TYPES OF SUBORDINATE CLAUSES AND THEIR MODES OF EXPRESSION IN FRENCH AND UZBEK

Аннотация

This article provides a comparative typological analysis of subordinate clauses in French and Uzbek, examining their classification, syntactic and semantic roles, and modes of expression in each language. French, an Indo-European language, primarily uses subordinating conjunctions (e.g. que, si, parce que, bien que) and relative pronouns (e.g. qui, que) to introduce subordinate clauses, including complement clauses, relative clauses, and various adverbial clauses. Uzbek, a Turkic language, employs markedly different strategies: instead of a generalized complementizer like que, it relies on non-finite verb forms (participles, converbs, and nominalized verbs) and a set of subordinating elements (e.g. agar ‘if’, chunki ‘because’, garchi ‘although’) to convey subordinate relationships. The syntactic behavior and semantic functions of these structures are analyzed with illustrative examples. We discuss how certain French subordinators arose via grammaticalization of prepositional phrases, and how Uzbek connective strategies have been influenced by morphological processes and contact (e.g. Persian loans like agar, chunki. Cross-linguistic comparison reveals substantial differences that pose challenges for translation: for instance, a French clause introduced by que (“that”) may correspond to an Uzbek nominalized clause or participial phrase. By drawing on linguistic literature and examples, the article highlights how each language’s typological profile shapes its system of subordination and discusses implications for linguistic theory and translation practice.