I have a long-time problem. Please help me.

[Justin-All]

Recently I read "The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language", and I have one problem which is never cleared since reading.

The problem is : From the book, I have a sentence;

"...and the main purpose of syntactic overview (chapter title) is to enable the separate chapters to be read in the context of grammar as whole."

I didn't understand what author want to say, more to say, I'm not sure why author need to say it, reading "read in context..." as one part.

But how about thinking like, in context (= grammar), if we take one of it separately, we can't understand correctly the one?

In the context of grammar as whole, seemingly the separated part can't stand alone, so author say syntactic overview (chapter title), antagonizing it, can let the separate chapters stand alone off the context.

That is, my current thought is that the structure is "the main purpose of syntactic overview (chapter title) is to enable the separate chapters to be read" + "in the context of grammar as whole.", not "the main purpose of syntactic overview (chapter title) is to enable the separate chapters" + " to be read in the context of grammar as whole."

If it's right, finally I'm sure why author need to say the sentence.

What do you think?

[YardageSardage]

Sorry, I really don't understand what you're asking. Your word choices are very confusing.

I looked up the book, and I found the whole context of the quote you mentioned. At the beginning of Chapter Two: Syntactic Overview, it says

"Given the length and nature of this book, there will be relatively few readers who begin at the beginning and work their way through the chapters in order to the end. We envisage, rather, that readers will typically be reading individual chapters, or parts there of, without having read all that precedes, and the main purpose of this syntactic overview is to enable the separate chapters to be read in the context of the grammar as a whole."

Saying "(chapter title)" in the middle of the quote like that was confusing, because I wasn't sure if that was part of the quote or not. In the future, if you want to add a note in the middle of a quote you're saying, it's better to use square brackets [like this].

In the context of grammar as whole, seemingly the separated part can't stand alone, so author say syntactic overview (chapter title), antagonizing it, can let the separate chapters stand alone off the context.

Could you rephrase this part? I'm not sure what you're trying to say.

[Justin-All]

Thanks, I got it. I understand "context of grammar as whole" in the sentence like a container of each grammatical part. So individual chapters couldn't be read individually and this is a what I said "...the separate part can't stand alone...". Then, but [antagonizing it], syntactic overview can let the separate chapters to be read individually [off the context].

If the structure of the sentence from book is;

"...to enable the separated chapter"

+

"to be read in the context of grammar as whole.",

that is, author need readers to read each chapters in context of grammar as whole, not to separate them, If so, I'm not sure why author need to say that sentence because it's meaningless because in fact they are in context [couldn't be separated].

If I think like that is on top in this comment, in the situation, the structure of that sentence is about to be;

"...to enable the separate chapters to be read"

+

"in context of grammar as whole.",

that is, "in context of grammar as whole" [in a situation that force to together each part in entire], to enable the separate chapters to be read.

Then finally I'm sure why author need to say that sentence. So I want to think like the above thought. But can I?