list of correlative subordinators in CGEL (1985: 999-1000), in which the

initial subordinator as is further stressed by the conjunct so at the beginning of the following

clause. The whole structure thus expresses proportional correlation. The fact that the conjunct

so is in these structures also part of a correlative relationship has been solved in the present

work in the same way as with the semi-coordinators so and yet – the conjunct so which is part

of correlative subordinator as … so has been excerpted and treated as a conjunct. Examples of

sentences in which the conjunct so is part of the correlative subordinator follow:

Example 11

As the business has grown, so more and more time is being spent on travel, telephone

calls and faxes.

(DIS: 123)

Example 12

More than 90% of all white collar workers in the USA now use a word processor to

perform their jobs, however, as personal computers and word processing packages become

more powerful, so users continually need to update their skills to get to grips with the next

generation of software.

(DIS: 5)

Another conjunct the classification of which has posed more problems has been the

conjunct then. The expression then has occurred with high frequency in the texts analysed, its

two main functions being an adjunct of time or a conjunct.

Then in its function of a listing conjunct has had to be distinguished from the time

adjunct then. Ambiguity has been mainly in the cases where the sequence of individual parts

of lecture or ordering of chapters has been announced by the authors since the announcement

64

of temporal succession of steps undertaken by the authors in their work during writing or

delivering a lecture is blended with the enumeration of the order of chapters or other parts of

their texts. In these cases then usually co-occurred with first and finally.

Example 13

This section provides a summary of the major findings of this study. First, descriptive

information about the 46 respondents is presented. Then, the reliability and validity of the

independent, intermediate and dependent variables are examined. Finally, the results of

simple and multiple regression analysis are discussed.

(JRPIT – T4: 188)

Example 14

The rest of this paper describes the issues considered when designing and

implementing CART for potential future use incorporating external data and software

components via “the grid”. It then explains what further work will need to be done to

complete the work of grid-enabling CART. Finally it summarises the benefits of designing

applications on such a way that they are easily extended to take advantage of grid

technologies.

(JRPIT – T3: 127)

In the above examples, the expressions first, then, finally partly fulfil the function of

enumeration, yet their temporal function prevails; therefore they have not been regarded as

conjuncts. In Example 14, finally corresponds with the previous time adjunct then and is

hence treated as an adjunct.

In contrast, there are clear conjuncts with enumerative function only, such as those in

the following example(s). The conjuncts first, next and finally are in semantic relationship to

the expressions several observations in the first clause; they enumerate a list of observations

without any indication of temporal succession, and so they contribute to the structural

development of discourse.

Example 15

This work is driven by several observations. First, we accept that a machine will be

compromised and attempts will be made to use it to generate malicious network traffic.

Attackers use compromised machines to amplify their ability to inflict damage; we can inhibit

their potential impact by reducing the benefits of incorporating these machines. Next, we

believe that many user-administrators do not want their machines to be used to inflict

damage, and they would be willing to thwart such activity if they could. …(after two other

sentences)… Finally, defining and indentifying unwanted behaviour is difficult and often

subjective; two hosts may not classify the same traffic in the same way.

(USENIX – T4: 55)

65

On the other hand, the following example presents the temporal use of first and then.

The description of a temporal succession is initiated by the verb started and is further

developed by the adjuncts first and then.

Example 16

The eConsent Symposium started by exploring the eConsent challenge with a group of

stake-holders who had had no previous exposure to the issues. We first gave a plenary

overview presentation about our eConsent model including the design decisions and goals,

and then conducted two demonstrations of the demonstrator software.

(JRPIT – T10: 166)

It has to be stated at this point that the initial position in the clause cannot be taken as a

distinguishing criterion between adjuncts and conjuncts in the above-presented examples

because sentence adjuncts can be placed initially and divided from the rest of sentence by a

comma.

However, if adjuncts of time (see Example 17) are moved from initial to final position

in a clause, the sentence is still meaningful and the function of adjunct does not seem to

change, whereas the enumerative conjuncts are not perceived as conjuncts when they are

moved to the final position in a clause or sentence (see Example 18). So the ability to be

shifted to the end of a clause can enhance the distinction between adjuncts and conjuncts in

these examples.

Example 17

Descriptive information about the 46 respondents is presented first. The reliability and

validity of the independent, intermediate and dependent variables are examined then. The

results of simple and multiple regression analysis are discussed finally. (Changed for the

purposes of the present analysis.)

(JRPIT – T4: 188)

Example 18

We accept first that a machine will be compromised and attempts will be made to use

it to generate malicious network traffic./We accept that a machine will be compromised and

attempts will be made to use it to generate malicious network traffic first. … Defining and

indentifying unwanted behaviour is difficult and often subjective finally; two hosts may not

classify the same traffic in the same way./ Defining and indentifying unwanted behaviour is

difficult and often subjective; two hosts may not classify the same traffic in the same way

finally. (Changed for the purposes of the present analysis.)

(USENIX – T4: 55)

In connection with the above examples, it should be noted that Halliday and Hasan

(1976) distinguish between internal and external conjunctive relations. The temporal external

66

conjunctive relation is exemplified as follows: First he switched on the light. Next he inserted

the key into the lock. (ibid.: 239).

These examples express that there is a “time sequence” (ibid.: 239), during which one

event happened after another. External temporal conjunctive relations are included in the list

of conjuncts by Halliday and Hasan (ibid.), although their main purpose is to express a

temporal sequence of events. Therefore external temporal conjunctive relations are other

examples of a wider definition of conjunctive relations by Halliday and Hasan (1976), which

was already mentioned in the previous parts of the present work.

As opposed to external temporal conjunctive relations, internal conjunctive relations in

the following examples do not describe any temporal order of events, they are used to relate

“steps in argument” (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 240). First he was unable to stand upright.

Next, he was incapable of inserting the key in the lock (ibid.: 239).

However, first and next expressing temporal relations are recognized as adjuncts of

time in CGEL (1985: 550). The difference between adjuncts of time and enumerative

conjuncts is also mentioned by Greenbaum (1969) and Sigiura (1988). Therefore, the external

temporal connectives can be regarded as being “inherent in the same phenomena which the

sentences are used to talk about” (ibid.: 125) and, consequently, can be considered as adjuncts

of time. Sigiura (ibid.) suggests that Halliday and Hasan should “seclude what they call

external temporal connectives from connectives in general” (Sigiura 1982: 130). Greenbaum

(1969), who does not use the division of conjuncts into external and internal, excludes the

adverbs expressing temporal sequence from conjuncts and, in accordance with CGEL, calls

them adjuncts of time (ibid.: 45).

In accordance with CGEL, Greenbaum (1969) and Sigiura (1988), the present work

does not consider external conjunctives of time as belonging to the type of adverbials which

are called conjuncts.

Another issue that pertains to the conjunct then is its occurrence in complex sentences,

in which then in initial position in the main clause is preceded by a subordinate clause that is

introduced by the conjunction if. Conjuncts in main clauses can co-occur with subordinate

conjunctions in previous subordinate clauses. Some authors (e.g. CGEL, Antaki and

Wetherell 1999, Lewis 1999) even make reference to typical links between subordinate

conjunctions and conjuncts in two successive clauses.

Again, in the same way as correlative proportional subordinators as … so, the adverb

then which is part of the correlative pair if … then has been included in the excerpted

conjuncts.

67

There are more correlative pairs consisting of a subordinator and a conjunct mentioned

in CGEL (1985), but the correlative subordinators if … then have been most frequent in the

texts analysed and therefore they indicated that the question of anaphoric relationships of

some conjuncts to subordinating conjunctions in previous clauses should be dealt with in this

work. If any other conjuncts occurred in correlative subordinators in the analysed texts, they

have been dealt with analogously to the correlative pair if … then.

In some analysed sentences, then can be understood as both an inferential conjunct and

an adjunct of time. Even the context often implies both types of interpretation. This situation

is typical of descriptions of individual steps in scientific experiments, when a sentence can be

interpreted either as describing the results of a previous stage of a scientific procedure, or as

describing another step during the advancement of a scientific procedure, with the emphasis

on the time sequence of individual steps, which is moreover amplified by then in the function

of adjunct of time.

Nevertheless, it is mostly the context which decides about the classification of these

ambiguous cases. Then occurs together with the modal verb can in many cases, as in the

following example:

Example 19

This provides bodies such as regional councils or grower cooperatives with

accumulated historical data over the region. Such bodies can then use the application in its

second mode, as a multi-user windows application over an intranet, to study the cumulative

effects of spray deposits from multiple operations over time, calculated by totalling what is

left from each deposit after degradation and dissipation over time, including all deposits over

the period of interest.

(JRPIT – T3: 126)

The ability of then to express more semantic relations simultaneously is also

mentioned by Puscasu and Mitkov (2006), who, however, only present examples of ambiguity

between adjunct of time and conjunct (inferential or enumerative) then, without

disambiguation of these controversial issues.

Then in the above example has been classified as a conjunct, since the inferential

meaning of then is emphasized by the modal verb can. The omission of the modal verb can

from the sentence may exemplify this difference.

Example 20

Such bodies can then use the application in its second mode…

(a) (JRPIT – T3: 126)

Such bodies then use the application in its second mode… (Changed for the purposes of the

present analysis) (b) (JRPIT – T3: 126)

68

While sentence (b), without the modal verb can, evokes a time sequence of events,

with then synonymous with afterwards, after that, sentence (a), owing to the ability of the

modal verb can to express possibility, more supports the interpretation of then as a conjunct.

Nevertheless, it should be noted that then in the function of conjunct will always

partially retain its temporal meaning. The adjunct and conjunct then have different

grammatical functions but their “central core meaning remains constant: „in that event‟ is

close enough to „at that time‟ to justify the use of then for both” (CGEL 1985: 648).

Consequently, in some cases the nuances of different meanings of then are so subtle

and the context is so ambiguous that more interpretations of the grammatical and semantic

roles of then are possible. In such cases the interpretation of then is left to the reader. Puscasu

and Mitkov (2006) mention cases when the function of then in the same sentence was

understood in a different way by different readers. Puscasu and Mitkov (ibid.) asked readers

to look up then in certain texts and to distinguish its function and semantic meaning. The

disagreement of readers about the function and meaning of then in the corpus which Puscasu

and Mitkov (ibid.) investigated reached 8.78 per cent.

Therefore, when there was some ambiguity left in the present analysis even after the

application of distinguishing criteria and the criterion of context, the final decision about the

classification of conjuncts had to be done by the author of the present work who took up the

role of an ordinary reader to rely on her personal and subjective text comprehension taking

into account all the restrictions of this approach which have been mentioned above.

Even if the list of conjuncts is relatively stable and therefore it is more closed than

other adverbials, the conjuncts presented by different authors differ in some respect. The most

complete list of conjuncts can be found in CGEL (1985), therefore this list is taken as the

basis of the present investigation.

The list of conjuncts has been completed with other conjuncts which are either quoted

in other works or have been excerpted from the analysed corpora.

So the conjunct which is to say, which is exemplified in LGSWE (1999), was added to

the list of investigated conjuncts before the proper analysis started.

During the analysis, the conjunct in this case as a variant of the inferential conjunct in

that case proved to be relatively frequent in the examined texts. Although Greenbaum (1969),

CGEL (1985), LGSWE (1999) do not list in this case as a conjunct, in this case is mentioned

by Fraser (1996, 1999). The expression in this case is included in one type of pragmatic

markers by Fraser (1996), namely in discourse markers. Discourse markers are equivalent to

conjuncts in Fraser‟s conception (1996) since they do not contribute to the meaning of

69

discourse. Discourse marker is described as an expression which “signals the relationship of

the basic message to the foregoing discourse” (ibid.: 186). Similarly to conjuncts, discourse

markers connect parts of discourse because they “provide instructions to the addressee on

how the utterance to which the discourse marker is attached is to be interpreted” (ibid.).

In this case is listed as a variant of the discourse marker in that case in Fraser (1996),

both of them being included in the group of inferential markers. In the examples below the

conjunct in this case is situated in initial position in a clause, where it expresses a logical

conclusion which is usually based on previous supposition which is expressed by the

preceding part of discourse. The conjunct in that case does not occur in the examined corpora.

Example 21

However, if the watermarks are set to comprise all free space on the disk, the file

system is forced to delete files synchronously from contributed storage when writing new files

to disk. In this case, the performance of the disk would be severely degraded, similar to the

synchronous cleaning problem in LFS.

(USENIX – T7: 216)

Example 22

Similarly there is an interface between the CART application and each external

software component as in Figure 2. In this case there will most likely be some data input to

the software component and the result data returned.

(JRPIT – T3: 128)

In Example 21 both conjuncts, however and in this case, are divided by comma from

the rest of the sentence in which they occur, while in Example 22, where there are also two

conjuncts, namely similarly and in this case, no punctuation marks have been used. This

indicates certain tendency of the authors of texts either to use or omit punctuation marks after

conjuncts caused probably by individual authors‟ preferences.

The conjunct in that case appears in the variant in any case, which has been included

in the list of investigated conjuncts.

The conjunct additionally has been added to the list of conjuncts as a variant of the

multi-word listing additive conjunct in addition (see Example 23).

Example 23

Additionally, we have shown that by using the existing SMS infrastructure to deliver

notifications on dynamic content changes, we can offer an energy efficient and user friendly

way to keep the clients up to date with their content of interest.

(USENIX – T3: 67)

70

5.2 Position of conjuncts in the sentence structure

As stated in Chapter 4 above, the position of conjuncts in the sentence structure has

been investigated from three different viewpoints on the placement of conjuncts in the texts

analysed. It focuses on the position of conjuncts in individual clauses, in simple sentences or

sentence complexes, and finally on the placement of conjuncts in longer stretches of text such

as paragraphs.

The position of conjuncts in the sentence structure is connected with the scope of the

cohesive links which they form because conjuncts at the beginning of a sentence mostly

express links with previous sentences or longer parts of text, while conjuncts in other than

initial position in a sentence do not necessarily link the previous sentence, since they can also

function inside sentences or clauses.

5.2.1. Position in clause

In accordance with CGEL, seven types of position are investigated in the present

work. The main distinguishing feature is the position of conjuncts as compared to the position

of obligatory sentence constituents. Therefore the initial position is specified as the placement

of conjuncts before the subject. There are four various medial positions distinguished in

CGEL, all of them indicating the position of an adverbial between the subject and the

predicate. The basic position is called medial and it describes conjuncts that are placed either

before the verb (in sentences with one verbal form only) or between the operator and the verb

(GCEL: 492).

Example 24 – (medial position)

Bittner and Spence (2002), for example, provide a chapter on conducting typical

reviews but they do not suggest more than general advice on how to do inspections, not

particularly what to look for.

(JRPIT – T1: 212)

Initial medial position (iM) includes those examples in which conjuncts are placed

between the operator and the subject, i.e. they mostly occur in clauses with the verbal forms

which consist of at least two verbs.

Example 25 – (initial medial position)

Businesses, however, are beginning to realise that mobile and wireless technologies

need to be deployed where critical customer contact is occurring (Karaian 2003; Keizer,

2003).

(JRPIT – T6: 210)

71

So as to distinguish more varieties of the medial positions in verbal phrases consisting

of three or more verbs, other two positions have been included, namely medial medial

position (mM) and end medial position (eM). While in end medial position conjuncts are

found immediately before the main verb, in medial medial position conjuncts are both

preceded and followed by at least two verbs.

Example 26 – (end medial position)

Modern computer programmes will have therefore worked with the latest

technological innovations.

(the author‟s example)

Example 27 – (medial medial position)

Some software programmes may have hence been circulating among the members of a

computer company.

(the author‟s example)

Both the above presented examples of end medial and medial medial position have

been devised by the author of the present work, since no occurrences of these two medial

positions have been found in the investigated corpora.

The verb to be and its position in the examined texts has had to be treated in a

different way, because the ordinary position of adverbs is after the verb to be. Therefore the

position of conjuncts after the verb to be in clauses with verbal phrases which consisted of

one verbal form (is, are, was, were) have been regarded as an instance of medial position,

while conjuncts which are placed before these verbal forms have been analysed as

occurrences in initial medial position. CGEL (1985) also emphasizes the fact that when the

position of adverbials in relation to the verb to be is investigated, to be should be included

among operators, “even when it is the sole realization of verb” (ibid.: 492).

Example 28 – (medial position with the verb to be)

There are, however, a number of simple data management facilities in most word

processing and spreadsheet packages, such as the ability of word processing program to

perform mail merges in which a standard letter is merged with personal information from a

database.

(DIS: 6)

The basic feature of the end position is the fact that it follows all the obligatory

constituents in a clause. On the other hand, initial end position is created when a facultative

72

sentence constituent is placed after the predicate but it changes the ordinary word order of a

sentence because it precedes some obligatory sentence constituent.

Example 29 – (end position)

The GLIF model is too inflexible to accommodate the narrative of the guidelines

however.

(JRPIT – T9: 75)

Example 30 – (initial end position)

Similarly, the address will usually be split into several fields to separate e.g. the postal

code, the town and the street.

(DIS: 80)

Table 18

Position in clause – textbook

Textbook Position

Total I iM mM M eM iE E

No. 306 13 0 36 0 14 74 443

% 69.1 2.9 0.0 8.1 0.0 3.2 16.7 100.0

The above presented results indicate that the most frequent positions of conjuncts are

at the beginning and at the end of clauses. The prevailing number of conjuncts in the textbook

is placed at the beginning of clause (306 occurrences), the next most frequent position is the

end position (74 occurrences), while the medial and initial end positions are less frequent (36

occurrences of conjuncts in medial and 14 in end initial positions).

It is also important to note that the zero occurrence of conjuncts in medial medial and

end medial position is due to the tendency of conjuncts to be placed either at the beginning of

a verb phrase (initial medial position) or after the operator (medial position).

Medial medial position, which has not occurred, shows that the tendency of conjuncts

to be placed symmetrically in the middle of a verb phrase consisting of four verb forms has

not been proved. The tendency of conjuncts to be placed immediately before the main verb

and therefore in the last but one position of a verb phrase consisting of at least three verb

forms, which is connected with end medial position, has not been indicated by the results,

either.

Moreover, another reason for the zero occurrences of medial medial and end medial

positions might be the types of verb phrases which are used in the computer textbook because

73

medial medial and end medial positions can be distinguished only in verb phrases with three

or more verbs and these are not typical of the textbook analysed.

When the number of conjuncts in initial and end positions is compared, it can be

noticed that the low frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in end position reflects the tendency

to predominantly anaphoric reference of conjuncts.

Fraser (1999) notices yet another reason why conjuncts and other sentence adverbials

mostly prefer initial position when he writes about the syntactic environment of discourse

markers which is “different from those environments where it (expression) occurs, for

example, as an adverbial. That is, the environments for their different functions are in

complementary distribution” (ibid.: 946).

Table 19

Position in clause – scientific journals

Text

Position Total

I iM mM M eM iE E

No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No.

T1 38 76.0 2 4.0 4 8.0 6 12.0 50

T2 90 81.1 5 4.5 1 0.9 1 0.9 14 12.6 111

T3 74 96.1 2 2.6 1 1.3 77

T4 32 86.5 2 5.4 3 8.1 37

T5 17 60.7 2 7.1 2 7.1 3 10.7 4 14.3 28

T6 49 84.5 1 1.7 2 3.4 6 10.3 58

T7 18 66.7 1 3.7 2 7.4 1 3.7 5 18.5 27

T8 26 78.8 1 3.0 6 18.2 33

T9 20 62.5 1 3.1 3 9.4 3 9.4 5 15.6 32

T10 25 83.3 4 13.3 1 3.3 30

T11 57 76.0 2 2.7 11 14.7 1 1.3 4 5.3 75

T12 11 57.9 1 5.3 2 10.5 5 26.3 19

Total 457 79.2 17 2.9 32 5.5 11 1.9 60 10.4 577

74

Table 20

Position in clause – conference papers

Text

Position Total

I iM mM M eM iE E

No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No.

T1 42 85.7 1 2.0 3 6.1 3 6.1 49

T2 44 88.0 1 2.0 3 6.0 2 4.0 50

T3 74 90.2 3 3.7 5 6.1 82

T4 21 84.0 3 12.0 1 4.0 25

T5 69 69.0 1 1.0 1 1.0 11 11.0 18 18.0 100

T6 87 87.0 5 5.0 8 8.0 100

T7 74 93.7 1 1.3 2 2.5 2 2.5 79

T8 87 79.1 6 5.5 17 15.5 110

T9 41 85.4 3 6.3 4 8.3 48

T10 11 78.6 2 14.3 1 7.1 14

Total 550 83.7 8 1.2 22 3.3 17 2.6 60 9.1 657

As far as the distribution of positions of conjuncts in scientific journals and conference

papers is concerned, the highest frequency of occurrence has the initial position. The second

most frequent position is, similarly to the computer textbook, the end position, although the

frequency of conjuncts in end position is lower than in the textbook (about 10% of conjuncts

in end position occurring in scientific journals and conference papers, while 17% in the

textbook).

Initial end position is used mainly by appositive conjuncts, such as e.g., for example,

in clauses where apposition acts as a sentence constituent, not as an individual clause. Again,

the percentage of conjuncts in initial end position is higher in the textbook (3.2%) than in the

other two types of texts (1.9% in scientific journals and 2.6% in conference papers). Both

types of texts, scientific journals and conference papers, also exploited fewer conjuncts in

medial position than the textbook; yet medial position is still the third most frequent position

as it is in the textbook.

The common features of positional distribution of conjuncts in conference papers and

scientific journals should be further analysed mainly from the point of view of the syntactic

structure of clauses and sentences in which they are placed.

75

The position of conjuncts can also be connected with the length of conjunctive

expressions; therefore the hypothesis that longer or multi-word conjuncts tend to be placed

near the end of sentences or clauses should be investigated.

5.2.2 Position in simple sentences versus sentence complexes

Conjuncts are not used as cohesive means just on the level of the clause, but they are

also used to express cohesive links on the level of the sentence structure. Therefore the next

part of my analysis concentrates on the position of conjuncts in the sentence structure.

For the purposes of my analysis, the position of conjuncts in the following basic types

of sentence structures has been distinguished – simple sentence and sentence complex, which

can include both complex sentences and compound sentences.

Let me now turn to the concepts of simple sentence and sentence complex, which have

been recognized as basic types of sentence structures in the present work. Together with

CGEL, the present study defines simple sentences as sentences consisting of only one simple

independent clause, while sentences that contain more than one clause are recognized as

sentence complexes (Tárnyiková 2007).

Although the present analysis uses the definition of simple, complex and compound

sentences in accordance with CGEL, there is one difference with regard to the clauses

functioning within a phrase. CGEL states that “… the relative clause that belongs to my sister

is a postmodifier within the complex noun phrase constituting the object element the car that

belongs to my sister” (ibid.: 719). CGEL, therefore, regards the sentence: You can borrow the

car that belongs to my sister (ibid.: 719) as a simple sentence. In my analysis, however, all

sentences consisting of more than two clauses are regarded as sentence complexes

irrespective of the fact whether clauses are at the level of the verb or noun phrase or at the

level of the sentence or clause.

Before classifying sentences into simple, complex and compound sentences, some

questions concerning the classification of certain types of constructions and clauses had to be

considered. Among the constructions that posed problems when the number of clauses in

sentences was to be determined, mainly infinitival, gerund and participle constructions should

be mentioned.

Sentences with the infinitive the function of which is to express purpose have been

regarded as clauses, as in the following example:

76

Example 31

Mutual information attempts to use combinations of feature probabilities to assess

how much information each feature, i.e. word token, contains about the classification.

(USENIX – T2: 4)

The infinitive to assess in the previous example is a condensed form of the clause of purpose

in order to assess and therefore is classified as a dependent clause in the present study.

Infinitival constructions which depend on the direct object of the verb of the main

clause because this object expresses the agent of the infinitival construction (Dušková 2006:

555) have also been included among clauses.

Example 32

Finally, it allows mobile clients to self-organize and share data through device

ensembles.

(USENIX – T6: 219)

Example 33

Again, the bypass mode allows information to flow directly from N to F to B, without

decryption.

(JRPIT – T11: 316)

In Examples 32 and 33, the direct object of the verb in the main clause belongs to both

the main clause and the infinitival construction. The sentences therefore can be interpreted as

condensation of two clauses:

Finally, it allows mobile clients so that they self-organize and share data through

device ensembles. (changed for the purposes of the present work)

Likewise, passive infinitival constructions have been regarded as dependent clauses,

illustrated below.

Example 34

In particular, domain separation devices allow the flow of information between high

and low-security domains to be controlled.

(JRPIT – T11: 311)

On the other hand, the infinitive in the following sentence is syntactically a subject. It

is moved from its normal position after a verbonominal predicate since it is replaced by the

anticipatory it in the initial predicative position. The infinitive fulfils the function of a

sentence constituent; hence the sentence is determined as a simple sentence.

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Example 35

However it is important to exploit the sequential nature of system messages.

(USENIX – T9: 2)

Further, infinitival constructions in which infinitive follows after the adverb likely

which is preceded by the verb to be are, in accordance with CGEL, taken as “semi-

auxiliaries” (ibid.: 143). Semi-auxiliaries are structures that always include the verbs to be or

to have. They are defined in CGEL as “set of verb idioms which express modal or aspectual

meaning” (ibid.:143) and apart from to be likely to include; for example, to be supposed to, to

be able to, to have to, to be apt to. Therefore, similarly to the other semi-auxiliaries such as to

be able to, the infinitival structure with be likely to is regarded as one verbal structure which

belongs to the same clause.

Example 36

In addition, the data storage mechanisms that are implemented are likely to influence

the ease with which current and historical data can be retrieved and processed .

(DIS: 34)

Another type of condensed structures to deal with are participle constructions.

Example 37

In practice however, the benefit of reorganization is often lower than the cost incurred

in probing and adapting.

(USENIX – T2: 1)

Participle constructions functioning as attributes in postposition are classified as

dependent clauses. They can be perceived as reduced relative clauses in which the

conjunction and verb to be are omitted; yet the reader reconstructs the full form of attributive

relative clauses subconsciously to enhance understanding.

Gerunds, which are also quite frequent in the examined corpora, are translated into

Czech by verbal nouns or by dependent clauses.

Example 38

Consequently, we hope this paper serves as a step forward for research in the space of

self-reorganizing overlays by providing a scalable means of neighbor selection.

(USENIX – T2: 1)

In the above example, the gerund by providing a scalable means of neighbour

selection is regarded as a dependent clause.

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Other examples of condensation:

Example 39

However, if we moved the block bitmaps to Ext2 data block, we could create a

completely backward-compatible version, easing adoption.

(USENIX – T7: 221)

Example 40

However, rather than tracking allocations block-by-block, we divide the disk into

groups of disk blocks, called chunks, and track allocations to chunks.

(USENIX – T7: 220)

Example 41

However, because of the large chunk size and the high locality of chunk allocations,

subsequent allocations for ordinary data tend to overwrite other blocks of the same

transparent file, making the rate at which transparent data lost approximately equal to the

rate at which blocks are overwritten.

(USENIX – T7: 220)

The reason why the above mentioned infinitival, participle and gerund constructions

have been counted as clauses is also supported by the fact that they are perceived as

condensed equivalents of clauses and are mostly translated by means of dependent clauses

into the Czech language.

For example, the participle easing adoption (USENIX – T7: 221) could be translated

into Czech as mohli bychom vytvořit … verzi, která usnadňuje přijetí (ibid.: 221).

Other arguments that support classification of gerunds, infinitives and participles as

clauses is the fact that they are called semi-clausal structures, which indicates that they range

on the scale between sentence members and clauses, yet their clausal function prevails. As

mentioned by Dušková (2006), these semi-clausal structures fulfil the function of secondary

predication in sentence structure and can be easily modified into clauses.

Gerunds, infinitives and participles are called non-finite clauses in CGEL and they are

recognized as clauses, which is reasoned by the possibility to analyse them into “the same

functional elements that we distinguish in finite clause” (ibid.: 992).

Sentence complexes containing conjuncts can be further distinguished into compound

and complex sentences. In accordance with CGEL, Dušková (2006) and Tárnyiková (2007),

complex sentences are defined as sentences containing one main clause and two or more

dependent, subordinate clauses, while compound sentences are based on the relation of

coordination between main clauses, i.e. they consist of two or more main clauses. Compound

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sentences do not necessarily have to include just main clauses since “… each main clause in a

compound sentence may include one or more subordinate clauses, each of which may in turn

include subordinate clauses” (CGEL: 990).

The present analysis concentrates on the differences between conjuncts in simple

sentences and conjuncts in sentence complexes in which, according to the hypothesis, marked

differences in the use of conjuncts are expected. Further division of sentence complexes into

compound and complex sentences has not been used in the analysis.

My presumption is that scientific prose style prefers more complex sentence

structures, with both main and subordinate clauses as these sentences have more levels of

clauses and can therefore express the subtle structure of logical reasoning and of deducing

more precisely.

The presumption also concerns the fact that the conference papers use fewer sentence

complexes with conjuncts than scientific journals or the textbook, since the papers are

influenced by the fact that they were originally written for oral presentation.

Another feature influencing the structure of sentence could be the tendency of English

scientific prose style to use long noun phrases consisting of multiword scientific terms which,

if occurring in too complex sentence structure, might make the sentence rather difficult to

comprehend.

Table 21

Number of conjuncts occurring in simple sentences versus sentence complexes – textbook

Conjuncts in simple sentences Conjuncts in sentence

complexes Total

No. % No. % No. %

109 24.6 334 75.4 443 100.0

As can be seen in Table 21, the tendency to use conjuncts in sentence complexes,

either complex sentences or compound sentences, clearly prevails in the computer textbook,

with 334 occurrences of conjuncts in sentence complexes and 109 in simple sentences, which

means that 24.6 per cent of all conjuncts in the textbook occur in simple sentences and 75.4

per cent in sentence complexes.

To be able to compare the frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in the sentence

structure, other types of texts have been analysed. My presumption was that scientific journals

80

use more complex sentence structure and therefore also more conjuncts can be found in

sentence complexes.

Table 22

Number of conjuncts occurring in simple sentences versus sentence complexes –scientific

journals

Text

Conjuncts in simple

sentences

Conjuncts in sentence

complexes Total

No. % No. % No.

T1 12 24.0 38 76.0 50

T2 18 16.2 93 83.8 111

T3 16 20.8 61 79.2 77

T4 8 21.6 29 78.4 37

T5 12 42.9 16 57.1 28

T6 8 13.8 50 86.2 58

T7 4 14.8 23 85.2 27

T8 10 30.3 23 69.7 33

T9 9 28.1 23 71.9 32

T10 6 20.0 24 80.0 30

T11 8 10.7 67 89.3 75

T12 4 21.1 15 78.9 19

Total 115 19.9 462 80.1 577

The results in Table 22 indicate that most conjuncts in scientific journals are placed in

sentence complexes, their frequency of occurrence being 462 conjuncts (80.1%), while the

frequency of conjuncts in simple sentences is 115 occurrences (19.9%). This means that the

frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in sentence complexes is higher than that in the

textbook. The frequency of conjuncts in sentence complexes is by 4.7 per cent higher than in

the textbook, which are statistically important differences that are in accordance with the

presumption concerning higher frequency of conjuncts in sentence complexes in scientific

journals than in the textbook.

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Table 23

Number of conjuncts occurring in simple sentences versus sentence complexex –

conference papers

Text

Conjuncts in simple

sentences

Conjuncts in sentence

complexes Total

No. % No. % No.

T1 16 32.7 33 67.3 49

T2 13 26.0 37 74.0 50

T3 10 12.2 72 87.8 82

T4 3 12.0 22 88.0 25

T5 28 28.0 72 72.0 100

T6 23 23.0 77 77.0 100

T7 15 19.0 64 81.0 79

T8 19 17.3 91 82.7 110

T9 15 31.3 33 68.8 48

T10 1 7.1 13 92.9 14

Total 143 21.8 514 78.2 657

In conference papers, similarly to the previous two texts analysed, substantially more

conjuncts occur in sentence complexes, which is in accordance with the presumption of the

present work that more conjuncts are placed in complex or compound sentences. The

frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in complex and compound sentences in conference

papers (514 occurrences, i.e. 78.2%) is slightly lower than that in the scientific journals (462

occurrences, i.e. 80.1%). The difference is 1.9 per cent, which is statistically important, but it

is not as marked a difference as was expected.

The presumption that the conference papers use fewer sentence complexes with

conjuncts than scientific journals and the textbook has not been confirmed. Although the

frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in sentence complexes is lower in conference papers

than that in scientific journals, the frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in sentence

complexes in the textbook (75.4%) is lower than that of conjuncts in sentence complexes in

conference papers (78.2%), which is contrary to my expectations.

It can now be concluded from the results of the analysis of the placement of conjuncts

in simple sentences versus sentence complexes that the most notable differences have

appeared between the textbook on the one hand and scientific journals and conference papers

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on the other, since the authors of the textbook have used more conjuncts in simple sentences

than the authors of the other two text types. The difference between the frequency of

occurrence of conjuncts in simple sentences in the textbook and scientific journals is 4.7 per

cent and between the textbook and conference papers 2.8 per cent, which indicates the

tendencies for different stylistic and hence also syntactic use of conjuncts in the textbook,

probably connected with the focus of the textbook on slightly different addressees.

5.2.3 Position in paragraph

The criterion of the position of conjuncts in paragraph has been applied to the

examined corpora because it can be connected with the scope of their linking function. In

some English textbooks of style for foreign language students, the examples demonstrating

the correct use of conjuncts often show conjuncts as they begin the first sentence of almost

every paragraph. Therefore another aim of the analysis has been to confirm whether the

position of conjuncts at the beginning of paragraphs is also preferred in scientific computer

texts.

Three positions in paragraph, namely initial, medial and end position, have been

recognized for the purposes of the present analysis. The positions have had to be determined

by the division of paragraphs into three equal parts so that, for example, the initial part of a

paragraph could include even more than one sentence in longer paragraphs, while in shorter

paragraphs with longer sentences more paragraph positions could be distinguished even

within one sentence.

Moreover, for the initial position in a paragraph, the positions at the very beginning of

paragraphs and in the second sentence in a paragraph have been recorded. Other positions

recognized within the end position in a paragraph have been the positions of conjuncts in the

last and in the last but one sentence of a paragraph.

In some cases, mainly in the textbook, which has more complex graphical layout, it

has been difficult to distinguish between paragraphs with enumerating lists of facts, with

individual items being placed on individual lines and marked by some graphical illustrative

marks, such as , , and between a paragraph divided into individual subparagraphs.

If the parts of enumeration have been graphically separated by their placement on

individual lines and consist of more clauses, they have been regarded as paragraphs and the

first paragraph of this enumeration or list has been called introductory paragraph (see DIS:

55).

83

On the other hand, if the enumeration or list were graphically separated by placing

individual list items on individual lines but its items were not complete sentences, then this

list has been considered as consisting of subsections of one paragraph.

Table 24

Position in paragraph

Position

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. %

I 126 28.4 156 27.0 198 30.1

M 156 35.2 204 35.4 223 33.9

E 161 36.3 217 37.6 236 35.9

Total 443 100.0 577 100.0 657 100.0

Table 24 illustrates the distribution of conjuncts in initial, medial and end position in a

paragraph. Conjuncts in end position in a paragraph constitute 36 per cent of all conjuncts in

the textbook, 38 per cent in scientific journals and 36 per cent in conference papers, while

conjuncts in medial position in a paragraph constitute 35 per cent in the textbook and in

scientific journals and 34 per cent in conference papers. The lowest percentage of conjuncts

occurs in initial position in a paragraph, namely 28 per cent in the textbook, 27 per cent in

scientific journals and 30 per cent in conference papers. It follows from these results that in

all text types, the largest percentage of conjuncts is placed at the end of paragraphs, lower

percentage is placed in the middle part of paragraphs and the lowest percentage of conjuncts

can be found at the beginning of paragraphs. Accordingly, the investigated texts show the

tendency of conjuncts to be placed in end position of paragraphs, which is rather

contradictory to my expectations.

The distribution of conjuncts in paragraphs indicates that most conjuncts do not

connect paragraphs but sentences or parts of text within paragraphs. The prevailing linking

function of conjuncts between sentences or clauses can also be connected with the fact that

very frequent conjuncts in the texts analysed are e.g. and i.e., which have appositive function,

which “involves the linking of units of the same rank” (CGEL: 1301), and therefore they need

to be added to some preceding part of text, sentence, clause or just part of clause.

The conjuncts i.e. and e.g. also occur at the beginning of sentences although their

frequency in this position is lower than in other positions. There has been only one occurrence

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of the conjunct e.g. at the beginning of a paragraph with paragraph-connective function in all

the three text types examined, namely in one scientific journal article. The conjunct i.e. has

zero frequency of occurrence in this position in all the texts examined. Therefore it could be

stated that the appositive conjuncts e.g. and i.e. do not tend to be placed in the position at the

beginning of the first sentence of paragraphs where the scope of their connective function is

over the whole paragraph.

Another very frequent conjunct is however (see Tables 3a-3c/2 in Appendix), which

could be placed at the beginning of paragraphs, but which mostly occurs in other than the first

sentence of paragraphs. This means that it preferably expresses links between sentences or

clauses and not so much between paragraphs. For example, only seven of 47 occurrences of

the conjunct however in the textbook are placed in the first sentence of paragraphs with the

function to emphasize and particularize the connection of the whole paragraph with the

preceding text. In scientific journals, there have been five occurrences of the conjunct

however at the beginning of a paragraph with paragraph-connective function, the total

frequency of occurrence of however being 123 in this type of text. In conference papers, there

have been eight occurrences of the conjunct however in the first sentence of the paragraph

while connecting the whole paragraph with the previous text; the total number of however is

119 occurrences.

It should be emphasized here that the conjuncts which connect the whole paragraph

with the preceding paragraphs or larger parts of text have always occurred in the first clause

of paragraph but not necessarily in initial position in the clause; these conjuncts can retain this

function even if they occur in non-initial position in the first clause of a paragraph.

Example 42

The definition of a system is, however, somewhat of an academic exercise. The real

essence of systems theory is being able to look at the world from a different perspective. The

systems view involves adopting the reference framework and the terminology of systems

theory, trying to apply various analogies with other systems and checking which of the

systems laws and theories hold for the system of interest.

(DIS: 23)

However, it must be noted that many conjuncts in the texts examined are placed in non-

initial clauses within sentence complexes, and thus function inside these sentences only: they

connect clauses within sentence complexes. Other conjuncts may express connective links between

parts of clauses and therefore the scope of their connective function does not exceed the borders of

one clause. Therefore, conjuncts in each of the analysed positions in paragraphs have been further

85

subdivided into two groups. The first group (marked outside in Table 25 and in Tables 4a-4c/2 in

Appendix) comprises conjuncts expressing cohesive links between sentences (placed either in initial

position in the first clause of the sentence complex or in non-initial position in the first clause of the

sentence complex but with the function to express relation to the previous sentence or larger parts of

text; or placed in any position in a simple sentence to express cohesion between sentences). The

second group (marked inside in Table 25 and in Tables 4a-4c/2 in Appendix) includes conjuncts

which express cohesive links inside simple sentences or sentence complexes, i.e. the relationship

between clauses or sentence constituents.

If the conjuncts in the first sentence at the beginning of a paragraph are compared

from the point of view of the above-mentioned two groups of conjuncts, i.e. conjuncts

expressing cohesive links between sentences and sentence complexes and conjuncts

expressing cohesive links inside sentences or clauses, a large proportion of conjuncts

functioning only within the first sentence of paragraphs (labelled „inside‟ in the tables) is

found in all the text types investigated.

As can be seen from Tables 4a-4c/2 (see Appendix at the end of the present work),

from the conjuncts placed in initial position in paragraphs, 30 conjuncts (7%) are at the very

beginning of paragraphs in the textbook, 33 (6%) begin a paragraph in scientific journals and

41 (6%) in conference papers. Conjuncts expressing cohesive links within the first sentence of

a paragraph constitute 34 conjuncts (8%) in the textbook, 28 (5%) in scientific journals and 39

(6%) in conference papers. These results indicate that even conjuncts in initial position in a

paragraph do not have to have their scope of influence over the whole paragraph or even over

both the following and the preceding paragraphs. The utilization of conjuncts for the

expression of cohesion inside the first sentence of a paragraph is surprisingly high, when it is

compared to the first group of conjuncts, which in the first sentence of a paragraph express

cohesive links with the previous paragraph, the difference not exceeding one per cent.

The present work has further focused on the two groups of conjuncts in question in all

positions in paragraphs. The conjuncts expressing relation between clauses within sentences

or between sentence constituents (labelled „inside‟ in Table 25) represent 49 per cent of all

conjuncts in all positions in paragraph in the textbook, 34 per cent in scientific journals and

29 per cent in conference papers. The results indicate a marked difference in the use of

conjuncts between the textbook on the one hand and scientific journals and conference papers

on the other, since both scientific journals and conference papers use most conjuncts to

express relation between sentences or larger parts of texts (66% of conjuncts in scientific

journals, 71% in conference papers). The textbook employs conjuncts in both functions, the

86

expression of connective links between sentences and within sentences, with a similar

frequency: 51 per cent of conjuncts in the textbook are used to connect sentences or bigger

parts of texts and 49 per cent express cohesive links within sentences.

Thus scientific journals and conference papers seem to use conjuncts mainly to stress

the cohesive links on a higher level of text, while the textbook uses a higher number of

conjuncts for the cohesive links between and inside clauses, which could otherwise be

expressed by means of conjunctions.

Table 25

Position in paragraph

Type of text

Position Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers Total

No. % No. % No. %

I position outside 73 16.5 115 19.9 141 21.5 329 19.6

inside 53 12.0 41 7.1 57 8.7 151 9.0

M position outside 77 17.4 133 23.1 167 25.4 377 22.5

inside 79 17.8 71 12.3 56 8.5 206 12.3

E position outside 74 16.7 135 23.4 159 24.2 368 21.9

inside 87 19.6 82 14.2 77 11.7 246 14.7

Total 443 100.0 577 100.0 657 100.0 1677 100.0

Further, the frequency of occurrence of conjuncts of the first group only, i.e. conjuncts

connecting sentences (labelled „outside‟), has been compared from the point of view of their

position in a paragraph. A pattern of distribution of conjuncts in initial, medial and end part of

paragraphs has appeared which can be compared to the paragraph position of all conjuncts.

Similarly to the paragraph position of all conjuncts, the conjuncts connecting sentences have

the lowest frequency of occurrence in initial part of paragraph in all the three text types

(16.5% in the textbook, 19.9% in scientific journals and 21.5% in conference papers).

However, their frequency of occurrence in medial and end position in paragraphs is different

in the textbook and conference papers, since the highest percentage of conjuncts occurs in

medial position in these text types (17.4% in medial position in the textbook as compared to

16.7% in end position; 25.4% in medial position in conference papers as compared to 24.2%

in end position).

87

I agree with the statement in CGEL that a paragraph “has on the one hand a relatively

strong sense of internal coherence and on the other a relatively loose linkage with the textual

material before and after it” (ibid.: 1145). The relatively loose connection of the paragraph to

the preceding parts of text can be strengthened by the use of conjuncts, mainly in the initial

part of paragraphs, although the paragraph-connective function of conjuncts has not proved to

be as frequent as the use of conjuncts which function within paragraphs in the texts analysed.

The next step of the present analysis has been the comparison of the various positions

which have been distinguished within the initial and end position of paragraphs. As Tables

4a-4c/2 indicate (see Appendix at the end of this study), if the position of conjuncts in the first

sentence of a paragraph is compared to the position of conjuncts in the second or in further

sentences in initial position of paragraph, it has to be stated that most conjuncts in paragraph

initial position occur in the first two sentences of paragraph. It is necessary to note here that

the number of conjuncts occurring in the initial part of a paragraph but not in the first or in the

second sentence also depends on the length of paragraphs themselves, since the length of

paragraphs in texts is very variable and in shorter paragraphs the initial part of a paragraph

may consist of one or two sentences. Yet the third position of conjuncts in the third and

further sentences in the initial part of paragraph has been introduced for more subtle

distinctions within initial positions in longer paragraphs.

Regardless of their function between or within sentences, the highest percentage of

conjuncts in the initial part of paragraphs has occurred in the second sentence of paragraphs in

scientific journals and conference papers, while in the textbook the distribution of conjuncts

has been higher in the first sentence than in the second one.

As for the end position of conjuncts in paragraphs, the highest percentage of conjuncts

in end position in a paragraph has been used in the last sentence in all the three text types.

The high frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in the second sentence in the initial part

of a paragraph in scientific journals and conference papers can be the result of the author‟s

effort to express explicitly the cohesive link between the first sentence of a paragraph, which

is often the topic sentence, and the rest of the paragraph. In accordance with CGEL (1985:

1436) and Kirszner and Mandell (2009: 52), topic sentence is understood in the present work

as a sentence which deals with the main idea of the whole paragraph, which is further

developed by other sentences in the given paragraph.

The position of conjuncts in paragraphs can therefore be regarded as one of the

important ways of the realization of various discourse strategies, which could include such

discourse strategies as expressing explicitly steps by “repetitious coordination with conjuncts

88

such as then or next” (CGEL: 1435), or even the stack technique that has “a vertical structure,

with a sound foundation (often called the topic sentence), an accumulation of „layers‟, finally

capped by a neat „roof‟ ” (ibid.: 1436). The stack discourse technique is thus more vertical

than linear and is recommended for the construction of paragraphs (ibid.).

The high frequency of conjuncts in the last sentence of the end part of paragraph can

also be ascribed to the fact that the last sentence of a paragraph can also be topic sentence

(Kirszner & Mandell 2009: 52), which summarizes the content of the given paragraph.

Moreover, the factor influencing the use of conjuncts in the last sentence can be the length of

the paragraph itself, which necessitates the use of a connective item or it can be the emphasis

on the addition of the last sentence, which by means of a conjunct conveys that the last and

final sentence of paragraph will follow.

It should be noted that the use of conjuncts in texts is influenced by other factors

which interact during the construction of paragraphs. The paragraph construction is closely

connected with punctuation which can distinguish individual meaningful units such as

sentences, phrases or connective elements in paragraphs and also with the formal layout of

texts, including illustrative graphical marks, various types of fonts, etc.

5.3 Punctuation

The criterion of punctuation is understood in the present work as a separation of a

conjunct from the rest of the sentence by means of some graphical devices such as a comma,

semicolon, and colon.

The hypothesis is that the use of punctuation devices to mark conjuncts as separate

elements within the rest of the sentence will not depend on the position of conjuncts in the

sentence structure but it will rather differ according to the realization type of conjuncts. The

hypothesis also supposes that the tendency to use punctuation with conjuncts will differ

between individual authors of texts.

The separation of a conjunct from the rest of the sentence by means of a comma

stresses the loose integration of the conjunct into the sentence structure. There are not exact

grammatical rules concerning the punctuation connected with the use of conjuncts. It is

usually stated that conjuncts can be followed or preceded by a comma (CGEL: 643).

In some cases the use of a comma is necessitated by the need to distinguish conjuncts

from adjuncts. Some conjuncts have their counterparts in temporal adjuncts and it is therefore

recommended to use a comma after such conjuncts to avoid ambiguity. For example, the

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conjunct again which has to be distinguished from the temporal adjunct again in sentence

initial position should be followed by a comma (Greenbaum 1969: 48).

Example 43

Accuracy of information at the transactional level can to some extent be controlled

through validation checks within the database and software design. Individuals are entitled

by law to check and correct personal information that is stored in corporate databases.

Nevertheless, since the users of information systems are humane and fallible, the use of

technology alone will not prevent the production of inaccurate information, either

intentionally or by accident. Again, the growth of the internet has made the dissemination of

incorrect information extremely difficult to control, and raises ethical issues about the

responsibility for its consequences.

(DIS: 151)

Punctuation marks may follow or precede conjuncts. With conjuncts which are in

initial position in the clause, punctuation marks preceding them have not been taken into

account, since they separate the beginning of a new clause and would be used even if

conjuncts were omitted. The following example is an illustration of a comma which is used

before the conjunct then in clause initial position and which is thus not relevant for the

analysis of punctuation in the present work.

Example 44

If the data is not linearly separable, then it is possible to translate the data into a

higher-dimensional space to find a separator, referred to as the kernel-trick.

(USENIX – T9: 3)

The type of punctuation mark which is called „commas‟ in the present work concerns

conjuncts separated from the rest of text by two commas, one preceding and the other one

following the conjunct, as in the following example:

Example 45

Process control, for example, is a very specialised field but extremely important for

automated factories (car manufacturing, canneries), continuous process environments

(nuclear plants, refineries) or hazardous places (microbiological research laboratories,

space exploration).

(DIS: 49)

The occurrence of two commas in initial position of conjuncts is an exception to the

rule that commas before initially placed conjuncts are not included in the scope of the present

analysis. In the examples included in the analysis, the comma preceding a conjunct is placed

90

after a coordinative conjunction and at the same time before the conjunct, and therefore such a

comma is cosidered as separating a conjunct from the rest of the clause, not as a marker of the

beginning of another clause, as can be seen from the following example:

Example 46

She informs me “36 200 kilograms” but obtained this figure by looking at the size of

the pile of sugar and making a rough estimate or, even worse, checked the brown sugar

instead.

(DIS: 17)

Conjuncts in initial position in the clause which are separated by two commas occur in

the analysed texts with lower frequency than conjuncts which are separated just by one

comma or which are without any punctuation. There are four occurrences of conjuncts in

initial position separated by two commas in the textbook, 14 in scientific journals and two in

conference papers.

Conjuncts in initial position in the clause which are separated by a semicolon

preceding the conjunct and by a comma following the conjunct can be included in this type of

punctuation as well, but they have zero frequency in clause initial position in all the three text

types examined. The conjunct in the following example is considered as separated by a

comma.

Example 47

Unfortunately, current computing environments make such keystroke logging trivial;

for example, X-windows allows any application to register a callback function for keyboard

events destined for any application.

(USENIX – T5: 185)

After comparing the individual occurrences of conjuncts separated by two commas in

initial position in the clause, it became evident that these conjuncts can be divided into three

types according to their position in the initial part of the clause. In the first type, the conjunct

is in initial position, but it is preceded by a conjunction and a comma is placed after the

conjunction and before the conjunct, in which case it does not separate two clauses, but it

denotes the looser integration of a conjunct into the clause structure.

Example 48

However, they do have the empowering ability to generalise to unseen data, given

large enough training sets, and, moreover, they do not make any assumptions about the

underlying data.

(JRPIT – T2: 44)

91

The second type of conjuncts in initial position separated by two commas are the

conjuncts which are in initial position in the clause but are preceded by other sentence

constituents, usually adverbials. These sentence constituents often have their usual place in

non-initial position in the clause and their importance and function in the clause is

emphasized by their placement at the beginning of a clause, or they have been shifted to the

sentence initial position for stylistic reasons.

Example 49

In the active mode, however, it makes use of a simple boundary layer model (see Heil

et al, in preparation) to calculate the surface fluxes interactively.

(JRPIT – T12: 144)

In the example above, the adverbial in the active mode has been shifted to the sentence

initial position because the following sentence is valid only if the mode (of running an ocean

model) is active and therefore the adverbial in the active mode expresses such an important

presupposition that it has had to be emphasized by its movement to an unusual place in the

clause.

The third type of conjuncts in clause initial position can occur only in clauses which

are part of complex or compound sentences and which, at the same time, are not the first

clauses in these complex or compound sentences. This third type of conjuncts in clause initial

position is placed at the very beginning of a clause which is part of a complex or compound

sentence, and the comma preceding conjuncts can also be said to separate the previous clause.

In other words, it is difficult to distinguish whether the comma preceding the third type of

conjuncts is intended to mark the beginning of a new clause or the separation of a conjunct

from the rest of the clause.

Distinguishing commas separating conjuncts from commas separating two clauses is

also aggravated by rather vague rules for the use of commas in complex and compound

sentences because in many cases the decision whether to use a comma between two clauses or

not is left to the author of a text (CGEL: 1911, Urbanová & Oakland 2002: 74).

Example 50

For each trial the training and testing data were mutually exclusive, however, there

was no guarantee of evenly distributed data, even though a uniform random number

generator was used.

(JRPIT – T2: 58)

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Example 51

Capturing users requires “transparency”, that is, users want information or

communication access whenever and wherever they need it, using whatever device is most

convenient at that moment (Osowski, 1999).

(JRPIT – T6: 211)

In the examples above, the conjuncts however and that is are placed in initial position

in the clause and are separated by two commas, although the commas preceding conjuncts

could also be interpreted as having the function of separating the previous clause.

In accordance with Greenbaum (1969: 27), in the third type of conjuncts in clause

initial position, the comma or semicolon preceding conjuncts in initial position has not been

taken as related to the presence of a conjunct and therefore only the comma following

conjuncts in this position has been regarded relevant for the present work. This third type, i.e.

conjuncts in initial position not preceded by any other sentence constituent and with commas

before and after the conjuncts, has been counted as conjuncts separated by one comma from

the rest of the clause.

Consequently, only the first and second type of conjuncts separated by two commas,

or by a semicolon and a comma, in initial position has been included in the present analysis.

In both types the conjunct in initial position is not at the very beginning of a clause, but it is

preceded by some words, either a conjunction or a sentence constituent, and therefore the

comma preceding the conjunct is not identical with the comma separating clauses in complex

or compound sentences. Example 52 is an illustration of the second type of conjunct in initial

position separated by two commas. The comma preceding the conjunct is placed after the

conjunction and, which expresses the connection with the previous clause and clearly

indicates that the conjunct in particular with both commas belongs to the second clause.

Example 52

The scope of the project was deliberately limited and, in particular, there was never

an intention to develop a production system, nor to address wider issues concerning the

concept of consent and access control over personal health information .

(JRPIT – T10: 162)

After the exclusion of the third type of conjuncts separated by two commas or by a

semicolon and a comma in initial position, the frequency of occurrence of the rest of

conjuncts in initial position which are separated by two commas has changed to four

occurrences in the textbook, 14 in scientific journals and two in conference papers. These

93

have been put in Tables 5a, 5b and 5c (see Appendix at the end of the study) as the final

frequency of occurrence of punctuation by commas in clause initial position. There has been

zero occurrence of conjuncts in initial position which are separated by a semicolon and a

comma.

Altogether, ten conjunct tokens which have been separated by two commas in initial

position have occurred in the texts analysed. Three tokens belong to the appositive type of

conjuncts – for example, for instance. The other tokens represent resultive conjuncts – thus,

therefore, contrastive conjuncts – after all, however, worse, and listing conjuncts – second,

moreover, in particular .

Table 26

Punctuation marks

Position of conjunct

in clause

Type of punctuation mark

Co

mm

a

Co

mm

as

Da

sh

Co

lon

Sem

ico

lon

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s

an

d c

om

ma

Sem

ico

lon

an

d c

om

ma

Co

lon

an

d c

om

ma

No

pu

nct

ua

tion

Textbook 161 16 2 1 44 1 218

Scientific journals 317 44 14 15 1 186

Conference papers 449 21 1 1 1 55 6 1 122

Total 927 81 2 2 1 59 71 7 1 526

As for the punctuation of conjuncts in all the three investigated corpora, the prevailing

type of punctuation is a comma in scientific journals and conference papers, the frequency of

occurrence being 317 in scientific journals and 449 in conference papers. The second most

frequently used type of punctuation of conjuncts in scientific journals and conference papers

is zero punctuation. However, the use of punctuation is different in the textbook, since most

conjuncts (218 occurrences) are not separated by any punctuation marks from the rest of the

clause, with the comma being the second most frequent type of punctuation in this type of text

(161 occurrences).

The semantic analysis of conjuncts separated by a comma or marked by no

punctuation connected with the analysis of their placement in the clause is another important

step of the investigation because it could indicate connections or relationships between

semantic types of conjuncts, their position in the clause, and punctuation.

94

Concentrating on the conjuncts with zero punctuation in the textbook, it could be

stated that 24 tokens have occurred at least once without any punctuation mark separating

them from the rest of the clause, which is almost 50 per cent of all conjunct tokens in the

textbook, the overall number of conjunct tokens occurring in the textbook being 47.

Most conjunct tokens with zero punctuation have also had other occurrences in the

textbook where they have been used with punctuation marks. The only conjuncts which

occurred without any punctuation mark only, and thus have not had any occurrences with

punctuation, are the following seven conjunct tokens – else, in any case, so, specifically,

rather, worse, yet. Six of them have very low frequency of occurrence in the texts, ranging

between one to three occurrences per one token. Only the conjunct so has the frequency of

occurrence as high as 30 and has always been used without any punctuation. It has always

occurred in clause initial position. When the clause beginning with the conjunct so has been

preceded by another clause of a complex or compound sentence, the conjunct so has always

been preceded by a comma. This comma has not been taken into account in the present

analysis, since a comma preceding the conjunct in initial position has been taken as a comma

separating the previous clause, not the conjunct (Greenbaum 1969: 27). The other ten

occurrences of the conjunct so have been in initial position in the clause which has been the

first clause in a complex or compound sentence or in a simple sentence, where they have not

had any punctuation.

If the conjunct tokens occurring in the textbook in both variants, with and without

punctuation, are compared, it could be stated that seven conjunct tokens – then, firstly,

therefore, thus, e.g., i.e., hence – occur mainly without punctuation, their occurrence with

punctuation being lower than that with punctuation. A very distinctive tendency for the

occurrence without punctuation can be found with the conjuncts then, therefore and thus,

where the occurrences without and with punctuation can be expressed in terms of two

numbers, the first one being the frequency of occurrence without punctuation, the other one

with punctuation. The frequency of occurrence without and with punctuation can then be

expressed as follows: then – 34 : 1, therefore 22 : 3, thus 13 : 1, e.g. 35 : 29, i.e. 27 : 16, firstly

2 : 1, hence 6 : 3.

When trying to find any relation between the punctuation of the above mentioned

conjuncts and their clause position or their semantic type, it is interesting to note that the only

conjunct then which has been used with punctuation in the textbook is the contrastive

conjunct then, while all the other conjuncts occurring in the textbook are without punctuation

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and they are mostly occurrences of the inferential conjunct then plus one occurrence of the

additive semantic type of then.

The clause position does not seem to have any influence on punctuation of then

because the conjunct then with punctuation occurred in clause initial position as well as most

occurrences of then without punctuation. There might be a certain relation between the

position of the clause in the complex or compound sentence and punctuation, because the

only conjunct then that was punctuated occurred not only in clause initial position but also at

the very beginning of a sentence, namely in the simple sentence. The other occurrences of

then in clause initial position occurred in complex or compound sentences where they have

not been placed in the first clause and therefore they have been preceded by other clauses.

Therefore also the criterion of the position of clauses in compound or complex sentences has

been used for clauses with conjuncts in clause initial position.

The next three examples are the only occurrences of the conjunct therefore in the

textbook that occurred with punctuation.

Example 53

There is in reality no such thing as a closed system, which would have no inputs and

outputs and therefore, in a sense, no environment.

(DIS: 26)

Example 54

Therefore, voice dictation typically requires a user to train the voice recognition

software by reading standard texts aloud.

(DIS: 38)

Example 55

An important task, therefore, is that of the proper scheduling of different tasks.

(DIS: 62)

In the textbook, the occurrence of the conjunct therefore with punctuation belong to

the same semantic type as most occurrences of the conjunct therefore without punctuation –

they are resultive conjuncts.

If we concentrate on the first two examples of the occurrence of the conjunct therefore

with punctuation (see Examples 53, 54), which are in clause initial position, it is worth noting

that the first example of therefore is followed by a comma because after therefore follows the

phrase in a sense, which is separated from the rest of the clause by commas. Thus the use of a

96

comma after therefore has been enforced by the need to separate the next part of the clause

with the phrase in a sense.

The second example of therefore with punctuation in Example 54 is different from the

other occurrences of the conjunct therefore without punctuation in that respect that it occurs,

similarly to then with punctuation, in initial position in the clause which stands at the

beginning of a sentence.

This emerging tendency is not found for the conjunct thus, since in clause initial

position, which is at the same time sentence initial position, thus has occurred both with and

without punctuation. The only difference between the conjunct thus with zero punctuation and

thus with punctuation is that thus with punctuation is the only appositive conjunct thus in the

textbook, while other occurrences of the conjunct thus are resultive or summative.

There do not seem to be any relations between the conjuncts e.g. with and without

punctuation. They are mostly without any punctuation (35 occurrences), sometimes they are

put into brackets with the whole part of the clause they belong to (21 occurrences) and

sometimes they are separated from the rest of the clause by a comma (8 occurrences). The

same can be said about the occurrences of the conjunct i.e., which, without any evident

relations between their position, also appear mainly without punctuation (27 occurrences), in

brackets (14 occurrences) and even with a comma (2 occurrences).

The conjunct firstly also does not show any relation between its occurrence with and

without punctuation, since all its occurrences belong to one semantic type of listing conjuncts

and occur in clause initial position, which is also the sentence initial position. (For more

details on punctuation according to individual conjuncts in the texts analysed, see Tables 6a-

6c in Appendix.)

Another criterion could be the position of conjuncts in the clause and the type of

punctuation which it is usually connected with. Although the frequency of conjuncts in initial

medial and medial position is quite low, still Tables 5a, 5b and 5c (see Appendix at the end of

the study) indicate that conjuncts in medial and initial medial position in the clause occur

either with zero punctuation or, if they are punctuated, they are separated from the rest of the

sentence by commas or are in brackets with the whole part of clause they separate.

Punctuation by means of a comma seems to be avoided almost absolutely in clause medial

positions, the only exceptions being two examples from conference papers.

In the textbook, there are 13 conjuncts in initial medial and 36 in medial position (see

Table 5a in Appendix), 49 conjuncts in medial positions in total. Of these 49 conjuncts in

clause-medial positions, 35 occur without punctuation, eleven conjuncts are separated from

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the rest of the sentence by commas and three conjuncts are separated by brackets. There is

zero occurrence of conjuncts in clause-medial positions punctuated by a comma (see Table 5a

in Appendix).

In scientific journals, there are also 49 conjuncts in medial positions, with 17

occurrences in initial medial position and 32 in medial position (see Table 5b in Appendix).

Similarly to the authors of the textbook, the authors of the scientific journal articles analysed

avoided punctuation by means of a comma in clause-medial positions, preferring zero

punctuation (27 occurrences) or commas (16 occurrences), eventually brackets or brackets

and a comma (4 occurrences and 2 occurrences) (see Table 5b in Appendix).

In conference papers, 30 conjuncts occur in clause medial position, eight in initial

medial and 22 in medial positions (see Table 5c in Appendix). Most conjuncts in medial

positions are with zero punctuation – 19 occurrences, seven conjuncts are punctuated by two

commas, two are separated by brackets and comma and two are separated by a comma.

As for the punctuation by means of a comma in medial position in the texts analysed,

it can be deduced from the results described above that punctuation by a comma has been

avoided in all the three text corpora and that zero punctuation or punctuation by two

punctuation marks, either commas or brackets, is preferred.

The two examples of punctuation by means of a comma in conference papers can be

regarded as exceptions to the prevailing tendency described above. Moreover, when the

clauses with these conjuncts are analysed, it can be said that the conjunct i.e. is an exception

in medial position and the punctuation of the conjunct on the other hand might be corrected

by some teachers or proofreaders as an omission of a comma before the conjunct as well as

the evidently incorrect spelling of it’s instead of its.

Example 56

Mutual information attempts to use combinations of feature probabilities to assess

how much information each feature, i.e. word token, contains about the classification.

(USENIX – T2: 4)

Example 57

The push based proxy using the WiFi connection on the other hand, uses 4% more

energy per download period than it’s polling based counterpart.

(USENIX – T3: 65)

The prevalence of zero punctuation and punctuation by two punctuation marks in

clause medial position is a consequence of the fact that in medial positions in the clause the

98

conjunct separated just by one comma would also divide the clause in two parts, which is not

usual in the middle of a clause since it would influence the relationship between the subject

and the predicate, which are hierarchically the most obligatory elements of all in the clause

(Leech et al. 1982: 84) and have the clause constituting function (Dušková 2006: 401). Then

the conjunct would become too integrated into the sentence structure. Zero punctuation of

conjuncts and punctuation by means of two punctuation marks, usually commas, do not

influence the subject predicate relationship in clause medial positions and preserve the loose

integration of conjuncts into the sentence structure, which is marked graphically by double

punctuation marks or, in the case of zero punctuation, follows from the semantic meaning of

conjuncts.

Otherwise, the punctuation connected with conjuncts in scientific journals and

conference papers is very diverse, the tendencies and trends in the use of punctuation with

conjuncts being different in various texts. Therefore, even the individual conjunct tokens have

been put into the tables (Tables 6b and 6c in Appendix) according to their occurrence with or

without punctuation.

When the results in quite complex tables (se Tables 6b and 6c in Appendix) of

punctuation marks connected with conjuncts in scientific journals and conference papers are

compared, the tendency to use certain conjuncts without punctuation has been confirmed in

scientific journals, where the conjuncts so, then, yet, for one thing and in this case occur with

zero punctuation only. When these conjuncts with zero punctuation only are also compared to

the conjuncts with prevailing zero punctuation, it could be stated that there is a strong

tendency to use the conjuncts so, yet and then without punctuation in all the texts examined.

Although they exceptionally occur with a comma or in brackets, this type of punctuation is

always used just in one of the three corpora. There is one occurrence of the conjunct then with

a comma in the textbook (plus 34 without punctuation in the same text). In conference papers,

there is one occurrence of the conjunct so in brackets (plus 22 without punctuation) and two

occurrences of the conjunct yet are followed by a comma, as compared to four occurrences

with zero punctuation.

Another interesting criterion may be the position of conjuncts so, then and yet in the

clause and in complex or compound sentences and their semantic type. The conjunct so can

occur only in clause initial position (CGEL: 643); therefore its position has not been taken

into account here. Both so and yet can occur as just one semantic type, so belongs to the

resultive and yet to the contrastive semantic type of conjuncts; therefore their semantic

analysis does not enable any analysis of punctuation tendencies. The occurrences of the

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conjunct then mostly belong to the inferential semantic type, only three occurrences of the

conjunct then are contrastive (always preceded by the conjunction but) and two occurrences

of the conjunct then are enumerative, one occurring after the conjunction and and the other

being placed in medial position.

As far as the positions of the clauses with the initially placed conjunct so in sentences

is concerned, these are prevalently clauses which are preceded by other clauses in complex or

compound sentences. In the textbook, 24 of 30 occurrences of the conjunct so are in clauses

which are the second and further clauses in their sentences, in scientific journals 14 of 20, in

conference papers 22 of 23 occurrences of the conjunct so are placed in other than the first

clause in their sentences. These results indicate that, in the initial position in the clause which

is preceded by another clause, the conjunct so seems to behave like a conjunction which is not

followed by any punctuation marks.

So shares with yet the place on the scale between conjuncts and conjunctions because

they are sometimes called conjunction-like adverbs (CGEL: 1615). This explains the

occurrence of yet with zero punctuation in sentences where it is in initial position in clauses

which are preceded by other clauses in their sentences. Allow me to note here again that the

comma separating the clause which precedes the clause with yet has not been considered as a

comma connected with the occurrence of a conjunct but as a comma which separates two

clauses and the use of which does not depend on the occurrence of conjuncts.

Example 58

This was attempted in the P-V network, yet under these conditions the accuracy was

only slightly better and still below that of acoustic only.

(JRPIT – T2: 62)

The only two occurrences of yet with punctuation, a comma after the conjunct, are in

clauses where yet is in the initial position in the first clause of a sentence where the features

common with conjunction are weakened and therefore yet could be perceived more like a

conjunct, which is usually separated by a comma in this position, as in Example 59 below.

Example 59

Yet, it remains challenging to integrate them into existing distributed systems.

(USENIX – T6: 231)

In CGEL, yet and then are also mentioned as correlators because they frequently occur

in constructions where they correlate with subordinate conjunctions in preceding clauses

100

(CGEL: 644). The conjunct then typically correlates with the subordinate conditional clause

conjunction if and the conjunct yet correlates with conjunctions of subordinate concessive

clauses even if, even though, while (ibid.: 645). However, the conjunct yet has not occurred in

the function of a correlator in the analysed texts at all. On the other hand, the co-occurrence of

then with the subordinate conjunction if is frequent. If the frequency of occurrence of then

correlating with if is compared to the total number of the conjunct then in the texts analysed,

with the first number expressing the frequency of then correlating with if and the second

number expressing the total frequency of then, the results are as follows: 19 : 35 in the

textbook, 15 : 23 in scientific journals and 22 : 33 in conference papers. When even the

correlation of then with the conjunction when is included in the analysis, the numbers change

to 21 : 35 in the textbook, 16 : 23 in scientific journals, 23 : 33 in conference papers.

As for the zero punctuation of conjuncts then, so and yet, it can be concluded that it is

partly due to their initial position in the second and further clauses within sentences where

they behave like conjunctions in that respect that they are not followed by any punctuation

mark. The occurrences of the conjunct then which are not correlators with if or when are, with

just three exceptions, placed at medial or initial-medial position in the clause, which further

supports the supposition that conjuncts in medial positions tend to occur without punctuation.

Other types of punctuation marks which occurred with conjuncts are commas, dash

(only two occurrences, namely in the textbook), colon (two occurrences – one in the textbook,

one in conference papers), semicolon (only one occurrence, in conference papers), brackets,

brackets and a comma, a semicolon and a comma (one occurrence in scientific journals and

six in conference papers), and a colon and a comma (one occurrence in conference papers). Of

these the most frequent ones have been the types of punctuation called commas, brackets, and

brackets and comma. The type of punctuation named „commas‟ denotes conjuncts which are

preceded and followed by a comma (see Examples 52 and 55 above). In the punctuation

called „brackets‟ the opening brackets immediately precede conjuncts but the closing brackets

are placed after the whole part of clause which is introduced by a conjunct (see Example 60).

Example 60

From this contour the same processing applied to each technique to calculate the

required features (eg. height and width).

(JRPIT – T2: 58)

101

The type of punctuation which is called „brackets and comma‟ includes a comma

which immediately follows a conjunct and brackets which precede the conjunct and are closed

after the part of clause introduced by the conjunct.

Example 61

The mobile device must simultaneously connect to the user’s input device (e.g.,

keyboard) and her host platform.

(USENIX – T5: 188)

Although brackets do not separate only the conjunct, they have been included in the

present analysis, since they considerably emphasize that the part of the clause introduced by a

conjunct has different position in the clause structure and that it adds supplementary

information or examples or that it further specifies some part of the clause.

Another important feature of parentheses is that “words contained within parentheses

do not affect the syntax of the rest of the sentence” (Garner 2000: 245).

Although the ways of punctuation named commas, brackets, and brackets and commas

are the next most frequent punctuation types after a comma and zero punctuation, their

frequency of occurrence is considerably lower. The frequency of commas is 16 in the

textbook, 44 in scientific journals and 21 in conference papers.

The lower frequency of conjuncts separated by two commas is also a consequence of

the fact that most conjuncts separated by two commas are placed at clause medial and end

positions, while most conjuncts occur in clause initial position where there are not conditions

for being separated by two commas, since conjuncts in clause initial position are almost

always preceded either by a full stop of the preceding sentence or by some punctuation mark

(exclamation mark, question mark) marking the end of the previous clause of a complex or

compound sentence.

The frequency of conjuncts separated by brackets is 44 in the textbook, 14 in scientific

journals and one occurrence in conference papers. Brackets and comma occurred with

conjuncts only once in the textbook, while their frequency being 15 occurrences in scientific

journals and 55 in conference papers. These results seem to indicate that conjuncts separated

only by brackets are preferred in the textbook, while brackets and comma are preferred in

conference papers because all but one of the conjuncts separated by brackets are also followed

by a comma in conference papers.

Scientific journals show preference neither for brackets nor for brackets and comma,

their frequency of occurrence being almost identical, 14 occurrences for brackets and 15 for

brackets and comma. Yet, if the use of brackets or brackets and comma is compared in

102

individual scientific journal articles, preferences of authors for either brackets or brackets and

comma becomes evident. Brackets and brackets and comma have occurred in eight scientific

journal articles, namely T2, T3, T4, T5, T7, T8, T11 and T12. The authors of scientific

journal articles T2, T3, T4, T8 and T12 have used bracketed conjuncts only whereas those of

scientific journal articles T5 and T11 preferred solely brackets and comma. The only author

who used both brackets and brackets and comma has been the author of the scientific journal

article T7, in which the equal number of bracketed conjuncts and bracketed conjuncts with a

comma has occurred, the frequency of occurrence being two for brackets and two for brackets

and comma.

Analysing conjuncts punctuated by brackets or by brackets and comma from the

semantic point of view could help to distinguish why they have been put into brackets and

maybe it could also enhance understanding the reasons why brackets and comma are

prevailing in some text types, while in other text types conjuncts in brackets are not separated

by a comma.

Table 27

Conjuncts in brackets

Conjunct Type of text

Total Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

for example 6 1 7

e.g. 21 8 29

i.e. 14 4 18

hence 2 2

better even 1 1

that is 1 1

So 1 1

Total 44 14 1 59

103

Table 28

Conjuncts in brackets followed by comma

Conjunct Type of text

Total Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

by the way 1 1

e.g. 12 41 53

i.e. 2 11 13

similarly 1 1

for example 1 1

in particular 1 1

again 1 1

Total 1 15 55 71

As shown in Tables 27 and 28, most conjuncts which appear in brackets are appositive

conjuncts e.g., i.e., for example and that is, with the abbreviated forms e.g., i.e. being clearly

preferred to the full form of these conjuncts, for example and that is. In the textbook, the

frequency of occurrence of the conjunct for example in brackets is only six as compared to 21

occurrences of its abbreviated form e.g. In scientific journals the frequency of occurrence is

one for for example and eight for e.g. The conjunct for example which is punctuated by

brackets and comma has occurred just once in the texts analysed, notably in conference

papers, as compared to 41 occurrences of e.g. in this text type.

The conjunct that is has been used only once in brackets, namely in scientific journals,

while its abbreviated form i.e. has occurred in brackets in four cases in the same text type. In

the textbook, only the abbreviated form i.e. has been used in brackets and there has been zero

occurrence of both that is and i.e. in conference papers.

The other conjuncts that occurred in brackets or in brackets and comma are the

additive conjuncts again, similarly and in particular, the resultive hence and so, the

contrastive even better and the transitional conjunct by the way. Their statistic importance is

rather low because their frequency of occurrence is one, with the exception of hence, the

frequency of occurrence of which is two.

The above described results indicate that mainly appositive conjuncts have occurred in

brackets and comma, particularly the abbreviations e.g. and i.e. The punctuation of the

conjuncts in brackets does not seem to depend on the semantic type of conjuncts or their

individual tokens but on the overall preferences of the authors of individual texts to mark the

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conjuncts in brackets by a comma following the conjunct or to leave the conjuncts in brackets

without any punctuation marks.

Finally, allow me to note that punctuation can also be influenced by writing styles of

the individual authors of the analysed texts since there are not any strict rules concerning the

placement of punctuation marks next to conjuncts. So, for example, the author of T9 from

scientific journals is the only author of all the analysed scientific journal articles who has

always used the conjunct e.g. with zero punctuation, while all the others use this conjunct

with punctuation marks. This author used the conjunct also with zero punctuation, while, for

example, the author of T4 used also with a comma following the conjunct. The author of the

scientific journal T5 has placed all the conjuncts e.g. in brackets where they are followed by a

comma. The author of the scientific journal T9 also generally preferred to use conjuncts with

zero punctuation, since 20 conjuncts without punctuation marks and only nine conjuncts with

a comma and three in commas have occurred in his text. Yet, it has to be stated that there has

not been found any text in which punctuation is used with all conjuncts or where it is totally

omitted. (For more details, see Tables 5a-6c in Appendix at the end of the study.)

5.4 Semantic role of conjuncts

The last criterion I would like to deal with is that of the semantic role of conjuncts.

This criterion concerns the semantic meanings that conjuncts express and how their meanings

affect the way they connect parts of text together. Although conjuncts do not contribute to the

meaning of a sentence or clause, they still have certain meanings that enable them to be

distinguished from the semantic point of view.

Since the main function of conjuncts is to link sentences or parts of texts together, they

do not contribute to the meaning of sentences but rather to the way the author wants the

reader to perceive the connection between the individual parts of texts. Therefore, when the

semantic role of conjuncts is pursued, it is not exactly the semantic meaning that is being

dealt with. Both Huddleston and Pullum (CaGEL 2002) and Biber et al. (LGSWE 1999)

speak about semantic relationships that conjuncts can express.

In accordance with Fraser (1996, 1999), the semantic meaning of conjuncts in the

present study is viewed as a procedural meaning. The procedural meaning of conjuncts, as

opposed to representational meaning, does not denote a particular group of semantic features,

which is typical of representational meaning, but specifies “how the sentence of which they

[conjuncts] are a part of is related to the preceding discourse” (Fraser 1996:169). In other

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words, procedural meaning tells the reader how the part of text which is introduced by a

conjunct shall be interpreted in connection with the previous context.

Allow me to mention that although the semantic division of conjuncts into classes

differs slightly with various authors, most authors (Greenbaum 1969, CGEL 1985, Biber et al.

1999, Huddleston & Pullum 2002) distinguish six basic types of conjuncts –

listing/enumerative/ordering, additive, appositive/exemplificative/explicatory, contrastive/

concessive, resultive, and transitional. Summative and inferential conjuncts are also

distinguished by all the previously mentioned authors with the exception of Huddleston and

Pullum (2002).

For better transparency and lucidity, a survey of the division of conjuncts by different

authors is listed below:

Greenbaum (1969)

Conjuncts:

– listing – enumerative

– additive

– transitional

– summative

– explicatory

– contrastive – substitutive

– adversative – replacive

– antithetic

– concessive

– illative

– inferential

– temporal transitional

GCE (1973)

Conjuncts:

– listing – enumerative

– additive – reinforcing

– equative

– transitional

– summative

– apposition

– result

– inferential

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– contrastive – reformulatory

– replacive

– antithetic

– concessive

– temporal transition

CGEL (1985)

Conjuncts:

– listing – enumerative

– additive – equative

– reinforcing

– summative

– appositive

– resultive

– inferential

– contrastive – reformulatory

– replacive

– antithetic

– concessive

– transitional – discoursal

– temporal

LGSWE (1999)

Linking adverbials:

– enumeration and addition

– summation

– apposition

– result/inference

– contrast/concession

– transition

CaGEL (2002)

Connective adjuncts:

– pure connectives: – ordering

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– addition and comparison/likeness and contrast

– elaboration and exemplification

– markers of informational status

– impure connectives: – concession

– condition

– reason/result

Halliday and Hasan (1976) introduce four basic types of conjunctive relations:

additive, adversative, causal and temporal, and they also mention another type of conjunctives

which they call continuatives. Yet at a closer look at the basic division by Halliday and Hasan

(ibid.), the division is similar to that of the previously mentioned authors, since the group of

temporal relations also includes listing relations, which are called sequential by the other

authors, and additive relation also includes exemplification. Moreover, adversative relations

consist of relations of contrast as well as of adversatives proper, which include concessive

expressions, while causal relations involve both reason and result.

The present work uses the semantic classification of conjuncts which is in accordance

with CGEL but which has been adapted for the purposes of the present analysis. The division

of conjuncts into classes, sub-classes and even groups inside sub-classes in CGEL has been

simplified to comply with the aims of the present investigation so that the following seven

classes and two sub-classes of semantic roles of conjuncts can be recognized:

– listing – enumerative

– additive

– summative

– appositive

– resultive

– inferential

– contrastive

– transitional

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5.4.1 Listing conjuncts

The class of listing conjuncts is used to emphasize the division of texts into certain

sequences, the internal structure of these parts of texts as well as the ordering of given parts of

texts.

Table 29

Listing conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

Enumerative

as a starting point 1 5.0 1 1.0

fifth 1 1.7 1 1.0

finally 15 78.9 6 30.0 25 42.4 46 46.9

first 3 15.0 15 25.4 18 18.4

firstly 3 15.8 3 15.0 6 6.1

for another 1 5.0 1 1.0

for one thing 2 10.0 2 2.0

fourth 1 1.7 1 1.0

next 1 1.7 1 1.0

second 2 10.0 14 23.7 16 16.3

secondly 1 5.0 1 1.7 2 2.0

then 1 5.3 1 5.0 2 2.0

third 1 1.7 1 1.0

Total 19 100.0 20 100.0 59 100.0 98 100.0

Additive

above all 2 4.3 2 1.1

additionally 4 5.4 9 14.1 13 7.0

again 6 12.8 3 4.1 3 4.7 12 6.5

also 5 10.6 13 17.6 4 6.3 22 11.9

correspondingly 1 1.4 1 0.5

equally 1 2.1 1 0.5

further 5 6.8 8 12.5 13 7.0

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Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

furthermore 1 2.1 7 9.5 12 18.8 20 10.8

in addition 24 51.1 7 9.5 9 14.1 40 21.6

in particular 4 8.5 14 18.9 10 15.6 28 15.1

in the same way 1 2.1 1 0.5

likewise 1 1.6 1 0.5

moreover 7 9.5 3 4.7 10 5.4

similarly 3 6.4 13 17.6 5 7.8 21 11.4

Total 47 100.0 74 100.0 64 100.0 185 100.0

Total of listing conjuncts 66 94 123 283

As can be deduced from the table above, the highest number of listing conjuncts

occurs in conference papers (123 occurrences), followed by scientific journals (94

occurrences) and textbook (66 occurrences).

The significantly lower frequency of listing conjuncts in the textbook could be, among

other reasons, caused by the formal layout of the textbook, which partially substitutes the

listing function of conjuncts. Much more than the other two corpora, the textbook has

markedly diversified layout of text since it uses distinctive type fonts, above all the important

scientific terminology is printed in bold and a more elaborate division of text into paragraphs

and subparagraphs is used. Moreover, there is a higher number of titles and subtitles and

enumeration or listing of individual parts of an issue is often supported by visual illustrative

marks (such asor ) at the beginning of paragraphs. The applied entire visual distinction of

text is intended to help students to distinguish the formal arrangement of text and can also

indicate the ordering or listing of items.

It should also be noted here that some conjuncts are described as formal or informal

means of cohesion by Greenbaum (1969) or in CGEL (1985) although most conjuncts are

regarded neutral from stylistic point of view. In the semantic class of listing conjuncts, four

formal conjunct tokens have occurred, namely the conjuncts correspondingly, again, further,

furthermore. The conjunct correspondingly has occurred only once in the text types

examined, namely in scientific journals. Further and furthermore have the highest frequency

of occurrence in conference papers, lower frequency of occurrence in scientific journals and

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very low frequency in the textbook, which is in accordance with the hypothesis that texts

designed for more academic readership prefer more formal conjuncts. However, the conjunct

again has occurred with the highest frequency of occurrence in the textbook, which is

contrary to my expectations.

When subclasses of listing conjuncts, i.e. enumerative and additive conjuncts, are

compared, it can be stated that additive conjuncts are a more frequent subclass in all the three

investigated corpora. The frequency of occurrence of additive conjuncts as compared to

enumerative conjuncts is 64 : 59 occurrences in conference papers, 74 : 20 in scientific

journals and 47 : 19 in the textbook.

Table 30

Distribution of enumerative and additive listing conjuncts

Type of conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

Enumerative 19 28.8 20 21.3 59 48.0 98 34.6

Additive 47 71.2 74 78.7 64 52.0 185 65.4

Total 66 100.0 94 100.0 123 100.0 283 100.0

The prevailing frequency of additive conjuncts suggests that more than the ordering

and numbering of text parts the authors needed to express explicitly that they are going to add

another part of text and that the next part of text will be of equal importance as the previous

one or that it is added to give support and to strengthen the previous statement.

If the division of additive conjuncts into equative and reinforcing is applied (CGEL:

635), so that conjuncts correspondingly, equally, likewise, similarly, in the same way are

regarded as equative conjuncts and the rest of additive conjuncts are regarded as reinforcing

conjuncts, it can be stated that all the text types analysed preferred reinforcing additive

conjuncts to equative additive conjuncts. Hence the relation of addition was more frequently

connected with the expression of certain type of gradation of importance which is expressed

by means of additive reinforcing conjuncts which convey that they add new ideas to the

previous part of text and, moreover, that they reinforce the message involved in the text parts

which they introduce.

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Example 62

The SMS based proxy is the most promising configuration. Most carriers offer free

incoming SMS messages. Furthermore, receiving an SMS message has minimal energy

consumption (as shown in Figure 3 (b)).

(USENIX – T3: 66)

In the above example, the additive reinforcing conjunct furthermore serves as a means

of listing which adds another sentence to the sentences dealing with the advantages of a

technical device called SMS based proxy. The relationship of addition which is expressed by

furthermore also includes confirmation of the previous statements simply in that it denotes

addition of another, more graded, or stronger, item in the list of advantages.

The frequency of occurrence of enumerative conjuncts in conference papers (59

occurrences) is markedly higher than in the textbook (19 occurrences) and scientific journals

(20 occurrences).

The higher frequency of occurrence of enumerative conjuncts in conference papers

seems to indicate that ordering and sequencing of individual parts of text is more important in

this type of text. On the one hand, this could be attributed to the trend of denoting individual

activities in research techniques by numbers or other means of enumeration. Conference

papers primarily report on the latest scientific achievements of their authors; therefore they

include the precise description of stages of investigation with particular emphasis being put

on the sequencing of scientific steps. On the other hand, conference papers are mostly

designed to be read aloud; hence the accentuated segmenting and ordering of texts by means

of listing conjuncts could enhance the understanding for readers.

The most exploited enumerative conjunct in all the three corpora is the conjunct finally

(25 occurrences in conference papers, 15 in the textbook, 6 in scientific journals) and

conjuncts expressing numerical order, such as first (15 occurrences in conference papers and

3 in scientific journals), second (14 occurrences in conference papers and 2 in scientific

journals) and firstly (3 occurrences in the textbook and 3 in scientific journals), which

indicates that enumerating tends to be also connected with numerical ordering of sentences or

parts of text.

The tendency towards text segmentation by means of enumerative conjuncts denoting

numerical order is also implied by the use of conjuncts then and on the other hand. Although

conjuncts then and on the other hand are quite frequent in the corpora (then – 35 occurrences

in the textbook, 33 in conference papers and 23 in scientific journals; on the other hand – 9 in

the textbook, 6 in conference papers and 3 in scientific journals), the conjunct then was used

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only twice for enumeration and on the other hand did not occur as enumerative conjunct at

all, its main purpose in the data being the expression of contrast.

It is interesting to note here that Halliday and Hasan (1976) see additive and

enumerative listing conjuncts (which they call sequential) as two different groups of

conjunctive relations which are included into different types of conjunctive relations.

Additive conjunctive expressions constitute one type of conjunctive relations, the

basic meaning of which is characterized by the conjunction and which is called the “and

type” (ibid.: 244). Semantic enumerative relations are classified as internal temporal relations

and are included in the temporal type which is characterized by the expression then – the then

type of conjunctive relations (ibid.: 261).

I agree with Halliday and Hasan (1976) that the additive and enumerative conjunct s

are different in the respect that the former emphasize the activity of attaching, adding another

part of text, while the latter concentrate more on the succession of messages or activities

described by the linked parts of text.

However, both the additive and enumerative conjuncts have as their primary function

listing; therefore the inclusion of enumeration and addition into the class of listing conjuncts

in CGEL (1985) has been chosen as the basis for the present analysis.

Different approaches of Halliday and Hasan (1976), Greenbaum (1969) and Sigiura

(1988) to the group of external temporal conjunctive relations, which Halliday and Hasan

(1976) classify as a group of temporal conjunctive relations, have already been discussed in

this chapter (see Subsection 5.1.4). Therefore, allow me to remark here that external temporal

conjunctive relations have not been included in the present work since they denote temporal

succession of activities or events and have the function of adjuncts of time (Greenbaum 1969,

Sigiura 1988). Consequently, expressions such as first, next, then in the function of time

adjunct are distinguished from the conjuncts first, next, then with the listing enumerative

function and only the conjunctive expressions have been the subject of the present analysis.

Example 63

This helps to illustrate the inherent complexity of any information system– first you

need to define what purpose it is going to serve (i.e. what information you want to produce),

then you need to identify what data will be required in order to generate that information,

work out how the data will be captured, how it will be stored, how it should be processed to

get the desired result, and how the resulting information should be communicated to the

person needing it.

(DIS: 10)

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The expressions first, then in the above example describe temporal succession of steps

in a scientific procedure of identifying the goals of information systems; hence they are

regarded as adjuncts of time and are excluded from the scope of the present analysis.

5.4.2 Summative conjuncts

The class of conjuncts which is named summative conjuncts introduces those sections

of texts which give summary of what has been described in the previous parts of text.

Summative conjuncts express the connection with the previous part or parts of text and they

also bring the contents of the previous parts together by joining them with the following

section of text which is introduced by a summative conjunct and which emphasizes the

messages described in the previous parts of text, draws conclusions from them or sums them

up.

Example 64

The primary aim of this research was to concentrate on those SMEs (small- and

medium-sized enterprises) that had already adopted technology in order to identify their

needs for the new mobile data technologies (MDT), the mobile Internet. The research design

utilised a mixed approach whereby both qualitative and quantitative data was collected to

address the question. Overall, the needs of these SMEs for MDT can be conceptualised into

three areas where the technology will assist business practices; communication, ecommerce

and security.

(JRPIT – T6: 205)

Example 65

Thus, focusing on these attributes may improve overall acceptance by SME

owner/managers, a view supported by Nambisan and Wang (1999) who posit that the

acceptance of web-based technologies is influenced by ease of use and perceived usefulness

in terms of current IS sophistication, complexity of the new technologies, and perceived costs

and benefits.

(JRPIT – T6: 209)

The summative conjunct overall in Example 64 above implies the relationship with the

previous part of the paragraph, which deals with needs of a certain type of enterprises, and

also introduces the conclusion about basic division of these needs, which is expressed by the

clause in which the conjunct occurs. By specifying the relation between the clause which it

introduces and the previous clauses as a summative relation, the conjunct overall emphasizes

that the purpose of the following clause is to summarize or to draw a conclusion.

Example 65 is an illustration of other functions that the expression overall performed

in the texts analysed and which had to be distinguished from the conjunct overall. The

expression overall in Example 65 above is an adjective which functions as an attribute and is

114

integrated into the sentence structure and is thus distinct from the conjunct overall in Example

64 above.

Table 31

Summative conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

in aggregate 2 15.4 2 5.1

in total 3 23.1 3 7.7

overall 6 27.3 2 15.4 8 20.5

therefore 3 75.0 3 13.6 1 7.7 7 17.9

thus 1 25.0 13 59.1 5 38.5 19 48.7

Total 4 100.0 22 100.0 13 100.0 39 100.0

The frequency of occurrence of summative conjuncts in all the three corpora analysed

is very low when compared to the frequency of occurrence of other classes of conjuncts.

There are only 22 occurrences in scientific journals, 13 in conference papers and four in the

textbook.

Moreover, the number of tokens of summative conjuncts that was applied in the

investigated corpora is also significantly low, since only three tokens of summative conjuncts,

namely the conjuncts therefore, thus and overall occur in scientific journals and conference

papers, while only two realization types, therefore and thus, have been excerpted from the

textbook. The multi-word summative conjuncts in aggregate and in total occur in conference

papers only.

Multi-word summative conjuncts such as to conclude, to sum up have not been

exploited in the texts at all.

The low frequency of summative conjuncts implies that the authors did not perceive

the need to express explicitly, by means of cohesive devices, that the part of text they intend

to write should be the summary or conclusion of the preceding sections of text. It has to be

considered that texts could use other means of cohesion instead of summative conjuncts,

namely the means of lexical cohesion, which express the summative function of a text section

by means of lexical units which are part of the basic sentence structure (words such as

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conclusion, follow from, results show) or by complete definite clauses, which can substitute

for the summative function of conjuncts.

The summative conjunct thus in Example 66 is used to sum up the classification tasks

which are described in the preceding paragraph in the text analysed. Example 67, on the other

hand, does not express the summative function of the particular part of text by means of a

conjunct but by means of a definite clause From these results, we can conclude, which is the

first clause of the paragraph which summarises the whole preceding section of the given

chapter.

Example 66

Phoneme, Viseme or Voicing were the three possible classification tasks for a NN (neural

network) to perform.

1. Phoneme classification tasks involved discriminating between the stops (/p,b,m,t,d,n,k,g,n/).

2. Viseme classes are defined as labial (/p,b,m/), dental (/t,d,n/), and glottal (/k,g, n/).

3. The voicing task discriminated between unvoiced (/p,t,k/), voiced (/b,d,g/) and nasal stops

(/m,n,n/).

Thus, the tasks were 9, 3, and 3 item discrimination tasks, respectively.

(JRPIT – T2: 58)

Example 67

From these results, we can conclude that TFS (Transparent File System) donates nearly as

much storage as other methods in the worst case.

(USENIX – T7: 224)

As for the level of stylistic formality of summative conjuncts excerpted, there has

occurred only one summative conjunct token which is defined as formal in CGEL, namely the

conjunct thus, in the texts examined. Thus has very low frequency of occurrence in the

textbook (1 occurrence only) as compared to scientific journals (13 occurrences) and

conference papers (5 occurrences), which coincides with the hypothesis that texts written for

readers with supposed higher level of academic knowledge use more formal conjuncts. The

formal conjunct thus comprises 25 per cent of all summative conjuncts in the textbook, 59 per

cent in scientific journals and 39 per cent in conference papers, which clearly indicates higher

preferences for this formal conjunct in scientific journals and conference papers.

If the frequency of occurrence of conjuncts therefore and thus in the function of

summative conjuncts is compared to the frequency of occurrence of therefore and thus in the

function of resultive conjuncts in the investigated texts, it is obvious that the texts analysed

mostly preferred the conjuncts therefore and thus in their resultive meaning. The preference

of resultive relations to summative relations could be also due to the tendency of scientific

116

prose style to express precisely the dependence between ideas because resultive, appositive or

inferential cohesive relations can be regarded as more subtle formulations of cohesive

relations between individual sections of text.

The results concerning the frequency of summative and listing adverbials obtained by

means of the present analysis can be compared to the corpus findings mentioned by Biber et

al. (1999), who regard listing and summative conjuncts as one group of conjuncts and

mention that they have the second lowest frequency in academic prose, the lowest frequency

group of conjuncts in academic prose being transitional conjuncts. In their corpus findings,

Biber et al. (ibid.) do not quote exact numbers but illustrate the frequency of conjuncts by

means of bar graphs. Therefore it is rather difficult to read the frequency since the bar graph

shows the frequency in thousands only. Yet it can be deduced that the approximate frequency

of summative and listing conjuncts in academic prose in their corpus findings constitutes

about one seventh of the overall conjunct frequency (about 1,000 of 7,000 occurrences),

which equals to 14.3 per cent.

As far as the frequency of occurrence of summative and listing conjuncts in the

present work is concerned, it is higher in all the three investigated text types than in the

corpus findings mentioned by Biber et al. (1999). The higher frequency of occurrence of

summative and listing conjuncts is in scientific journals and conference papers (20.1% and

20.7% respectively), while it is notably lower in the textbook (15.8%), which is still 1.5 per

cent higher than that in the corpus of academic prose mentioned above (see Biber et al. 1999:

887). These results indicate that the frequency of summative and listing conjuncts in the data

investigated is remarkably higher mainly in scientific journals and conference papers than in

the results mentioned by Biber et al., the difference being by 5.8 per cent higher in scientific

journals and by 6.4 per cent higher in conference papers, which are statistically important

differences.

Table 32

Frequency of listing and summative conjuncts as compared to the frequency of all conjuncts

Type of conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

Listing and summative 70 15.8 116 20.1 136 20.7 322 19.2

All conjuncts 443 100.0 577 100.0 657 100.0 1677 100.0

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The differences in the frequency of summative and listing conjuncts might be partly

caused by the topic of the texts which have been analysed in the present work, since the

investigation focuses on texts dealing with natural scientific themes only, namely with

computer science. The choice of texts which are included in the corpora of academic prose in

LGSWE (1999) is more varied, since they “are taken from a wide range of academic

disciplines, including sciences, social sciences and humanities” (ibid.: 33).

The different frequency of certain conjunct tokens in general scientific prose style

(investigated in LGSWE 1999) and scientific prose style on computers, which is investigated

in the present study, seem to confirm the notion that conjuncts as text connectors might be not

only style-restricted means of cohesion (Altenberg 1986), but also scientific discipline-

restricted conjuncts, i.e. the use of conjuncts may differ in sciences, social sciences and

humanities.

5.4.3 Appositive conjuncts

As the name of this type of conjuncts suggests, they introduce cohesive relations

within texts which are based on the grammatical phenomenon of apposition.

Apposition consists in the identity of reference, which means that the appositive part

and the part of the clause which it relates to refer to an identical part of the extralinguistic

reality. Apposition usually modifies a nominal part of a sentence and the resulting

construction is therefore based on the relation of coordination. Apposition is therefore

“construction in which one noun phrase is defined by another” (Leech et al. 1982: 61) or “the

reference of one must be included in the reference of the other” (CGEL: 1301).

However, appositive conjuncts often stand at the beginning of sentences, which means

that they express appositive relation to previous sentences, not just apposition inside clauses

which modifies sentence elements only.

The division of apposition according to CGEL into the scale of equivalence,

attribution and inclusion can be applied to the type of appositive conjuncts as well.

Thus the appositive conjuncts namely, that is to say, that is, i.e., in other words can be said to

belong to the appositive relations which are established on equivalence, the conjuncts

especially, for example, e.g., for instance, specifically should be treated as conjuncts

expressing appositive inclusion.

Appositive conjuncts, together with contrastive concessive conjuncts, belong to the

most frequent semantic types of conjuncts. Particularly the conjuncts e.g. and for example

rank among the most frequent types of conjuncts in all the three corpora examined.

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The high frequency of appositive conjuncts is the result of the explicatory tendency in

scientific prose style in which most expositions are supplemented by a large number of

examples. Explanation in scientific texts also often consists of saying the same things

repeatedly, from different points of view or in other words.

Scientific prose style tries “to explore, extend, or clarify society‟s knowledge store of

a special domain of „facts‟ by presenting and examining evidence drawn from observation or

documentation” (de Beaugrande & Dressler 1981: 186). Presentation and examination of

evidence is frequently introduced by cohesive means from the sphere of appositive conjuncts.

Example 68

As a positive side effect, the SMS notification may enable the user to avoid using the

browser altogether. For example, if the user is interested in a stock quote, then the SMS

message containing the new value may convey all the information required.

(USENIX – T3: 59)

The conjunct for example in the example above is an exemplification of the preceding

clause the SMS notification may enable the user to avoid using the browser altogether and it

is based on the appositive relation of inclusion because the appositive relation is only partial,

with the referents which are not totally identical.

Table 33

Appositive conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

e.g. 64 39.8 32 22.7 61 33.3 157 32.4

for example 43 26.7 48 34.0 55 30.1 146 30.1

for instance 6 3.7 16 11.3 25 13.7 47 9.7

i.e. 43 26.7 18 12.8 21 11.5 82 16.9

in other words 1 0.6 1 0.2

namely 2 1.2 2 1.4 1 0.5 5 1.0

specifically 1 0.6 7 5.0 10 5.5 18 3.7

that is 15 10.6 5 2.7 20 4.1

thus 1 0.6 3 2.1 5 2.7 9 1.9

Total 161 100.0 141 100.0 183 100.0 485 100.0

119

It can be implied from the table above that the conjuncts i.e., e.g., for instance and for

example have the highest frequency of occurrence in all the three text types analysed.

5.4.4 Resultive conjuncts

The function of resultive conjuncts is included in their name since they express result s

which follow from the previous discourse. Resultive conjuncts are similar to inferential

conjuncts in that they convey the outcome of the message conveyed by the previous sentence

or clause. While resultive conjuncts express the result as such, as a product of the preceding

events or actions, inferential conjuncts indicate that the following part of discourse is a logical

consequence that can be derived from ideas which are contained in the preceding part of

discourse.

Some authors (Biber et al. 1999, Huddleston & Pullum 2002) do not even distinguish

between inferential and resultive conjuncts and include them in one common class of

conjuncts. In Biber et al.‟s (1999) terminology, this group of conjuncts is called

result/inference. On the other hand, Huddleston and Pullum (2002) do not mention inferential

conjuncts in their division of conjuncts at all and they include resultive conjuncts in the class

of conjuncts which is referred to as the reason/result group.

The conjunct for this reason which has been excerpted from the texts analysed has

been added to the list of resultive conjuncts. The function of the resultive conjunct for this

reason is in certain antinomy to resultive conjuncts as a result, as a consequence, in

consequence. Although the conjunct for this reason as well as the other immediately above

mentioned conjuncts are placed in initial position in clauses expressing result, they differ in

the reason – result relationship between clauses which they relate.

If we take into account the fact that the part of discourse which precedes the above

mentioned conjuncts expresses reason or cause for the following sentence, which expresses

result, the differences between the conjunct for this reason on the one hand and the conjuncts

as a result, as a consequence and in consequence on the other become more apparent.

In spite of the fact that the conjunct for this reason is placed at the beginning of a

sentence expressing result, it refers to the previous part of text, either to a sentence or even a

longer stretch of text, which is denoted as the reason for the following sentence by means of

the conjunct for this reason. On the contrary, the conjuncts as a result, as a consequence, in

consequence explicitly state that the sentence which they introduce is going to deal with an

issue which follows from the previous sentence or sentences as their result.

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It should also be emphasized here that resultive conjuncts are not identical with

conjunctions which introduce clauses of result, since they link main clauses or simple

sentences. Resultive conjuncts have not been used to denote a type of subordinate clause but

to make relationships between sentences explicit.

Example 69

Decisions made by top-level executives are often too unstructured to be adequately

supported by a DSS (Decision Support Systems). For this reason, Executive Information

Systems (EIS) have been developed, which provide rapid access to both internal and external

information, often presented in graphical format, but with the ability to present more detailed

underlying data if it is required.

(DIS: 98)

In the above example, the conjunct for this reason introducing the second sentence

stresses that the reason for the consequence conveyed by the second sentence is contained in

the preceding part of text, i.e. in the first sentence in Example 69. Therefore, the link between

sentence one and sentence two is more anaphoric.

In Example 70 below the conjunct as a result is used to express explicitly that the third

sentence is going to consider the consequences or results produced by the operations

described in the first and the second sentences. If the cohesive link expressed by the conjunct

as a result had to be expressed in terms of linear direction, it would have to be named forward

reference, or cataphora (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 17).

Example 70

The mobile proxy intercepts any incoming SMS messages from the edge proxy. It strips

off the control portion of the message and passes the remaining user portion back to the SMS

handler for delivery to the user. As a result, both the user and the mobile proxy have

information describing the updates.

(USENIX – T3: 59)

It is necessary to note here that the terms anaphoric and cataphoric reference of

resultive conjuncts have been used in connection with the specification of direction of

cohesive links between two sentences. Since conjuncts generally operate anaphorically and

express cohesive bonds with the preceding sentence (CGEL: 644), the above considered

examples always deal with sentences with conjuncts which are connected anaphorically to

previous sentences. The basic orientation of conjuncts is regarded as anaphoric.

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Table 34

Resultive conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

accordingly 1 0.8 3 2.7 4 1.2

as a result 1 0.8 8 7.1 9 2.8

consequently 2 1.5 2 1.8 4 1.2

for this reason 1 1.3 1 0.8 1 0.9 3 0.9

hence 9 11.5 18 13.5 12 10.7 39 12.1

of course 4 5.1 2 1.5 6 1.9

so 30 38.5 20 15.0 23 20.5 73 22.6

therefore 22 28.2 23 17.3 28 25.0 73 22.6

thus 12 15.4 65 48.9 35 31.3 112 34.7

Total 78 100.0 133 100.0 112 100.0 323 100.0

The highest number of resultive conjuncts is in scientific papers (133 occurrences),

which is followed by conference papers (112 occurrences), with the lowest number of

resultive conjuncts being in the textbook (78 occurrences).

As far as the level of formality is concerned, the group of excerpted resultive

conjuncts includes two formal conjunct tokens hence and thus and one informal conjunct

token so. Results in Table 34 indicate that the formal conjuncts hence and thus, which

typically occur in academic scientific texts, have significantly lower frequency of occurrence

in the textbook, which is aimed at less academic readership. On the contrary, the informal

conjunct so has the highest frequency of occurrence in the textbook.

In addition, the frequency of occurrence of the resultive conjunct therefore, which can

be regarded as stylistically neutral, can be compared to the frequency of occurrence of the

formal thus. Both scientific journals and conference papers prefer more formal thus to therefore,

the frequency of occurrence in scientific journal being 65 occurrences of the conjunct thus and

23 occurrences of therefore as compared to 35 occurrences of the conjunct thus and 28

occurrences of therefore in conference papers. On the other hand, the frequency of occurrence

of therefore (22 occurrences) is higher than that of thus (12 occurrences) in the textbook.

Before drawing conclusions from the use of resultive conjuncts in the text types

examined, it is necessary to compare them to inferential conjuncts because both resultive and

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inferential conjuncts are used to express cohesive links concerning consequences which

follow from the content of the preceding text.

5.4.5 Inferential conjuncts

Table 35

Inferential conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

else 2 4.9 2 1.8

otherwise 3 10.3 5 11.6 8 7.1

then 33 80.5 21 72.4 32 74.4 86 76.1

in this case 6 14.6 5 17.2 6 14.0 17 15.0

Total 41 100.0 29 100.0 43 100.0 113 100.0

From the table above it can be seen that the conjunct otherwise, which typically occurs

in academic scientific texts, is not used in the textbook at all, since the textbook is aimed at

the less academic readership.

It is also interesting that conveying logical relationships by means of inferential

cohesive links is more frequent in both the textbook (41 occurrences) and conference papers

(43 occurrences) than in scientific journals (29 occurrences).

The comparison of the frequency of occurrence of resultive and inferential conjuncts

indicate that the expression of cause and effect, which is the purpose of these two types of

conjuncts, is significantly higher in scientific journals (162 occurrences) and conference

papers (153 occurrences) than in the textbook (119 occurrences) in the data analysed.

Table 36

Comparing the frequency of resultive and inferential conjuncts

Type of conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

Resultive 78 65.5 133 82.1 112 73.2 323 74.4

Inferential 41 34.5 29 17.9 41 26.8 111 25.6

Total 119 100.0 162 100.0 153 100.0 434 100.0

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5.4.6 Contrastive conjuncts

Contrastive conjuncts are probably the largest group of conjuncts as far as the number

of realization types is concerned. Transitional conjuncts, on the other hand, exploit a very

small number of realization types and their frequency of occurrence is very low. It is also due

to the fact that the transitional function is quite often expressed by adjuncts which, as well as

transitional conjuncts, express the sequence of events.

For contrastive conjuncts, the typical function is expressing links between ideas which

are mutually contradictory or links between two different perspectives on the same idea. The

former links are conveyed by antithetic and contrastive conjuncts, such as on the other hand,

however, the latter ones are implied by means of replacive or reformulatory conjuncts, such as

in other words, alternatively.

De Beaugrande and Dressler‟s (1981) division of cohesive conjunctions into four

types includes the type which they refer to as contrajunction. Contrajunction is defined as

enabling “problematic transitions at points where seemingly improbable combinations of

events or situations arise” (ibid.: 73). As examples of contrajunctions are cited but, however,

yet, nevertheless (ibid.: 73).

The above cited de Beaugrande and Dressler‟s (1981) characterictics of

contrajunctions can also be taken as a basic feature of contrastive conjuncts, with certain

modification for replacive and reformulatory conjuncts which rather deal with contradictory

approaches than with contradictory ideas. Since the places in texts where the authors

introduce contradictory ideas are the most difficult ones as far as the comprehension of the

text is concerned, the readers might perceive the particular parts of text as lacking coherence

and cohesion. The seemingly incoherent parts of text which introduce opposing views thus

might enforce the use of a contrastive conjunct to convey explicitly to the reader how the

connection between ideas should be comprehended.

As can be seen from the examples below, the omission of contrastive conjuncts would

significantly lower their comprehensibility, especially in Example 72 below, while in

Example 71 the conjunct nevertheless was used for both purposes – to enhance

comprehension and to emphasize the contrastive idea conveyed by the sentence which was

introduced by nevertheless.

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Example 71

Password protection is the most common method of protecting corporate data.

Nevertheless, fraudulent transactions are often carried out by unauthorised users who

manage to gain access to the corporate network by using the login details of another user .

(DIS: 112)

Example 72

Consumer electronic devices (CEDs) are increasingly important computing platforms.

CEDs differ from general-purpose computers in both their degree of specialization and the

narrowness of their interfaces. As predicted by Weiser (27), these computers “disappear into

the background” because they present a specialized interface that is limited to the particular

application for which they are designed. Nevertheless, CEDs are often formidable computing

platforms that possess substantial storage, processing, and networking capabilities.

(USENIX – T6: 219)

Moreover, the high frequency of occurrence of contrastive conjuncts in all the

investigated corpora can also be accounted for as a consequence of the above-mentioned

function of contrastive conjuncts to ease transition between contradictory ideas in a text.

While the use of other types of conjuncts is usually not necessary, the use of contrastive

conjuncts is more elicited by the necessity to explain somewhat difficult relationships in a text

and therefore they are exploited very often in more complex scientific texts.

Table 37

Contrastive conjuncts with regard to their frequency

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

after all 1 1.1 1 0.6 2 0.5

alternatively 2 2.2 5 2.7 7 1.6

at the same time 1 1.1 2 1.3 1 0.5 4 0.9

by comparison 1 1.1 1 0.2

by contrast 3 1.9 3 0.7

conversely 1 0.6 5 2.7 6 1.4

either way 1 1.1 1 0.2

even better 1 1.1 1 0.2

even worse 2 2.2 2 0.5

for comparison 1 0.5 1 0.2

however 47 51.6 123 77.8 119 65.0 289 66.9

125

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

in any case 1 1.1 1 0.6 2 0.5

in any way 1 1.1 1 0.2

in contrast 4 2.5 17 9.3 21 4.9

in other words 1 0.6 1 0.5 2 0.5

instead 6 6.6 3 1.9 9 4.9 18 4.2

nevertheless 6 6.6 2 1.3 1 0.5 9 2.1

nonetheless 1 0.6 1 0.2

of course 3 3.3 2 1.1 5 1.2

on the other hand 9 9.9 3 1.9 6 3.3 18 4.2

on the reverse side 1 1.1 1 0.2

put another way 1 0.5 1 0.2

rather 2 2.2 4 2.5 4 2.2 10 2.3

still 3 1.6 3 0.7

then 1 1.1 1 0.6 1 0.5 3 0.7

though 3 1.9 3 0.7

to put it into other words 1 1.1 1 0.2

worse 1 1.1 1 0.5 2 0.5

yet 3 3.3 5 3.2 6 3.3 14 3.2

Total 91 100.0 158 100.0 183 100.0 432 100.0

In accordance with my hypothesis that more formal style also prefers more formal

conjuncts, the formal conjunct conversely has occurred exclusively in scientific journals (1

occurrence) and conference papers (5 occurrences). The very formal conjunct nonetheless has

been used in scientific journals only (1 occurrence). On the other hand, the informal conjunct

put another way has occurred in conference papers only (1 occurrence), which is in contrast to

my hypothesis.

5.4.7 Transitional conjuncts

The name of this group of conjuncts can be rather misleading since all conjuncts can

be characterized as expressing a transition between individual parts of text and consequently

between individual messages encoded in sentences or paragraphs. A more appropriate term

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for this type of conjuncts is used by Huddleston and Pullum (2002), who treat them under the

heading “markers of informational status” (ibid.: 779). Both Huddleston and Pullum (2002)

and CGEL understand transitional conjuncts and markers of informational status as

expressing shift of attention to another topic. The topic to which the readers‟ attention has

been shifted is often of lesser importance; yet the author of the text considers it worth

mentioning.

An even more appropriate name for transitional conjuncts was introduced by Fraser

(1996), who writes about topic change markers that are characterized as “departure from the

current topic” (ibid.: 187). Fraser, however, deals with discourse markers, which have a

broader definition than conjuncts, although conjuncts are also included in his classification of

discourse markers. Further, Fraser‟s topic change markers include the expressions put another

way, which are classified as contrastive markers in the present work.

Table 38

Transitional conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of text Total

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

No. % No. % No. % No. %

along the way 1 50.0 1 50.0

by the way 1 50.0 1 50.0

Total 2 100.0 2 100.0

Example 73

An important task, therefore, is that of the proper scheduling of different tasks. The OS

also ensures that ill-behaving applications do not impact on the integrity of the other

applications and their data. (By the way, when a single application program runs multiple

tasks simultaneously this is known as multithreading.)

(DIS: 62)

In the above example the digression from the main topic, which is handling multiple

tasks by computers, is emphasized not only by the conjunct by the way but also graphically

because the whole sentence introduced by the conjunct was put into brackets to indicate its

lesser importance for the main topic.

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Example 74

In future work, we plan to investigate the ability to remove correlated features found

via MI (mutual information) by computing feature-to-feature MI. Conversely, forward fitting

will likely only add one of these terms, moving on to a more descriptive second term.

(USENIX – T2: 5)

The frequency of occurrence of transitional conjuncts is very low in the textbook and

conference papers, with only two occurrences in each text type and with zero occurrence in

scientific journals. Zero occurrence in scientific journals could be a consequence of the fact

that scientific articles are supposed to have carefully structured and planned structure without

any unexpected comments and digressions from the main topic, which is the main function of

transitional conjuncts.

Moreover, if the authors of texts wanted to express a transitional link between parts of

text, they could use other formal means such as footnotes, which are quite frequent in

scientific prose style.

Table 39

Distribution of all semantic classes of conjuncts

Type of text

Textbook Scientific journals Conference papers

Conjuct No. % Conjuct No. % Conjuct No. %

Appositive 161 36.3 Contrastive 158 27.4 Appositive 183 27.9

Contrastive 91 20.5 Appositive 141 24.4 Contrastive 183 27.9

Resultive 78 17.6 Resultive 133 23.1 Listing 123 18.7

Listing 66 14.9 Listing 94 16.3 Resultive 112 17.0

Inferential 41 9.3 Inferential 29 5.0 Inferential 43 6.5

Summative 4 0.9 Summative 22 3.8 Summative 13 2.0

Transitional 2 0.5 Transitional 0 0.0 Transitional 0 0.0

Total 443 100.0 Total 577 100.0 Total 657 100.0

Table 39 illustrates the overall distribution of all the investigated semantic classes of

conjuncts in the three types of texts examined. If the semantic classes of conjuncts are ordered

according to their frequency of occurrence in the three text types, i.e. from the most frequent

to the least frequent semantic classes, the order is very similar in all the three text types, the

exceptions being the two most frequent semantic classes of appositive and contrastive

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conjuncts, the order of which is reversed in scientific journals, and listing and resultive

conjuncts in conference papers, which also have reversed order as compared to the other two

types of texts.

The order of semantic classes of conjuncts in the text types examined according to

their frequency of occurrence is thus the following: appositive , contrastive, (contrastive,

appositive in scientific journals), resultive, listing (listing, resultive in conference papers),

inferential, and summative conjuncts. Transitional conjuncts have occurred in the textbook

only, as a semantic class with the lowest frequency of occurrence.

Thus it should be stated that although there are differences in the preferences for

different semantic classes of conjuncts between the three types of texts, such as the overall

preference for appositive conjuncts in the textbook and conference papers, while contrastive

conjuncts are the most preferred semantic class in scientific journals, there also exist certain

tendencies to similarity in all the three types of texts as far as the preferences for semantic

classes are concerned.

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6 Conclusions

The investigation of cohesive devices in the present work has been focused on one

type of cohesive devices, namely adverbials called conjuncts, while analysing their cohesive

function in three different text types of scientific prose. The material under investigation has

been taken from authentic scientific texts on computer sciences, all of which are intended for

technically educated reading scientific public, although the texts analysed are different in the

purpose for which they were written, the presupposed type of readers and the setting.

The analysis has been aimed at investigating how differences between various genres

of scientific prose influence the variety, frequency, position and type of conjuncts used.

It should be emphasized that only conjuncts expressed by means of words have been

taken into consideration and therefore conjuncts expressed by means of sequences of

individual letters in the alphabetical order [a);b);c);…] or by digits [1);2);3);…] have been

excluded from the investigated corpora.

The investigation applies both formal and semantic criteria, considering primarily the

function of conjuncts in the analysed discourse. For the purposes of the analysis, conjuncts

elicited from the texts analysed have been further divided into single-word conjuncts and

multi-word conjuncts.

As for the criteria applied in the analysis, the first criterion has been the frequency of

occurrence of conjuncts, which proved to be the highest in conference papers (1% of the

words used in the investigated text type), with slightly lower frequency in scientific journal

articles (0.9%), and in the textbook (0.7%), which is in accordance with the hypothesis that

texts aimed at the addressees with more advanced shared background knowledge employ

more cohesive means in the form of conjuncts. The high frequency of occurrence of conjuncts

in conference papers seems to confirm the hypothesis concerning the higher frequency of

occurrence of conjuncts in conference papers in which the higher frequency of occurrence of

conjuncts has been aroused by the necessity to present these texts in oral form.

When the frequency of occurrence of single-word and multi-word conjuncts is

compared, it has to be stated that all the types of texts examined prefer single-word conjuncts

to multi-word conjuncts, the frequency of single-word conjuncts ranging from 74 to 78 per

cent of all conjuncts used in the individual text types, with the lowest frequency of occurrence

of single-word conjuncts in the textbook. The lower frequency of occurrence of single-word

conjuncts in the textbook could be related to the narrowest variety of single-word conjunct

tokens used in this text type, which is further considered in the following paragraph.

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The analysis of conjunct tokens also confirms the tendency towards prevalence of

single-word conjuncts, since single-word conjunct tokens constitute the majority of conjunct

tokens in all the three text types. The overall number of conjunct tokens in the textbook (47

conjunct tokens) is considerably lower than that in scientific journals and conference papers

(53 and 55 conjunct tokens respectively). The wider variety of conjunct tokens is exhibited

particularly with single-word conjunct tokens in scientific journals and conference papers,

where the number of single-word conjunct tokens is substantially higher than in the textbook.

The results concerning the low number of single-word conjunct tokens and their low

frequency of occurrence in the textbook indicate that the lower frequency of occurrence of

single-word conjuncts in the textbook can account for the lower number of single-word

conjunct tokens in this text type.

The results of the analysis of conjunct tokens are in agreement with the hypothesis that

more complex academic texts aimed at more educated addressees utilise a wider variety of

conjunct tokens.

As regards the formal realization of conjuncts, it can be expressed either by clausal or

by phrasal forms. Phrasal realization prevails in all the text types, while clausal realization

occurs with multi-word conjuncts only.

Phrasal realization forms are further divided into single-word and multi-word adverb

phrases and prepositional phrases. While single-word conjuncts are expressed by single-word

adverb phrases only, multi-word conjuncts occur mainly in the form of prepositional phrases

in all the text types. The frequency of multi-word prepositional phrases in multi-word

conjuncts accounts for 96 per cent in the textbook and conference papers and 88 per cent in

scientific journals. There have been four occurrences of adverb phrases in the textbook only,

which accounts for three per cent of all multi-word conjuncts in this text type, with zero

frequency of occurrence of multi-word adverb phrases in the other two text types investigated.

This indicates that most multi-word conjuncts are realized by means of prepositional phrases.

Clausal realization, which, as already stated, occurs only in the form of multi-word

conjuncts, is the least frequent in the textbook, where it is represented by a single occurrence

of a non-finite clausal realization form. The frequency of occurrence of clausal realization of

multi-word conjuncts is the highest in scientific journals (12%), followed by conference

papers (4%), represented by the single conjunct token that is in scientific journals and two

tokens, that is and put another way, in conference papers.

As for the distribution of conjunct tokens in the three text types, the analysis ha s

shown that a rather high number of conjunct tokens are identical in all the three text types,

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since 29 conjunct tokens (10 single-word and 19 multi-word conjunct tokens) have occurred

in all text types. Moreover, certain conjunct tokens have been identical in two text types,

namely 14 conjunct tokens in scientific journals and conference papers, three in the textbook

and scientific journals and two in the textbook and conference papers, which indicates a

tendency towards larger similarity between conjunct tokens used in scientific journals and

conference papers.

The conjuncts which have occurred in one text type only comprise 13 conjunct tokens

in the textbook, seven in scientific journals and ten in conference papers, which seem to

indicate that the largest variety of conjunct tokens is in the textbook. However, the high

number of conjunct tokens identical in scientific journals and conference papers should be

also taken into account. This shows that the largest variety of conjunct tokens is in the

conference papers, followed by scientific journals. The analysis of the distribution of conjunct

tokens has also demonstrated differences between conjunct tokens used in the textbook as

opposed to scientific journals and conference papers. These results are in accordance with the

hypotheses that individual conjunct tokens used differ in individual text types and that more

complex academic texts aimed at more educated addressees utilise a wider variety of conjunct

tokens. Another important finding is the high level of congruence between the conjunct

tokens in scientific journals and conference papers.

When individual conjunct tokens are compared with regard to their frequency of

occurrence, the results indicate that the most frequent multi-word conjunct is for example in

all the three text types. The preference for similar multi-word conjunct tokens in all text types

is evident, since six of nine most frequent multi-word conjunct tokens are identical in the

three text types analysed. Moreover, scientific journals and conference papers exhibit even

higher congruence because eight of nine most frequent multi-word conjunct tokens are

identical.

The tendency towards congruence in the most frequently used conjunct tokens in the

analysed corpora is also confirmed by single-word conjuncts, since of eight most frequent

conjunct tokens seven conjunct tokens are identical in all the three text types. The conjunct

however belongs to the most frequently employed single-word conjunct tokens in all the text

types, followed by e.g., thus, i.e., then, therefore, and so.

A large proportion of identical conjunct tokens which belong to the most frequently

occurring tokens in all the investigated text types is partially contrary to the hypothesis that

different text types, which represent different genres of scientific prose style, differ in the

conjunct tokens used and also in their frequency. Although the analysis has proved the

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differences in conjunct tokens used and their frequency, there has emerged the above-

described antagonistic tendency towards similarity in the conjunct tokens with the highest

frequency of occurrence since when conjunct tokens have been ordered according to their

frequency of occurrence, it has been revealed that most conjunct tokens which occur most

frequently are the same in the three text types.

The position of conjuncts in the sentence structure has been investigated from three

different points of view, focusing on the position of conjuncts in individual clauses, in simple

sentences or sentence complexes and in the paragraph structure.

Concerning the criterion of the position in the clause, which distinguishes between

seven different positions of conjuncts in clauses, the initial position in the clause clearly

predominates in all the text types, being followed by the end and medial position. Although

the end position is the second most frequent position in all the text types, the frequency of

occurrence of conjuncts in end position in the textbook is noticeably higher than in scientific

journals and conference papers. The prevalence of conjuncts in initial position in the clause is

connected with their function of expressing cohesion by means of anaphoric cohesive links to

the previous sentences or clauses, which is further supported by the fact that the non-initial

positions in the clause are frequently occupied by other adverbials, namely adjuncts. The

dominance of both the initial position and the end position of conjuncts in the clause can be

accounted for by the tendency not to interrupt the linear sequence of basic sentence

constituents of subject, predicate and object. The hypothesis that the preference for certain

positions of conjuncts in the sentence structure does not differ in individual text types of

scientific prose style has been confirmed as far as basic preferences for conjunct position in

the clause are concerned.

With regard to the position of conjuncts in simple sentences versus sentence

complexes, the prevailing number of conjuncts has occurred in sentence complexes in all the

text types (75% in the textbook, 80% in scientific journals and 79% in conference papers).

Moreover, the present analysis has confirmed the hypothesis that conjuncts in different types

of texts differ in the type of sentence they are part of, since the frequency of occurrence of

conjuncts in simple sentences versus sentence complexes differs in individual text types. The

highest frequency of occurrence of conjuncts in simple sentences is in the textbook, the

difference being five per cent when compared to scientific journals and three per cent when

compared to conference papers, which can be accounted for by the differences in style and

syntactic structure of the textbook, which are caused by the focus of the textbook on different

addressees.

133

The position of conjuncts in paragraphs, distinguishing initial, medial and end

positions, has shown that most conjuncts are placed in the final parts of paragraphs in all the

three text types examined, with lower frequency of occurrence in the medial parts of

paragraphs. The paragraph initial position has the lowest frequency of occurrence in all the

texts examined, which is contradictory to my expectations. It follows from these results that

most conjuncts in the texts analysed do not express cohesive links between paragraphs but

rather between sentences or between clauses inside sentences or parts of clauses only.

The criterion of the position of conjuncts in paragraphs has further subdivided

conjuncts in all positions in paragraphs into two groups – conjuncts which express cohesive

links between sentences or larger parts of text and conjuncts which express links within

sentences, i.e. either connection between clauses inside sentences or between sentence

constituents. The results of the application of this criterion indicate that scientific journals and

conference papers, which are texts aimed at more advanced academic readership, prefer to use

conjuncts primarily to express cohesive links between sentences or larger parts of texts. The

textbook, by contrast, uses almost half of all conjuncts (49%) to express cohesion within

sentences, which means that there is almost equal utilization of both functions of conjuncts in

the textbook, i.e. the expression of cohesion between sentences and within sentences.

Thus it can be stated that scientific journals and conference papers use conjuncts

mainly to join sentences, paragraphs and larger sections of texts, while the textbook uses a

higher number of conjuncts to convey cohesion within sentences than the other two text types,

although cohesive links between clauses inside sentences or between sentence constituents

could also be expressed by conjunctions.

The differences in punctuation illustrate the validity of the hypothesis that the

tendency to use punctuation with conjuncts differs between individual authors of the texts

analysed. Concerning the differences in the type of punctuation marks used, it has been

evidenced that the prevailing type of punctuation is a comma in scientific journals and

conference papers in contrast to the textbook, in which zero punctuation is preferred.

Moreover, the analysis has shown the tendency of the conjuncts so, yet and then to be

used without punctuation in all the text types. It should be stressed here that a comma

separating the clause with a conjunct in initial position from the preceding clause has not been

understood as a comma connected with the occurrence of conjuncts, but as a comma which

separates two clauses. The tendency of the conjuncts so and yet to occur without punctuation

could be partly accredited to the position of so and yet on the scale between conjunctions and

conjuncts, since so and yet are sometimes called “conjunction-like conjuncts” (CGEL: 1615).

134

Similarly to conjunctions, so and yet also tend to occur without any punctuation mark

following them.

As far as the semantic criterion is concerned, the analysis has proved that the three text

types analysed include six out of seven investigated semantic classes of conjuncts, namely

listing, summative, appositive, resultive, inferential and contrastive conjuncts. The seventh

semantic class of conjuncts, transitional conjuncts, is represented in the textbook only.

Appositive and contrastive conjuncts are the two semantic classes of conjuncts with

the highest frequency of occurrence, since they rank first or second in all the three text types

if the semantic classes of conjuncts are ordered according to their frequency of occurrence.

The frequency of occurrence of appositive and contrastive conjuncts is the same in conference

papers, while contrastive conjuncts have the highest and appositive conjuncts the second

highest frequency of occurrence in scientific journals. In the textbook, appositive conjuncts

are the most frequent semantic class of conjuncts and contrastive conjuncts the second most

frequent class.

The conjunct however has the highest frequency of occurrence in the semantic class of

contrastive conjuncts, comprising 52-78 per cent of all the contrastive conjuncts in the

investigated corpora, while the frequency of other contrastive conjuncts does not exceed ten

per cent.

The high frequency of occurrence of contrastive conjuncts in all the texts examined

can be accounted for by the function of contrastive conjuncts to facilitate transition between

contradictory ideas in texts (de Beaugrande & Dressler 1981: 73). The results of the present

analysis seem to indicate that the introduction of contrastive ideas was perceived by the

authors of texts as more difficult to comprehend as far as their cohesive links with the rest of

the text is concerned, thus they decided to express cohesive links explicitly by means of

conjuncts most frequently in those places in the texts analysed which introduce contradictory

opinions.

The high frequency of occurrence of appositive conjuncts in the corpora is connected

with the high frequency of examples given in individual texts, which is in accordance with the

explicatory and exemplifying tendency of scientific prose style (LGSWE: 884, Hyland 2007).

Another interesting finding is that, although the percentual representation of the

frequency of occurrence of semantic classes is different in individual text types (e.g.

inferential conjuncts – 9% in the textbook, 5% in scientific journals, 7% in conference

papers), when the six semantic classes of conjuncts are ordered according to how preferred

they are in the text types, their order is very similar in all the text types included in the study

135

(e.g. inferential conjuncts are the fifth most preferred semantic class of conjuncts in all the

three text types). With the exception of contrastive and appositive conjuncts, the order of the

other four semantic classes of conjuncts when they are sequenced according to how they are

preferred in the text is the same in the textbook and scientific journals. In conference papers,

listing conjuncts tend to be more preferred than resultive conjuncts. Thus, it can be said that

there are certain common tendencies concerning the preferences of semantic classes of

conjuncts in all the three text types – contrastive and appositive conjuncts rank first or second,

resultive and listing conjuncts rank third or fourth, inferential conjuncts are the fifth and

summative conjuncts the sixth in all the three text types. Yet there can be found certain

tendencies to prefer some semantic classes of conjuncts more in individual text types, which

is in accordance with the hypothesis that different text types prefer different semantic classes

of conjuncts. Thus, the textbook prefers appositive conjuncts to contrastive conjuncts as

compared to scientific journals where contrastive conjuncts are more preferred than appositive

conjuncts, with equal preferences for contrastive and appositive conjuncts in the textbook.

Listing conjuncts are more preferred in conference papers, ranking third, than in the textbook

and scientific journals, where they rank fourth when they are ordered by preferences for

individual semantic classes.

If the frequency of occurrence of conjuncts inside individual semantic classes of

conjuncts is compared, the differences between individual text types become more apparent.

One of the hypotheses supposes that the texts aimed at more academic readership use a higher

number of formal conjuncts. Therefore, for the purposes of the analysis of conjuncts from the

stylistic point of view, the excerpted conjuncts have been compared from the viewpoint of

their level of stylistic formality and the frequency of occurrence of conjuncts with stylistically

marked level of formality has been investigated.

Most conjuncts are regarded as stylistically neutral means of cohesion. Certain

conjuncts, however, are defined as formal by Greenbaum (1969) or CGEL. Conjuncts which

are denoted as informal constitute only a few exceptions from the stylistically neutral set of

conjuncts.

The results of my analysis have shown that with the exception of the conjunct again

and hence, all the formal conjunct tokens which have been excepted from the investigated

texts, namely correspondingly, further, furthermore, thus, conversely, nonetheless, have

higher frequency of occurrence in scientific journals and conference papers than in the

textbook, which is in accordance with the hypothesis that the texts designed for more

academic setting and aimed at more academic readership prefer more formal conjuncts. The

136

number of formal conjunct tokens is also higher in scientific journals and in conference

papers than in the textbook, since four formal conjunct tokens have zero frequency of

occurrence in the textbook (conversely, correspondingly, further, nonetheless). Contrary to

my expectation, the conjunct again has the highest frequency of occurrence in the textbook.

The frequency of occurrence of the informal conjunct so also confirms the above-

mentioned hypothesis, since so is most frequent in the textbook. On the contrary, the informal

conjunct put another way has occurred only once in all the three text types, namely in

conference papers, which is contrary to my expectations, although the frequency of occurrence

of put another way is importantly lower as compared to the high frequency of the conjunct so.

The results of the analysis of the level of stylistic formality thus seem to indicate that

scientific journals and conference papers, which are texts aimed at more academic readership,

tend to use a higher number of formal conjunct tokens and that formal conjunct tokens used in

all the three text types tend to occur with higher frequency of occurrence in scientific journals

and conference papers. Analogically, the overall frequency of occurrence of informal

conjuncts is the highest in the textbook. However, the conjuncts again and put another way,

which have been used contrary to my hypothesis, imply that the hypothesis does not have

absolute validity. The results rather establish strong support for it, and thus it may be better to

speak about the prevailing tendency towards formality, which can be influenced by other

features such as the individual style of an author.

It should also be stated that even if the number of formal conjunct tokens and their

frequency of occurrence are not high, they represent an important contribution to the level of

stylistic formality of texts.

Finally, allow me to mention that the present inquiry of conjuncts in scientific prose

texts has tried to contribute to the study cohesive devices. The findings of my analysis

concerning differences in the use of conjuncts in the three text types which represent different

genres of scientific prose have also attempted to contribute to the investigation of individual

genres of scientific prose. The results of the present investigation can be utilised during the

lessons of English for Specific Purposes or during the lessons of academic writing in order to

enhance students‟ knowledge of the use of conjuncts in practice, i.e. in various text types of

scientific prose written by native speakers. While working on my doctoral dissertation I also

came across many questions which could not be included in the scope of the present analysis

and which require further large-scale investigation into this scientific field. I hope that my

dissertation could then serve as a modest point of departure for further inquiry into conjuncts,

their use and function in different text types of scientific prose.

137

List of tables

Table 1. Number of words in analysed texts ............................................................................37

Table 2. Frequency of conjuncts in the investigated texts .....................................................38

Table 3. Conjuncts realized by single-word conjuncts or by multi-word conjuncts .........42

Table 4. Multi-word conjuncts ...................................................................................................44

Table 5. Number of multi-word conjunct tokens ....................................................................46

Table 6. Number of multi-word conjunct tokens in scientific journals according to

individual articles ...........................................................................................................46

Table 7. Number of multi-word conjunct tokens in conference papers according to

individual papers ............................................................................................................46

Table 8. Multi-word conjuncts with regard to their frequency ............................................47

Table 9. Distribution of multi-word conjuncts according to the number of words

(in individual conjuncts) ...............................................................................................48

Table 10. Distribution of multi-word conjunct tokens ...........................................................50

Table 11. Single-word conjuncts with regard to their frequency of occurrence................52

Table 12. Number of single-word conjunct tokens .................................................................55

Table 13. Number of single-word conjunct tokens in individual scientific journals .........56

Table 14. Number of single-word conjunct tokens in individual conference papers ........56

Table 15. Number of single-word conjunct tokens as compared to number of

words in body text .......................................................................................................57

Table 16. Distribution of single-word conjunct tokens ..........................................................58

Table 17. Number of conjunct tokens .......................................................................................60

Table 18. Position in clause – textbook .....................................................................................72

Table 19. Position in clause – scientific journals .....................................................................73

Table 20. Position in clause – conference papers ....................................................................74

Table 21. Number of conjuncts occurring in simple sentences versus sentence

complexes – textbook ...................................................................................................79

Table 22. Number of conjuncts occurring in simple sentences versus sentence

complexes –scientific journals ...................................................................................80

Table 23. Number of conjuncts occurring in simple sentences versus sentence

complexex – conference papers.................................................................................81

Table 24. Position in paragraph.................................................................................................83

Table 25. Position in paragraph.................................................................................................86

Table 26. Punctuation marks .....................................................................................................93

Table 27. Conjuncts in brackets ............................................................................................. 102

138

Table 28. Conjuncts in brackets followed by comma .......................................................... 103

Table 29. Listing conjuncts ...................................................................................................... 108

Table 30. Distribution of enumerative and additive listing conjuncts .............................. 110

Table 31. Summative conjuncts .............................................................................................. 114

Table 32. Frequency of listing and summative conjuncts as compared to the

frequency of all conjuncts......................................................................................... 116

Table 33. Appositive conjuncts ............................................................................................... 118

Table 34. Resultive conjuncts .................................................................................................. 121

Table 35. Inferential conjuncts ............................................................................................... 122

Table 36. Comparing the frequency of resultive and inferential conjuncts .................... 122

Table 37. Contrastive conjuncts with regard to their frequency....................................... 124

Table 38. Transitional conjuncts ............................................................................................ 126

Table 39. Distribution of all semantic classes of conjuncts ................................................ 127

Tables in Appendix

Table 1a. Distribution of all conjuncts (number) ................................................................. 153

Table 1b. Distribution of all conjuncts (%) .......................................................................... 154

Table 2a. Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – textbook ......................................... 155

Table 2b/1. Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – scientific journals (number).... 156

Table 2b/2. Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – scientific journals (%) ............. 157

Table 2c/1. Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – conference papers (number) ... 158

Table 2c/2. Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – conference papers (%) ............. 159

Table 3a. Single-word conjuncts – textbook ......................................................................... 160

Table 3b/1. Single-word conjuncts – scientific journals (number).................................... 161

Table 3b/2. Single-word conjuncts – scientific journals (%).............................................. 162

Table 3c/1. Single-word conjuncts – conference papers (number) ................................... 163

Table 3c/2. Single-word conjuncts – conference papers (%) ............................................. 164

Table 4a. Position in paragraph – textbook .......................................................................... 165

Table 4b/1. Position in paragraph – scientific journals (number) .................................... 166

Table 4b/2. Position in paragraph in scientific journals – (%) .......................................... 167

Table 4c/1. Position in paragraph – conference papers (number) .................................... 168

Table 4c/2. Position in paragraph in conference papers – (%) .......................................... 169

Table 5a. Punctuation marks – textbook ............................................................................... 170

Table 5b. Punctuation marks – scientific journals .............................................................. 171

139

Table 5c. Punctuation marks – conference papers .............................................................. 173

Table 6a. Punctuation in the textbook according to individual conjuncts ....................... 175

Table 6b. Punctuation in scientific journals according to individual conjuncts ............. 177

Table 6c. Punctuation in conference papers according to individual conjuncts ............. 183

140

Abbreviations

CaGEL – Huddleston, R., Pullum, G. K. (2002) The Cambridge Grammar of the English

Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

CGEL – Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G., Svartvik, J. (1985) A Comprehensive

Grammar of the English Language. London: Longman.

DIS – Van Belle, J.-P., Nash, J., Eccles, M. (2003) Discovering Information Systems. An

Exploratory Approach. Durbanville: South African Universities Press, 2003.

EAP – English for Academic Purposes

ESL – English as a Second Language

GCE – Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G., Svartvik, J. (1973) A Grammar of

Contemporary English. London: Longman.

JRPIT – The Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology. Sydney:

Australian Computer Society, 1967-2009 . ISSN 1443-458X

LGSWE – Biber, D., Conrad, S., Finegan, E., Johansson, S., Leech, G. (1999) Longman

Grammar of Spoken and Written English. London: Longman.

USENIX – the Advanced Systems Computer Association–conference proceedings 1997-

2008. http://www.usenix.org/

T1, T2, … – Text 1, Text 2, …

I – initial position

iM – initial medial position

M – medial position

mM – medial medial position

eM – end medial position

iE – initial end position

E – end position

Outside – (abbreviation used in tables) conjuncts which express cohesive links between

sentences

Inside – (abbreviation used in tables) conjuncts which express cohesive links between clauses

or sentence constituents

141

Glossary of terms

additive conjuncts – a semantic sub-class of listing conjuncts which mark the addition of

another part of text of either equal or greater importance;

adjunct – an adverbial which is integrated into the sentence structure;

adverb – a word class which can modify verbs, adjectives, other adverbs or nouns

(Merriam Webster‟s Dictionary of English Usage);

adverb phrase – a phrase consisting of one obligatory element, namely an adverb, to which

one or more optional elements can be added; thus adverb phrase can be composed of

one or more words;

adverbial – the most peripheral sentence constituent determining circumstances of the action

or a state expressed by the main sentence constituents of subject, verb and object; it is

further subclassified into adjuncts, subjuncts, disjuncts and conjuncts;

anaphoric reference – referring to the previous parts of texts (backward reference);

appositive conjuncts – a semantic class of conjuncts which mark cohesive links between

parts of text which are based on a certain type of appositive relationship; the essence

of appositive conjuncts is a kind of explication;

body text – the investigated text adjusted for the purposes of the present investigation so that

the names of authors, contents, key words, bibliography, tables, footnotes and index

have been excluded;

cataphoric reference – referring to the following parts of texts (forward reference);

clausal realization – formal realization of conjuncts which comprises conjuncts realized by

clauses; these are further sub-divided into finite, non-finite and verbless clauses;

coherence – logical connectedness and semantic unity of text which enables readers to

perceive the text as a meaningful unit;

cohesion – grammatical and lexical links between elements of text which help to create text

structure and contribute to the coherence of text;

cohesiveness – the extent to which parts of text are formally linked together;

conjunct – an adverbial with connective function which is not integrated into the sentence

structure and which cannot function as a response to yes-no questions;

conjunct token – one individual conjunct realization form and its occurrence in a text without

regard to its frequency;

conjunction – a word class expressing relationship between clauses (subordination or

coordination);

142

context – the linguistic and non-linguistic environment in which an analysed text item occurs,

including the preceding and following text, background knowledge of the author,

his/her communicative intention and the situation in which a text is produced and

perceived;

contrastive conjuncts – a semantic class of conjuncts which denote the introduction of a text

part which is in contrast to the preceding text, contrastive relationship consisting in

expressing concession, counter-argument, reformulation of the previous text or

replacement of some of its items;

disjunct – an adverbial expressing the author‟s emotions or his attitudes to and comments on

the text; it is not integrated into the sentence structure but can serve as a response to

yes-no questions;

end medial position – the position of conjuncts concerning verbal phrases consisting of at

least three verbs, the conjunct being placed immediately before the main verb;

end position – the position of conjuncts in a clause after all the obligatory sentence

constituents;

enumerative conjuncts – a semantic sub-class of listing conjuncts expressing the ordering of

certain parts of text, emphasizing the importance of the sequencing of individual items

of a list or of a particular order of text parts;

finite clause – a clause in which a verb in finite form is used distinguishing particular tense

and mood, expressing relationship to the subject including the person and number;

genre – a class of communicative events, the members of which share some set of

communicative purposes and which are recognized by the discourse community; they

exhibit similar patterns of structure, style, content and intended audience, (Swales

1990);

inferential conjuncts – a semantic class of conjuncts which denote that the following part of

text is a logical consequence derived from the ideas or conditions which are described

in the preceeding text; the logical basis of the consequence is emphasized;

initial end position – the position of conjuncts after the predicate and before some obligatory

sentence constituent;

initial medial position – the position of conjuncts between the subject and the operator,

occurring in verbal phrases consisting of at least two verbs;

initial position – the position of conjuncts in the clause denoting the placement of a conjunct

before the subject;

143

listing conjuncts – a semantic class of conjuncts which denote the arrangement of individual

parts of texts and their succession, either by means of enumeration or by emphasizing

the addition of another item into the text;

medial medial position – the position of conjuncts in clauses with verbal phrases consisting

of at least four verbs, with the conjunct being preceeded and followed by at least two

verbs;

medial position – the position of conjuncts immediately after the subject and, if an operator

occurs, after the operator;

non-finite clause – a clause with a verb in non-finite form (infinitive, gerund or participle)

which does not distinguish the person, number and tense;

operator – an auxiliary verb in a clause, which in the case of a verb phrase consisting of more

auxiliary verbs is defined as the first auxiliary verb in a clause;

phrasal realization – formal realization of conjuncts which comprises conjuncts realized by

both adverb phrases (single-word and multi-word adverb phrases) and prepositional

phrases;

prepositional phrase – a phrase consisting of a preposition which is followed by a

prepositional complement;

resultive conjuncts – a semantic class of conjuncts which indicate that the following part of

text is a result or consequence of what is expressed by the preceeding text;

semantic class of conjuncts – a group of conjuncts which are classified according to their

identical basic semantic function in the text, i.e. the way they refer to the meaning of

cohesive relation between parts of text which they denote explicitly;

sentence complex – complex and compound sentences, (Tárnyiková 2007);

setting – situational framework of discourse, concerning especially the supposed time and

place in which a discourse takes place;

stylistic formality – a stylistic value of text or its parts which refers to its placement on the

scale of formality (very formal – formal – neutral – informal – very informal), which

proceeds from the attitude to the reader, to the topic and the purpose of

communication;

subjunct – an adverbial which is integrated into the sentence structure and which has a

subordinate role in comparison with other sentence constituents;

summative conjuncts – a semantic class of conjuncts introducing a concluding and

recapitulating part of text;

144

transitional conjuncts – a semantic class of conjuncts which indicate a digression from the

fluent flow of ideas resulting in a shift of attention to another topic;

verbless clause – a clause in which no verb form occurs;

(Most terms have been defined in accordance with CGEL and Greenbaum 1969)

145

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Tárnyiková, J. (2007) Sentence Complexes in Text: Processing Strategies in English and in

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Urbanová, L. (2001) „On the language of authentic English conversation.‟ Brno Studies in

English 27, Brno: Masaryk University, 49-55.

Urbanová, L. (2008) Stylistika anglického jazyka. Brno: Barrister & Principal.

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150

List of investigated texts

Van Belle, J.-P., Nash, J., Eccles, M. (2003) Discovering Information Systems. An

Exploratory Approach. Durbanville: South African Universities Press, 2003.

(abbreviated as DIS)

The Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology. Sydney: Australian

Computer Society, 1967-2009. ISSN 1443-458X (abbreviated as JRPIT)

Text 1: Aurum, A., Rooss, J. (2004) „An experiment in inspecting the quality of use case

descriptions.‟ Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology 36/4,211-

229.

Text 2: Trent, L.W., Powers, D.M.W. (2003) „Audio-visual speech recognition using red

exclusion and neural networks.‟ Journal of Research and Practice in Information

Technology 35/1, 41-64.

Text 3: Post, E. (2007) „Designing and implementing a grid application for cumulative

agrichemical residue tracking using third-party data sources and software

components.‟ Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology 39/2,125-

136.

Text 4: Cavaye, A.L.M. (2003) „The effect of reusability on perceived competitive

performance of Australian software firms‟ Journal of Research and Practice in

Information Technology 35/3, 183-196.

Text 5: Appelbe, B. (2003) „The future of open source software‟ Journal of Research and

Practice in Information Technology 35/4, 227-236.

Text 6: Akkeren, J.V., Harker, D. (2003) „The mobile Internet and small business: An

exploratory study of needs, uses and adoption with full adopters of technology‟

Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology 35/3, 205-220.

Text 7: Armstrong, B., Fogarty, G., Dingsdag, D., Dimbleby, J. (2005) „Validation of a

computer user satisfaction questionnaire to measure IS success in small business‟

Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology 37/1, 27-42.

Text 8: Bride, T. Mc (2008) „A model for investigating software accidents‟ Journal of

Research and Practice in Information Technology 40/1, 19-31.

Text 9: Lewis, B. (2003) „From narrative therapeutic guidelines to decision support: Design

for production efficiency and safety‟ Journal of Research and Practice in Information

Technology 35/2, 69-82.

151

Text 10: O‟Keefe, C., Greenfield, P., Goodchild, A. (2005) „A decentralised approach to

electronic consent and health information access control‟ Journal of Research and

Practice in Information Technology 37/2, 161-178.

Text 11: Rae, A., Fidge, C. (2005) „Identifying critical components during information

security evaluations‟ Journal of Research and Practice in Information Technology

37/4, 311-322.

Text 12: Roberts, J., Heil, P., Phipps, S. J., Bindoff, N. (2007) „AusCOM: The Australian

Community Ocean Model‟ Journal of Research and Practice in Information

Technology 39/2, 137-150.

USENIX – the Advanced Systems Computer Association–conference proceedings 1997-

2008. http://www.usenix.org/

Text 1: Walker, E. (2006) „A distributed file system for a wide-area high performance

computing infrastructure‟ In: Proceedings of the 3rd Conference on USENIX

Workshop on Real, Large Distributed System. Berkeley, CA: USENIX Association, 9.

Text 2: Beverly, R,.Afergan, M. (2007) „Machine learning for efficient neighbour selection in

unstructured P2P networks‟ In: Proceedings of the 2nd

USENIX Workshop on Tackling

Computer Systems Problems with Machine Learning Techniques. Berkeley, CA:

USENIX Association, 1-6.

Text 3: Armstrong, T., Amza, C., Trescases, O., Lara, E. de (2006) „Efficient and transparent

dynamic content updates for mobile clients‟ In: MobiSys2006: Proceedings of the 4th

International Conference on Mobile Systems, Applications and Services. New York,

NY: ACM Press, 56-68.

Text 4: Shaw, M. (2005) „Leveraging good intentions to reduce unwanted network traffic‟ In:

Proceedings of the 2nd Conference on Steps to Reducing Unwanted Traffic on the

Internet, 9. Berkeley, CA: USENIX Association, 55-60.

Text 5: Cune, J.M.Mc, Perrig, A., Reiter, M.K. (2006) „Bump in the ether: A framework for

securing sensitive user input‟ In: Proceedings of the 2006 USENIX Annual Technical

Conference. Berkeley, CA: USENIX Association, 185-198.

Text 6: Peek, D., Flinn,J. (2006) „EnsemBlue: Integrating distributed storage and consumer

electronics‟ In: Operating Systems Design and Implementation: Proceedings of the 7th

Symposium on Operating Systems Design and Implementation. Berkeley, CA:

USENIX Association, 219-232.

152

Text 7: Cipar, J., Corner, M.D., Berger, E.D. (2007) „TFS: A Transparent File System for

contributory storage‟ In. Proceedings of the 5th USENIX Conference of File and

Storage Technologies, Berkeley, CA: USENIX Association, 215-229.

Text 8: Cadar, C., Dunbar, D., Engler, D. (2008) „KLEE: Unassisted and automatic

generation of high-coverage tests for complex systems programs‟ In: OSDI. Berkeley,

CA: USENIX Association, 209-224.

Text 9: Fulp, E. W., Fink, G. A., Haack, J.N. (2008) „Predicting computer system failures

using support vector machines‟ In: Proceedings of the USENIX Workshop on the

Analysis of System Logs (WASL). Berkeley, CA: USENIX Association, 1-8.

Text 10: Miller, M. S., Donnelley, J. E., Karp, A.H. (2007) „Delegating responsibility in

digital systems: Horton‟s “Who done it?‟ In: Proceedings of the 2nd USENIX

Workshop on Hot Topics in Security. Berkeley, CA: USENIX Association, 1-5.

153

Appendix

The following section of the present work comprises tables with more detailed results

concerning the analysis of individual investigated texts. The tables are too long and complex

to be included in the body of the study.

Table 1a

Distribution of all conjuncts (number)

Type of text Digital

conjuncts (DC)

Alphabetical letters

conjuncts (ALC)

Total

(DC+ALC)

Word-

conjuncts All conjuncts

Textbook 2 4 6

Total 2 4 6 443 449

Scientific journals

T1 5 1 6

T2 1 1

T5 2 2 4

T6 2 2

T7 1 1

T11 1 1 2

T12 1 1

Total 13 4 17 577 594

Conference papers

T1 1 1

T2 1 1

T4 1 1

T5 2 2

T8 9 9

Total 13 1 14 657 671

Total of all texts 28 9 37 1677 1714

154

Table 1b

Distribution of all conjuncts (%)

Type of text Digital

conjuncts (DC)

Alphabetical letters

conjuncts (ALC)

Total

(DC+ALC)

Word-

conjuncts All conjuncts

Textbook 0.4 0.9 1.3

Total 1.3 98.7 100.0

Scientific journals

T1 0.8 0.2 1.0

T2 0.2 0.2

T5 0.3 0.3 0.7

T6 0.3 0.3

T7 0.2 0.2

T11 0.2 0.2 0.3

T12 0.2 0.2

Total 2.9 97.1 100.0

Conference papers

T1 0.1 0.1

T2 0.1 0.1

T4 0.1 0.1

T5 0.3 0.3

T8 1.3 1.3

Total 2.1 97.9 100.0

Total of all texts 2.2 97.8 100.0

155

Table 2a

Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – textbook

Conjunts No. %

Adverb phrase

better even 1 0.9

either way 1 0.9

even worse 2 1.7

Prepositional phrase

above all 2 1.7

after all 1 0.9

along the way 1 0.9

at the same time 1 0.9

by comparison 1 0.9

by the way 1 0.9

for example 43 36.8

for instance 6 5.1

for this reason 1 0.9

in addition 24 20.5

in any case 1 0.9

in any way 1 0.9

in other words 1 0.9

in particular 4 3.4

in the same way 1 0.9

in this case 6 5.1

of course 7 6.0

on the other hand 9 7.7

on the reverse side 1 0.9

Finite clause

Non-finite clause

to put it into other words 1 0.9

Verbless clause

Total 117 100.0

156

Table 2b/1

Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – scientific journals (number)

Conjunts T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12 Total

Adverb phrase

Prepositional phrase

after all 1 1

as a result 1 1

as a starting point 1 1

at the same time 1 1 2

by contrast 3 3

for another 1 1

for example 3 10 2 7 3 3 4 8 1 7 48

for instance 2 9 5 16

for one thing 2 2

for this reason 1 1

in addition 1 1 3 1 1 7

in any case 1 1

in contrast 1 2 1 4

in other words 1 1

in particular 1 7 5 1 14

in this case 5 5

of course 1 1 2

on the other hand 1 1 1 3

Finite clause

that is 8 1 1 2 2 1 15

Non-finite clause

Verbless clause

Total 8 22 19 3 4 12 6 6 8 18 14 8 128

157

Table 2b/2

Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – scientific journals (%)

Conjunts T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12 Total

Adverb phrase

Prepositional phrase

after all 12.5 0.8

as a result 16.7 0.8

as a starting point 7.1 0.8

at the same time 33.3 16.7 1.6

by contrast 75.0 2.3

for another 5.3 0.8

for example 37.5 45.5 66.7 58.3 50.0 50.0 50.0 44.4 7.1 87.5 37.5

for instance 25.0 47.4 35.7 12.5

for one thing 10.5 1.6

for this reason 12.5 0.8

in addition 5.3 25.0 25.0 12.5 7.1 5.5

in any case 12.5 0.8

in contrast 12.5 9.1 8.3 3.1

in other words 7.1 0.8

in particular 16.7 38.9 35.7 12.5 10.9

in this case 26.3 3.9

of course 4.5 5.6 1.6

on the other hand 4.5 5.3 5.6 2.3

Finite clause

that is 36.4 8.3 16.7 33.3 25.0 5.6 11.7

Non-finite clause

Verbless clause

Total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

158

Table 2c/1

Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – conference papers (number)

Conjunts T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 Total

Adverb phrase

Prepositional phrase

as a result 5 1 2 8

at the same time 1 1

for comparison 1 1

for example 2 4 3 11 8 2 11 12 2 55

for instance 3 1 14 7 25

for this reason 1 1

in addition 2 3 1 3 9

in aggregate 1 1 2

in contrast 1 3 1 2 5 1 2 2 17

in other words 1 1

in particular 1 4 2 2 1 10

in this case 2 3 1 6

in total 3 3

of course 1 1 2

on the other hand 3 2 1 6

Finite clause

that is 1 3 1 5

Non-finite clause

put another way 1 1

Verbless clause

Total 4 13 21 6 19 30 17 23 16 4 153

159

Table 2c/2

Multi-word conjuncts in individual texts – conference papers (%)

Conjunts T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 Total

Noun phrase

Prepositional phrase

as a result 23.8 4.3 12.5 5.2

at the same time 16.7 0.7

for comparison 3.3 0.7

for example 15.4 19.0 50.0 57.9 26.7 11.8 47.8 75.0 50.0 35.9

for instance 23.1 4.8 46.7 41.2 16.3

for this reason 5.9 0.7

in addition 15.4 14.3 5.3 13.0 5.9

in aggregate 25.0 16.7 1.3

in contrast 7.7 14.3 16.7 10.5 16.7 5.9 8.7 12.5 11.1

in other words 25.0 0.7

in particular 25.0 30.8 9.5 10.5 5.9 6.5

in this case 6.7 17.6 4.3 3.9

in total 13.0 2.0

of course 25.0 4.3 1.3

on the other hand 14.3 11.8 4.3 3.9

Finite clause

that is 7.7 15.8 25.0 3.3

Non-finite clause

put another way 25.0 0.7

Verbless clause

Total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

160

Table 3a

Single-word conjuncts – textbook

Adverb phrase No. %

again 6 1.8

also 5 1.5

alternatively 2 0.6

e.g. 64 19.6

else 2 0.6

equally 1 0.3

finally 15 4.6

firstly 3 0.9

furthermore 1 0.3

hence 9 2.8

however 47 14.4

i.e. 43 13.2

instead 6 1.8

namely 2 0.6

nevertheless 6 1.8

rather 2 0.6

similarly 3 0.9

so 30 9.2

specifically 1 0.3

then 35 10.7

therefore 25 7.7

thus 14 4.3

worse 1 0.3

yet 3 0.9

Total 326 100.0

161

Table 3b/1

Single-word conjuncts – scientific journals (number)

Adverb phrase T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12 Total

accordingly 1 1

additionally 1 3 4

again 1 2 3

also 1 6 3 1 2 13

consequently 2 2

conversely 1 1

correspondingly 1 1

e.g. 6 1 2 4 3 4 5 7 32

finally 1 2 1 2 6

first 2 1 3

firstly 1 1 1 3

further 4 1 5

furthermore 4 1 2 7

hence 2 9 2 2 3 18

however 21 30 23 7 4 12 4 8 5 2 5 2 123

i.e. 2 3 3 1 2 2 4 1 18

instead 1 1 1 3

moreover 7 7

namely 1 1 2

nevertheless 2 2

nonetheless 1 1

otherwise 1 2 3

overall 1 3 2 6

rather 1 3 4

second 2 2

secondly 1 1

similarly 3 1 9 13

so 1 2 6 3 2 2 1 2 1 20

specifically 1 1 2 2 1 7

then 5 1 3 2 1 1 1 2 2 5 23

therefore 2 5 1 6 1 10 1 26

though 2 1 3

thus 5 27 17 5 2 8 1 1 3 2 10 81

yet 1 2 1 1 5

Total 42 89 58 34 24 46 21 27 24 12 61 11 449

162

Table 3b/2

Single-word conjuncts – scientific journals (%)

Adverb phrase T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12 Total

accordingly 8.3 0.2

additionally 4.8 11.1 0.9

again 4.8 3.3 0.7

also 2.4 10.3 8.8 3.7 8.3 2.9

consequently 5.9 0.4

conversely 1.7 0.2

correspondingly 4.2 0.2

e.g. 6.7 1.7 5.9 16.7 14.3 14.8 20.8 11.5 7.1

finally 2.4 4.3 4.2 3.3 1.3

first 4.3 8.3 0.7

firstly 1.1 1.7 4.8 0.7

further 8.7 8.3 1.1

furthermore 4.5 2.9 18.2 1.6

hence 2.2 26.5 4.3 8.3 27.3 4.0

however 50.0 33.7 39.7 20.6 16.7 26.1 19.0 29.6 20.8 16.7 8.2 18.2 27.4

i.e. 4.8 3.4 8.8 4.8 7.4 8.3 6.6 9.1 4.0

instead 4.2 4.8 3.7 0.7

moreover 7.9 1.6

namely 4.8 9.1 0.4

nevertheless 3.3 0.4

nonetheless 2.4 0.2

otherwise 2.9 3.3 0.7

overall 1.1 6.5 9.5 1.3

rather 1.1 12.5 0.9

second 4.3 0.4

secondly 4.8 0.2

similarly 5.2 3.7 14.8 2.9

so 2.4 3.4 25.0 14.3 7.4 8.3 8.3 3.3 9.1 4.5

specifically 2.4 2.9 4.3 7.4 1.6 1.6

then 11.9 1.1 5.2 8.3 2.2 4.8 3.7 8.3 16.7 8.2 5.1

therefore 4.8 5.6 1.7 13.0 8.3 16.4 9.1 5.8

though 4.8 4.2 0.7

thus 11.9 30.3 29.3 14.7 8.3 17.4 4.8 3.7 12.5 16.7 16.4 18.0

yet 1.1 4.3 3.7 8.3 1.1

Total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

163

Table 3c/1

Single-word conjuncts – conference papers (number)

Adverb phrase T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 Total

accordingly 3 3

additionally 1 2 1 2 3 9

again 1 1 1 3

also 2 1 1 4

alternatively 1 2 2 5

consequently 1 1 2

conversely 1 3 1 5

e.g. 2 1 28 13 1 16 61

fifth 1 1

finally 1 2 5 2 1 4 1 6 3 25

first 2 1 1 3 4 4 15

fourth 1 1

further 1 3 1 3 8

furthermore 1 6 2 1 2 12

hence 3 1 4 4 12

however 16 6 12 3 19 16 25 15 7 119

i.e. 1 5 5 1 9 21

instead 3 2 1 3 9

likewise 1 1

moreover 1 1 1 3

namely 1 1

nevertheless 1 1

next 1 1

otherwise 2 2 1 5

overall 1 1 2

rather 3 1 4

second 2 1 3 5 3 14

secondly 1 1

similarly 2 2 1 5

so 3 2 3 3 6 6 23

specifically 1 1 5 2 1 10

still 3 3

then 2 2 3 1 6 6 9 4 33

therefore 4 6 4 4 1 2 8 29

third 1 1

thus 3 9 1 2 10 9 6 5 45

worse 1 1

yet 6 6

Total 45 37 61 19 81 70 62 87 32 10 504

164

Table 3c/2

Single-word conjuncts – conference papers (%)

Adverb phrase T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 Total

accordingly 4.8 0.6

additionally 1.6 10.5 1.2 3.2 3.4 1.8

again 2.2 1.4 3.1 0.6

also 4.4 1.6 1.6 0.8

alternatively 1.6 10.5 2.5 1.0

consequently 2.7 1.1 0.4

conversely 2.7 4.9 1.1 1.0

e.g. 4.4 1.6 34.6 18.6 1.6 18.4 12.1

fifth 2.2 0.2

finally 2.2 5.4 8.2 10.5 1.2 5.7 1.6 6.9 9.4 5.0

first 4.4 1.6 5.3 4.3 6.5 4.6 3.0

fourth 2.2 0.2

further 1.2 4.3 1.6 3.4 1.6

furthermore 2.2 9.8 3.2 1.1 6.3 2.4

hence 6.7 2.7 6.6 4.9 2.4

however 35.6 16.2 19.7 15.8 23.5 22.9 40.3 17.2 21.9 23.6

i.e. 2.2 13.5 8.2 1.2 10.3 4.2

instead 4.9 2.5 1.4 3.4 1.8

likewise 1.6 0.2

moreover 2.7 1.6 1.1 0.6

namely 1.2 0.2

nevertheless 1.4 0.2

next 5.3 0.2

otherwise 3.3 2.9 1.1 1.0

overall 1.6 1.1 0.4

rather 8.1 1.4 0.8

second 4.4 1.6 4.3 8.1 3.4 2.8

secondly 2.7 0.2

similarly 3.3 2.9 3.1 1.0

so 6.7 3.3 3.7 4.8 6.9 60.0 4.6

specifically 2.2 2.7 8.2 2.5 3.1 2.0

still 3.7 0.6

then 3.3 10.5 3.7 1.4 9.7 6.9 28.1 40.0 6.5

therefore 8.9 16.2 21.1 5.7 1.6 2.3 25.0 5.8

third 2.2 0.2

thus 6.7 24.3 1.6 10.5 12.3 12.9 9.7 5.7 8.9

worse 1.6 0.2

yet 8.6 1.2

Total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

165

Table 4a

Position in paragraph – textbook

Position No. %

I position 1st outside 30 6.8

inside 34 7.7

Total 64

2nd outside 29 6.5

inside 16 3.6

Total 45

others outside 14 3.2

inside 3 0.7

Total 17

Total 126

M position 1st outside 77 17.4

inside 79 17.8

Total 156

E position last outside 58 13.1

inside 68 15.3

Total 126

last but one outside 14 3.2

inside 16 3.6

Total 30

others outside 2 0.5

inside 3 0.7

Total 5

Total 161

Total 443 100.0

16

6

Table 4b/1

Position in paragraph – scientific journals (number)

Position T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12 Total

I position 1st outside 2 2 7 1 5 4 0 1 3 0 8 0 33

inside 0 5 1 1 1 3 1 3 4 3 4 2 28

Total 2 7 8 2 6 7 1 4 7 3 12 2 61

2nd outside 4 11 10 3 1 7 4 4 4 5 5 1 59

inside 2 0 0 2 0 6 0 0 0 0 1 0 11

Total 6 11 10 5 1 13 4 4 4 5 6 1 70

others outside 7 7 4 0 2 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 23

inside 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2

Total 7 8 5 0 2 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 25

Total 15 26 23 7 9 20 6 9 11 8 18 4 156

M position 1st outside 13 22 26 8 5 11 8 8 3 8 15 6 133

inside 5 17 2 2 3 3 8 3 10 4 10 4 71

Total 18 39 28 10 8 14 16 11 13 12 25 10 204

E position last outside 2 12 11 11 4 13 3 8 5 7 20 1 97

inside 2 15 5 6 1 7 2 4 2 2 10 3 59

Total 4 27 16 17 5 20 5 12 7 9 30 4 156

last but one outside 6 5 5 3 3 4 0 0 1 1 2 0 30

inside 2 9 2 0 2 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 17

Total 8 14 7 3 5 4 0 1 1 1 2 1 47

others outside 2 3 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8

inside 3 2 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6

Total 5 5 3 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 14

Total 17 46 26 20 11 24 5 13 8 10 32 5 217

Total 50 111 77 37 28 58 27 33 32 30 75 19 577

16

7

Table 4b/2

Position in paragraph in scientific journals – (%)

Position T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12 Total

I position 1st outside 4.0 1.8 9.1 2.7 17.9 6.9 0.0 3.0 9.4 0.0 10.7 0.0 5.7

inside 0.0 4.5 1.3 2.7 3.6 5.2 3.7 9.1 12.5 10.0 5.3 10.5 4.9

2nd outside 8.0 9.9 13.0 8.1 3.6 12.1 14.8 12.1 12.5 16.7 6.7 5.3 10.2

inside 4.0 0.0 0.0 5.4 0.0 10.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.3 0.0 1.9

others outside 14.0 6.3 5.2 0.0 7.1 0.0 3.7 3.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 5.3 4.0

inside 0.0 0.9 1.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.3

M position 1st outside 26.0 19.8 33.8 21.6 17.9 19.0 29.6 24.2 9.4 26.7 20.0 31.6 23.1

inside 10.0 15.3 2.6 5.4 10.7 5.2 29.6 9.1 31.3 13.3 13.3 21.1 12.3

E position last outside 4.0 10.8 14.3 29.7 14.3 22.4 11.1 24.2 15.6 23.3 26.7 5.3 16.8

inside 4.0 13.5 6.5 16.2 3.6 12.1 7.4 12.1 6.3 6.7 13.3 15.8 10.2

last but one outside 12.0 4.5 6.5 8.1 10.7 6.9 0.0 0.0 3.1 3.3 2.7 0.0 5.2

inside 4.0 8.1 2.6 0.0 7.1 0.0 0.0 3.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 5.3 2.9

others outside 4.0 2.7 3.9 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.4

inside 6.0 1.8 0.0 0.0 3.6 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.0

Total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

16

8

Table 4c/1

Position in paragraph – conference papers (number)

Position T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 Total

I position 1st outside 8 3 5 3 2 4 5 10 1 0 41

inside 1 1 3 3 12 2 1 10 2 4 39

Total 9 4 8 6 14 6 6 20 3 4 80

2nd outside 10 4 5 3 14 14 11 11 5 0 77

inside 0 4 1 1 4 1 1 2 0 2 16

Total 10 8 6 4 18 15 12 13 5 2 93

others outside 0 1 4 2 4 4 6 1 1 0 23

inside 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 2

Total 0 1 5 2 4 4 6 2 1 0 25

Total 19 13 19 12 36 25 24 35 9 6 198

M position 1st outside 12 11 31 6 21 34 22 20 9 1 167

inside 3 4 3 0 8 6 9 15 5 3 56

Total 15 15 34 6 29 40 31 35 14 4 223

E position last outside 8 14 21 3 9 15 11 22 13 2 118

inside 4 3 4 0 13 6 4 9 5 1 49

Total 12 17 25 3 22 21 15 31 18 3 167

last but one outside 1 2 3 2 3 7 6 5 5 1 35

inside 2 3 0 2 7 5 1 4 1 0 25

Total 3 5 3 4 10 12 7 9 6 1 60

others outside 0 0 0 0 3 2 1 0 0 0 6

inside 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 3

Total 0 0 1 0 3 2 2 0 1 0 9

Total 15 22 29 7 35 35 24 40 25 4 236

Total 49 50 82 25 100 100 79 110 48 14 657

16

9

Table 4c/2

Position in paragraph in conference papers – (%)

Position T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 Total

I position 1st outside 16.3 6.0 6.1 12.0 2.0 4.0 6.3 9.1 2.1 0.0 6.2

inside 2.0 2.0 3.7 12.0 12.0 2.0 1.3 9.1 4.2 28.6 5.9

2nd outside 20.4 8.0 6.1 12.0 14.0 14.0 13.9 10.0 10.4 0.0 11.7

inside 0.0 8.0 1.2 4.0 4.0 1.0 1.3 1.8 0.0 14.3 2.4

others outside 0.0 2.0 4.9 8.0 4.0 4.0 7.6 0.9 2.1 0.0 3.5

inside 0.0 0.0 1.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.9 0.0 0.0 0.3

M position 1st outside 24.5 22.0 37.8 24.0 21.0 34.0 27.8 18.2 18.8 7.1 25.4

inside 6.1 8.0 3.7 0.0 8.0 6.0 11.4 13.6 10.4 21.4 8.5

E position last outside 16.3 28.0 25.6 12.0 9.0 15.0 13.9 20.0 27.1 14.3 18.0

inside 8.2 6.0 4.9 0.0 13.0 6.0 5.1 8.2 10.4 7.1 7.5

last but one outside 2.0 4.0 3.7 8.0 3.0 7.0 7.6 4.5 10.4 7.1 5.3

inside 4.1 6.0 0.0 8.0 7.0 5.0 1.3 3.6 2.1 0.0 3.8

others outside 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 3.0 2.0 1.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.9

inside 0.0 0.0 1.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.3 0.0 2.1 0.0 0.5

Total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

170

Table 5a

Punctuation marks – textbook

Position of conjunct

in clause

Type of punctuation mark

Com

ma

Com

mas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s

an

d c

om

ma

Sem

icolo

n

an

d c

om

ma

Colo

n

an

d c

om

ma

No p

un

ctu

ati

on

I 143 4 1 12 1 145

iM 3 3 7

M 8 28

eM

iE 1 1 4 8

E 17 2 25 30

Total 161 16 2 1 44 1 218

171

Table 5b

Punctuation marks – scientific journals

Text Position of conjunct

in clause

Type of punctuation mark

Com

ma

Com

mas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s

an

d c

om

ma

Sem

icolo

n

an

d c

om

ma

Colo

n

an

d c

om

ma

No

pu

nct

uati

on

T1 I 27 2 9

iM 2

M 3 1

eM

iE

E 3 3

Total 30 7 13

T2 I 66 2 1 21

iM 4 1

M 1

eM

iE 1

E 8 2 3 1

Total 74 10 4 1 22

T3 I 36 38

iM

M 2

eM

iE

E 1

Total 36 1 40

T4 I 25 7

iM 2

M

eM

iE

E 2 1

Total 27 3 7

T5 I 6 11

iM 2

M 2

eM

iE 1 2

E 3 1

Total 6 4 18

T6 I 32 4 13

iM 1

M 1 1

eM

iE

E 2 1 3

Total 34 7 17

172

Text Position of conjunct

in clause

Type of punctuation mark

Com

ma

Com

mas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s

an

d c

om

ma

Sem

icolo

n

an

d c

om

ma

Colo

n

an

d c

om

ma

No

pu

nct

uati

on

T7 I 13 1 4

iM 1

M 1 1

eM

iE 1

E 1 2 1 1

Total 14 4 2 2 5

T8 I 19 7

iM

M 1

eM

iE

E 1 2 2 1

Total 20 2 3 8

T9 I 9 11

iM 1

M 3

eM

iE 3

E 2 3

Total 9 3 20

T10 I 18 1 6

iM

M 4

eM

iE

E 1

Total 18 2 10

T11 I 38 4 4 11

iM 1 1

M 2 9

eM

iE 1

E 2 2

Total 38 7 9 21

T12 I 8 1 2

iM 1

M

eM

iE 1 1

E 3 2

Total 11 2 1 5

173

Table 5c

Punctuation marks – conference papers

Text Position of conjunct

in clause

Type of punctuation mark

Com

ma

Com

mas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s

an

d c

om

ma

Sem

icolo

n

an

d c

om

ma

Colo

n

an

d c

om

ma

No

pu

nct

uati

on

T1 I 32 10

iM 1

M 3

eM

iE

E 1 1 1

Total 33 1 1 14

T2 I 36 1 7

iM 1

M

eM

iE 3

E 2

Total 39 1 10

T3 I 64 2 8

iM

M 1 1 1

eM

iE

E 3 1 1

Total 68 2 3 9

T4 I 19 2

iM

M 1 2

eM

iE 1

E

Total 19 1 5

T5 I 59 1 4 5

iM 1

M 1

eM

iE 2 7 2

E 8 10

Total 59 11 22 8

174

Text Position of conjunct

in clause

Type of punctuation mark

Com

ma

Com

mas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s

an

d c

om

ma

Sem

icolo

n

an

d c

om

ma

Colo

n

an

d c

om

ma

No

pu

nct

uati

on

T6 I 79 2 6

iM 3 1 1

M

eM

iE

E 2 6

Total 79 3 5 6 7

T7 I 61 13

iM

M 1

eM

iE 1 1

E 1 1

Total 62 1 16

T8 I 64 1 1 7 14

iM

M 2 4

eM

iE

E 16 1

Total 64 3 1 23 1 18

T9 I 19 22

iM

M 3

eM

iE

E 4

Total 23 25

T10 I 3 8

iM

M 2

eM

iE

E 1

Total 3 1 10

175

Table 6a

Punctuation in the textbook according to individual conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Total

Com

ma

Com

mas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s an

d

com

ma

Sem

icolo

n a

nd

com

ma

Colo

n a

nd

com

ma

No p

un

ctu

ati

on

again 5 1 6

also 5 5

alternatively 2 2

e.g. 8 21 35 64

else 2 2

equally 1 1

finally 12 3 15

firstly 1 2 3

furthermore 1 1

hence 1 2 6 9

however 35 3 9 47

i.e. 2 14 27 43

instead 3 3 6

namely 2 2

nevertheless 6 6

rather 2 2

similarly 3 3

so 30 30

specifically 1 1

then 1 34 35

therefore 2 1 22 25

thus 1 13 14

worse 1 1

yet 3 3

better even 1 1

either way 1 1

even worse 2 2

above all 1 1 2

after all 1 1

along the way 1 1

at the same time 1 1

176

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Total

Com

ma

Com

mas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

Bra

cket

s an

d

com

ma

Sem

icolo

n a

nd

com

ma

Colo

n a

nd

com

ma

No p

un

ctu

ati

on

by comparison 1 1

by the way 1 1

for example 20 4 1 6 12 43

for instance 3 2 1 6

for this reason 1 1

in addition 18 6 24

in any case 1 1

in any way 1 1

in other words 1 1

in particular 1 1 2 4

in the same way 1 1

in this case 5 1 6

of course 5 1 1 7

on the other hand 7 2 9

on the reverse side 1 1

to put it into other words 1 1

Total 161 16 2 1 44 1 218 443

177

Table 6b

Punctuation in scientific journals according to individual conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Comma Commas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

Accordingly 1

additionally 1 3

again 1 2

also 1 3 3 1

consequently 2

conversely 1

correspondingly 1

e.g. 4 1 1 1

finally 1 2 1 2

first 2 1

firstly 1 1

further 4 1

furthermore 4 1 2

hence 1 4

however 19 23 23 7 2 7 2 7 1 1 4 1 2 5 2 2 2 1 1

i.e. 2 1 1 1 1 2 1

instead 1

moreover 6 1

namely 1 1

nevertheless 1

nonetheless 1

otherwise 1

overall 1 2 2

rather 1

second 2

secondly 1

similarly 1 1 7

so

specifically 1 1

then

178

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Comma Commas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

therefore 2 3 1 2 4 1 1 3

though 1

thus 15 2 4 5 1 2 1

yet

after all 1

as a result 1

as a starting point 1

at the same time 1 1

by contrast 3

for another 1

for example 1 7 2 5 2 3 3 6 1 4 2 3 1 1 1 1 1

for instance 1 4 4 1 1

for one thing

for this reason 1

in addition 3 1 1

in any case 1

in contrast 1 2 1

in other words 1

in particular 1 6 5 1 1

in this case

of course 1

on the other hand 1

that is 6 1 2 2 1

Total 30 74 36 27 6 34 14 20 9 18 38 11 7 10 7 4 2 3 2 7 2

179

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Brackets Brackets and comma

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

accordingly

additionally

again

also

consequently

conversely

correspondingly

e.g. 2 1 1 1 3 4 2 6

finally

first

firstly

further

furthermore

hence

however

i.e. 2 2 2

instead

moreover

namely

nevertheless

nonetheless

otherwise

overall

rather

second

secondly

similarly 1

so

specifically

then

therefore

180

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Brackets Brackets and comma

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T11

T12

though

thus

yet

after all

as a result

as a starting point

at the same time

by contrast

for another

for example 1

for instance

for one thing

for this reason

in addition

in any case

in contrast

in other words

in particular

in this case

of course

on the other hand

that is 1

Total 4 1 3 2 3 1 4 2 9

181

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Tota

l

Sem

icolo

n

an

d c

om

ma

Colo

n a

nd

com

ma

No punctuation

T2 T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12

accordingly 1

additionally 4

again 3

also 3 2 13

consequently 2

conversely 1

correspondingly 1

e.g. 5 32

finally 6

first 3

firstly 1 3

further 5

furthermore 7

hence 1 5 2 2 3 18

however 2 2 3 1 2 1 123

i.e. 1 2 18

instead 1 1 3

moreover 7

namely 2

nevertheless 1 2

nonetheless 1

otherwise 1 1 3

overall 1 6

rather 3 4

second 2

secondly 1

similarly 2 1 13

so 1 2 6 3 2 2 1 2 1 20

specifically 1 2 2 7

then 5 1 3 2 1 1 1 2 2 5 23

therefore 2 3 1 3 26

though 1 1 3

182

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Tota

l

Sem

icolo

n

an

d c

om

ma

Colo

n a

nd

com

ma

No punctuation

T2 T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12

thus 5 12 15 1 2 2 1 3 2 8 81

yet 1 2 1 1 5

after all 1

as a result 1

as a starting point 1

at the same time 2

by contrast 3

for another 1

for example 1 1 1 48

for instance 5 16

for one thing 2 2

for this reason 1

in addition 1 1 7

in any case 1

in contrast 4

in other words 1

in particular 14

in this case 5 5

of course 1 2

on the other hand 1 1 3

that is 1 1 15

Total 1 13 22 40 7 18 17 5 8 20 10 21 5 577

183

Table 6c

Punctuation in conference papers according to individual conjuncts

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Comma Commas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T1

T1

T8

accordingly 3

additionally 1 2 1 2 3

again 1 1

also 2 1

alternatively 1 2 2

consequently 1 1

conversely 1 3 1

e.g. 2 2 6 1 1 1

fifth 1

finally 1 2 5 2 1 4 1 6 3

first 2 1 1 3 4 4

fourth 1

further 1 3 1 3

furthermore 1 6 2 1 1

hence 3 3

however 15 6 9 2 17 16 25 13 3 1 1 2 2

i.e. 3 2 1

instead 3 2 1

likewise 1

moreover 1 1

namely 1

nevertheless 1

next 1

otherwise 1 2 1

overall 1

rather 1 1

second 2 3 5 3

secondly 1

similarly 2 2 1

so 1

184

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Comma Commas

Dash

Colo

n

Sem

icolo

n

Bra

cket

s

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T1

T1

T8

specifically 1 1 5 2 1

still 3

then

therefore 1 6 2 2 1 3 1

third 1

thus 1 5 1 2 9 8 1 5

worse 1

yet 2

as a result 5 1 2

at the same time 1

for comparison 1

for example 2 4 3 8 8 2 10 7 2 2 1

for instance 3 1 14 7

for this reason 1

in addition 2 3 1 3

in aggregate 1

in contrast 1 3 1 2 4 1 2 1 1

in other words 1

in particular 1 3 2 2 1

in this case 2 3

in total 3

of course 1

on the other hand 3 2 1

that is 1 3 1

put another way 1

Total 33 39 68 19 59 79 62 64 23 3 2 1 11 3 3 1 1 1 1

185

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Tota

l Brackets and comma

Sem

icolo

n

an

d

com

ma

Colo

n a

nd

com

ma

No punctuation

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T6

T8

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

accordingly 3

additionally 9

again 1 3

also 1 4

alternatively 5

consequently 2

conversely 5

e.g. 1 20 4 1 15 6 1 61

fifth 1

finally 25

first 15

fourth 1

further 8

furthermore 1 12

hence 3 1 1 1 12

however 1 2 4 119

i.e. 2 1 8 1 2 1 21

instead 3 9

likewise 1

moreover 1 3

namely 1

nevertheless 1

next 1

otherwise 1 5

overall 1 2

rather 2 4

second 1 14

secondly 1

similarly 5

so 3 2 3 3 5 6 23

specifically 10

186

Conjunct

Type of punctuation mark

Tota

l

Brackets and comma

Sem

icolo

n

an

d

com

ma

Colo

n a

nd

com

ma

No punctuation

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

T6

T8

T1

T2

T3

T4

T5

T6

T7

T8

T9

T10

still 3

then 2 2 3 1 6 6 9 4 33

therefore 3 2 1 1 1 5 29

third 1

thus 2 4 1 1 5 45

worse 1

yet 4 6

as a result 8

at the same time 1

for comparison 1

for example 1 5 55

for instance 25

for this reason 1

in addition 9

in aggregate 1 2

in contrast 1 17

in other words 1

in particular 1 10

in this case 1 6

in total 3

of course 1 2

on the other hand 6

that is 5

put another way 1

Total 1 3 22 5 1 23 6 1 14 10 9 5 8 7 16 18 25 10 657