Functional Fx-bar Projections for Local and Global Text Structures. the Anatomy of Predication

This paper proposes and discusses issues on local and global text structures, all of them being connected to a lexical concept of predication. The main contributions of the present work comprise: (a) A novel functional X-bar (FX-bar) scheme is advised, aiming to reveal, model and relate the local, clause-level markers and text structures. (b) At global level, two FX-bar schemes are proposed, one pursuing the inter-clause level relations, and the other being of discursive, rhetorical nature. (c) There are described local and global classes of markers, together with their graph-based hierarchy, to be incorporated on the projection levels of FX-bar schemes and within SCD (Segmentation-Cohesion-Dependency) linguistic strategy algorithms. (d) The concept of functional generativity is discussed, with implications on parsing algorithm classification and FX-bar projection mechanism. (e) Local FX-bar projection functions have at their core the notion of lexical predication. Direct (towards clause) and inverse (towards lexicon) FX-bar projections of the verbal group (verbal complex) are shown to be efficient tools for a better understanding of the structure and functioning of the Romanian predication and predicate, and for supporting our challenging proposal of handing down the predication from the classical, syntactic level to the lexical one. (f) Finally, direct and inverse global FX-bar projections mediate between larger text spans and inter-clause vs. discourse trees, the intricate relationship between the finite clause and (sub-clause and multi-clause) discourse segment being highlighted.