> Peter,

    "surprisingly" and "sadly" are sentence modifiers. They tell us more
about the speaker (tone of the message) than about the world
represented. When you say "surprisingly, Phil likes them too", you are
saying that you are surprised, not that Phil is.  The same is true of
"honestly," "as a matter of fact," "to be frank", and so on. They tell
us how the reader should take the intention of the statement. "off the
record, the mayor is stealing our funds." It's not the mayor who is
off the record, but the statement itself.
   If I say "Meanwhile, Phil is sending an email of his own," "meanwhile"
has to do with the internal world being represented. Two things are
happening at once in two different spaces. If i say "first, I will tell
you about..." I am using "first" as a statement about the text. I can
also say "first he walked toward the plate," which makes "first" a
number for the steps in the action.
   Functional grammar calls the sentence opening position "thematic", and
when something other than grammatical subject opens the clause, it
becomes "marked theme." So it might make sense to say that these words
have different functions in the discourse, but share a marked theme
status.
   "Outside, the cold wind blows. Inside, a warm fire glows." "Outside"
and "inside" aren't subjects, but they are very much a stepping off
point for the message structure of the sentence.
   Some words are in sentence opening position by default. For the most
part, this is true of the conjunctions (though compounding can happen
at almost any point.) Others, like the ones above, are there by choice.
The notions of marked theme extends to the first non-default choice.
"As a child, he loved baseball. But, after all the scandals, he lost
his love."
   When I talk about discourse this way, I always feel I'm helping people
out. The categories are functional. Like you, I get mixed feelings when
the rules seem arbitrary. I want the categories to be highly functional
in ways other than simply "this is the rule book rule for how you are
supposed to do it." I want to say "this is a nice way to build a
relationship with your reader," or "this keeps the sequence of actions
clear."
   Some arbitrariness is necessary (a comma and not a smiley face), but I
would like much less.
   To me, it makes more sense to take a goal like coherence and then
discuss how it happens rather than just pay attention to the rules and
then occasionally point out that they help a text be coherent. The
whole issue of coherence is never adequately covered, especially by
minimalist approaches.
   I get students who write incoherent texts, but stick on a few
transition phrases. One doesn't necessarily give you the other.
   From a wider functional base, though, you do get a chance to see what
is arbitrary and what is not. You almost have to say so to keep your
credibility. It's hard to defend dysfunctional aspects of the system,
but they are there, realities we have to deal with.

Craig

> In a message dated 9/11/06 11:14:29 AM, [log in to unmask] writes:
>
>
>> These are frequently called "transitions" or "conjunctive adverbs".  I
>> find
>> it best to teach them along side subordinate and coordinate conjunctions
>> because that is the full set of words the provide the function of
>> linking one
>> idea to the next.  Sentences are more tightly bound by conjunctions, but
>> conjunctive adverbs have the same meaning effect.  They should not be
>> taught to
>> distantly from conjunctions because they will muddle students'
>> thinking. 
>>
>
> This makes sense, but what about the following:
>
> 1. Christine likes adverbs; surprisingly, Phil likes them too.
> 2. Martha knows her grammar; sadly, Peter's knowledge is more shaky.
> 3. Herb sent an email; later, he thought better of it.
> 4. Herb sent an email; meanwhile, Ed was composing a similar one.
> 5. Herb sent yet another email; finally, he went to bed.
>
> I expect general agreement that the words following the semicolon in
> numbers
> 1, 2, and 3 are, in fact, adverbs.   But what about meanwhile, in the
> fourth
> one.   Martha calls it a conjunctive adverb; so do Hacker, Troyka, and
> Aaron.
> And finally in number 5.   These do serve "the function of linking one
> idea
> to the next," but so does later in #3.   And so does the next day in #6,
> but I
> don't think anyone would want to call it conjunctive in any way.
>
> 6. Peter sent an email.   The next day he tried to retrieve it.
>
> So perhaps "the function of linking one idea to the next" is not a
> characteristic solely of conjunctions . . .
>
> I realize that some do not find this discussion interesting.   Please
> indulge
> those of us who do.
>
>
> Peter Adams
>
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