Points of convergence between functional and formal approaches to syntactic analysis

The paper discusss two different approaches to ling uistic theory and their relation to empirical issues in syntactic analysis. The two app roaches chosen are probably the two most widespread ones in Scandinavian linguistics, here s een as representing a functional and a formal view respectively: The functional approach i s represented by Paul Diderichsen’s (1936, 1941, 1946, 1964) saetningsskema , ‘sentence model’, and the formal approach is represented by analysis whose main features are com mon to the principles and parameters framework (Chomsky 1986) and the minimalist programme (Chomsky 1995). Section 2 argues that the difference between theor etical and empirical lingustics is not an opposition but an interdependence, and section 3 discusses various differences within the two approaches. After these preliminary discussions, section 4 giv es a detailed introduction to clausal architecture in the two approaches, and sections 5 and 6 directly juxtapose the two appproaches, by taking something often considered t ypical for one approach (the fields and slots in the functional approach, and the movement operations in the formal approach), and examining what they correspond to in the other appr oach. The paper concludes that the approaches have more things in common than on might think, and linguists would therefore be well-advise d to pay attention to insights gained in approaches different from their own.