Meta-operational grammar

Résumé En

Meta-operational grammar Meta-operational grammar was born in France in the 1970s by Professor Henri Adamczewski who taught English grammar at the Sorbonne Nouvelle. At a time when English grammar books stuck to a « rule and exceptions » approach, meta-operational grammar brought new principles and explained phenomena so far unaccounted for. Adamczewski first tackled English auxiliary DO, his primary concern being to explain why DO was used in a variety of contexts with no apparent link between them, so as to understand the role played by DO, whatever the uttererance. As opposed to a traditional approach which merely mentioned when DO was used, but not why, meta-operational grammar put forward the idea of « un invariant » as we say in French. Along with this concept, another concept surfaced, that of status. What opposes a to the, this to that, some to any, to to -ing (He began to shout at her / Only then did he begin shouting at her), till to until, nearly to almost etc. is a matter of status. For instance, in « I need a car » and « I need the car », car is given a different status : either assertive with a, or non assertive with the. The same concept applies to what opposes the « simple present » to « be+ing present » : « I agree with you of course. » « Don’t you think you are agreeing to this too quickly? ». What meta-operational grammar has shown is the idea that grammar relies on scientific principles and not on unreliable rules. For instance, once the « progressive » is associated with actions in progress, many occurrences cannot be accounted for. We propose to show how meta-operational grammar helps solving problems traditional grammar cannot cope with.