National open university of nigeria school of arts and social sciences
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- 3.7 Multiple Themes
| 3.7 Marked and Unmarked Themes A marked theme is the unusual Theme. The usual Theme is the one that occupies the position of the subject. This shows that inmost cases, the subject position and that of the theme overlap. When there is this overlap, which is often the case, we are said to have and Unmarked Theme. However, when other elements apart from the subject are given prominence by being placed in the initial position, they are called Marked Theme. Examples of Marked Theme are given below: 8.9. While in school, I was very sickly. 48 8.10. Away it flew. 8.11. Strangely, I could not recognize he. 8.12. Before you arrived, my father had spoken about you. In the examples above, we can see other elements functioning as Theme apart from the subject, thereby pushing the subject to a second position in the clause. In 8.9, we have an adverbial group indicating time. In 8.10, we have a complement. In 8.11, we have a comment adjunct, while in 8.12, we have a subordinate adjunct of time. 3.7 Multiple Themes Multiple Themes do sometimes occur in clauses when more than one constituent in the clause are given thematic status. Halliday (1985) identifies three types of theme that can feature in the multiple themes. He used the three dimensional metafunctions: Experiential, Textual and Interpersonal. The three types of theme recognized are the Textual Theme, the Interpersonal Theme and the Topical Theme. The latter, Topical Theme is typically unmarked, because it is the usual Theme. Textual Theme are used mostly in conversation to indicate argument. Interpersonal Themes are used to address listeners in conversation. They are usually signified by first names (David), terms of affection (darling), mood adjuncts (maybe), comment adjuncts (fortunately). Now let us see how multiple themes operate in clauses . Now Darling my aim is to get him to follow me tomorrow TEXTUAL INTERPERSONAL TOPICAL RHEME Download 0.49 Mb. Share with your friends:
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