Extended existentials
These occur as the result of expansions of the noun group. Common expansions include -ing clauses, which present an entity in action 1 or in a state 2. Certain postposed adjectives can express a temporary state 3, 4. Passives and comparatives are also common, especially with the constructions there’s nothing better/worse than . . . in 5 and 6 respectively:
1 There are hundreds of people clamouring for food.
2 There is a box containing dynamite in the corner.
3 There was plenty of food available.
4 There are not many shops open at this hour.
5 There were several civilians killed in a terrorist attack yesterday.
6 There’s nothing worse than being stuck in a traffic jam when you’re late for an appointment. (comparative clause)
The function of these expansions is to establish the relevance and coherence of the new referent at the point when it is introduced into the discourse.
In formal English and in fiction, verbs of appearing and emerging lend themselves naturally to the presentation of New information as in Fossil records suggest that there emerged a fern resistant to this disease. However, existence or appearance should not always be taken in a literal sense, but rather in relation to the discourse: it is appearance on the scene of discourse, or cognitive awareness, that counts. Because of this, even a verb like disappear may, in an appropriate context, function as a presentative, as in the first sentence of the novel by H.P. Lovecraft, The Strange Case of Charles Dexter Ward:
From an asylum for the insane near Providence, Rhode Island, there recently disappeared an exceedingly singular person.
From this it becomes clear that the notions ‘bringing something into cognitive awareness’ or ‘onto the scene of discourse’ are the key to the discourse function of there- structures. In this sense we can also apply the traditional term ‘existential’: once introduced, the new referent is ‘present’ in the discourse, and can be taken up and developed as a topic.
