6 Stanley E. Porter and Matthew Brook O’Donnell one set of features over another, and hence a systemic relationship among the elements of the system. As discourse markers, conjunctions perform a variety of discourse functions. These include the linking function previ- ously noted in discussion of conjunctions. This linking function occurs at a variety of levels of discourse, from the linking of words up to the linking of paragraphs. These levels of linkage are endemic to what con- stitutes discourse, and contribute in significant ways to its cohesion. That is, conjunctions are important words that create the textual tapestry that constitutes discourse. In the same way that conjunctions are used to unite a discourse, or at least to link smaller units into larger units, conjunctions are also used to indicate the boundaries of these units. These two functions indicate the continuity–discontinuity cline that is important to the con- junction system. Lastly, in terms of its discourse function, conjunctions indicate how the reader is to process the discourse. Whereas conjunctions are used to cohede and differentiate the segments of a discourse, they are also used to guide the reading process through indicating the nature and types of relationships between conjoined units. This suggests not only the continuity–discontinuity cline, but a cline of logico-semantic relations, such as comparison, conditionality, cause and purpose, among others. (2) The second observation is that conjunctions are procedural or functional words, and not content words11. Procedural or functional words are words such as prepositions, particles, articles, and conjunctions that are used in discourse to connect together and indicate the relations of the content words, such as nouns, verbs, and pronouns. In the semantic do- main dictionary12, conjunctions are placed in several different categories, illustrating some confusion over the procedural vs. content dimension of some of the conjunctions. For example, a select number of conjunc- tions–though along with a number of other words–are placed in semantic domain 91, discourse markers, while some other conjunctions–again along with a number of other words–are placed in semantic domain 89, relations. Besides the fact that it is unclear on what basis one would make such a distinction, it appears that this reflects an attempt to differentiate content for these procedural or functional words. This categorization also overlooks the systemic relations among them. As Black notes (Sentence Conjunctions, 43-70), there are a variety of ways that this 11 distinction has been made: content vs. function words, lexical vs. grammatical words, and truth-conditional vs. non-truth-conditional words. Here is not the place to debate the mer- its of the various proposals. However, we wish to focus upon categories that are concerned with formal and functional categories, rather than cognitive categories, so we do not ad- dress issues of truth-conditionality. J.P. Louw and E.A. Nida, Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament Based on 12 Semantic Domains (2 vols.; New York 1988).