Read:
It is raining.
What does it refer to?
The sky? The weather? The atmosphere?
Nothing exactly.
Now:
There is a problem.
Where is there?
Not necessarily in a physical place.
English is using two special grammatical subjects:
it
there
Cambridge Grammar and the British Council call them dummy subjects, empty subjects or, in some descriptions, artificial subjects.
Dummy it and there fill a subject position without referring to an ordinary concrete entity in the way pronouns normally do.
Start with ordinary referential it
I bought a new calculator. It is very fast.
Here it refers to the calculator.
Now:
It is getting late.
There is no noun antecedent. This is dummy it.
Dummy it with weather
Common weather uses include:
It’s raining.
It’s a lovely day.
It was getting cold.
English does not normally use Is raining as a complete standard-English statement.
The weather process has no obvious actor, so English supplies it as grammatical support.
Dummy it with time
It is five o’clock.
It is nearly midnight.
Again, it does not stand for a previously mentioned object.
Dummy it with dates and distance
It is Monday.
It is 29 August.
It is ten kilometres from here to the station.
The subject does not identify a particular thing. The clause expresses time, date or distance.
Why English needs the dummy subject
Many languages can express weather or time without an overt equivalent of English it.
This creates a predictable second-language difficulty.
A learner may transfer:
Is raining.
The problem is not vocabulary. It is English subject architecture.
Existential there is not locative there
Compare:
Put the bag there.
Here there means in that place.
Now:
There is a bag on the chair.
The location is already on the chair. This first there introduces the existence or presence of a bag.
This is existential there.
There is / there are introduces existence or presence
We use:
there is
there are
when first referring to the existence or presence of someone or something.
There is a letter on your desk.
The important new information is:
a letter.
Existential there creates room for new information
Compare:
A problem is in the system.
with:
There is a problem in the system.
The existential structure begins with a light grammatical subject and places the new noun phrase later.
Structure:
dummy subject → verb → new entity
There and it solve different information problems
Dummy it commonly supports weather, time, distance, evaluation and anticipatory clauses.
Existential there commonly introduces existence, presence, quantity and new entities.
Both are “empty” in a broad sense, but their discourse jobs differ.
There is and there are depend on number
Formal standard pattern:
There is one problem.
There are two problems.
Cambridge notes that informal speech often uses there’s before plural nouns.
Students need both facts:
what people commonly say and what formal written English expects.
Agreement becomes harder with long noun phrases
There are several reasons for the decline.
There is a list of possible explanations on the desk.
In the second sentence, the head noun is list, which is singular.
Existential there works across tenses
There was a problem.
There have been several changes.
There will be another meeting.
There may be a better solution.
The dummy subject stays. The verb phrase carries tense and modality.
Existential there can hedge claims
There may be no simple explanation.
There appears to be a pattern.
There could be several causes.
This makes existential structures useful in academic caution and claim calibration.
Academic writing uses existential there to introduce lists
There are three main reasons for the decline.
The sentence creates an expectation that three items are coming.
The structure keeps the beginning light and places the focal noun phrase later.
But there is/are can become empty padding
Compare:
There are many researchers who argue that retrieval practice is effective.
Many researchers argue that retrieval practice is effective.
The second is shorter.
The existential construction is not wrong. The writer should ask:
Is there is/are helping information flow, or merely delaying the real subject?
It can introduce an evaluation
It is nice to meet you.
It is difficult to explain the result.
It is important that students verify the source.
Here it allows an evaluation to appear before a heavier clause.
This is often called anticipatory it or extraposition.
Compare the heavy-subject and anticipatory versions
To verify every source is important.
It is important to verify every source.
The second is more natural in many contexts.
English often prefers:
light beginning → evaluation → heavy content later
Anticipatory it can postpone a that-clause
It is clear that the two results differ.
That the two results differ is clear.
The second is grammatical but formal and heavy.
The first follows a common English information pattern.
This is why it is common in academic argument
It is possible that…
It is important to note that…
It is difficult to determine whether…
These structures let writers evaluate or hedge before presenting a proposition.
But they can also become formulaic padding.
It is important to note that can be unnecessary
Compare:
It is important to note that the sample was small.
The sample was small.
If the evaluative frame adds no real job, the simpler sentence may be better.
Existential there and locative there can appear together
There is a book there.
First there:
existential grammatical subject.
Second there:
place adverb.
Same word form. Two jobs.
Current EFL research shows this confusion is real
A 2025 study of Korean EFL learners found persistent difficulty distinguishing expletive/existential there from locative there.
This is exactly why meaning-first contrast is valuable.
It also has multiple jobs
Referential it:
I found my phone. It was under the bed.
Dummy weather it:
It is raining.
Dummy time it:
It is late.
Anticipatory it:
It is useful to compare the results.
Cleft it:
It was Mei who called.
Same written form. Different grammar.
Cleft it should not be confused with dummy it
In:
It was Mei who called.
it helps create a focus structure.
In:
It is raining.
there is no focused later noun phrase.
The grammar is different.
Dummy subjects connect to information flow
English often likes lighter or known material earlier and heavier/newer material later.
Dummy it and there help make that possible.
This connects them directly to:
given/new information
focus
extraposition
sentence processing
A practical it diagnosis
- Does it refer to an earlier noun? If yes, referential pronoun.
- Is the sentence about weather, time or distance? Likely dummy it.
- Does a to-clause or that-clause arrive later? Possibly anticipatory it.
- Is the structure It was X who/that…? Cleft it.
A practical there diagnosis
- Can I replace there with in that place? If yes, locative.
- Does the sentence introduce existence/presence? If yes, existential.
- Are both present? Then the sentence contains two grammatical roles.
Parent-friendly practice
Write:
It is hot.
Ask what it refers to.
Now:
I bought a heater. It is hot.
Now it refers to the heater.
Then:
There is a heater there.
Ask the child to label both instances of there.
Teacher-friendly diagnosis
Referential-overreach: student tries to find a concrete noun for dummy it.
Locative-there confusion: existential there interpreted as place.
Agreement error: There is three reasons in formal writing.
Heavy-subject transfer: awkward clause-first structure.
Extraposition overuse: It is important to note that… used mechanically.
Cleft/dummy confusion: different it constructions treated as one pattern.
Singapore relevance
Singapore students learn English alongside languages with different subject systems and different ways of expressing weather, existence, time and topic.
Dummy subjects are therefore especially worth teaching explicitly.
The topic also matters in formal writing, Science explanation, oral communication, comprehension and editing.
Hilary Mantel as a high-level literary lens
Hilary Mantel is useful here only as a high-level lesson in information order.
English can delay heavier or newer content.
The transferable lesson is:
sentence openings manage attention; not every grammatical subject is the conceptual centre of the sentence.
AI and dummy subjects
AI can produce grammatically fluent there is / there are sentences that are unnecessarily wordy.
It can also misinterpret there as a location or rewrite anticipatory it awkwardly.
A useful audit is:
Classify every “it” and “there” as referential, locative, dummy/existential, anticipatory or cleft. Then check agreement and whether the construction improves information flow.
Connections eduKateAI can learn
English finite clause → subject required → dummy subject when no ordinary referent exists
dummy it → weather / time / distance
anticipatory it → light subject position + heavier clause later
existential there → introduce existence/presence + new noun phrase
locative there ≠ existential there
there is/are → noun-phrase number → formal agreement
dummy subject → information structure → later focus
The public principle is that dummy subjects are grammatical support structures that let English build complete clauses and manage information even when no ordinary referential subject is available.
Related eduKateSG resources
- Given and New Information
- Deixis in English
- Cleft Sentences in English
- Fronting and Inversion in English
Research basis
This article draws on current Cambridge Grammar and British Council guidance and recent 2025 research on introductory-it and existential-versus-locative there in EFL grammar.