Functional Discourse Grammar (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008) is, as the name suggests, a functional theory of grammar which also takes into consideration aspects of the discourse context in which utterances are used. It is functional in that it assumes that the structure of linguistic utterances is not arbitrary but motivated by the communicative function these utterances fulfil. It is discourse-oriented in that it acknowledges that the structure of utterances can be systematically influenced by the communicative context in which they occur. It is, in other words, assumed that the grammar of a language does not exist in a vacuum and can only be fruitfully studied as part of a wider theory of verbal interaction. Figure 1 illustrates how these assumptions are reflected in the overall organization of the model. In the middle we find the Grammatical Component (the Functional Discourse Grammar, or FDG, itself), which interacts with three other components: A Conceptual Component, a Contextual Component, and an Output Component. These other components are regarded as non-grammatical in that they do not provide (or contain) the grammatical means available in a language to code speaker intention and linguistic meaning. They are, however, linguistic, as far as they have an impact on linguistic form. Taking a top-down approach, every linguistic communication starts with some communicative intention and its corresponding mental representation at the prelinguistic conceptual level. These intentions, which are contained in the Conceptual Component, trigger the operation of Formulation in the Grammatical Component, which converts them into interpersonal (pragmatic) and representational (semantic) structures. Next, the operation of encoding translates these representations into morphosyntactic and phonological representations, which form the output of the Grammatical Component. This, in turn, forms the input to Output Component, which converts this information into acoustic, orthographic or signed form. This top-down organization of the grammar reflects the idea that “pragmatics governs semantics, pragmatics and semantics govern morphosyntax, and pragmatics, semantics, and morphosyntax govern phonology” (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008: 13; see also Section 2.3 below).