Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and

Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein

Discourse Study of A Clausal

Subject Extraposition in Selected
Political and Religious Speeches
Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
Faculty of Human Sciences and Physical Education
University of Garimian
Abstract
Extraposition can be defined as a process by which an element is
moved from its normal position to another position that is at or near the end
of the sentence. It is regarded as a stylistic rule, the failure to extrapose can
result in awkward constructions that may even cause interpretation
difficulties. It is mostly used in the formal writings more than in the
informal ones.
The extraposition strategy is in general used with certain verbs such
as (seem, appear, follow, …..) . It has two cases: extraposition of a clausal
subject and extraposition of a clausal object. In addition, it has several
syntactic constructions such as that-clause, infinitive and gerund.
This study is limited with studying the clausal subject extraposition and
also it focuses on the use of the clausal subject extraposition in two selected
registers: political speeches and religious speeches showing the cases and
the forms of extraposition that are used in these two registers.
The issues that are going to be discussed are:
1. the concept of extraposition, its cases and syntactic constructions
2. the meaning of each case and construction
3. the reasons for using extraposition in general and its constructions in
specific
4. the frequency of clausal subject extraposition in political and religious
speeches
It has been found that the clausal subject extrapostion is used more in
the political speeches than in the religious speeches. that -clause is used
more than the other forms.
1.1. The Problem and its Significance
Extrapostion is a strategy that is used to move important information
to the end of the sentence. The most important case in extrapostion is the
clausal subject extraposition because it is used mostly by speakers/writers.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
This aspect is used very widely in written and spoken forms but the
reason of using it is still ambiguous. It is right to say that the use of this
aspect is connected with the heaviness of information but the problem is
that how the writer/ speaker decides what is the heavy information, why in
English language, the speaker/ writer wants to focus on this exact piece of
information, and what are the constructions that are mostly used and why?
Extraposition has several constructions so there is a need to shed light on
its kinds, constructions and cases and how it is used in the normal speech
and what are the reasons for using this strategy in our daily speech.
This research examines how English speaker/writer reconstructs
some sentences in order to lead the hearer/ reader to focus on certain
information by postponing it. Also it shows that extraposition in general
and the clausal subject extraposition in specific are used more in religious
speeches than the political speeches for the purpose of focusing on the new
information.
2.1. On Defining Extraposition
It is a term used in grammar referring to the process or result of moving
an element from its normal position to a position at or near the end of the
sentence, for example:
1. a. That boy came in late upset the teacher.
b. It upset the teacher that the boy came in late.
2. a. Working here is nice.
b. It’s nice working here.
Extraposition operates almost exclusively on subordinate nominal
clauses
(Crystal, 2003: 174 and Crystal, 2010: 447).
Quirk and et.al.(1973:422-423) mention that extraposition is a device of
postponement that serves the two principles of end-focus and end-weight.
English allows a pattern where a finite or infinitival clause appears in
sentence-final (or ‘extraposed’) position:
3. a. I made it my objective [to settle the matter].
b. I owe it to you [that the jury acquitted me].
(Greenbaum and Quirk, 1990: 418)
This pattern involves the introduction of expletive (or ‘dummy’) it
which, though morphologically identical to the third person singular
pronoun, is not referential, and hence is unable to be assigned by any
semantic role.
Another aspect of it-extraposition that distinguishes it from canonical
cases is that the extraposed constituent is usually a clause; it-extraposition
cannot extrapose a prepositional phrase. This fact can be explained by

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
appealing to the status of it as a cataphor. In other words, it is a pro-form
of a sort; its appearance pushes the clause that it stands for to the end of the
sentence. Since prepositional phrases cannot appear in the position of a
clause, it should not be surprising that prepositional phrases cannot be it-
extraposed (Jespersen, 2004: 89,113).
Richards and Schmidt (2010: 211) state that “heavy” constituents are
more likely to be placed near the end of a sentence than “light” ones.
Compare He picked the book up with He picked up the first book he saw.
Another important fact about extraposition is that it is clause-bound. This
aspect of extraposition is known as the Right Roof Constraint. In other
words, extraposition cannot occur out of an embedded clause:
4. a. That we think that the idea is good is no secret.
b. *That we think is no secret that the idea is good. - Failed attempt
to extrapose out of a subject clause
5. a. Someone who thinks that Romney will win was talking non-stop.
b. *Someone who thinks was talking non-stop that Romney will
win. - Failed attempt to extrapose out of a relative clause
6. a. Before it was certain that it would rain, we were planning a
picknick.
b. *Before it was certain, we were planning a picknick that it would
rain. - Failed attempt to extrapose out of an adjunct clause
Extraposition is regarded as a stylistic rule, the failure to extraposed
can result in awkward constructions that may even cause interpretation
difficulties.
The reasons for using the extraposition are:
a. When a sentence contains heavy or dominant elements, the speaker/
writer intends to move those elements to the end of the sentence.
Murcia and Freeman (1999: 671) say that this kind of movements is
a processing strategy since dominant noun phrases are harder to
encode and decode in initial and medial positions than in final
position such as:
7. a. We saw [ the movie which she had spoken about] Sunday.
b. We saw Sunday [the movie which she had spoken about].
The noun phrase is followed by a relative clause modifier so it is relatively
longer than other kinds of noun phrases so there is a need to extrapose it to
the end of the sentence. But in such sentences, the extraposition strategy is
impossible:
8. a. We saw the movie Sunday.
b. We saw Sunday the movie.
(ibid)

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
b. The second reason for using the extraposition is that English
language tends to place old and given information in subject position
and new information in the predicate. Since old information is
typically encoded in brief form relative to the rest of the sentence. A
sentence like the following tends to sound better with an extraposed
subject:
9. a. That the governor will formally announce the new sales tax bill is
likely. → Unextraposed form
b. It is likely that the governor will formally announce the new sales
tax bill. → Extraposed Form
If the bill in question is already familiar to the hearers/readers and is
mentioned within the subject, it is far more likely to appear in shorter form:
c. The governor’s new sales tax bill is likely to be announced today.
So the given/new distinction may play a considerable role in an utterance’s
decision to extrapose (ibid: 672).
Generally speaking, the use of clausal that subjects is higher in formal
writings than the spoken or informal written genres.
The case in which someone should not choose to extrapose is that when the
predicate of the main clause itself contains a clause. The use of
extraposition may present a serious problem such as:
10. a. That he always selects the correct answer shows that he has studied
the material.
b. * It shows that he has studied the material that he always selects
the correct answers.
11. a. That you brought this matter to our attention helps us to see the
real problem.
b. It helps us to see the real problem that you brought the matter to
our attention. (ibid)
2.2. Discourse Functions of Extraposition
Extraposition is used to lighten the load of a sentential subject (and
less frequently, an object) by demoting a subordinate clause from subject
(or object) position to the end of a sentence. For instance:
1. a. That he left in such a hurry is no surprise.
b. It is no surprise that he left in such a hurry.
2. a. It never ceases to surprise and horrify me how these criminals get
away.
3. Well, I believe it to be a crime to let any murderer walk free like that.
4. The professor found it incredible that any student could write
such an essay on their own.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
There is consensus in the literature regarding the type of clauses
which can be extraposed: they can be finite (the most frequent type), or
non-finite with gerunds, much less frequent than infinitives, and they can
be introduced by that, a wh-word or nonfinite to (Biber et al., 1999;
Huddleston and Pullum, 2005).
However, one aspect which still causes debate concerns is the status
of it. As with IT-clefts, it has been analyzed in different ways. Some argue
that extraposed constructions have two subjects, it being the ‘formal’
subject and the extraposed clause being the ‘notional’, ‘real’, or
‘postponed’ one (Quirk et al.,1985); others maintain that it is the only
subject, the extraposed clause being stripped of its subject-like properties
once it is demoted to sentence-final position . With regard to the discourse
function of extraposition, a recent study by Rowley-Jolivet and Carter-
Thomas (2005) found two main and partially related uses of extraposition.
First, it helps to “increase dynamism” by placing new information
sentence-finally. Secondly, it is used to express the speaker’s/writer’s
evaluative opinion in a “rhetorically effective” way by introducing the
evaluative comments sentence-initially: It is obvious that [...] or It is
unusual that [...] so that they are less conducive to being challenged
(Rowley-Jolivet and Carter- Thomas, 2005: 51).
Despite the fact that extraposition has received most attention in past
work, it could be argued that the opposite phenomenon (i.e., non-
extraposition) merits equal, if not more, attention. There are two related
reasons for this. First, extraposition is more frequent than non-
extraposition. Secondly, extraposition is functionally motivated, whether
one adopts a psychologically oriented explanation whereby sending heavy
constituents to the end of the sentence allows for easier processing (as
shown by Biber et al. for that-clauses (1999: 676) and Quirk et al. (1985:
1392), from a statistical standpoint,), or whether it is simply assumed that
end-focus and end-weight principles are at work here . In other words, both
functionally, as well as statistically, extraposition appears to be the norm
rather than the exception.
Nonextraposition requires that the content of the subject be
discourse-old or directly inferable. If the content is discourse-new, then
extraposition is necessary. The choice between extraposition and
nonextraposition for discourse-old and inferable subjects is examined and
is shown to depend on the discourse status of the predicate and on whether
it is the predicate or the subject that links to the following discourse so that
the common discourse properties of fronting and nonextraposition must

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
be linked to their common linear ordering properties, rather than to a
common syntactic position (Calude, 2008:12).
Bolinger (1977: 288) claims that the extraposed construction may be
used when "the topic has been introduced" . Also he claims that the
nonextraposed variant is impossible if the content of the sentential subject
is topical and that sentences such as his [7] are impossible, as opposed to
[8] and [9], because the anaphoric link entails topic status.
As for the extraposition of infinitives, while a pair such as
5. To give in now would be fatal.
6. It would be fatal to give in now.
are interchangeable in many contexts and look as if they might be in free
variation, actually the it again relates to some kind of prior basis. Consider
the following answers to the question What do you think of running him
as a candidate?:
7. *To do that would be a good idea.
8. To run him as a candidate would be a good idea
9. It would be a good idea to do that.
In [7], the use of that forces the anaphora -- the speaker has to be
picking up the idea from his interlocutor and is therefore obliged to use it
and the construction in [9]. But [8] is possible where the speaker is turning
the question over in his mind and treating it as his own idea (ibid).
Given the importance of end focus , it is not surprising that English has
numerous resources to enable us to phrase a sentence in such a way to
ensure the distribution of information according to our wishes.
2.3. The Constructions of Extraposition
2.3.1. that- clauses
The main kind of extraposition is the extraposed that- clause:
1. a. That you don’t fit their image of a fairy princess annoys them.
b. May be it annoys them that you don’t fit their image of a fairy
princess.
In these two sentences, that- clause functions as the subject of the main
sentence (Biber. et.al, 1999: 676).
There is a kind called pre-predicate that is in form just like the extraposed
that- clause such as:
2. * That Saint managed to cause an upset with nothing more than
direct running and honest endeavor bodes well for Great Britain.
This pre-predicate (that) presents the proposition in that- clause as factual
or generally accepted information (ibid).

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
Extraposed that- clauses reports an attitude or stance which is overtly
attributed to any person. This is usually the attitude of the speaker or the
writer of the texts, even though the author does not assume explicit
responsibility for the attitude:
3. * It was obvious that the challenges ahead are at least as daunting
as anything the Cold War produced.
4. * It was obvious that no subjects could perceive the movement at a
normal distance. (ibid, 661)
There are certain verbs that take the extraposed that- clause and they are as
follows:
a. verbs to (be)
b. seem, appears
c. follow
d. passive verbs (be found, be known, be assumed, be said, be shown)
for examples:
5. It’s wonder he’s got any business at all.
6. It seemed however that in-pig sows showed more stress than empty
ones.
7. It now appears that I will be expected to part with a further portion of
my income as a graduate tax.
8. It follows that frequentist probability is conceptually inadequate for
the design or licensing of hazardous facilities.
9. It has been shown that sites near the mushroom bodies control the
production of normal song-rhythm. (ibid: 670-671)
Murcia and Freeman (1999: 668-669) also say that (seem) is a verb with
which the extraposition case can take place such as:
10.It seems that John is happy.
But it is wrong to say:
11.* That John is happy seems.
So the use of extraposition (it) here is important because that- clause can
not take the place of the subject although it represents the doer and that is
because of the presence of the verb (seem).
(that) can not be omitted when its clause is placed in the subject position
such as:
12.a. It is unfortunate that he left without any money.
b. It is unfortunate he left without any money.
c. That he left without any money is unfortunate.
d. * He left without any money is unfortunate.
In the first two sentences (12. a and b), the occurrence and the absence of
(that) does not effect on the meaning of the sentence but in sentence (12.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
d), the omission of (that) is unacceptable cause it is placed at the beginning
of the sentence (ibid).
Greenbaum and Quirk (1990: 417) add that besides the verb (seem), there
are verbs like (appeared, happened, chanced, ….. ) with which the
extraposition is obligatory as in the following examples:
13.a. * That she wanted to go into politics is said.
b. It is said that she wanted to go into politics.
Also with the copula verbs (to be), this kind of extraposition is “used for
expressions of possibility and (especially) for reflective questions” as in:
14.It may be that she no longer trusts you. Could it be that you left the
keys in your office? (ibid)
2.3.2. Relative Clauses Extraposition
Rochemont, (1986, Ch.4) claims that definite NPs from which relative
clauses have been extraposed appear to require a stringent set of discourse
conditions. He assumes that the structures themselves are well-formed, but
whether or not they can be interpreted depends on finding the appropriate
context for them, though he does not discuss what the possible contexts
might be:
1. The guy just came in that I met at TRENO’S yesterday.
Huck and Na (1990) describe a context in which the speaker has been
talking about two people, one of whom he met at Treno’s and
one of whom he met somewhere else, e.g. at Andrea’s. If the first of these
two people walks in, the speaker could felicitously say (1); the emphasis on
Treno’s signals contrast with the person he met at Andrea’s.
In the example just described, the NP subject refers to a person already in
the common ground of the discourse - the speaker was already talking
about this person. The information contained in the relative clause is not
new, because the interlocutors know, from explicit mention in the
conversation, that the speaker met one guy at Treno’s and one at Andrea’s.
The use of the definite NP implies that its referent is familiar to participants
in the discourse. More specifically, Huck and Na (1990) state that “a
definite NP is acceptable when the identity of its referent is calculable from
the information given.” In (1), the definite NP the guy has been explicitly
mentioned at some point in the discourse, so the referent of the NP is
present in the common ground. In addition, according to Huck and Na’s
description of the context for (1), both interlocutors know that the speaker
met two people, one of those people at Treno’s, so the property expressed
by the relative clause, “meeting x at Treno’s,” is in the common ground as
well. So definite NPs presuppose that the referent is calculable from
discourse information, the information status of the definite NP will always

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
be such that the referent of the NP is present in the discourse context
somehow. If they assume this, then the only way for a mismatch to be
generated, according to their view, would be to have the property expressed
by the relative clause to be new with respect to the discourse.
Extraposition of relative clauses from definite NPs is acceptable as long as
the information in the relative clause is given in the discourse, so that it is
congruent with the given nature of the definite NP.
In the theoretical literature, it has been claimed that the acceptability of the
relative clause extraposition decreases when:
a. the antecedent noun phrase of the relative clause is definite (the
definiteness restriction)
b. the main verb of the sentence is not a verb of appearance (the
predicate restriction)
Walker (2013, 149) says that a sentence with extraposition becomes
ungrammatical when a definite instead of an indefinite noun phrase is used
as antecedent as in:
2. a. A man is here who is carrying a large package.
b. *The man is here who is carrying a large package.
Ziv and Cole (1974: 772) also make a contrast between extraposed and
nonextraposed relative clauses, they speak about reduced acceptability as
in:
3. a. A guy whom I met at Treno’s yesterday just came in.
b. The guy whom I met at Treno’s yesterday just came in.
c. A guy just came in whom I met at Treno’s yesterday.
d. * The guy just came in whom I met at Treno’s yesterday.
Walker ( 2013: 153) says that the verbs that are used in relative clause
extraposition are verbs with an appearance meaning such as (arrive, enter,
come in, show up, appear). It is possible that this kind of extraposition can
occur with other kinds of verbs but the appearance kind is preferable. Any
verb can be used as a predicate of appearance if the sentence is embedded
in an appropriate discourse context. So it seems possible to improve the
acceptability of extraposition with a verb like (scream) if the sentence is
embedded in a context in which “the verb is pragmatically emptied of all
semantic content beyond that of appearance in the world of the discourse”
(Guéron, 1980: 653-645). The following example illustrates this idea:
4. Suddenly there was the sound of lions growling. Several women
screamed. Then a man screamed who was standing at the very edge
of the crowd.
(Culicover and Rochemont, 1990: 65)

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
Maynell (2003:4) adds that the information contained in extraposed
relative clauses must be given with respect to the discourse, in order to
match the given status of the definite noun phrase that the relative clause
modifies, see these examples:
5. a. The woman who was wearing a blond wig walked into the room.
b. *The woman who was wearing a blond wig walked into the
room.
c. A woman walked into the room who was wearing a blond
wig walked into the room.
In sentence (5 b) when the noun phrase is definite, the movement has to be
to the left side not to the right.
It has to be mentioned that just the restrictive relative clauses can be
extraposed. Restrictive relative clauses are necessary modifiers: they
restrict the set of entities referred to by the nominal head and help pick out
its referent. Nonrestrictive relative clauses give only additional information
about the head whose reference is independently established as in:
6. a. Here is the man (who I love).
b. Here is the man (that I love).
c. Here is the man ( ø I love).
7. a. That handsome man, who looks like Ewan McGregor, is my
Husband.
b. John, who is going to move to Antarctica, is having a farewell
party tomorrow. (Manninen, 2011: 2)
2.3.3. Non- Finite Clauses Extraposition
The extraposition of the –ing participle clauses is possible as in:
1. a. Getting the equipment loaded was easy.
b. It was easy getting the equipment loaded.
(Quirk and Greenbaum, 1973: 423)
-ing clauses occur in ordinary subject position:
2. a. Teaching her to drive turned out to be quite enjoyable.
But extraposed –ing clause is uncommon, it is used mostly in the informal
speech because it seems to be untidy afterthoughts:
b. It turned out to be quite enjoyable teaching her to drive.
(Greenbaum and Quirk, 1990: 417)
Dixon (2005: 48) states that –ing clauses are generally not extraposable but
there is what is called right dislocation “in which the two clauses are set off
by contrastive , appositional intonation” as in:
3. It was admired, Mary’s singing ‘Salty Dog’ in church.
(it) here refers to (Mary’s singing), it is not an empty (it). This case is
different from extraposition.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
In addition, Murcia and Freeman (1999: 669) say that the –ing clause does
not extrapose well with possessive subjects, but it sometimes occurs
extraposed without expressed subject in colloquial English:
4. a. (Her whistling old songs) woke up the neighborhood.
b. *It woke up the neighborhood (her whistling old songs).
5. a. (Spending the afternoon with you) is nice.
b. It is nice (spending the afternoon with you).
6. a. (Living without a car in this city) is not easy.
b. It is not easy (living without a car in this city).
In sentence (4 a), the subject (her whistling old songs) has a possessive
meaning so its extraposed form is unacceptable as exemplified in (4 b).
Quirk and et. al. (1985:1393) mention that the –ing clause often “shows
itself in completely adapted to the extraposion construction, notably by
being resistant to bearing the main information focus”. Instead of:
7. a. It’s fun being a HOSˋ TESS.
b. It’s FUˋ N being a HOSˊ TESS.
This can be noticed in spoken form while in the writing form, the following
sentence is used:
8. It’s fun, being a hostess.
So the –ing clause has just as much affinity with a noun phrase tag as with
a genuine extraposed subject as in:
9. He’s a friend of mine, that man. (ibid)
Dixon (2005: 160, 162) adds that –ing clauses occur with certain kinds of
verbs such as (like, love, hate, prefer, fear, dread, dislike, loathe, abhor,
admire, value, regret, enjoy, favour, object,…...). The infinitival (to) occurs
with the following verbs (like, love, hate, fear and dread) and it does not
occur with the other previously mentioned verbs such as:
10. I like/hate to go.
11. * I dislike/loathe to go. (ibid)
When the non-finite clause functions as extraposed subject, however, the
infinitive is usually preferred, as in (4)-(5). There can be a good deal of
variation here too, though, e.g.:
12. It's nice to have/having money in the bank.
13. It wasn't nice to call/*calling your brother a jerk.
14. It's enough just to know/knowing you're here.
15. Do you think it's clever to make/*making a remark like that?
If the subject of the extraposed non-finite clause is expressed--i.e.
introduced by for--only the infinitive is possible (Morrissey, 2007: 284).
There are a number of different syntactic and semantic factors that affect
the choice of the infinitive or participle in noun clauses. All things

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
considered there seem to be more restrictions on the -ing participle than on
the infinitive--except in subject position, where the -ing participle occurs
more frequently. As a rule of thumb, then, it is advised to use the -
ing participle clause as subject and the infinitive elsewhere.
3. The Extraposition of a Clausal Subject
Elements of the sentence that are shifted from their normal position
to the end of the sentence are either complex and lengthy or under stress
(emphatic) or both. For example, when the subject is expressed by a non-
finite (infinitival or gerundial) or a finit clause, it is normally shifted after
the predicator and the subject position is filled by the anticipatory
(introductory, dummy) subject it. The non-finite or the finite clause then
functions as apposed or postponed subject.
The most important type of extraposition is that of a clausal subject. A
simple rule for deriving a sentence with subject extraposition from one of
orthodox ordering is:
Subject + predicate ~ it + Subject + predicate
(Quirk and Greenbaum, 1973:423)
But it is worth emphasizing that for clausal subjects, the extraposition is
more usual than the basic position before the verb as in:
1. Type SVC : It is a pleasure to teach her .
2. Type SVA : It was on the news that income tax is to be lowered .
3. Type SV : It doesn’t matter what you do .
4. Type SVO : It surprised me to hear him say that .
5. Type SVOC : It makes her happy to see others enjoying themselves .
6. Type SV pass : It is said that she slipped arsenic into his tea .
7. Type SV pass C : It was considered impossible for anyone to escape .
(ibid)
The extraposed subject might be a finite clause, then the real subject may
be expressed by:
a. a noun:
8. It’s a good thing that you had a fire extinguisher at hand.
b. an adjective, particularly one expressing modality:
9. It’s desirable that all possible doubts and ambiguities concerning this
project should be eliminated now.
c. the passive construction with the verbs such as believe, consider,
expect,
know, report, say, think:
10. It is believed that the prisoners will be set free.
d. a dependent question with a rather limited number of openings:
11. It doesn’t matter how he got that information.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
12. It is not certain yet when they will move into the new flat.
e. occasionally a dependent exclamatory clause with such opening as:
13. It’s unbelievable how easily some people earn lots of money.
(Dixon, 2005:47)
It is generally the indefinite present infinitive of the active voice (and
affirmative form) that occurs as predicator in a non-finite subject clause – it
occurs after:
a. adjectives:
14. It’s dangerous to cross the street when the lights are red.
b. participial adjectives (expressing emotion):
15. It is annoying to be kept waiting.
The infinitival clause may have its own subject introduced by a for-phrase
or an of-phrase:
16. It was impossible for me to remain serious.
17. It is hard for him to live away from his family. (ibid)
The –ing clauses are extraposed when they occur:
a. after some adjectives (also infinitival clause could be used):
18. It seems foolish quarrelling over such trifles.
19. It’s incredible meeting you in London.
b. after some nouns and set expressions: It’s no use, It’s a pleasure, It’s a
good thing...
20. It’s no use complaining. (ibid)
A gerund or a gerundial clause is used as postponed subject in certain types
of exclamatory sentences beginning with what or how. What a nuisance (it
is) having to wait for an hour.
Sometimes just one part of a subject, such as a relative clause or a
complement, may detach and move to sentence-final position; such
movement in structures other than complements is most common in
colloquial usage but is not considered good formal written style:
A. Extraposed NP Complement
21. a. The fact that you have won the lottery is irrelevant.
b. The fact is irrelevant that you have won the lottery.
B. Extraposed Relative Clauses
22. a. The plan which the president proposed has been approved.
b. The plan has been approved which the president proposed.
23. a. The problem that I told you about has been diagnosed.
b. The problem has been diagnosed that I told you about.
C. Extraposed Participial Clauses
24. a. Any questions regarding the contract should be dealt with
immediately.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
b. Any questions should be dealt with immediately regarding the
contract. (Murcia and Freeman, 1999: 671)
In addition, clauses with extraposed subject must be distinguished from
superficially similar clauses in which it is a personal pronoun or empty
‘prop’ subject : 13. It’s good to eat. (ie This fish is good to eat)
25. It’s lovely weather to go fishing . (Quirk et.al, 1985:1392)
Also If- and when- clauses behave very much like extraposed
subjects in sentences like:
26. a. It would be a pity if we missed the show.
of
b. It is a pity that we missed the show.
27. It’ll be a great day when you win the sweepstake . (ibid)
It is doubtful in each case , however , whether the clause could act as
subject, although it could act as initial adverbial clause :
28. If we missed the show , it would be a pity .
On balance, therefore these appear to be adverbials rather than the
extraposed subjects. Contrast :
29. For us to miss the show would be a pity ~ It would be a pity for us to
to miss the show .
Another marginal case is the ‘phrasal extraposition’ of
30. It’s two hundred miles from Boston to New York.
Where the prepositional phrase sequence , if fronted , could act either as
subject or as adverbial:
31. From Boston to New York (it) is two hundred miles
Compare also :
32. It’s Wednesday today ; Today (it ) is Wednesday .
While the extraposed clause can only rarely be a nominal relative in type
SV, It is even rarer with SVC :
33. Whoever said that was wrong but
34. * It was wrong whoever said that .
In examples like It’s a mystery why she did it \ how he does it , the wh-
clauses are best regarded as indirect interrogatives (ibid).
The extraposition is avoided when it gives rise to certain awkward
combinations that are generally avoided. For example, if there is both a
subject complement and an object complement, extraposition of the subject
complement gives rise to a derived structure in which the object
complement is in the middle of the sentence:
35. a. That the corkscrew had blood on it proves that the butler is the
culprit.
b. *It proves that the butler is the culprit that the corkscrew had

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
blood on it.
Sentences having a S in the middle of a constituent are avoided regardless
of whether Extraposition plays any role in them . . .."
4. Data Analysis
The sentences that are used in the political and religious speeches are
intended to highlight and show the speakers are concerned with the
problems of their followers and they try to convince their audience of what
they believe to be right.
The main goal for the political and religious speeches is to convince the
listeners of the orators’ opinions by choosing the most powerful linguistic
devices. They use the most appealing or effective words and sentences in
order to catch the attention of the listeners (Uvehammer, 2004: 20-24;
Keane, 1997: 44-49).
The data of this research consists of four samples of speeches: Two are
political and the other two are religious. The political speeches were
spoken by Eleanor Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter while the religious ones are by
Jefferson Davis, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr..
It has been found that the strategy of extraposition is used very often in the
political speech more than in the religious speech. The following table
illustrates the findings of the analysis:
Table (4.1) The Frequency of the Clausal Subject Extraposition in the
Political Speeches
No. Kind of Clauses Frequency Ratio
1 That- clauses 84 44%
2 Non-Finite clauses 60 32%
3 Relative Clauses 45 24%
Total 189 100%
Table (4.2) The Frequency of the Clausal Subject Extraposition in the
Religious Speeches
No. Kind of Clauses Frequency Ratio
1 That- Clauses 27 19%
2 Non-Finite Clauses 66 47%
3 Relative Clauses 48 34%
Total 141 100%
The total number of the clausal subject extraposition that are used in
the political speeches is 189 sentences while in the religious speeches, the
total number is 141 sentences. The frequency of the clausal subject
extraposition in the political speeches is higher than in the religious
speeches.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
The politicians intend to use extraposition in order to take the
intention of the hearers to focus on the new information that they utter. For
the religious men, they intend to just give advices which are not necessary
to be new information all the time.
The frequency of that- clauses is higher in the political speech than
in the religious speech because that- clauses are used to report an attitude
or stance which is overtly attributed to any person. It is usually the attitude
of the speaker (Biber et.al., 1999: 661). The politicians give their opinions
about certain matters so they intend to use the that- clauses more while the
religious men do not give their opinions most of the time.
The frequency of the non-finite clauses is higher in the religious
speech than the political speech. The religious men intend to use informal
speech with their audience in order to be more understandable and familiar
for their followers. Quirk and et. al (1985) say the non-finite extraposed
clauses are mostly used in the informal speeches so this is the reason of the
high frequency of this kind in the religious speeches.
The frequency of the extraposed relative clauses is higher in the
religious speeches than in the political speeches because they are used
when the noun phrase is known from the context, ie, the speaker and the
listeners already know the reference of the mentioned noun (Maynell,
2003:4). In the religious speeches, the speaker tries to clarify what he is
talking about as possible as he can so he intends to use the extraposed
relative clauses in order to give more details while the politicians do not
need this kind of strategies because they only need to persuade the listeners
and catch their attention by using new words, changing the order of the
sentence, politeness strategies …. (Uvehammer, 2004: 20).
5. Conclusions
It has been concluded the following:
1. the extraposed that- clauses are used to report the attitude of the speaker
and also they occur with certain verbs (such as seem, follow …..).
2. the extraposed relative clauses are used when the noun phrase is definite
and its reference is known from the context.
3. just the restrictive relative clauses can be extraposed for they restrict the
set of entities referred to by the nominal head and help pick out its
referent.
4. – ing participle clauses can be extraposed more than the other forms of
the non- finite clauses.
5. the clausal subject extraposition is used mostly in the political speech
than in the religious speech.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
6. the that- clause is used mostly in the political speech than the religious
speech because it is used to express the opinions of their speaker.
7. the non-finite extraposition is used mostly in religious speech because it
is used mostly in the informal speeches and the religious speeches can
be considered as a type of informal speech.
8. the relative clauses extraposition is used mostly in the religious speech
because it give description of the noun phrases that are mentioned
before.

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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein
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Discourse Study of A Clausal Subject Extraposition in Selected Political and
Religious Speeches ………………Assi. Instr. Taban Mohammed Fawzi Hussein

seem, appear, follow, ….

that

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