Grammar: Clause: Using the clause to organise text
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Further reading | |
Up until this point we have been looking just at individual clauses:
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Theme |
New Information |
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|
(focus on textual meaning) |
(focus on topic) |
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| Boris the Bat | had his dinner | |
| and then | he | went to sleep for a while. |
| Boris the Bat | went to sleep for a while | |
| after | he | had had his dinner. |
In a sentence (or clause complex) the clause that comes first can be interpreted as the Theme of the whole sentence:
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clause as Theme |
New Information |
| Boris the Bat went to sleep for a while | after he had had his dinner. |
| After he had had his dinner, | Boris the Bat went to sleep for a while. |
For more information, see 
Grammar: Sentence: Combining clauses in a sentence: Further reading: Clause as Theme in a
sentence
Note that the terms New Information and Theme are written with a capital to
remind us that they are functional
terms.
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Tell me more ... How do we identify the Theme of a clause? |
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