الخلاصة

'Grammatical shift' is an extremely interesting grammatical phenomenon that does require some knowledge of grammar as such knowledge provides some basic understanding about the operations involved in such shift. By means of this phenomenon it is possible to vary the ways of expressing the language. In English, the issue of ‘shift’ is problematic by itself as consistency in writing is considered important to preserve its clarity and smooth flow. Unnecessary shifts in pronouns, verb tenses, discourse and others are ungrammatical unless they are motivated by meaning and discourse. One of the main issues which syntax is concerned with is 'consistency' of sentence elements. 'Consistency is the key', this sentence and similar expressions have been used and emphasized by most linguists and teachers advising learners to keep consistent in whatever they write and to avoid unnecessary shifts in persons, tenses, voices, moods and discourse. It has been argued that consistency in writing is important to preserve clarity and smooth flow. These shifts occur whenever a speaker or writer shifts from one person to another, from one tense to another ...etc. without a discourse or semantic reason for doing so. (Harris and Kunka, 2011: 138-139; Kies, 1995. Online). The phenomenon of ‘grammatical shift’ in English, as it is intended in this study, has not been widely discussed and investigated. On the contrary, making shifts within writing has been avoided and attention has been paid for good and consistent writing. In this study, focus will be mainly made on three types of shift: person shift, tense shift and discourse shift which, as will be shown, has a direct effect on the various aspects of the first two types of shift.