Letras – Relações Textuais em Língua Inglesa - 2014/1
Profª Flávia Cunha
Emphasis and Focus: Cleft and Pseudo-Cleft Sentences
In English, sometimes we need to emphasize any of the sentence functions within a
sentence. CLEFT SENTENCE is a construction that makes it possible for us to put special
emphasis on a particular sentence function. This special structure is called CLEFT sentence
because to form such a sentence we cleave (cleave means to divide or to split and cleft is
the participle form of the verb to cleave) the sentence into two parts in a way that
emphasized part takes place in the first section. Consequently, structural pattern of a cleft
sentence remains as
It + be + emphasized sentence function
+
(who / that)…………
FIRST PART
SECOND PART
For example, considering the following sentence, let’s try to emphasize different sentence
functions.
Peter
Su
wrote
P
Mary
Oi
a love letter
Od
in Paris
A1
last week.
A2
Emphasizing the Subject Function:
Sentence
Pattern
: Peter wrote Mary a love letter in Paris last week.
: It + be + emphasized sentence function + (who / that )…………
(considering
the tense)
Cleft Sentence: It
was Peter who wrote a love letter to Mary in Paris last week.
(It was Peter who wrote Mary a love letter in Paris last week is also acceptable.)
Emphasizing the Direct Object Function:
It was a love letter that Peter wrote (to) Mary in Paris last week
Emphasizing the Indirect Object Function:
It was Mary Peter wrote a love letter to in Paris last week.
Emphasizing the Adverbial (1) Function:
It was in Paris that Peter wrote Mary a love letter last week.
Emphasizing the Adverbial (2) Function:
It was last week that Peter wrote Mary a love letter in Paris.
PSEUDO CLEFT SENTENCES
Pseudo Cleft Sentence is the second structure that enables us to put special emphasis on a
certain sentence element.
Pseudo Cleft Sentences can be considered as typical sentences in Subj + V + C pattern in
which
Subj is realized by WHAT clause
V is realized by linking verb “be”
C is realized by NP, to infinitive or –ing participle non-finite clause
For example in sentence Alcohol killed him, let us try to emphasize “alcohol”
We already know that its cleft form is “It was alcohol that killed him.”
To form Pseudo Cleft version, we should convert the sentence into Subj + V + C pattern
where C stands for the emphasized constituent.
What killed him was alcohol
is the Pseudo Cleft form of the sentence.
As you see, C is realized by NP here. (Alcohol = NP)
As we have stated C can be realized by two non-finite clause type. The following
sentences are Pseudo Cleft ones whose C functions are realized by these type of clauses:
C is realized by to infinitive non-finite clause:
Non pseudo-cleft
Pseudo cleft
: Mary gave John a white rose
: What Mary did was to give John a white rose
What Mary did was to give a white rose to John.
or
C is realized by to infinitive non-finite clause:
Non pseudo-cleft
Pseudo cleft
: They are spoiling their children
: What they are doing is spoiling their children.
There are two other possibilities for the structural pattern of pseudo cleft sentences.
a) WH- clause may not be at the beginning of the pseudo cleft sentence
Full mark in grammar final is what every student would like best.
b) WH- item may not be WHAT, that is, it may contain a WH-item other that WHAT (For
example it is WHERE in the following example)
This is where the terrible accident happened a year ago.
You should keep in your mind that all sentences introduced by WH- clause are not pseudocleft sentences.
For example: What made me panic was an explosion is a pseudo cleft sentence.
To understand whether such a sentence is pseudo or not, convert it into non-cleft form.
If non-cleft form (here it is An explosion made me panic) conveys the same message, you
can say that previous form of the sentence is pseudo cleft one.
What made me panic was a mystery to her is not a pseudo cleft sentence, because its noncleft form (that is *A mystery to her made me panic) does not convey the e message as the
cleft one does.