Let us imagine that selection is chosen as the basis of analysis. Then in the first operation the given chain is analyzed into first-degree selection-units; the category that is obtained from all these units we call the ‘funcional category’. By this, then, is understood the category of the functives that are registered in a single analysis with a given function taken as the basis of analysis. Within such a functional category four kinds of functives may be imagined: 1. functives that can appear only as selected; 2. functives that can appear only has selecting; 3. functives that can appear both as selected and as selecting; 4. functives that can appear neither as selected nor as selecting ('i'. 'e'., functives that contract only solidarities and/or combinations, or that do not contract relation at all).
- Hjelmslev (1961), a pag.85-86