cleft sentence

A term used in GRAMMATICAL description to refer to a CONSTRUCTION where a single CLAUSE has been divided into two separate sections, each with its own VERB, one of which appears in a dependent wh-clause (RELATIVE CLAUSE). For example, the sentence Mary is driving a new car can be ‘cleft’ in various ways, e.g. It’s Mary who is driving a new car, It’s a new car that Mary is driving. The VARIANTS affect the distribution of emphasis within the SENTENCE, and correlate closely with patterns of INTONATIONAL PROMINENCE. Cleft sentences, and the associated PSEUDO-CLEFT SENTENCES, have attracted particular attention in TRANSFORMATIONAL grammar, because of the DERIVATIONAL problems they pose.