M. Iriskulov, A. Kuldashev a course in Theoretical English Grammar Tashkent 2008

III. The cognitive aspects of the simple sentence.
Traditional grammar holds that a simple sentence normally consists of 3 key 
elements: a subject, a verb element(or predicate) and a complement (an object or 
an adverbial). This standard pattern can be illustrated in the following examples:
1. Susan resembles my sister. 
2. Susan is peeling a banana. 
3. Susan loves bananas. 
4. The hammer breaks the glass. 
5. Susan has a large library. 
6. Susan received the present. 
7. Susan swam the Channel. 
8. The garden is swarming with bees. 
9. There was a loud bang (R.Langacker’s examples). 

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Though all these examples contain the said elements, they are in fact rather 
divergent. The subjects refer to persons, things, places or they are empty (as 
“there”-subject in the last example). Persons, things and places are also eligible as 
complements. In one case (sent.1) the subject and the object can be exchanged, 
while this is not possible with the other sentences, and the transformation into 
passive sentences is also restricted.
Both traditional grammarians and modern linguistic schools have recognized 
these differences and have tried to cope with them by proposing different verb 
classes or case frames (Ch. Fillmore) or explaining some of them in terms of 
transformations of other patterns (N. Chomsky : e.g. “She swam the Channel.” –
derived from “She swam across the Channel.”).
In cognitive linguistics the semantic diversity of subjects and objects is 
viewed within the main cognitive principles: the prototypical principle of category 
structure, the principle of figure-ground segregation and “windowing of 
attention”.
According to the prototypical principle of category structure the categories 
are based on the principle of relative similarity but not absolute identity (like it was 
in traditional grammar). Any category has the list of properties typical for its 
members. The more properties a category member realizes the more prototypical 
(or typical for this category) it is and vice versa. Real members of categories are 
evaluated as possessing this or that degree of prototypicalness which depends on 
their closeness to the prototype. 
American linguists P. Hopper and S. Thompson suggested the notion of the 
prototypical transitive construction, associating the interpretation of the sentence 
with the idea of transitivity. The scientists suggested 10 semantic criteria, 
possession of which makes concrete syntactic construction (sentence) perfectly 
transitive, i.e. prototypical from the point of transitivity. The less characteristic 
features it realizes the less transitive and so the less prototypical it is. 
Taking into consideration these criteria we can judge that constructions 
(sentences), describing the event where the concrete subject (semantically 
characterized as agency) commits the concrete intentional action (semantically 
described as patience), resulting in modification of the object, including its creation 
or destruction, can be characterized as prototypical from the point of transitivity. 
So, we can see that within the cognitive approach the transitive syntactic 
constructions are believed to make up a prototypical category.