Zero cataphora of clause subject

In the narrative text, the information that constitutes the main line of the event by directly describing its progression belongs to the category of foreground information; the information that elaborates or modifies the primary narrative line without carrying it forward (e.g., the scene, the relevant factors of the event, etc.) is background information ¹ (see Hopper, 1979; Tomlin, 1985). Foreground information and background information not only represent the difference in textual function, but also correspond to a series of syntactico-semantic features. Hopper and Thompson’s (1980) study of transitivity correlates the information property of the clause with its syntactic features, maintaining that clauses expressing foreground information tend to exhibit a number of high-transitivity properties and those expressing background information show a series of low-transitivity properties. ²